Most Popular Q&As

My 1 1/2 year old Golden suffered from bad GI issues as a pup. Ended up having surgery at nine months: vet called from OR and said it's mesenteric torsion. Basically asking if I wanted to stop the surgery and put the pup down. I decided to finish the surgery and see what happened. Vet removed an estimated 30% of the small intestine. Miraculously the dog recovered and is thriving with no apparent side affects, except the dog has terrible intermittent gas. I had him on Pro Plan salmon and o...

Hello Cindy, My name is Mark, I have a wife and two girls (9 and 14) and I want to purchase another German Shepherd towards the end of 2013. My last Shepherd was killed some 12 years ago and it was hard to recover from that but it is now time to get a son back in my life. My last Shepherd had some basic command obedience schooling but now I want more training and protection skills for my future boy now that I have a new wife and step children. I want them to understand the rules and role o...

I am training a Redbone Coonhound. While working on obedience, he is responsive to the "here" command but is easily distracted by other dogs. Using an ecollar gets his attention and he will come most of the time. Lately, and quite often, he gets confused with the ticks from the e-collar when he hears the "here" command and gets a correction. This repeats several times. He sits and stays, I call "here" and he stays. I have to bend down and say okay go or praise him. I have probably been too co...

Cindy, We have a litter of 14 black and tan bloodhounds that were supplemented with Ed's amazing formula. They look fantastic at 3 weeks old. All sizes of pups are consistent, coats shiny like minks, and puppies are very healthy and content. We ordered Ed's DVD Whelping Puppies and educated ourselves on his excellent level of expert knowledge on newborns. We did not lose one pup. We are extremely grateful for Ed taking his time to put a DVD together with so much amazing information. ...

Good Morning, We are raw feeding our 5 month GSD. He absolutely hates sardines. We have tried food processing, blending, whole frozen raw, chopped raw, and mixing them with all sorts of foods. No results. Any suggestion would be appreciated. Thanks. Ron

Cindy, I bought your Nosework DVD and I trained my dog. He did well in the first session, but the second session, he started using his eyes to search in the drawer spots. For example, when I put the food in spot 3 after several times in spot 1 and 2, he just immediately went to three using his eyes and not his nose, then after that he lost interest. What should I do?

Hi, I have a question that I hope you can guide me to the correct source... I have a question about training my new GSP puppy (4.5 months old) from getting kicked by my gelding. My goal is to go riding with the dog on trail. Do you have a reliable source as to how to properly approach this topic? My horse isn't a kicker--and my pup does respect him (the horse). But, all my work thus so far has been done on leash (introductions, etc.). I'm thinking about purchasing a Dogtra ecollar (...

Hi guys, I have purchased several of your great videos and they have been awesome. However, I am getting hung up in one area. I am teaching my new puppy to go in the kennel by throwing a treat inside and giving a "kennel" command. Now I'm trying to transition to giving the command and then rewarding the behavior with a marker/treat. Sounds simple... but now the dog won't go inside first and keeps staring at the treat. Where did I go wrong here? Thanks in advance!

Hi Cindy, I've been somewhat disappointed by the relatively narrow perspective being presented about the use of Rimadyl in the Newsletter. While I don't doubt that there will always be a downside to the use of any prescription medication, there are also upsides as well. For example, I presently have a 10 year old Border Collie that LOVES to train, compete, etc. and has since day one. Unfortunately, after a long career in dog agility, she's arthritic. Should she "be put out to pasture" and ...

I take in and rehab strays. I do a lot of trick training using clickers. However, I have a Blue Heeler who screams and tries to push himself under the bed or cram himself into the corner of a closet when he hears the click. Someone suggested using a retractable pen, but the timing with it is unreliable. The Heeler was not scared of its sound, though, so I am hoping a quieter clicker would do. I saw two in the Leerburg catalog that advertised as being having softer clicks. They were the i-Clic...

I am sending you this email from outside of my house. I'm so upset I can't go in right now. I have a 1 year old dog that is house trained and a week ago a friend moved in my brand new home with her dog. Her dog is not house trained and it seems the owner has no desire to train her dog. I am trying the crate training now but her dog and my dog cry all day and night wanting to get to each other. I am afraid my dog is going to start "marking" his territory again before I get her's house trained....

Can a dog be reconditioned to enjoy working through marker training if its previous owner used compulsion training? I have an adopted dog who I believe was trained using compulsion and is very timid or cautious when training, I can tell she is afraid to make a mistake. I adopted her at about 1 year old, she looked pretty neglected, but is smart as a whip. Thanks, Sharon

Cindy Thanks for your previous help. Here is my question. I switched to RAW 2 weeks ago and am having no problems at this time. The question is about the chicken I am feeding. I have 2 local sources, one sells leg quarters for .59 per pound. They appear to be fresh, young chicken quarters, not frozen, with no back or other parts attached. The second source sells them frozen for .39 per pound. These are larger with pieces of back and often small bits of liver attached. They are probably ...

Dear Mam and Sir, My Dog and Cat were raised together with no problems. I adopted a desperate stray with monumental pray instinct. Today they got after my cat in a bad way. Jim, who grew up with the cat, was just as involved as our new dog. Jim and the cat are four years old. I suspect the new arrival is one year old. I need a direction in correcting, not only the new dogs behavior, but the change in Jim's behavior. Thank you in advance if you have time to offer me any direction in this...

Dear Cindy, I was recently bitten by my 3yr old intact male Doberman. It was very unexpected, he was laying on the floor & I sat by him to touch his back leg (I noticed stiffness) he lunged forward, attacked; he bit me in multiple places and only stopped when pulled away by another person, luckily I didn't need stitches. I know dogs can lash out when in pain, maybe this is a naive assumption , I thought in those instances it would be one time bite and release situation (he seemed to be in a b...

Hi Cindy, I have a 9-month-old GSD and I cannot get him to stop eating rocks. I have bought a muzzle from you and I was wondering if you have a plastic muzzle that I can feed food rewards through to him?

Hi Cindy. I hope this question makes sense. I am looking for a little guidance on how to use what I've learned in Michael Ellis's e-collar course. I think I understand his process of introducing it: verbal command, followed by stim+leash pressure, escape upon compliance. However, I haven't really used leash pressure to teach any of the behaviors ME suggests using leash+e-collar for: foot targets, down, back. We taught those with luring and shaping only. I do use a prong and leash pressure for...

Hello. I have an intact male 18-month-old Golden Retriever. For a few months, I would take him on a long walk on a jogging trail using a 20 ft long line so he could run around and sniff and mark. NOW, I don't allow him on a 20ft line instead I only use a 6 ft line and I take him on "structured" walks and not free roaming walks. He marks inside a store if there were previous dog smells like a pet store. But he does not mark if I take him to dept stores or hobby stores where there are no dog sm...

Hi there. My 14-week-old pitbull puppy is terrified of going for walks. She is super rambunctious inside, wanting to play and bark and run around with the other dogs, but once we try to go outside she slams on the brakes and tries to go back inside. We tried luring her with treats to help her move forward but she is just fixated on getting back in. How can I help her get used to being outside for play and walks?

I have done a lot of AI's using your video and have been successful, I'm thinking of having semen flown in from another state but am having trouble finding a vet that can thaw and AI. Do you have a video that instructs how to thaw the semen? I'm happy to AI, I know my dogs heat cycle and don't need all the tests, just knowledge of how to thaw correctly so I don't damage the sperm.