Vince

You took the words out of my mouth. It does seem like it is always the guys who do not praise enough. I, like you apparently, look like an idiot out there praising constantly!

Mike 1

Gifted trainers do not break weak dogs!!!!

A little off the subject but I feel what separates an experience trainer from a beginner is how he reads his dog and adapts his training accordingly. A beginner will find a dog that fits him. Example is if he is very calm and laid back he finds a high drive dog which will compliment for his lack of enthusiasm. The opposite is true for the master trainer. Rather than fitting a dog for his personality he changes his personality to fit his dogs.

I beg to differ. Really here in America alot of people will train and change ther style of training from day to day. THis method is more popular then this, or so and so does this so let's do this. Yes you must vary a little, but the way most of these guys train that are at the top, they prety much stick to the same way. With that said, people here will change this and that, and never get anywhere really, when in fact the dog is weak. I really believe that this man is gifted, he has been in the BSP a number of times and has done well, and in the world cup and trained dogs to 299 a few times in SCH 3, but if the dog is weak, it really has no place in the sport unless someone is just having fun and does not care about the sport, just having fun with thier dog, but the dog if it cannot withstand the training then, he will break the dog, and that is it. THe dog is washed out. Next dog. I beleive that this is realistic instead of trying to mask things that the dog cannot do, and believe me there are not many people as talented in dog training in this country as this man is. I believe I have said this before, but in the real dog world, there is what some would call abuse of the animals, it it goes on all the time, and this shit that a good trainier will not break a dog, that is just bullshit, top trainiers push there dogs to the limit, to get the points, not all but most do. Anyone who does not believe this is not living in the real dog world. If not so there would be a hell of a lot less dogs that have done well in the BSP and World CUp then there has been, and in the Nationals in this country too. This is why, we have so many shit Police dogs in this country, unrealistic views.

Mike:

I have a feeling that you misunderstood my post. What I said is the experienced trainer adapts his training to fit the dog not vise versa. NO dog is perfect. It is the handler’s job to assess his dog and work on his weaknesses. I would be very surprised if you disagreed with that statement.

To Vince:
I agree with that statement. YOu are correct with that, and reading back I am getting a little off the subject.

 Quote:

Originally posted by Mike1:
and this shit that a good trainier will not break a dog, that is just bullshit, top trainiers push there dogs to the limit, to get the points, not all but most do. Anyone who does not believe this is not living in the real dog world.

Mike,

Determining that a dog is not suited for PPD, sport, or police service does not involve breaking a dog. Your comments are ridiculous. "Breaking" connotes something very different than assessing or pushing a dog to his limit. I would say that ALL good trainers push their dogs to the limit, but breaking dogs is anathema to all dog training. What's the point? Once you know that the dog can't make it, why break it down further. It is possible that this is a problem of semantics, so maybe you should explain what you mean by breaking.

Let me explain. what I have seen and in tracking it is common with forced tracking that a dog is pushed until it shuts down, will not go on further and is forced to go on. At the point where the dog shuts down, most people would call this dog broken in tracking. One of two things is normally done. You go back and use food/ball to try and build him her up, or they push this dog until it works again. This is not normally a good thing. I have seen this. These dogs forever never forget what has happened to them. They almost work like they are a little nervous the ones that can withstand this stress. Many cannot and are sold, etc. There are few dogs that are not forced to the line of abuse in the top of Schutzhund in the past and present that most people would never do. Maybe I should have been clearer in what I meant by a dog being broken but for all purposes the dog is broke. Now what many believe and they have done well with this is that the dog is reliable to them. For the most part the dog will never diobey, but starts to look sloopy after time because the dog is broke, and performing realy out of fear. This is also not uncommon in the retrieve with some.
With that said, most people would never push a dog to the point that some would for the 100 points.
I agree that it is not nessery to do this to see if a dog can do the work , but complusin is used to make a dog reliable and the level depends on the dog, and the handler. Strict complusion is a common way to train in Germany, and I will say that the way some poeple train does weed out some of the wealer dogs, but I guess that it another topic. But I stand behind this that there are not many dogs that are top dogs that have not had strict complusion training done to them.

Mike,

Thanks for the explanation. What you describe is precisely why compulsion needs to be balanced with praise and rewards.

I agree with you as many cannot train this way, and there should be a balance.

Many people are in Schutzhund for many different reasons. On the left side is the dog owner who wants to spend more time with his pet and decides this is a good way to bond. He or she more times than not wastes everyones time and moves from club to club determined that it is the training directors fault that fito runs off the field as soon as he says fuss. Then on the other the right is the handler thats only goal is to win the Nationals or so. He sees the dog as a tool which he will do anything it takes to win. I will not mention names but I have seen someone who won the World many years ago tie a dog out to a pole and whip a dog brutaly until he bit the sleeve. He took a calculated risk. He saw something in this dog that he felt he could bring out. If it did not work he would have sold it and started again. This time it worked. The dog went on to SCH 111 with a high in protection (Died in a car crash soon after). Was it cruel? Yes. Was the dog ever the same? No. It has a look in its eye that was very creepy. But fact is that it took 5 minutes to do what could have taken 5 months to do with motivation. Me personaly I am in the middle. I will have NO part in that but as Mike says it is a FACT. The question is how far are you willing to go for that extra point?????