Hi,

Bart Bellon is known for his "NEPOPO" system which from what I understood is essentially escape training with a reward on the end.

And I know Ed considers ET old school and obsolete method with only purpose to get commercial trainers more money. But why would Bart, such a well known trainer use a variation of it?

I don't use ET, this is just a curiosity question. I know Ed has been on many seminars and probably on Bart's as well so perhaps someone here knows what's the deal with NEPOPO? Is it just ET in disguise? From what I know Mike Ellis has got some really impressive results with very little (if at all) ET done on a dog... or I'm wrong.

I have Mike's e collar seminar and I think he mentioned Bart and NEPOPO at some point but can't remember.

Maybe its in the application of the method. Kind of an evolution from cranking it up like your trying to light up Culver City, to a step by step balance with rewards.

I have seen some videos of bart bellon's dogs. They work extremely fast. Stresses me out just watching his dog do a routine. I can only imagine how the dogs feel.

His training has a huge visual impact, but I would not want my dog performing like he is on crack.

Right so I went through Mike’s e collar seminar again and he does mention Bart at 00:30 at Part 2.

To prevent confusion, a reminder what ET means (from his seminar, though Ed also wrote about it in his correction e-book):
"Escape avoidance training covers any of the stuff we do with pressure, *period*. It’s either escape where they need to turn off pressure or avoidance where they learn to avoid some unpleasant consequence." – I think that’s a best definition we can get.

So, I think what Ed’s so much against is clearly not the ET itself but the old fashioned application of ET system where there’s no motivational foundation (marker training) and basically no use of positive reinforcement whatsoever. This is how hunting dogs used to be trained when continuous stim was first introduced with e collars.

Also, it’s interesting how different Mike is from Bart in the way they work with dogs. What Bart is doing is very similar to Mike’s system of training –in the seminar Mike mentioned that he borrowed most of his e collar knowledge from Bart (at 35:00). So, only difference from my observation is Mike’s (to me revolutionary) use of toys. Mike’s really into playing with dogs whereas Bart is still heavily relying on e collar pressure.

Edit: the web form removed all my apostrophes, sorry about that.

Edited by Bojan Sala (05/18/2012 05:12 PM)
Edit reason: last edit I swear

I think this is Michael Ellis in the earlier days working with Bart at one of his seminars at least it looks like Micheal Ellis?




http://www.dogforums.com/dog-training-forum/111828-bart-bellon.html

Open link and scroll down to #7

A young Michael Ellis

Yeah, thats Michael Ellis and thats not "De poosie-woosie bite" Lol.