New Video: Understanding the Character Traits of Your Detection Dog
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New Video
Understanding the Character Traits of Your Detection Dog

New Video: Understanding the Character Traits of Your Detection Dog

In this video, Kevin Sheldahl talks about makes a great detection dog. Kevn breaks down the critical differences between trainability, prey drive, play drive, and pack drive. He also explains how each one can either support or complicate your training. You’ll learn why highly trainable dogs can still struggle with independence, how to correctly identify true prey drive, and why understanding your dog’s natural tendencies is the key to building a reliable search and indication dog.

If you’re serious about scent work or detection training, this video will help you shift your mindset from “training problems” to “training challenges”. It'll show you how to tailor your approach to the dog in front of you. Watch the full video to start seeing your dog’s strengths in a whole new way.

Interested in learning more? Enroll in Kevin Sheldahl's newly released course, Foundations of Scent Work.

Learn more about Foundations of Scent Work Training Course
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Today's Q&A from the Archives

Is teaching a dog their name the same as charging the mark?

This might have been obvious to some, but I missed it watching the "8 Week" stream. The way to teach a dog their name and "charging the mark" seems to be the exact same process.

If they differ, how do they differ? Should you do one before the other? Can it be done around the same time? Do they get combined at some point?

Hopefully, you can provide a little clarity.

Today's Q&A

Cindy's Answer:

They are the same in that it's basically just building value for a word (the name and a marker).

I play the name game from the moment I get the puppy and have a name picked out, I may or may not charge the mark right away. I may wait a week or more, depending on the puppy. You can do them around the same time but since your marker is used as the predictor of a reward event in later training I separate the two and usually from the beginning make sure that the puppy knows when we are training and when we are done using our markers of Ready, Yes, No and All Done. You don't necessarily want your puppy explosively running to you just because you mention his or her name. (Of course, that depends on your training goals.)

The goal is for the puppy to recognize their name and using food to reinforce that at first is the easiest way. I hope this makes sense.

Cindy's Answer
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