One of the most common pictures those who have dogs that have Reactive behaviour aspire to achieving is ‘calm’, and I would say that this is a word that is more commonly used in modern dog training without true understanding of what it is and what it actually looks like. But to truly understand what calmness is, ask yourself this question. Put dogs aside for a second, and ask yourself the question….Do you know anyone that is ‘calm’? Really think about that before answering. I can hear you giving examples of people you know, or seen, or aspire to be, that encapsulate ‘calmness’, but are they tr ..read more

As a professional dog trainer, who deals with behavioural issues with dogs, and sports dogs, there are two factors which can make or break the life a dog has, and those within that dogs life. These two non negotiable attributes are good health and good temperament. It may seem obvious to many of you reading this, but it seems both of these are more and more over looked in favour of other ‘desirable’ traits. As a breeder, I invest thousands on health tests, and DNA analysis….I spend months, years, looking at pedigrees of dogs, and researching them as much as a possible can, to try and avoid any ..read more

We are most definitely in the season to ‘Be jolly’… and the streets are decorated with Christmas lights, and house adorned with inflatable Santa’s and Reindeers attached to the sycamore! We can sense that a BIG event is coming on the 25th of this month…. The excitement, the anticipation…. The dread at eating one too many Brussel sprouts! Whether you love or loath the festive period, you know that its on its way! Often we we train our dogs, we forget this pivotal factor when training… We forget to make the process and reinforcing an ‘event’! We forget to let them know something worth celebratin ..read more

Ever noticed how everything in life done well has a conflicting entity to it… just look at sports…. Martial arts for example as the conflict between absolute discipline against aggression, tennis has the conflict between the chaos of a bouncing ball and the blistering accuracy with which it can be hit into a specific point on the court… or a sprinter hurtling down a track appearing to be a blur, yet their technique and motion is smooth as silk… Dog sports is no different. Agility has the conflict between speed and accuracy, IGP drive and control and tracking has a dog to ignore their natural d ..read more

Its that moment we all dread happening to our kids…. The realisation that Santa isn’t real…. I know, I know… some of you will be reading this in shock… go get a stiff drink, because there is more bad news on the way! Did you also know ‘Lassie’, the gold standard by which all dogs across the world are measured, wasn’t a girl!! That’s right people… Lassie was a boy! In fact Lassie was several boys!! All identical in appearance, and trained to perfection but none of which were female!! I can sense the disbelief and hear the sound as childhood dreams are shattered! So the icon on which we base our ..read more

I recently did a training day, and the plans for the day were altered by the random British weather…. As per typical UK summer, we had rain, rain and more rain! LOL. Two days prior it was like the Bahamas! So the planned session had to be adapted. I decided to do a simple session of shaping everyone’s dog to stand on a blue yoga block. Easy right? Well, yes… but I wanted to use this to examine the process of training and competing. Each person was asked to shape their dog to place two paws on the block, but due to the rain, we used an open shed as the training space. Each person was given 2min ..read more

Did you ever hear the phrase ‘Children should be seen and not heard’….. I definitely did! LOL. My mother was big on the notion that, children should be seen and not heard, and that ‘big people’ are talking…. I think this was a very common held belief system that a lot of children were brought up with, and maybe still are….  And I would say that is a similar belief system that many expect of their dogs….  To be inconspicuous, to be constantly calm despite the situation, to ignore all other dogs people and things…. But like children, is that realistic…. And more importantly, is that fa ..read more

Have you ever thought about how your dogs feels? I can imagine a sea of dog owners and trainers across the globe, all responding in unison ‘Of course I do’…. However, lets take this a stage further… Have you ever though about how your dogs feels about the reinforcement you have chosen? Have you created the ‘right feelings towards the reinforcement?’ Does the dog have the appropriate feelings about the reinforcement and the way in which you deliver it? This may sound somewhat cryptic, but as with all life lessons… I am having this one reaffirmed to me at present as I train my three (that’s righ ..read more

Have you ever thought about how your dogs feels? I can imagine a sea of dog owners and trainers across the globe, all responding in unison ‘Of course I do’…. However, lets take this a stage further… Have you ever though about how your dogs feels about the reinforcement you have chosen? Have you created the ‘right feelings towards the reinforcement?’ Does the dog have the appropriate feelings about the reinforcement and the way in which you deliver it? This may sound somewhat cryptic, but as with all life lessons… I am having this one reaffirmed to me at present as I train my three (that’s righ ..read more

This is a ‘Birthday Blog’, and whilst not about ‘My Birthday’, it is ‘My Birthday’… so what better way to celebrate then to blog… (I’m a bit old for Birthday cake and bouncy castles….) I was thinking about what are the most important factors to effective dog training, irrespective of what the intended purpose is… Well there is ‘confidence’… The dogs and yours…. There is ‘understanding’… There is motivation…..both outlined in my book ’Pathway to Positivity’…. But there is actually one major factor that intertwines all these factors…. Communication. Our ability to communicate what we want to our ..read more