I took my dog to a Schutzhund club and the trainer corrected my dog. He is now afraid of this person and will not perform at trials. What can I do?

Hi, Mr. Ed,



First of all thank you for your reply and second CONGRATULATIONS about your web site we really need more people with the knowledge you posses in this field.



Before I proceed I find it appropriate to introduce myself and believe it's a good and polite way to give you a picture with whom you communicating. As you already know my name is Angela I'm greek grew up in Germany moved back with my parents to Greece when I was 17 after 2 years met my husband who was living in New York and came to Greece as well,we got married had 3 kids and we decided to come to Australia-Melbourne.



I always wanted to have a Doberman was never allowed as my parents thought a dog can't live in a apartment,when I saw that here in Australia all the houses have gardens etc. I said "now i will get a Doberman," because of not knowing much about dogs I started reading books to learn as much as I could about them before I buy one. I accidentally came across a guy who's bitch had a litter of 17 and he gave me one pup,I started the old fashion obedience training, enrolled in a Doberman Club and after 2 years my dog was no where near obedient and gave up training blaming my dog eg. it was not in his genes. However he was loved and as a pet he was ok. He died at the age of 14. Before I made a step to purchase a second Dobe I wanted to investigate further to find more out about the breeders and then about the pedigree of the future pup and came across VON FORELL. I was told that he has the best dogs etc. So I got my pup Sire: BLITZKRIEGER BARON DAM: VONFORELL FARO, it took me 14 months to get the pedigree papers (that's another long story). I enrolled in the schutzhund club called southern cross K-9 and my trainer, president and judge is John Mcdonald, we started with the prong collar to train the dog learned quick and he was doing ok. Now and then the trainer was handling him to teach and to show me what I was doing wrong this made my dog scared of John (trainer) because when he was correcting him the dog could feel the correction when it was my turn to correct the dog couldn't feel a thing, for the dog to come to me after a recall with John nearby he was making a detour to come to me just to avoid John. This was a problem when I competed for BH we failed, because John was on that trial the judge and at the long down the dog got up and sat next to me so I failed of course. So we changed to the e-collar to fix the down problem (still its a problem) the worst part is whilst at the down position he cries non stop e-collar or no e-collar many times other members yell at him"SHUT UP!"at the next trial I was sure that we do alright the judge came from the U.S.A. in the meantime the dog was showing big improvements (so I thought at the time) and the result was that he behaved like a dog that never had training done, he didn't even know what "SIT" meant. I was told he got away the first time, he did it again and it was the same ground and he remembered that he got away unpunished. I gave myself and the dog a break from training and did a lot of thinking instead and reading at your web site I came to the conclusion that he became collar wise (collar on! no problems, collar off! who cares) and that I posses only 50% the title of the Alpha dog.To finish off, I think I need to start from scratch again and here I need your assistance please. Which DVD should I buy first and from where to start and finish? I leave it up to your advice. Just to remind you of the problems which are: not heeling correctly, not focusing, crying at down (leaking), collar wise.



But it's not all that bad, he has a strong drive and loves bite work. (I'm always optimistic). Thank you for your time and hope to hear soon from you!



Regards,
Angela