First of all I'd like to say hello, i'm new to this board and pretty glad I stumbled on this community when searching for protection dog training videos -- looks like theres tons of dog training knowledge here and I would appreciate any advice or help what so ever! Hopefully i'll learn a few things and will be able to contribute myself later.

My GSD pup just turned 6 months today, and due to other circumstances in my life I'm going to be able to be spending a lot more time with him and I'd like to get him trained for protection.
I'd like him to be able to due the following on command.
-Bark
-Growl
-Show Teeth
-Attack
-And generally walk close to my hip without a leash.
Also have him trained to a muzzle

Here's a little background on him.
Hes MY first dog.
I've moved into a new apartment for school but my parents live in town so he sort of has 2 homes.
He visits a dog park daily and gets along with other dogs great, usually playing with dogs much older than him (and still taking them down by the neck, so I see a 'drive' in him)
I take him to a lake on weekends and he loves swimming.
He's housebroken and knows how to sit.
I'm in the process of teaching him the "Here" command.
I'm a little concerned about how attached he is to me.
He follows me everywhere, ALWAYS. And he barks and whines when I leave, at the apartment he wont stop barking unless someone else is home. (Really trying to fix this problem)
At my parents house that I think hes more familiar to, he stops barking after about 5 minutes.
I'd like to get a crate and teach him thats his place but he just won't stop barking while in it unless i'm in his sight.
But if he's not crate trained it wouldn't be that big of a problem for me.
He gets REALLY excited when anyone comes home.
In general hes a great dog, hasn't chewed anything up, is very playful, gets along with other dogs, and different groups of people great.

So my question is what assortment of videos and in which order would be recommended? (He is 6 months now)

# Bite Training for Puppies
# Building Drive & Focus with Bernard Flinks
# How to Raise a Working Puppy
# The First Steps of Bite Training
# The First Steps of Defense
# Training Personal Protection Dogs

Im on a a bit of a budget so if a certain video is more important and covers more information i'd rather get it.

More random questions:
What food would you recommend for a PPD, and where to order it?
Are there any toys/equipment that are a must-have for this type of training, if so where to purchase them.
Would you guys recommend this type of muzzle?
http://www.fordogtrainers.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=105

Once again, any help what-so-ever would be appreciated, I realize this was a pretty long post, I promise the next ones won't be as long!
ps. If there is another forum this would fit under better feel free to let me know!


Thanks!

The experts can address the PPD questions but one thing really pops out at me in your post.

Dog parks are a REALLY bad idea. Ed addresses this on the web site. Allowing your pup to "take down" older dogs by the neck seems like an EXTREMELY bad idea, IMO. If he tries that with the wrong dog your pup may be seriously injured. One bad incident with another dog can cause life-long problems and it's not worth the risk. Again, JMO.

Here's the link about dog parks:

http://www.leerburg.com/pdf/dogparks.pdf


Edited by (09/23/2007 09:21 PM)
Edit reason: adding link

Wow,

Thanks for that link, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. There are some terrible stories in that article.
I started going to the park a couple weeks ago but will now definitely look for other methods to wear my pup out!

Thanks again.

Here are a few other links that might help you with training:

Orbee ball-on-a-string:
http://www.leerburg.com/788.htm

Puppy tug:
http://leerburg.com/puppytug.htm

This is an easy way to teach your pup to focus and "Watch":
http://www.leespets.com/TheEyeContactGame.html

Building Drive and Focus is a fantastic DVD.

Since your pup is 6 mos, I'd start with
1- Building Drive and Focus - this is the one you probably need right now and should use for a few months.

Then graduate to:
2- Preparing your dog for the Helper http://leerburg.com/310.htm

Then followed by:
3- First Steps of Bite Training http://www.leerburg.com/101-b.htm

Then:
4- First Steps of Defense http://leerburg.com/101-d.htm
In the description of this DVD, Ed says "There is a section describing exactly where a dog must be in his bite
development before he can be started in defensive training."

You don't need all these at once, but you might want to get them anyway for education on personal protection dog training.

I do want to suggest one other important DVD that you didn't mention: Basic Dog Obedience http://www.leerburg.com/302.htm . I would get that one along with #1 above at the same time.

Food: I recommend raw food, as many do on this forum. Articles you can read about it: http://leerburg.com/feedingarawdiet.htm and http://www.leerburg.com/diet.htm

As far as necessary equipment, all you need can be purchased here on this website (Leerburg). Go to http://www.leerburg.com/equip.htm and check out the Tugs, Collars, etc. Here's the specific site for bite training equipment: http://www.leerburg.com/bitetrainequip.htm . Although you won't be needing all of these of course, since I imagine you'll be getting a trainer specializing in Protection Training in the near future and he/she will have the necessary advanced equipment such as bite suits, etc.

What I love about Ed Frawley's site (Leerburg) is that he explains the use of each of his equipment, when to use it and for what. Just click on each individual tug, for example, and a full explanation is there.

As far as a muzzle is concerned, why do you want a muzzle? From the way you described your dog, he doesn't need one. If you have the impression that a Personal Protection Dog (PPD) needs a muzzle, that's not true, not if the dog is well-trained and only attacks on your command.

Since your pup is only 6 months old, take it slow, build its drive, train obedience without tons of corrections, keep him progressing forward in those areas and you'll have a good foundation for future bite training.

I would also like to advise against dog parks.

You may have absolute control over your dogs but that has nothing to do with most of the clueless folks that attend them.

In the past yr or two we had a Dane kill a Golden in a dog park not to far from me. It happened in a matter of seconds.

There are a lot of great videos here at LB. All worth viewing but I also believe PPD training requires a very high level trainer and many PPD trainers are nothing more the beat em till they bite folks.

That can make your dog scary looking yet dangerous to all around it including you and your family.

What many people see as a protective dog is more often then not fear biters. Their aggression can be triggered with all the wrong reasons.

So how did this thread from 2007 end up in the Active Topics list? I noticed it did even before Bob posted to it.

Kind of a blast from the past considering LB still was using the Flinks DVDs then.

 Quote: Cathy Goessman

So how did this thread from 2007 end up in the Active Topics list? I noticed it did even before Bob posted to it.

Kind of a blast from the past considering LB still was using the Flinks DVDs then.

I thought that too, but assumed I was half asleep as usual

 Quote: Cathy Goessman

So how did this thread from 2007 end up in the Active Topics list? I noticed it did even before Bob posted to it.

Kind of a blast from the past considering LB still was using the Flinks DVDs then.

SO glad I read the Whole Thread before posting, LOL -- Wonder how "MK" ended up with training his GSD puppy ???

Who me?