Dog Training Question and Answer Session

In this episode we respond to a lot of comments from YouTube and other social media sites. If you have a question you would like us to cover please let us know!

Episode Transcript

(00:07):
Welcome back, everybody. How's it going?
Welcome, Nelson. How's it going?
Good, man. How about you?
Super good. Super good.
It's incredible. Incredible, Super incredible.
Fantastic. Some might say super fantastic.
It's a good day, I've got all kinds of fun stuff planned.
Had a good morning and excited for my day.
How about you? It is crazy how your morning can

(00:31):
definitely set right like the the rest of the day and really
how you feel about it. If you had to like a relaxing
morning outside all day, like, you're probably set up to have a
really good day as opposed to like.
I did. I watched dogs play and did some
training and birds were chirping.
It was. I was at one with nature.

(00:51):
Maybe that was close, maybe not.I wasn't.
But Arizona? Was darn close.
Yeah. All right.
Well, today we're doing another question and answer episode.
Hopefully everyone listening likes these.
From the analytics, it sure seems like people do watch time
on our question and answer episodes are really good.

(01:14):
So that tells me people like it.But we don't get much questions
or feedback on them. So I'd love to hear more.
You know, when you're listening,drop a comment or if you
disagree with something we said or we missed something, we'd
love to hear it. OK, so we've got a lot of stuff
from the last time and we get a lot of questions on social media
and YouTube. So there's just there's so many

(01:36):
we could talk about. Let's start with let's see, I'm
scrolling down here. You know this one we get a lot
and it intrigues me. So this person said on our we
have a video recently called howto calm down a crazy puppy with
heel sit and stay. And it's basically just showing
how to train a young dog, you know, using obedience for

(01:59):
calmness rather than for excitement.
So someone had commented and said, so I've never used a stay
command. The concept for me being sit
means sit or down means down until I release them.
What are your thoughts on that concept?
None of my dogs have been taughtstay, just the initial command.
They do no wait, however, like when opening the door, etcetera.
So you want to take that one what you know and this person we

(02:22):
we had a conversation as well through and it was a good
conversation. Sometimes people are angry that
we use stay, which like I've never had a.
Client. I was going to say some.
People online are going to. Be angry with me, but no.
No, clients expect it. They're like, and that's what I
tell a lot of people like clients expect staying.
But anyways, we've had some comments where people are like
mad. They're like, this is

(02:42):
ridiculous. You don't need to stay.
That's, you know, like it. It's crazy.
And then when I create a fight about it.
What are your thoughts? But this person was not like
that. This is John, John and Nikki.
We had a good conversation, but what are your.
Thoughts. So let's take like my own
personal dogs. Actually, I do things probably a

(03:03):
lot closer to John where sit means sit, down means down.
And I don't have to say stay nearly as much.
There's always some kind of leeway, right?
If I which is tough, I just I guess I kind of feel like I know
my dogs enough for them to be able to decipher when they
actually need to stay somewhere or when they can get up and

(03:25):
wander around. And even if they don't write, I
mean, it's a super easy corrections, really nothing lost
there. But with clients dogs,
especially if we're doing just regular leash and off leash
stuff, I always teach the state.But I really do agree that I
think it's just because it's expected the E collar side of

(03:47):
things when we start working with clients that have a lot of
property or just, you know, really want to start doing
things kind of advanced off leash, right where we bring in
the E collar, that's definitely where I revert back to no stays.
And one of the biggest reasons is just because I have a hard
time quantifying or justifying when I should be correcting on

(04:10):
what word should I be correctingand what like what the
expectation is with the leash and collar.
You know, we have our own protocols.
We do all of that stuff, but with an E collar it's just easy
to correct for a sit or a down as opposed to a sit stay or a
down stay. So we we do actually start
nixing that stuff, or at least Ido.
I start nixing that stuff as soon as we talk about E collars

(04:33):
being introduced. Interesting, you know, overall
my thought on this is I've neverhad a client not want to use
stay, but I can tell you if a client said, Hey, can we train
without using the word stay, I'dsay you sure?
Like it's not going to change really anything.
It's you know, stay is not needed.
There's there's no argument likethat.

(04:54):
I would make that like that. You need now I should say the
word stay. You know, the dog needs the
ability to stay. So if you want like an implied
stay, like they lay down and they're down until you need a
release word. You know, some people don't.
I've had some people argue with us on social media like they
don't like free and like, like how and like, how would you
release them? That makes no sense like that.

(05:14):
You need to release them. Absolutely.
If you want it implied, sure. Like stay doesn't really add
value. The word itself.
It's just people seem to like itand it's easy.
You tell them like it's not hard.
You tell them down, then you saystay.
So if I had a client and so I told this person, I replied to
them and like, you know, absolutely.
Like that's an implied state. There's zero things wrong with
that. You know, he mentioned wait and

(05:37):
he might have mentioned it because of things I talked about
in that video. What I tell clients is I don't
like stay to turn into weight. And what I mean by that is I
don't want the dog staying, staying, staying.
I say free and now they run awayafter whatever they were like
thinking about like they see a squirrel, you tell them stay,
you say free. Now they chase the squirrel.
Well, that was just wait and what's the point if they're

(05:59):
still doing the thing you don't want them to do.
So I do a lot of work when I free a dead.
I know you do as well, Nelson, when I free a dog up from stay
come to me, let's you know, I praise them, I talk to them and
now you go free and then throughtime you can relax that more.
And what I use I use wait for. It's a whole different thing for
me. Wait means you're going to get

(06:20):
the thing. So I use weight for the doorway.
I use weight for stairs, I use weight for maybe for food.
And weight means you're going toget it.
You can go after it, just wait. And then so and I use weight and
then say free. And then you don't let them go
after it and stay. Maybe they get to go after it,
maybe they don't. But stay is not like I don't

(06:40):
want my dog staring like OK, I'mI'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready
and now I'm going to pounce. So weight is cool to me.
I use it very different though. And John's examples were like
open, he said, opening the door,etcetera.
So it sounds like he's using it similar to to the way I would.
Yeah, weight is extremely valuable.
And really for I, I guess I haven't seen a weight that isn't

(07:04):
valuable to the person unless they're trying to use weight as
a as stay or stay as weight, right.
So with, with everybody, I try to make sure that they have a,
you know, clear understanding that those are two completely
different things because I'm with you there.
There definitely is a huge difference.

(07:24):
The other thing though, is with a stay, you know, like I hate
when like Petsmarts and Petcos and, you know, pure positive
trainers and stuff, when they doa lot of the tricks as a, I
don't know, declaration of how good the dog is.
So what I mean by that is, you know, they'll put the dog in a

(07:45):
down stay and then they'll tell him, you know, stay, they'll put
the treat down on the floor, they'll wait 30 seconds and then
they'll free him up. He immediately runs over to eat
the treat, you know, and they'relike, look at how awesome that
was. And it's like, I can't wait to
blow your socks off. What a stay actually is.
Because this isn't like this isn't it, right?
You're just working on on wait. I just need you to hesitate,

(08:09):
right? Just to pause before running to
eat the thing. And I always ask them, you know,
I'm like, OK, but what happens if you didn't want them to eat
that, right? Like, do you think you could get
him to walk around and just ignore the thing?
Because really, that's what we should be working on whenever
we're doing something with, you know, like stuff on the floor,
food on the floor. It should be don't eat it,

(08:30):
right? Just don't pounce on it all
together. So it it's weird how a lot of
people will think about that as a stay and it's just, it's just
ingrained into the training, right?
That's that's how they practice the stay.
That's how they practice gettingthe dogs to be able to, you
know, to hold it. But that's kind of so at least

(08:51):
for us, right? Like that's so far away from
what the actual point of the command is.
And it's like, I wish you didn'tdo that.
I show clients like when we intro, we start stay.
I don't free the dog up from a distance.
I go back to them each time through time.
I'll free him up from a distance, of course, but I don't
want them like looking at me andlike, did he just move his hand

(09:12):
up? That's what he does before he
says free, I'm free. And now they're, you know, and I
say that it's easy to laugh, butthat happens a lot if you free
them up to, you know, and they don't really figure out, you
know, everything that's expectedof them.
And then when I, it's also at the start, I never free them up
to chase a thing. So I don't work on throwing a
ball and then telling the dog free and you can chase the ball

(09:33):
for a while. I, I work on you're in a sit,
stay, I throw the ball and I call you to me.
And once that's easy, then sure,we can put them in a sit, stay,
throw the ball and tell them free.
But I don't find that to be a super, you know, valuable
exercise to, you know, stay and then you can run.
But depends on your dog. You know, if you're doing dog

(09:54):
sports, then, yeah, like, you want your dog going to stay
targeting something. And they're ready, ready, ready.
And you say free. And now they go.
Do their, you're saying like, that's a really, really good
point because I'm thinking in myhead like there'd be, there
wouldn't be any time where I'd want the dog to wait before
chasing or running off or something like that.
And instead what I'd be working on is throwing the toy and can I

(10:17):
call you back from it, right? Something that's actually real
life, you know, applicable, but I'm also not a sport dog trainer
so that's interesting that of course there is an application
for everything most. Things.
Most things. All right, that's fair.
All right, let's move on. So we have a comment on one of

(10:40):
our litter mate videos and someone said I recently rescued
or I rescued 2 Dutch Shepherd puppies.
They just turned 6 months old. They're fighting very
aggressively. Seems like they're fighting to
the death. I asked a local trainer for
advice. He told me I have to give one of
them up. It broke my heart trying to
decide what to do, you know, andthen some other things.
But you know, that's all that kind of relevant detail.

(11:02):
And you know, I mean, there's somuch here.
I mean, like, you know, so we need to know a lot more.
So if you're a trainer and you're hearing this like you're
probably already thinking about like, well, why are they
fighting right? Like are they fighting over
resources? Are they fighting over
excitement? Is 1A jerk?
And it's just like pushing the other one's buttons until that

(11:25):
one can't take it and lashes out.
We don't know yet. We don't have that detail from
the. Are they even fighting right?
I mean 2 Dutch shepherds, I guarantee you it looks like
fighting right? Even when they're playing.
That's it. Good point.
Yeah. So we've just got a lot of
questions. And when I ask a client, you
know, a lot of times if you wereto say like, why are they

(11:45):
fighting? They're like, I have no idea.
But you break it down from the different options, they're like,
oh, the the ones pushing the other ones buttons until he
snaps or resources or whatever. So we need to figure out what it
is. But there's so many questions.
So are like, can they be together?
Are they together like 16 hours a day?
Everything's cool and they fight, you know, at dinner time

(12:08):
or do they like, never want to be around each other?
And so it's really hard, you know, anytime anyone who asks a
question, you know, online for us, give some details.
And I hope they gave details to the local trainer who told him
to get rid of a dog because oftentimes I've heard from
clients where they they don't give those details.
And they're like, yeah, the trainer said euthanize or get
rid of them. Like, but they didn't even see

(12:29):
the dogs. Like, they didn't even see a
video. Like no one's been to the vet
for an injury. Like, how do we know there's,
like you said, that it's a real fight.
So what I would tell someone like that is figure out why
they're fighting. Of course, you have to start
immediately doing some training with the dogs.
And by training you need both ofthem really good on.
If they're not, you know, I don't care if it's resources, I

(12:52):
don't care if it's one being a jerk.
I don't care if it's excitement.If you can't heal them calmly,
everything else is going to be next to impossible.
I would start teaching them all their commands.
I would start teaching them the place command for sure.
You know two dogs that fight. I'm a big believer.
That's the the main time I use places when dogs fight.
And if you can get your dogs to listen to you in basically every

(13:15):
situation. Now when you start working
around the aggression, you've got some tools at your disposal,
whether it's resources, excitement, one's just picking
on the other, whatever. If they're really good and they
listened well and you're like, hey, get back and you shoo one
of them away, they're going to listen.
And if you, if you can't do any of that stuff, then you've got

(13:35):
no tools. So when we show up to a client's
house with something like this, we explain to them that like we
need our tools first. So you know, we, here's what
we're going to work on with eachdog.
And once we've made enough progress on that stuff, that's
when we start getting them together around their bones.
And maybe that's 1/2 hour of work, maybe that's two weeks.
It just depends on, you know, the dog's personality.

(13:56):
So there's a lot of prep work. And I think often people don't
realize how important the prep work is.
You can't just, if you just jumpinto the fighting, what are you
going to do? Like yank on their leashes and
like tell them no, I think. You need a lot, yeah, and.
Or if you're purely positive, like show them a ball and be
like, hey. That resource is cool, but this

(14:17):
resource is cooler. We can fight over here, but that
is one of those things that I, Itry and tell not so much
clients, but you know, like whenever I get asked from like
friends, family, that kind of stuff is sometimes when you get
a trainer, maybe they didn't explain why they're doing
something, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're wrong

(14:39):
either. And an example that I would give
for this one is if you had, you know, a local trainer and he
said, Hey, let's start working with this one first and then
we'll, we'll talk about that oneafter.
And then, and it's very, very easy for anyone to say, well, my
problem is both, you know, my problem is when both dogs are

(15:00):
together. I don't have a problem with
either dog when they're by themselves, if they're ever by
themselves, But there's value tothat, right?
Hey, I need to teach this one how to heal first so that I can
teach that one how to heal and we can actually start healing
together, right? And, and actually working.
And so sometimes it, you know, Iget, like I said, normally this

(15:21):
is for just other people, not, not so much clients because, you
know, we would explain all of this stuff.
But you need to have good control over both individual
dogs because when it comes to a fight, it's, that's all you're
dealing with is 2 individual dogs.
You're not dealing with two thatare acting the same way, right?
Because you need to be able to split them.

(15:42):
Up and the thought that you don't have problems with one,
you don't have fights with one because there's no no other dog
to fight. But most likely the dog is not
perfect, even when they're on their own.
And it doesn't have to be in an aggressive way.
They're pushy. They're they jump all over you.
They're super excitable, you know, like things that normal
people are like he used to acting like a normal dog, like,

(16:04):
right. But that's that's in fueling the
fire when they get into a fight.So well I want to hear you reply
to this one. OK this first part before the
semi colon is all. Caps.
It's on a come come one call video.
It's so easy. Don't do this.
Say semi colon. Much much much they will come.

(16:25):
Munch much bunch. MCHMCH, Mitch, Mitch.
I don't know. Mitch, Mitch, they will come.
It's so easy. Don't wait, it's so easy.
Don't do this. Say much, much.
They will come. OK, well.
What are your? Thoughts And my thoughts are,
and this is me being very nice, you don't have all of the

(16:48):
information or context in any given situation because maybe
this actually does work for yourdogs.
Who knows, right? Maybe you've much, much, much
and all dogs come running because in, in whatever native
language that means food treats,because you could do the same
thing in English technically, right?
You could yell out treats. And there's a lot of dogs that
know what that means, and they'll come running, but that's

(17:10):
not reliable. You know, again, something that
we're always talking about is ifyou're training with excitement,
excitement always wins. So if that squirrel is more
exciting than the same treat you've given me for two years,
I'm going for the squirrel. I don't care about the treat.
I'll come back later, right? And I'll grab my treat after.
But the squirrel's here and now,right?
I have a real chance of actuallycatching him and so.

(17:34):
What if much much means squirrel?
What if? Much much does mean squirrel,
and he is the squirrel. Who knows?
That's interesting. See, there's.
This is actually from Gaming Girl.
Gaming Girl MW6DH is the handle.That sounds like someone that
would say much much. It's probably a bot from Russia.

(17:54):
And you know, it's funny that you say Russia because the
whenever it comes to people speaking weird foreign
languages, I always think Germanbecause, you know, like, we have
clients every now and then that want their dogs trained in
German, but they don't know German.
And so the words get lost in translation.

(18:15):
We're using weird words because that's the words that they know,
that kind of stuff. And then a German person walks
by and they're like, what's wrong?
With your eyes. So yeah, that that happens
pretty often. But yeah, you know, again, to
think that every dog is going tocome to much much without any
training whatsoever seems a little ridiculous.

(18:35):
All right, this comments on thisis how to get perfect recall
with your dog. Debbie is from Australia and she
had mentioned that she's been working with a trainer working
on come and just can't get the dog to do it consistently.
And, you know, asked some questions and found that the dog

(18:58):
on leash doesn't necessarily pull a lot, but stops for smells
and then won't listen and won't come come with her.
And that is like, to me, that's a big point, right?
So do you want to take that one on you know, so her her first
questions like my daughter, I can't no matter I've worked the
trainer for a while can't get mydog to come consistently.

(19:20):
I'm going to try your method. We asked a few questions and
found that out about the leash work.
What are your? Thoughts.
So I guess my first question would be if Australia is allowed
to use tools or not. You know, because parts parts
are and then OK, yeah. So I don't, you know, hopefully
she's in one of the areas that can use tools because we would
work on heal and probably with the prong collar.

(19:43):
Because one of the big things isthat if, if in an easy
situation, and realistically a walk is a very easy situation,
your dog feels good about, you know, like just disobeying you
or just kind of blowing you off,you know, when you're actually
trying to do a recall and it's not a benefit to the dog, at
least from their point of view, you know, why listen, I don't

(20:06):
have to listen here. I don't have to listen at the
door. I could probably push you out of
the way and go first. I can probably nip at your heels
while going down the stairs, right?
And then beat you down in a race, that kind of stuff.
There's so many places that likely you're losing the battle,
right? And it's it's creating a dog

(20:28):
that just doesn't buy into the authority.
And like some people will say that's a bad word, authority or
you know, like they'll get crazyuntil like who's dominant and
alpha and all that stuff and like, I don't care what words
you use, but authority is a realthing and you absolutely need
it, right? If your dog is not worried about

(20:49):
consequences, what's the point in doing anything, right?
It's just pure feel good. And right now, smelling this
thing right here, this pee, thisfood, whatever feels way better
than having to listen to you. Like you keep walking.
I'll catch up to you. And then when it comes to a
recall, it's the same thing. It's a suggestion come no, I

(21:09):
want to chase this thing instead.
I'll come back to you later, hopefully.
So there's a there's probably a lot that the trainer didn't
didn't hit. You know the trainer that you
were working with where it makesa huge difference in the
aftermath of it. All right, so again, how you
actually structure your walk? Are you able to give corrections

(21:31):
and then how? Are you just keeping your dog in
check or working on impulse control around the house?
Yeah. And the way I sum that up for a
client is, and I've said this inthe podcast probably many times
is if your dog isn't going to listen on leash in a scenario,
the odds of them listening off leash are like one for sure.

(21:54):
Very few times they're going to listen off leash and they won't
be good on leash. So if you're healing them
through the park and they're stopping to smell and won't
listen, well, you know, when they're off leash and you call
them up from a smell, they're not going to listen.
And then if your dog like sees asquirrel and pulls really hard
on leash, well, how do you possibly think you're going to
get off leash cum if you can't heal past that?

(22:15):
So that's why we're always starting on leash.
And once a client hears that they're like, yeah, it makes
sense. I don't, I didn't think about
that. But it's not always common
sense, right? And you know, we think about
dogs for a living. Other, you know, people don't.
And their thought is I don't really care about the leash
stuff because I don't want to walk him on.
I want him to be able to run andplay.

(22:36):
I get that. But if he's not going to listen
on leash, we know he won't listen.
Yeah, exactly. But I mean, you're right, that
is one of the big things. It's like I didn't, I didn't
think about that because that is, I have zero desire to do
that. You know, when I'm going for a
walk, it's for the dog. It's for the dog to sniff and
the dog to do, you know, all that stuff like that's great,

(22:57):
but that's also driving your dognuts, so.
OK so we had dozens of comments this week on people.
Lots of Shih tzu comments which is weird, but a lot of people
having trouble introducing the puppies to their adult dog.
So on one of our videos had a comment.
I have a 2 year old Shih tzu andrecently introduced a 2 month

(23:20):
old Shih tzu to him. It's four weeks later.
Older dog's still scared, he runs away.
He stays out of the reach of thepuppy.
Puppy's energetic runs after himwon't stop.
So, you know, my answer to that is we need some control of the
puppy. So every older dog is different.
Sometimes the older dog we've, we got a comment from another

(23:40):
person with a Shih Tzu with the older dog will attack the puppy
if it doesn't like what it's doing.
This one, it sounds like the older dog won't stand up for
itself. Either way, the answer is you
need to be in charge, you know, not the dogs.
So the puppy is going to blow your mind.
You're going to, you're going tofreak out when you hear what I
say because you're never going to see it coming.
I would do some leash work and Iwould get it to listen so, and

(24:05):
the client might hear that and like, well, why does that
matter? Well, once again, if you can't
walk your puppy past the old first, we need your, your
younger dog to take signals, right?
So let's start from the beginning.
He needs to see your older dog. When the older dog growls or
runs and say like, oh, he doesn't like this, I need to
stop. So he needs to learn that.
He's not going to learn that on his own.
Someone has to teach him. It's going to have to be you.

(24:26):
So you're going to be able to tell him no and shoo him away.
Say you've I guarantee you've already tried that and it's not
working. Of course, right.
And then with a puppy, like if you're like, hey, stop it,
buddy. Like they don't care.
They need like they need to be calmer before they're going to
care or you need to prove the word no.
So you put him on a leash and you try to walk him by your
older dog. I can guarantee that's not

(24:46):
going. To go well.
The puppy's going to be trying to get the older dog right.
He's going to be like my buddy and he's going to be running
over there. So it might take you a couple
days work until you can loose leash walk your puppy around the
older dog, however long it takeswhen you can your older dog and
he's going to, it's going to build his confidence.
The puppy's going to be much calmer.
Now when you drop the leash, if you've done your job well and

(25:07):
your puppy goes over and goes crazy, there's a good chance if
you say no or hey or stop or something with some energy in
your voice and the puppy will just listen.
And if not, you can pick up the leash and heal them, calm them
down, might take you 30 seconds and then you drop the leash
again. So this is the kind of thing in
a lot of house calls, in one house call.
By the end of it, we've shown the client you're like, look,

(25:28):
now your two dogs are together and they're doing well.
But an hour from now, like afterdinner, it's going to happen
again. Like your puppy has not learned
to be perfect with your older dog yet.
But we've I've shown you how to get him perfect in the moment
and then when he makes a bad judgement call later on, here's
how to call him down again. So very, very doable.

(25:49):
But you can't just chase the puppy around.
I would really suggest having the puppy drag a leash, you
know, quite a bit because of this.
And I would of course supervise all their time together.
Yeah, definitely. And I think, I mean, this is
super solid advice in the fact that it would fix 90% of all of
the commenters. You know, there's a very few
percentage where the the puppiesare the ones that are more

(26:11):
nervous and that they're more subdued and that kind of stuff.
But more than more than that, what we're seeing is that the
puppies are definitely the aggressors, right?
And just looking for fun and chewing on someone's leg seems
to be the the go to move, right is the leg.
But this this works with the cats as well.
You know, this really works withkind of anything.

(26:32):
This works with the kids as wellas, hey, if your puppy is
jumping on your kids and you're scared, your kids are scared.
Yeah, calm the puppy down. Get them to understand how to
behave around the kids. And then now you can just finish
up with a couple of Corrections here and there and everything is
going to be, you know, super solid.
Everybody gets to grow up happy together, that kind of stuff.

(26:53):
I did want to touch on the fact that let's take the Shih Tzu
that is willing to, you know, aggress or, or fight back and
just stand up for itself. The advice you gave doesn't
change at all, right? I mean, you still need control
over the puppy. And we, we get that a lot,
right? Where it's like, well, it's not
the puppy's fault. It's definitely the older dog's

(27:15):
fault. I'm like, no, no, no, I'm like,
the puppy has fault and the older dog has fault.
And so it's, it's more work, notdifferent work.
You know, you definitely got to do all the same stuff with the
puppy that we had mentioned. And then you have to do some
work with your older dog to makesure that when they're getting
pissy, you can shoo them off andsay, hey, hey, hey, get out of
here. You know, and like, let me work

(27:36):
with this puppy without the control of both you're you're
probably still not going to always fix every fight, but.
Like your your point, it's 90 something percent the same.
For sure. OK, here is a fun one.
So we've got a video on balancedtraining, just explaining

(27:58):
balance training in general, kind of a theory video.
And Zombie Puppy Love said, wow,thumbs up.
Very well explained. And I just want to say thank
you, Zombie Puppy Love. Appreciate it and I'd like to
agree with Zombie Puppy Love. That was well explained.
You know what's weird about our videos?
It's just YouTube in general is you have a video that doesn't

(28:19):
get like nothing happens for a while.
And then all of a sudden like you know that that balance
training video got quite a few views this week and people
commenting on it. Our like our we got on some Shih
Tzu list algorithm. I don't know what like all these
Shih Tzu comments with puppies this week.
It's weird. And then you'll go like a month
with nothing on a certain video and then a lot more.

(28:43):
OK, how about this one? I'll give you another Shih Tzu.
I think there were like, honestly like five of them.
It's crazy. My 2 year old Shih Tzu and her
new 2 month old Shih Tzu are, you know, let me just shorten
this. It's not going well.
The older one drools very badly.I don't know how to get them to
be playful with each other, Whatdo I do?

(29:05):
That sounds horrible. Yeah, I, I think one of the
things that's worth mentioning is the fact that when your older
dog sees you working with your puppy, they, they recognize
what's going on. They recognize the fact that
you've taken authority over the situation and they learn to

(29:27):
trust you a little more. You know, that doesn't mean that
they'll trust you for everything, but they're learning
that, hey, in this situation, I don't have to be as nervous or
worried about the puppy because I know through through watching
that mom is consistently has my back, right?
So you know, mom's going to grabthe puppy, correct it.
I don't have to, I don't have toaggress, but I also don't have

(29:50):
to sit here in the corner drooling because I'm worried
about what's going to happen next.
And so, you know, like I said, the advice given last time will
fix 90% of the of these cases because just you working on your
puppy and getting your puppy to leave that other, that older dog
alone and then calm down. Subsequently, what your older

(30:11):
dog is going to learn is, hey, Ican take a little bit more risk
because I know mom is here to tohelp me through, you know,
whatever is going to happen, thepuppy is not going to just jump
on me and beat me up the entire day.
So I can you know, I can start to try and play and then when
play gets too rough, I can run away and mom will help me.

(30:32):
But also because the puppy gets calmer, you know, the older dog
won't feel as you know, like, I don't know, annoyed, I guess
would probably be the the motionthat I would feel.
So you're, you're actually working on that relationship.
You're working on that relationship at both ends.
You're teaching your older dog that hey, stop being a Sissy and

(30:53):
come play with the puppy, but then also that the puppy is not
the same wild puppy that it was day one, right?
And it's it's started to improveitself.
Yes, yes, yes. All, all the other Shih Tzu
comments for the week. You, you've got your answer from
that one and the previous one. You might have to combine them a

(31:13):
little bit, but it's crazy like these comments kept rolling in
this week and just like Shih Tzuafter Shih Tzu is It's nuts.
OK, this one is interesting. So this is from Sandra S and
Sandra. So here, I've got a lot to say
on this one and I'm not coming for the record, I'm not coming
down on you in the slightest. But so Sandra's a nine month old

(31:35):
arrest two dogs. Long story short, one is wild
when they play ball steals the ball from the other one and
she's trying to fix that. So she put an E collar on him
and called the one when he stolethe ball he didn't listen so she
pushed the vibrate and she said it broke her heart.
He wouldn't touch the ball againand he was terrified and then he
didn't want to play anymore. And she, you know, feels awful.

(31:56):
This is the the reason I'm saying I'm not coming down on
you. This is the kind of stuff that
makes people think E collars arebad because when you use it
without a method, the it's easy to scare a dog.
So I'm not surprised he was scared from that.
And the reason I'm saying, Sandra, that I'm not coming down
on you here is because as a human, you're like, it's a

(32:17):
vibration. It's nothing like it's he's not
going to get like you wouldn't even think he's going to get
super scared, but dogs do. So This is why a lot of people
don't like E collars or you try the stem level on yourself and
you're like, oh a 10, that's notbad.
You put on the dog. Well, he doesn't expect it.
He has no idea what happened. So you have to, I don't care if
you're using vibration, tone, stem, whatever.

(32:40):
You have to acclimate them to it.
If you don't, I mean, every dog's different.
If you don't, you're most likelygoing to have problems and the
only time you know, we don't acclimate.
Why I shouldn't say weeks, I don't do this, but the only time
you that you generally wouldn't want to acclimate is if you're
trying to create fear in the dogfor a reason.
So rattlesnake of like snake proofing a dog.

(33:04):
You know, you want to you, you don't.
There's no training in the senseof you don't want to teach the
dog a lot. You want to teach them snakes
are scary. So if you're trying to teach the
dog, you know, like, and this isscary, then yes, like they just
feel that the first time they'relike, oh man, this was scary.
But if you're trying to work on come or you're trying to play
ball, you need to teach them what that thing is.

(33:25):
And they need to know the expectations, they need to know
it's coming. So I would for sure spend a lot
of time teaching them the vibration.
And if you, if you watch our videos on this, we use treats
for this a lot. And this is a method we've grown
with through time. We didn't always do it this way
because at first you're like, it's a vibration, how could it
be scary? And then you see enough dogs get

(33:47):
scared by it. They're like, OK, we need a
better way because the dog doesn't know it's just a
vibration and what's causing it.So lots of treats teach them
vibration means come. And then through time you start
using it actually you know to come when called.
Yeah. And that that is one kind of one
of those things though. So that's what we call a
superstition, right? Is your dog is convinced that

(34:08):
that ball is the one that attacked him.
And so he's he's terrified of it.
And that's that's what you're trying to create when you're
doing things like jumping on theoven or rattlesnakes or, you
know, that kind of stuff, you'recreating a superstition.
And the reason I use that word is because we've talked about
similar stuff in the past. And so, you know, hopefully

(34:30):
they've people have seen both episodes and now know, have a
better idea of what it was that we were talking about.
But the other thing too is this is one of the biggest reasons
why I tell clients when we startworking on E collars of this is
going to be more work, not less.This is going to be easier, but
it's going to be more work, not less.

(34:51):
Because we have to now get the dog conditioned and used to and
understanding that collar fully before we're ever going to try
and use it for a behavior that the dog is not attached to a
leash for. You know, might be a little bit
different if you were talking about resource guarding or maybe
not even resource guarding, but definitely like barking at other

(35:11):
dogs, you know, that kind of reactivity.
But I would make sure that you personally, as well as your dog
know what the collar feels like,understand what the game plan
like Matt was talking about what's for what.
So vibration is for recall. Corrections are for doing the
naughty thing because it also kind of sounds just based on the

(35:34):
question that you don't you don't necessarily know what it
is that you're trying to achievethere with the E collar, right.
So the dog stole the ball from the other dog and you called it
to you. Well, one of the things that we
don't do is we don't recall a dog to then correct them when
they get to us right because we don't want to you know, quote UN
quote poison the well. And so you need to know what,

(35:56):
like what's what's the training plan there, you know, not even
the tool plan, but what's the training plan on top of that?
Because if you're going to do that every single time, you're
just playing fetch, right? So the dog steals it from the
other dog runs back over to you,you throw it and your dog's
like, this is the greatest game in the world, right?
And really there's, there's no point to the E collar even

(36:18):
because he's doing the same behavior anyways.
You know, where that probably would have been a correction as
opposed to a vibrate. And if you don't have a game
plan, if you don't go into it like, OK, these are what what
you know, this is what this means, this is what this means,
this is how I'm going to use it.And this is the result that I'm
trying to get to. And these are the steps that I

(36:38):
broke. Like this game plan down into,
it's going to be really, really tough.
You kind of ran out there like the Wild West to see what
happens. And that's what happens, right?
Is that your dog got scared, youmoved a little too fast and your
dog has 0 context as to like what to even expect.
So, and it's tough to get this information if you're not
talking to a trainer who's well versed with E collar.

(37:01):
So yeah, I'm not coming down on you because it's, you know, it's
tough to know who to trust. But I guess two things.
One, come up with a game plan. You can definitely get your dog
over the fear and and still fix the problem, you know, if you're
just going to move much, much slower.
But the other thing too with that, with the fear is, you

(37:24):
know, I always tell people traumatic experiences like like
that, right? That's superstition.
They're only traumatic because they never happen again in the
in the right way, right in the positive way.
So the last time your dog touched a ball, it got the
vibrate and scared the poop out of it.
And now he's like, I'm never going to touch a ball ever again

(37:46):
because it sucked every single time that I did it.
Where if if you get your dog really, really confident again
and playing with the ball and then you're using the vibrate
again, it's going to learn that,hey, yeah, sometimes it sucked,
right? The first time sucked, but the
second time was pretty cool. The third time was pretty cool.
And so you can kind of count your condition.
What happens is that if you never do the thing ever again,

(38:08):
that's the only experience that that dog is drawing from, right?
And that that really creates a big problem.
We see a lot of people doing that with with dogs actually.
So my puppy got into a fight or,you know, a dog snapped at my
puppy. And so I was terrified of
bringing them around other dogs.And like now he hates other
dogs. It's like all right, because the
last experience he had was getting snapped at by that dog.

(38:31):
And now your dog just assumes that every single dog does that.
You know, where you could have you could have counter
conditioned right by getting them around more dogs.
The solution was more dogs, not.Less and sometimes it'll never
fix itself on its own. And I probably told the story in
a previous episode, but you know, I had an American bulldog
years ago that we were at my in laws.

(38:52):
They have a farm. And she saw she was looking at a
horse and she was like down low,like kind of checking it from a
distance. And she was very close to an
electric fence. The horse looked over at her and
she kind of stood up a little bit and touched the hot wire,
the electric fence for the horses, right, Because the horse
looked at her and she was like, oh man.
And stood up and the fence buzzed her and she like

(39:14):
immediately ran back to my side and kind of sat behind me like
oh man, keep me safe. And we purposely didn't do any
training to try to overcome thatand for the rest of the dogs.
And then I didn't try to create that.
It's just what happened. But for the rest of the dogs
life, when she would see the horses when we were there, she'd
keep her distance and she associated with the horse

(39:37):
looking at her. She wasn't like, oh man, I
shouldn't touch the line on thisfence.
That's what did it. She's like that thing looked at
me and that happened. And I thought, you know what,
that's probably a happy accidentin the sense that she's going to
be way safer around horses. I know if I take my eyes on her,
she's not sneaking into that pasture and going to get kicked
by a horse. She's going to keep her
distance. And the dog lived a long time

(39:58):
after that. And she never, ever had any
interest in going super close tothose horses.
And when they would look at her,she'd kind of trot back and
stay, you know, close to me. And so that was, that was a
happy, you know, accident in that sense, because it kept the
dog safer. And but my point being for years
and years that the dog never forgot.
And, and to your point, I would have had to have spent, if I

(40:21):
wanted to have the dog get over it, I would have had to have
spent a lot of time doing fun stuff around the horses.
But. I didn't want her to go near
horses, so we didn't do that. Yeah, I had a happy accident
because there's a lot of value there.
Like I said, she's significantlysafer because she keeps her
distance away from 2000 LB animals that can kick her,
right. And so there's, there's a lot to

(40:42):
be said about that when it comesto, you know, like rattlesnake
training and stuff like that. Is it, you know, like you
correct them when they smell theshed or when they smell, you
know, the snakes or whatever thecase might be, but they're
significantly much safer by being, you know, adverse to
that, to that scent. OK so this was a short comment
on one of our videos. E collar training for beginners

(41:04):
acclamation to stem. The person said that dog doesn't
need it and the dog in the video, if you haven't seen it,
is a German shepherd, super gooddog, like not drivey, just like
a cuddle bug and does really well in the video.
So our response to that was basically, you know, if you see

(41:24):
the E collar as this like punishment device for bad dogs,
then yeah, she doesn't need it. Like from that standpoint, sure
doesn't need it. If you see it as a communication
tool to allow her to run off leash in nature and know you can
get her back no matter what, well then she does need it.
And it makes a lot of sense because any dog can get

(41:45):
distracted and I don't want to take a chance of her shine and
getting hit by a car or run awayand lost or goes too far and
gets into a a horrific dog fight.
I mean get shot by someone who doesn't trust her, right?
I mean, all those things happen.So if you see it as just like,
yeah, you put that on and you make the dog getting, you know,

(42:07):
nervous for doing really bad things, well then yes, agreed.
If you that's how you're training.
But if you see this as a communication device so she can
be off leash, almost every dog needs it for that and doesn't
mean needs it like you're using it every split second.
You might use it like once a year, right?
But you're paging them, you've got it.

(42:27):
And if anything ever happens, you know you can get their
attention. And I won't bore everyone who
listens to each episode with thelong version of the story, but
sometimes the wind can make yourdog not be able to hear.
I went through that myself yearsago with one of my own dogs on a
farm, couldn't hear, dog would listen for anything.
And that to me was a big shift where I was like, you know what?
I'm never letting my dogs run really far away from me again

(42:49):
without an E collar because thenyou can page them.
And I got lucky. The dog finally saw my hand
signal, like turned around, saw me and is like, oh, what's up?
How are you? And came back.
But luckily he turned because ifhe hadn't, I don't know, you
know, what would have happened there.
Like, you know, so point being to be to be able to get your
dog's attention when they can't hear you or see you is

(43:10):
priceless. Yeah.
And I think that's the that's really the shift that needs to
happen, right, is that E collarsshould not be and to some people
they are right. And that's that's still a
problem. You know, they shouldn't be just
a correction method. You know, they should be a full

(43:31):
comprehensive training tool thatcan do both good and bad because
I mean, how many dogs would get distracted by a squirrel, right?
The vast majority. And they don't get to run off
leash because of it. That sucks dude.
So yeah, it's not about, hey, you're a Naughty Dog, therefore
you deserve this E collar. Hey, I want you to be off leash

(43:54):
and running around and get some good distance.
So now you need the C collar. OK, maybe last one.
This one's for you Nelson, that basically says on one of our
come videos, I can't do this correction.
If I try to stop my dog, they throw themselves on their back
and won't get up. Been there.

(44:16):
So what do you say to that person?
You know that that one's tough. It's frustrating because, you
know, again, we've seen that 1,000,000 * 2 things, you know,
because I don't actually know your dog.
And that that would be helpful because based on the dog's
personality and what's actually happening, you know, like my

(44:37):
answer could change significantly.
So I'm just going to go based onlike the majority of my
experience, right? And the majority of my
experience is that dogs learn toroll over on their back and get
really, really good at using their paws and their teeth
because it works. And the usual reason it works is

(44:57):
not because they're mean or malicious or, or fighting or
anything like that. It's because people don't pull
them through it, right. And they're like, oh, he's, he's
gotten into a crazy mode here. Like it's not even worth it.
And and it is, it is it's significantly worth it.
It's worth getting that dog backup on its feet and then
finishing the correction so thatyour dog realizes, one, this

(45:20):
isn't play time, right? This is a serious, you know,
serious command, serious correction.
And two, that that doesn't become the go to had so many
puppies will just launch themselves on the floor, roll
around until you try to grab them and then they're like,
guess what? I'm scratching, I'm biting, I'm
kicking, you know, like it's, I mean, to be fair, when it's not

(45:41):
happening to you, it's hilarious.
So, you know, they're having a good time with it too.
But that's the problem, you know, the problem is, is that,
you know, a lot of people kind of give up when their dog gets
into that manic mode. And the right thing to do is to
get them up, do the correction, heal to calm them down.
If if they're too crazy, you know, because a lot of the times

(46:02):
you'll get the dog up and they're like, Oh, well, then
this is different. But I would tell you that that
would probably be my go to. But if you have a like a
severely timid dog, that would, that would be the worst thing to
do, right? You know, Like it would be a lot
more about encouraging into a heel to get the dog moving and
out of a tense type of situationand then try it again.

(46:24):
So unfortunately, you know, likeI have no perfect answer, but my
first instinct with knowing whatI know would be the first one
right is get the dog through it and finish the correction and
then try it again. So that they figure out that
screwing around and kicking isn't isn't actually the the
benefit they thought it was. So I wish we, you know, we need

(46:45):
a video on this subject, but youknow, we need the right dog
who's doing it in the moment when we have a camera, right?
So that's a challenge. But you know what I explained?
And I see a lot of new trainers have trouble with this as well.
The dog won't walk you when I'm walking with you.
The tricks are you keep moving, keep your body face.

(47:05):
If you're trying to get them healing and they threw
themselves on the ground or they're on the ground and you're
trying to get them into a heel, you start walking away from
them. Your body has to face the other
way. If you're facing them, it's
either a game or if they're submissive, they might like it
looks like you're coming to get them when you turn away.
It can also create some excitement where they're like,
hey, I want to go with you, so step one face away from them.
Crucial then start walking take baby steps.

(47:29):
The reason is you like you don'twant to drag the dog here.
So the goal is you need to keep moving.
If you stop, you've lost. So and you're like, come on,
buddy, let's go heal. And you start giving like little
tugs on a leash. And when I say tugs, just like
soft, just trying to like you just like catch their attention,
break their focus and you're like, come on, buddy, let's go,
let's go, let's go. And I talk in like a repetitive

(47:50):
voice like that. Come on, let's go, let's go,
let's go to kind of catch their attention.
And it could be heal like whatever, say anything with
quick little tugs, but you have to keep your feet moving, your
body facing away. You can look over your shoulder
at them, but keep your body faced away and just keep moving.
If you do it right, it will work.
You'll, I mean, very few dogs that there's very few that

(48:11):
doesn't work the first try. But I can also tell you, you're
going to hear me say that I'm like, OK, got it.
And first try. The odds of you doing it right
are slim. And like this is not a critique
on anybody. It's just like you're going to
forget part of it and then you're going to be stopped.
And when I'm coaching a client, I'm like, hey, move, come on,
move, move, move, move, move. Like you have to keep your feet
going. And when the energy in in like

(48:33):
all the excitement and energy isleaving, the dog comes with if
you stop, your energy stops and the dog stops.
So there's a very, there's a lotof skill that goes into it.
Once you get it, it's pretty easy.
But you've got a massive yeah. The skill is in not turning
around and keeping your feet moving.
Those are the two most common places that I see people kind of
fail, right? The dog applies some pressure,

(48:56):
it holds itself back, and then people stop walking or else
they'll turn around and like, dude, let's go.
Come on, we need to go. Yeah.
As soon as they, as soon as theyturn around, it's it's over with
the puppies, like, ha, ha, I won.
This is great. And yeah.
So this is, you know, piece of advice for newer trainers and

(49:17):
this is something everyone has to learn sometimes the hard way,
myself included, for sure what you, and this is, I mean a valid
for owners as well. What you work on, you know, in
an obedient session sometimes isdetermined by the dog.
And what that means is like, notlike, oh, my dog doesn't want to
train today, so I'll just let him like run around and be
naughty. It's you want to work on come

(49:39):
and then the dog is insane and throwing themself on their back
and they figured out that game. Well, guess what we're working
on, right? Not throwing yourself on your
back, right? And I might have just said to
the client today, here's what here's my goal for today.
We're going to work on drop leash in the long line.
He's been doing great. So I think we'll probably end up
going out to the, you know, walking down to the park and

(49:59):
working down there. If he does well enough at that,
which I think he might, we, you know, might get the E collar on
and start acclimating the vibration with treats.
So hopefully we get all that covered today and then 30
seconds later everything changes.
Everything. Changes that's a possibility and
you have to be able to like be comfortable and like in your own
skin and I'm not going to be embarrassed by that.
I'm going to be like, oh man, OKCharlie's having a moment today.

(50:23):
Is this a normal thing for him? And they're like, yeah, he's
this is his new habit. I'm like, OK, well, change of
plan. Let's fix this.
Hopefully we get it fixed quick and we can still go to the park,
but let's do this first. And it's hard as a trainer at
first when you're like, I just told them we're going to do
come. We need to power our way through
this. And if you do, you're either
going to scare the dog or the training's going to suck.

(50:44):
It's not going to be scare the owner whatever happens, right?
Like something's not going to begood.
So be comfortable. And as an owner, you know, you
might have heard your trainer say like, hey, when you've
decided like you need to end on a good note.
So they're like, OK, I've been told I need if, if I decide to
do something, we're going to do it.
And then a good note. I said come, he didn't do it.
And now you fight with the dog and come take a step back,

(51:06):
breathe. And maybe you need to re
evaluate what you're doing that day and that's OK, nothing wrong
with that. At all.
Nothing wrong at all. Yeah, absolutely.
But most of the stuff we talk inthis about in this podcast, I've
learned a lot of lessons the hard way.
I think everyone has that. That's how you remember a lesson
is when you. Yeah.
Exactly. Yeah, for sure, especially in

(51:27):
front of clients, right. Then you're like, I definitely
should have done that different.Yep, but that's life.
I mean, whether it's dogs, kids,anything, you learn some lessons
the hard way. And it's funny though, right?
Because that's a really good point.
Who's around you changes everything.
You know, like when it's just you and the dog, like, of
course, this is what we're working on because this is

(51:49):
annoying and we should fix it. And especially for trainers, but
hopefully for a lot of owners too, you make that change
because you don't have to justify it to anybody, right?
It's just, this is what makes sense to me at this moment.
And so it's super easy to do that kind of stuff, but then you
get in front of some clients, right?
And and now you're contending with what are they going to

(52:09):
understand why this is significant?
Are they going to say, Hey, I don't, I don't actually care
about this. I care about this, you know,
that kind of stuff. And you got to be able to
explain to them, no, no, no, dude, you like, you'll see
dividends off of this, you know,for years to come.
It's worth fixing this. And that's where the challenge
is. You know, like also same same

(52:30):
thing with kids, right? With my kids were misbehaving or
something like that like, OK, this is how I'm going to fix
this because this is annoying. But now you're out in public and
it's like, OK, well, I can't can't do half the stuff I would
have done right. Whether it's like go run a lap
or go sit in a corner or, you know, like whatever it.
Is whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,whoa, whoa.

(52:54):
You make your kids run laps? Heck yeah.
You kidding me? Do you have a?
Whistle No, I should. I should get one though.
That's a good point. Coach Nelson, you're in like
your sweatpants with your tuckedin T-shirt and you're like your
baseball cap and you're like, that was a whistle out for the
record laps around what? I mean, it depends on where we
are, right? I mean, like if we're, if we're

(53:16):
at my house, it's laps around the around the yard.
If we're, I mean, there's a couple of places like at a park
or something, if someone's beingless than ideal would be the
nice way to put that right because we're pissy.
We're leaving the park. Guess what dude, you're doing a
lap around that playground or something, right?
Like something needs to happen where fighting isn't in your

(53:38):
best option. And usually being tired will
help that. Being tired, it's like you're
right if we should. Leave.
What about push ups? Burpees?
Are you like hit the deck? Give me 20 soldier anything like
that. You know, I definitely wanna
start getting there for sure. Imagine if Gabe is like jacked
by the time he gets into high school.

(53:59):
And then people are like, why are you so strong?
He's like because. I'm I'm Bama, naughty kid dude.
I'm. Bad.
I'm not a bad boy, yeah, but I can do like 200 push ups at
once. That's.
Where all of those phrases came from?
Probably from very strict fathers.
I'm bad to the bone, dude. That's why, for the record,
everyone listening, Nelson was not in the military.

(54:20):
But it sure sounds like it. I was not.
Sounds like you're like a drillsdrill Sergeant.
Yeah, I probably couldn't. Do you know half of those half
of the stuff that I would make my children do?
That's for sure. Maybe that's something about me.
Like maybe I need to get out there with them, right?
Like here, I'll do it with you. I don't know if Taylor is a
loyal subscriber to the podcast,but Taylor, if you're listening,

(54:41):
make Nelson run laps. If he's like, you ask him to do
something, you come home. He hasn't like emptied the
dishwasher. She's like Mr. you get outside
and I want 10 laps. Out of here, I want 10 laps.
I'll be like, all right, I'll see you tomorrow.
Oh, that'll make me so happy. Yeah, you'll be sleeping in the
yard, exhausted. I'll come in later.

(55:03):
Just leave me here, I'll be all right.
Nobody worried about me. But then you have.
All right, everybody. Just to finish that story off.
But then you have like other people, other parents and that
kind of stuff, and they're like,what kind of psycho makes their
kids run around in circles because they're misbehaving?
So outside influences definitely, definitely play a

(55:24):
role. Yeah, I'm not a lap person.
We would use timeouts. Timeouts, too.
Where are you going to do that? In the grocery store, right?
That's tough. So wait, do you have them do
laps in the grocery store? I haven't yet, but that's not to
say I wouldn't. I'd be like, hey man.
I wouldn't lose it if I was at agrocery store and I see a dad
making their kid run laps like around like the, I don't know,

(55:45):
like around those like little coolers.
Yeah, exactly. Say frozen section.
Come on, let's do it. All right, well, that is it
everybody. If you have questions, submit
them. We love answering questions on
here and we've got a long, we'vegot some other questions.
We I mean, we've got a ton we didn't get to and we've got some
Spotify ones maybe we need to get to in the next 1.
So if you have them, ask them. We'd love to love to answer

(56:08):
them. Yeah, definitely.
All right. I'll see you guys.
All right. Bye everybody.