Must say over the last few months that I've missed the info here. Decided to go the purely positive, ignore the negative, reinforcement the positive behaviour route of training with my dog. Discovered that for alot of things, it works very well and she learned very fast and I still use it. I really liked working with shaping and the clicker.

On the other hand for some things it didn't work. Her on leash aggression..nope, her snarling and having hissy fits when seeing other dogs in the car..nope. It's hard to ignore a barking, snarling dog in the back seat of your car!! In training class if she decided the dirt on the arena floor was more exciting, no amount of treats and/or me trying to be more exciting had much effect.

In training, my trainer suggested a prong, so after coming back here and doing a little refresher reading, I though ok. Give it a try. Needless to say it works, I think the first few corrections where a bit of a surprise for a dog who didn't get any physical corrections for quite a while. So because of her totally ignoring me off leash-beginner agility-trainer thought maybe try an e-collar. So back here I came did some more reading, checked out the e-collars and some of the posts. I ordered the dvd and have already watched it. I should have the collar next week.

Now I've been using the prong and following Ed's advice for wearing the collars..awesome, she's much calmer now when she doesn't expect to immediately be going out. Also I've been using NO with a correction, after giving her a chance to think about my command. Then when she does it lots of praise and a goodie. OMG today took her into the small town, lots of dogs around. She was starting to get huffy in the car, told her quiet, gave her a second, then NO..no major barking snarling outburst. A little excited but a major improvement. Same with the dogs on the street. Had a little hissy over a Great Pyrenees but his people had little control over him and they were coming right at us.

I really enjoyed Ed's e-collar dvd and plan on watching it again and using his methods when I get my collar. This is one of the very few sites where an e-collar or prong isn't looked upon as a torture device!!

Prong collars & E-collars are trianing 'tools' as are treats & markers in training. They can be an asset to training in the right hands or a dogs's worse nightmare in the wrong hands. Use them all wisely.

I tried the "all positive" route a few years ago (hey, I live in VT ) and discovered that in the process I was failing my dogs. While I was trying this, I had a chance to experience just what it was like to handle powerful, willful dogs that had no consequences for obnoxious behavior other than a lack of reward. The experiment didn't last very long. Not only did it most definitely NOT work, but ultimately could have wound up creating a dangerous situation.

I sincerely feel that the folks who don't believe in consequences (I've read about the theory of this idea in SO many books...)have never handled a dog that wasn't on the soft side. I really gave it every chance I could, but within just a couple of months it was very clear that this system was failing miserably. I don't really believe that my dogs were enjoying being hyper and completely out of control either.

I think learning needs to be positive and fun and that a LOT can be accomplished behaviorally that way too. I think the overuse of corrections can do a lot of damage to a dog's confidence and relationship with his handler. BUT well-timed corrections and fair, firm discipline in addition to a positive learning experience creates a nice balance.

Reading these posts made me think of a movie my wife and I watched a couple of weeks ago. "Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation" One of the young grandchildren in the movie was a real terror, being raised by parents who didn't believe in saying "no". It was funny.

I know more than a few 'real life' versions of these folks.

They call lying "expressing imaginative tendencies" and acting like an out and out brat "crying out for autonomy". It's a little bit scary in real time, especially when you think about where these kids' lives are likely to be headed when they are older. These parents don't seem to get that they aren't showing their kids any kindness by not setting any limits.

Working with the dogs in an all-positive way SO reminded me of these folks!

Thanks for the 'positive' feedback. She's very quickly learning what NO means!!

Yay! keep us posted

100% positive obviously didn't work for another dog trainer who lives in my city. One of her dogs attacked her husband when he disturbed the dog while it was sleeping on the couch. The dog grabbed his throat and put him in the Emergency room for a week.

I hope more 100% positive trainers can learn from this situation, This ladies career is now gone, and her husband almost died as a result of her ignoring the fact that dogs need a leader more than a clicker+treats.

I have found that a healthy combination of the two is what works best for me and my dogs.

I'm learning that for sure. Sometimes it takes a bit of experimenting.