I have watched this tape a few times to see what all of this hype about Benhard was about. To my surprise it is not just a lot of hype. This man is one of the most talented dog trainers that I have had the oppertunity to watch.
What I have found intresting is that he competes in schutzhund and does street police work with the same dog, and manages to have a Champion in Police competitions, and still do well in schutzhund. His grips are to say one of the best I have seen in the sport, and much better then most police dogs. I have not seen many people take a dog and have and compete a dog in schutzhund and work the dog on the streets as a police dog. I guess it shows that alot of these people that like to shun the sport, really do not know what they are speaking of. The dog is really a plesure to watch and so is his handler.
I feel that this man's seminars, should be taken advantaged by not only sport people but more for police handlers as there is alot of knowledge lacking in those circles. I am not meaning to be insulting to anyone, but just making a point that it is not the schutzhund program itself that makes a dog useless for work, but the way in which many people train it. There is no way that the sport can survive without Police support and what better way then to have people like Benhard's style of training taught in order to get cops invovled at the clubs, and to compete in WPO and Sch. Granted that alot of depatments policy's dictate rules that are in contridiction to Sch and the other way around, and in some cases this is so, but noone can argue that Benhard's dog is very well trained and his methods are sound. I have read many times people say that sport dogs cannot do real work, well, I think Benhard puts that to rest.

I broke down on the way to his seminar lost out on the hotel bills. It was a nightmare. You bet I will be there next time!

I do not know of too many "knowledgeable" people that truly believe that "ALL" SchH trained dogs cannot do street, real life work, but rather that due to some people are only interested in a high scoring dog who are prepared to make a dog paint a picture it is truly not capable of that not all schH dogs can do the job on the street. Clearly however there are still many very serious dogs competeing in the sport of schH who are extremely street capable. Work a dog like "Stromfonts Brawnson SchH111 IPO111 FH FH2 etc" who was also the 2000 Police dog Champion and tell him that he cannot work on the street.

The grey area with SchH dogs has come about due to those unlike Bernard who work dogs only to pass the test that really would not make the grade if not locked in prey etc.

Mick.