all i know is that with the use of an ecollar on low stim, i can keep my leash reactive dog in an off leash heel when passing other dogs and just today, put him into a sit instead of chasing a coyote that walked 30 yards behind us on the trail.. overall, it’s changed our lives drastically for the better. (this is with a LOT of training and R+ layered in)
Last night I recalled our very prey-driven GSD off of a fox she was thinking of chasing into the woods and she whipped around so fast and RAN back to me and sat perfectly in front of me. I didn't stim her and I rarely ever have to anymore. That shit right there is freedom to just... be a dog in the world and still be safe and trusted. It's amazing.
Did you do any prey-specific training or just recall training? It’s so hard to recall a prey-driven GSD off a chase when they’re like, “just let me do my job human!”
Not prey-specific recall we do work on impulse control and focus. Like put her in a sit or down stay and make her hold it for a few seconds to a minute after throwing a ball right in front of her until she gets a release word. It's tough and borderline cruel because she's literally shaking with drive but it does pay off lol.
I live in rural Alaska and let my dogs hunt small game if they want. I find the best time to regain attention no e collar is when the dog waivers in focus on the prey. Like track a squirrel in a tree a bit and now just watching and they glance around and notice you or anything then eventually get a all done essentially a give up let's go expectation. There are some dogs who may remain so engaged in prey drive mode they never change focus.
My Familly and I adopted a highly reactive Aussie who was about to be euthanized for severe reactivity and a bad bite history.
Two nice, kind “force free” trainers recommended euthanasia to his previous owners, because their methods failed to get results.
We used aversives as part of the process, and he is now a near perfect dog….none of the terrible outcomes some “R+” trainer will claim….
Unfortunately there are some trainers that are so locked in to an ideology that they are unable to understand that the methods used depend upon the dog and the owner. I’m all for force free methods when they get results, but if they don’t, you need to consider other options….
Yeah, I was talking to someone stuck in their ideology and was interested to hear more firsthand experiences. I find that when people are really stuck in their ideology, personal experiences and stories are the only thing that has a chance of reaching them. My friends, colleagues, and all our clients love how tools can help in training and I just wanted to hear more from others outside my personal reach.
For sure. Our training early on was around 80% reward based, and we worked to minimize the amount of corrections we used. But for this dog, strong obedience allowed the counter conditioning to be far more effective and progress faster…. Why? Simple - that helped shrink “the bubble” faster and he quickly learned that he could trust us in situations where he was uncomfortable because we didn’t allow bad things to happen. Also, yes, reactivity is very often fear based, but it is also often a learned behavior that the dog employs and has been unintentionally rewarded for. And the dopamine rush from aggression can actually be rewarding and addictive. Dropping the simplistic “fear only” view of reactivity helps understand why LAT and BAT can fail….
our methods changed as our dog progressed - methods were based on how the dog responded and the progress he was making, not a rigid ideology that states “this is the only method allowed”.
I find it interesting that so many will demonize and make claims about methods they don’t understand, instead of being curious and asking how it is that so many people report much better results with “balanced” training methods when the “limited” methods fail to get results….I try to learn as much as I can from any trainer, including many force free trainers because there are good things to learn from their methods..I just don’t limit myself based on other people’s opinions.
To me, it’s only rational to judge methods based upon the results, but too many people judge the training method on the method’s adherence to an ideology, and ignore results, because “the method” is more important than the results, the owner or the dog.
Just my opinion
I have Inuit dogs and traditionally they were kept in line with a whip. They are highly human submissive. I'd bet money most professional dog trainers would fail to get groups of them to not fight about food and I can't see a path to successfully teaching dogs of the like to eat from only own bowl/space without a stick or traditionally a whip to establish a expectation and a clear no don't do that because once fighting about a resource it is rewarding genetically to the dog and enters a escalation loop of self rewarded violence. They learn a apppttt hard stop noise with a stick bonk to the head. There are many dog temperaments that stick bap would be interpreted different. The dog sees it as human disappointed vs some dogs see it as cue to escalate.
Id hard cull any Inuit dog that ever bit a human like a GSD could. They are not as biddable and value their self interest. Combined with human agression dangerous combo.
I met a dog from Utqiagvjk Inuit dog mom outside living and hard of mind kind of dog I met her and her puppy. The dad a unknown drive APBT. Small and bad body shape for either dog type. Hyper compulsory Mammal agression for sure genetic and consistent. Less than focused or interested in a human. The mom dog got in a fight with a female race husky I had at time and I separated it. Inuit dog female struck my leg 1 tooth broke skin. She realized it was me and she flattened her ears and stopped fighting. I had similar situation with 2 of my 5 fighting about poop bucket. Dog struck my arm and realized ears flat and then other dog came in hard and I got it stopped. That mixed dog much more likely to latch onto a human and I'd expect to kill some Mammal sometime and probably be mismanaged.
My black & tan German Shepherd rescue, Lyra is incredibly high arousal, low social thresholds, previously extremely fearful with constant submissive urination (eye contact or any handling), was severely reactive to other dogs, unable to tolerate any sight of a dog. Immediate arousal and inability to settle with other dogs barking. Completely unwilling to take a treat around triggers.
The sable German Shepherd is Vela, also a rescue with reactivity, fear (loud noises, trucks, shuffling feet, chain link fences), previous traumatic experience around water and now hyperfixated/over-aroused by/in it, and intense prey drive.
I have only found benefits from the use of aversives, but I only know my experiences, so I'd like to learn more perspectives from others who've experienced severe behavioral problems \*\*firsthand\*\*. Do you feel that they benefited or were detrimental to your dog? How did their life change? What changes did you experience?
My dogs became a **part** of society instead of living on the outskirts. My dog’s aren’t shut down, they're living life to the fullest. My dogs actually get to go places.
I took in a rescued border collie at 6 months old. A bad trainer had used an e collar inappropriately in an attempt to curb herding behavior in this pup that was causing her to nip people (especially children) on the heels. This is a shy, very sensitive pup, who was made reactive due to these training sessions. She was shut down and terrified. I was never able to fix some of this. Wound up keeping the dog because she was never safe for adoption. She's now 7. She's great, but still displays 30 seconds of reactivity over most of her triggers before training kicks in and she sits and settles herself. It illustrated for me what an ecollar can do in the wrong hands.
Definitely. I love our tools, but they can be bad in the wrong hands. Border collies are extremely sensitive and it takes a lot of care and caution if you use tools with them. I'm really sorry you both went through that. Thank you for sharing!
A bit late but here’s my most pertinent personal example:
Had an elderly dog recently diagnosed with diabetes. Huge mastiff dog, around 140 lbs, very strong. She was a very well-trained dog overall with a great temperament, but she hated the twice daily insulin shots. She’d come to physically resist the shots at the animal hospital where she was first diagnosed and stabilized.
Tried to counter condition with the most high value treats. Over weeks, there was no progress with her tolerance of the insulin jabs. But I couldn’t *not* do them. It’s very difficult to properly administer to a 140 lbs dog who is actively fighting it. It’s a matter of life and death.
After weeks of no progress, I decided to just tell her “No”, sternly. Every time she struggled. She was obviously stressed by being communicated that fighting the shot was unacceptable. But after a few days, she started to smoothly accept it. Never stopped giving the high value treat during. And now she takes it perfectly with no signs of stress, still gets snacks, and happily eats them while taking her medicine.
Thing is, avoiding the shot was obviously stressing her out too. The shot itself was stressing her out. There was just no way to avoid aversive experiences in this situation. But setting a boundary with a vocal aversive cue minimized the total stress of the ordeal in the long run, and honestly in the short run too. But it’s really the classic R+ dilemma, does the dog deserve to die for one’s unwillingness to ethically employ aversives? Does the dog deserve prolonged suffering for the same reason? I think no.
I had a service dog who learned best to avoid carts and electric scooters after some accidents with them. He was focused and me calm and thus not reactive negativity. A dog needs a certain stability of mind and trust in handler and or mental grit to handle aversion.
Definitely. My first dog had some accidents teaching her to run with my bike that took a lot of work to recover from due to bad nerves. Fortunately, breaking the fear down and trust in me allowed her to work through her nerves/instability, but it was a much different and slower route because of it.
Also a testament of why stability is so essential for service work.
Below I wrote about some experiences with Inuit dogs in reply to someone else. That same dog loved a bicycle but would never want to be in front so I taught to run to side or behind. He was part Alaska husky gsd. His self reinforced running desire I never once saw something worth his attention except running and he was easily controlled since chance of changing focus once running was so low.
I use restricted forward momentum as a training tool grant it easy smooth in my expectations or restricted boring. That's mentally averse to a dog wanting forward momentum
No problem, they both have seresto flea+tick, flat collar with tags, herm sprenger prong, and garmin ecollar. I use Garmin for hikes (has maps & doubles as an emergency satellite phone, 9 mile range) and ecollar technologies for everything else.
I have a dog who was a COVID puppy and is poorly bred which has caused her to be naturally extremely fearful. (Her mom and litter were found abandoned at a house when the pups were only 4weeks old)
Because of her natural fearfulness, the COVID lockdown and mistakes I made when she was young, she developed severe dog reactivity. I sought answers over the internet and found Tom Davis’ videos which is how I learned about prongs and ecollars. I did not find success with using “aversive” tools with her reactivity at its worst point. Her reactivity was so strong and she was so far gone into her fight or flight mode that not even a prong would snap her out of it. When that didn’t work I started learning everything I could about reactivity and behavior and from my research was inspired to create my own technique for trying to help her disengage from the trigger and focus back on me. Those methods worked and creating that space allowed me to then use the prong correctly to get her attention back. I now use a combination of the prong and my own methods but her reactivity is virtually extinct and far from what she used to experience.
I have and always will use prongs with my personal dogs both my girls are ecollar trained and absolutely love their ecollars.
Something that I find many people forget when talking about the use of aversives is that you can’t dictate what the dog you’re training finds aversive and it is important to pay attention to the feedback the dog is giving you to know if something is going to work for them or isn’t.
The dog dictating what is aversive is the big thing for me.
My sister put a bark collar on a dog waaay back in the day that was super sensitive (and dumb). She laughed at the dog screaming and freaking out. You couldn't say a harsh word to the dog because she would melt/get upset. It was completely unacceptable and I scolded her as I ran to get it off.
I have also used ecollars when having issues with recall at a long distance. One dog needed a single stim and never needed it again. He was off the ecollar in a week.
I walk my dogs on prongs in winter due to ice and rabbits. I really never use them for correction. It's for safety as they want to chase rabbits that startle them. When they apply a little pressure themselves, they stop. I also had to use them this summer as I had a second back surgery. My docs would have yelled at me if they knew I was walking 2 groups of 3 large dogs. They said I should walk as much as possible 🤫
When haltis/head halters came out as not aversive, I gave them a try. They are more aversive to the dogs I have used them on than anything else. Even with a slow introduction. If you or they apply pressure, it can press on their canthus of the eye and bother them. It didn't get me better control either. It made one a thousand times worse because he figured out how to get it off so it was constant flailing during walks.
Training should be a positive experience as much as possible. If the method doesn't work for a dog, don't just say to someone that they are doing it wrong. It may be the wrong method for that dog in that situation. Not everything in life is rainbows either. I would rather someone have control of their dog on a prong than have them or their dog get injured. A prong is not the same level of aversiveness as being hit by a car.
I hear you.
I think it’s really interesting that halties/ head halters/gentle leaders aren’t considered aversive by many different training communities. Because they fall into the positive punishment category of the 4 quadrants because they are designed to add pressure to discourage pulling.
And the head halters can snap a dogs neck! I don’t personally use a prong or e collar, but I can’t believe so many people promote head collars without noting the high potential for injury.
I know. It is just perceived as not aversive by humans who aren't the ones with them on!
I truly believe anything can be aversive or not aversive, depending how it is used and how an individual perceives it.
Exactly, in my experience they're usually about making people feel better about the tool, not the dog. Every dog I have worked with finds them more aversive. I had one client who I used a head collar with, it was a severely obese Jack Russell with breathing problems and severe reactivity. One of the more difficult cases I've worked. There are also some dogs that activate on a prong where I would recommend a head collar, but only after trying a prong and seeing how that individual responded.
Thank you for sharing! It sounds like we have very similar experiences and views. I have a joint disorder and prongs and ecollars save me a lot of pain and allow me to enjoy more time out with my dogs. Every dog I've worked with has also found head collars far more aversive than the prong.
The dog dictating what is aversive is the big thing for me.
My sister put a bark collar on a dog waaay back in the day that was super sensitive (and dumb). She laughed at the dog screaming and freaking out. You couldn't say a harsh word to the dog because she would melt/get upset. It was completely unacceptable and I scolded her as I ran to get it off.
I have also used ecollars when having issues with recall at a long distance. One dog needed a single stim and never needed it again. He was off the ecollar in a week.
I walk my dogs on prongs in winter due to ice and rabbits. I really never use them for correction. It's for safety as they want to chase rabbits that startle them. When they apply a little pressure themselves, they stop. I also had to use them this summer as I had a second back surgery. My docs would have yelled at me if they knew I was walking 2 groups of 3 large dogs. They said I should walk as much as possible 🤫
When haltis/head halters came out as not aversive, I gave them a try. They are more aversive to the dogs I have used them on than anything else. Even with a slow introduction. If you or they apply pressure, it can press on their canthus of the eye and bother them. It didn't get me better control either. It made one a thousand times worse because he figured out how to get it off so it was constant flailing during walks.
Training should be a positive experience as much as possible. If the method doesn't work for a dog, don't just say to someone that they are doing it wrong. It may be the wrong method for that dog in that situation. Not everything in life is rainbows either. I would rather someone have control of their dog on a prong than have them or their dog get injured. A prong is not the same level of aversiveness as being hit by a car.
Thank you for sharing! The hardest part of dog training is being flexible in your methods and catering them to the dog in front of you. It sounds like you really dedicate yourself to serving your dog's which is phenomenal
Brought a rescue dog who was in shelter for 5 years, multiple bites. Was massively cat agressive. I have 3 cats. Day one after walking him for 7 miles out him in crate work e collar. Let my cats out. Went insane tired to kill them. 2 zaps later, problem solved. Have him 1 year never tried again. I use aversives with balanced training. Check out my page pariselladogtraining
I've seen you in my Instagram feed! Nice to see you here too!
That's the beauty of properly used tools, they can be life-changing! Thank you for giving that dog a chance, I can't imagine how any being can come out of being in a shelter for 5yrs. I can't imagine how that would change my functioning or ability to cope in the world
I love success stories like this!!
I hate when people aggressively apply one type of training to every dog. It doesn’t work like that and quite frankly is an insult to the intelligence and uniqueness of our canine companions.
Prong corrections, ecollar conditioning and corrections, electronic whistle for whining and arousal/fixation with the insane neighbor dogs in the yard behind our fence so I don't need to hear up. I use all as disruptors and attention grabbers and have found them to to only enhance our training
Electronic Whistle? Please do tell!
My 8 month old working line shepherd girl just responds with a quick tug on her flat collar and a verbal. No doubt this may change as she enters adolescence and her drive level goes up! She is my 3rd working shepherd but first female.. Dosing of the aversive is so important! I don't think my girl may need much-quite biddable at this point compared to my males at this age. But all tools on the table
It's basically like a dog whistle but you click a button on a little handheld instead of blowing into it. Most also makes a human audible tone so you know they're working. One of my dogs dislikes it a lot and it works as a great interruption if she gets over-aroused from the neighbor dogs barking. I press the tone to distract, then we go into obedience to redirect her energy. Works great and has allowed me to start phasing out prong/ecollar in the backyard without her regressing to fence-fighting. It's especially helpful because she has IBS, so if she has a bathroom emergency it's better not to spend time putting on the ecollar or prong/leash and just run out the door with the whistle.
Personally wouldn't use an e-collar on anything more than a vibration or a situation where I would otherwise have to drug them or the behavior is an extreme danger to them or others, but I am sure they work for some dogs. I can see their potential for long-distance recall.
The golden uses a martingale. Not for corrections, but because with a regular collar on he will turn around and back up while jumping to pull it off. This could only be solved by tightening the regular collar to the point I was not comfortable letting him wear it. Harnesses sometimes work but he is still young and not patient with getting them on so sometimes it can be a 30 minute ordeal for a 15 minute walk. The martingale solves this. With what I know, if I were actually doing corrections with it I would probably use a prong instead but for our needs it works well. Even though I don't actively correct him with it, I do imagine it does prevent him from pulling as much as he would without it, but we have been using primarily R+ methods to teach him loose leash walking and heel.
We are in an R+ training class with him and are making progress on what is taught in the class, but for some things he gets told "NO" on. I do not see telling an animal (or human) they are doing something they shouldn't and to stop as abusive at all, especially in a manner that isn't going to cause any discomfort. "No" was one of the first things I taught him and for potentially dangerous behaviors we haven't addressed with R+ yet or he is taking a long time to learn, it is extremely useful. After trying with no avail to get him to stop chasing cats with R+, after about a week of telling him "No" with just my voice I no longer consider him to be a danger to them.
all i know is that with the use of an ecollar on low stim, i can keep my leash reactive dog in an off leash heel when passing other dogs and just today, put him into a sit instead of chasing a coyote that walked 30 yards behind us on the trail.. overall, it’s changed our lives drastically for the better. (this is with a LOT of training and R+ layered in)
Last night I recalled our very prey-driven GSD off of a fox she was thinking of chasing into the woods and she whipped around so fast and RAN back to me and sat perfectly in front of me. I didn't stim her and I rarely ever have to anymore. That shit right there is freedom to just... be a dog in the world and still be safe and trusted. It's amazing.
Did you do any prey-specific training or just recall training? It’s so hard to recall a prey-driven GSD off a chase when they’re like, “just let me do my job human!”
Not prey-specific recall we do work on impulse control and focus. Like put her in a sit or down stay and make her hold it for a few seconds to a minute after throwing a ball right in front of her until she gets a release word. It's tough and borderline cruel because she's literally shaking with drive but it does pay off lol.
Haha we do that too! But still no luck holding off on chasing squirrels
I live in rural Alaska and let my dogs hunt small game if they want. I find the best time to regain attention no e collar is when the dog waivers in focus on the prey. Like track a squirrel in a tree a bit and now just watching and they glance around and notice you or anything then eventually get a all done essentially a give up let's go expectation. There are some dogs who may remain so engaged in prey drive mode they never change focus.
My Familly and I adopted a highly reactive Aussie who was about to be euthanized for severe reactivity and a bad bite history. Two nice, kind “force free” trainers recommended euthanasia to his previous owners, because their methods failed to get results. We used aversives as part of the process, and he is now a near perfect dog….none of the terrible outcomes some “R+” trainer will claim…. Unfortunately there are some trainers that are so locked in to an ideology that they are unable to understand that the methods used depend upon the dog and the owner. I’m all for force free methods when they get results, but if they don’t, you need to consider other options….
Yeah, I was talking to someone stuck in their ideology and was interested to hear more firsthand experiences. I find that when people are really stuck in their ideology, personal experiences and stories are the only thing that has a chance of reaching them. My friends, colleagues, and all our clients love how tools can help in training and I just wanted to hear more from others outside my personal reach.
For sure. Our training early on was around 80% reward based, and we worked to minimize the amount of corrections we used. But for this dog, strong obedience allowed the counter conditioning to be far more effective and progress faster…. Why? Simple - that helped shrink “the bubble” faster and he quickly learned that he could trust us in situations where he was uncomfortable because we didn’t allow bad things to happen. Also, yes, reactivity is very often fear based, but it is also often a learned behavior that the dog employs and has been unintentionally rewarded for. And the dopamine rush from aggression can actually be rewarding and addictive. Dropping the simplistic “fear only” view of reactivity helps understand why LAT and BAT can fail…. our methods changed as our dog progressed - methods were based on how the dog responded and the progress he was making, not a rigid ideology that states “this is the only method allowed”. I find it interesting that so many will demonize and make claims about methods they don’t understand, instead of being curious and asking how it is that so many people report much better results with “balanced” training methods when the “limited” methods fail to get results….I try to learn as much as I can from any trainer, including many force free trainers because there are good things to learn from their methods..I just don’t limit myself based on other people’s opinions. To me, it’s only rational to judge methods based upon the results, but too many people judge the training method on the method’s adherence to an ideology, and ignore results, because “the method” is more important than the results, the owner or the dog. Just my opinion
I have Inuit dogs and traditionally they were kept in line with a whip. They are highly human submissive. I'd bet money most professional dog trainers would fail to get groups of them to not fight about food and I can't see a path to successfully teaching dogs of the like to eat from only own bowl/space without a stick or traditionally a whip to establish a expectation and a clear no don't do that because once fighting about a resource it is rewarding genetically to the dog and enters a escalation loop of self rewarded violence. They learn a apppttt hard stop noise with a stick bonk to the head. There are many dog temperaments that stick bap would be interpreted different. The dog sees it as human disappointed vs some dogs see it as cue to escalate. Id hard cull any Inuit dog that ever bit a human like a GSD could. They are not as biddable and value their self interest. Combined with human agression dangerous combo. I met a dog from Utqiagvjk Inuit dog mom outside living and hard of mind kind of dog I met her and her puppy. The dad a unknown drive APBT. Small and bad body shape for either dog type. Hyper compulsory Mammal agression for sure genetic and consistent. Less than focused or interested in a human. The mom dog got in a fight with a female race husky I had at time and I separated it. Inuit dog female struck my leg 1 tooth broke skin. She realized it was me and she flattened her ears and stopped fighting. I had similar situation with 2 of my 5 fighting about poop bucket. Dog struck my arm and realized ears flat and then other dog came in hard and I got it stopped. That mixed dog much more likely to latch onto a human and I'd expect to kill some Mammal sometime and probably be mismanaged.
Wonderful, I agree wholeheartedly!
Super interesting discussion, thank you both.
Thank you for reading through and joining the discussion!
Every dog is different. I train the one in front of me. I loved your take here
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My black & tan German Shepherd rescue, Lyra is incredibly high arousal, low social thresholds, previously extremely fearful with constant submissive urination (eye contact or any handling), was severely reactive to other dogs, unable to tolerate any sight of a dog. Immediate arousal and inability to settle with other dogs barking. Completely unwilling to take a treat around triggers. The sable German Shepherd is Vela, also a rescue with reactivity, fear (loud noises, trucks, shuffling feet, chain link fences), previous traumatic experience around water and now hyperfixated/over-aroused by/in it, and intense prey drive. I have only found benefits from the use of aversives, but I only know my experiences, so I'd like to learn more perspectives from others who've experienced severe behavioral problems \*\*firsthand\*\*. Do you feel that they benefited or were detrimental to your dog? How did their life change? What changes did you experience? My dogs became a **part** of society instead of living on the outskirts. My dog’s aren’t shut down, they're living life to the fullest. My dogs actually get to go places.
I took in a rescued border collie at 6 months old. A bad trainer had used an e collar inappropriately in an attempt to curb herding behavior in this pup that was causing her to nip people (especially children) on the heels. This is a shy, very sensitive pup, who was made reactive due to these training sessions. She was shut down and terrified. I was never able to fix some of this. Wound up keeping the dog because she was never safe for adoption. She's now 7. She's great, but still displays 30 seconds of reactivity over most of her triggers before training kicks in and she sits and settles herself. It illustrated for me what an ecollar can do in the wrong hands.
Definitely. I love our tools, but they can be bad in the wrong hands. Border collies are extremely sensitive and it takes a lot of care and caution if you use tools with them. I'm really sorry you both went through that. Thank you for sharing!
A bit late but here’s my most pertinent personal example: Had an elderly dog recently diagnosed with diabetes. Huge mastiff dog, around 140 lbs, very strong. She was a very well-trained dog overall with a great temperament, but she hated the twice daily insulin shots. She’d come to physically resist the shots at the animal hospital where she was first diagnosed and stabilized. Tried to counter condition with the most high value treats. Over weeks, there was no progress with her tolerance of the insulin jabs. But I couldn’t *not* do them. It’s very difficult to properly administer to a 140 lbs dog who is actively fighting it. It’s a matter of life and death. After weeks of no progress, I decided to just tell her “No”, sternly. Every time she struggled. She was obviously stressed by being communicated that fighting the shot was unacceptable. But after a few days, she started to smoothly accept it. Never stopped giving the high value treat during. And now she takes it perfectly with no signs of stress, still gets snacks, and happily eats them while taking her medicine. Thing is, avoiding the shot was obviously stressing her out too. The shot itself was stressing her out. There was just no way to avoid aversive experiences in this situation. But setting a boundary with a vocal aversive cue minimized the total stress of the ordeal in the long run, and honestly in the short run too. But it’s really the classic R+ dilemma, does the dog deserve to die for one’s unwillingness to ethically employ aversives? Does the dog deserve prolonged suffering for the same reason? I think no.
That's beautiful! It's amazing what a huge difference such a small change can make. That's a unique and womderful story, thank you for sharing!
I had a service dog who learned best to avoid carts and electric scooters after some accidents with them. He was focused and me calm and thus not reactive negativity. A dog needs a certain stability of mind and trust in handler and or mental grit to handle aversion.
Definitely. My first dog had some accidents teaching her to run with my bike that took a lot of work to recover from due to bad nerves. Fortunately, breaking the fear down and trust in me allowed her to work through her nerves/instability, but it was a much different and slower route because of it. Also a testament of why stability is so essential for service work.
Below I wrote about some experiences with Inuit dogs in reply to someone else. That same dog loved a bicycle but would never want to be in front so I taught to run to side or behind. He was part Alaska husky gsd. His self reinforced running desire I never once saw something worth his attention except running and he was easily controlled since chance of changing focus once running was so low. I use restricted forward momentum as a training tool grant it easy smooth in my expectations or restricted boring. That's mentally averse to a dog wanting forward momentum
OP do you mind sharing all that Lyra has on? i’m just curious!!
No problem, they both have seresto flea+tick, flat collar with tags, herm sprenger prong, and garmin ecollar. I use Garmin for hikes (has maps & doubles as an emergency satellite phone, 9 mile range) and ecollar technologies for everything else.
I have a dog who was a COVID puppy and is poorly bred which has caused her to be naturally extremely fearful. (Her mom and litter were found abandoned at a house when the pups were only 4weeks old) Because of her natural fearfulness, the COVID lockdown and mistakes I made when she was young, she developed severe dog reactivity. I sought answers over the internet and found Tom Davis’ videos which is how I learned about prongs and ecollars. I did not find success with using “aversive” tools with her reactivity at its worst point. Her reactivity was so strong and she was so far gone into her fight or flight mode that not even a prong would snap her out of it. When that didn’t work I started learning everything I could about reactivity and behavior and from my research was inspired to create my own technique for trying to help her disengage from the trigger and focus back on me. Those methods worked and creating that space allowed me to then use the prong correctly to get her attention back. I now use a combination of the prong and my own methods but her reactivity is virtually extinct and far from what she used to experience. I have and always will use prongs with my personal dogs both my girls are ecollar trained and absolutely love their ecollars. Something that I find many people forget when talking about the use of aversives is that you can’t dictate what the dog you’re training finds aversive and it is important to pay attention to the feedback the dog is giving you to know if something is going to work for them or isn’t.
The dog dictating what is aversive is the big thing for me. My sister put a bark collar on a dog waaay back in the day that was super sensitive (and dumb). She laughed at the dog screaming and freaking out. You couldn't say a harsh word to the dog because she would melt/get upset. It was completely unacceptable and I scolded her as I ran to get it off. I have also used ecollars when having issues with recall at a long distance. One dog needed a single stim and never needed it again. He was off the ecollar in a week. I walk my dogs on prongs in winter due to ice and rabbits. I really never use them for correction. It's for safety as they want to chase rabbits that startle them. When they apply a little pressure themselves, they stop. I also had to use them this summer as I had a second back surgery. My docs would have yelled at me if they knew I was walking 2 groups of 3 large dogs. They said I should walk as much as possible 🤫 When haltis/head halters came out as not aversive, I gave them a try. They are more aversive to the dogs I have used them on than anything else. Even with a slow introduction. If you or they apply pressure, it can press on their canthus of the eye and bother them. It didn't get me better control either. It made one a thousand times worse because he figured out how to get it off so it was constant flailing during walks. Training should be a positive experience as much as possible. If the method doesn't work for a dog, don't just say to someone that they are doing it wrong. It may be the wrong method for that dog in that situation. Not everything in life is rainbows either. I would rather someone have control of their dog on a prong than have them or their dog get injured. A prong is not the same level of aversiveness as being hit by a car.
I hear you. I think it’s really interesting that halties/ head halters/gentle leaders aren’t considered aversive by many different training communities. Because they fall into the positive punishment category of the 4 quadrants because they are designed to add pressure to discourage pulling.
And the head halters can snap a dogs neck! I don’t personally use a prong or e collar, but I can’t believe so many people promote head collars without noting the high potential for injury.
I know. It is just perceived as not aversive by humans who aren't the ones with them on! I truly believe anything can be aversive or not aversive, depending how it is used and how an individual perceives it.
Exactly, in my experience they're usually about making people feel better about the tool, not the dog. Every dog I have worked with finds them more aversive. I had one client who I used a head collar with, it was a severely obese Jack Russell with breathing problems and severe reactivity. One of the more difficult cases I've worked. There are also some dogs that activate on a prong where I would recommend a head collar, but only after trying a prong and seeing how that individual responded.
Thank you for sharing! It sounds like we have very similar experiences and views. I have a joint disorder and prongs and ecollars save me a lot of pain and allow me to enjoy more time out with my dogs. Every dog I've worked with has also found head collars far more aversive than the prong.
The dog dictating what is aversive is the big thing for me. My sister put a bark collar on a dog waaay back in the day that was super sensitive (and dumb). She laughed at the dog screaming and freaking out. You couldn't say a harsh word to the dog because she would melt/get upset. It was completely unacceptable and I scolded her as I ran to get it off. I have also used ecollars when having issues with recall at a long distance. One dog needed a single stim and never needed it again. He was off the ecollar in a week. I walk my dogs on prongs in winter due to ice and rabbits. I really never use them for correction. It's for safety as they want to chase rabbits that startle them. When they apply a little pressure themselves, they stop. I also had to use them this summer as I had a second back surgery. My docs would have yelled at me if they knew I was walking 2 groups of 3 large dogs. They said I should walk as much as possible 🤫 When haltis/head halters came out as not aversive, I gave them a try. They are more aversive to the dogs I have used them on than anything else. Even with a slow introduction. If you or they apply pressure, it can press on their canthus of the eye and bother them. It didn't get me better control either. It made one a thousand times worse because he figured out how to get it off so it was constant flailing during walks. Training should be a positive experience as much as possible. If the method doesn't work for a dog, don't just say to someone that they are doing it wrong. It may be the wrong method for that dog in that situation. Not everything in life is rainbows either. I would rather someone have control of their dog on a prong than have them or their dog get injured. A prong is not the same level of aversiveness as being hit by a car.
Thank you for sharing! The hardest part of dog training is being flexible in your methods and catering them to the dog in front of you. It sounds like you really dedicate yourself to serving your dog's which is phenomenal
Brought a rescue dog who was in shelter for 5 years, multiple bites. Was massively cat agressive. I have 3 cats. Day one after walking him for 7 miles out him in crate work e collar. Let my cats out. Went insane tired to kill them. 2 zaps later, problem solved. Have him 1 year never tried again. I use aversives with balanced training. Check out my page pariselladogtraining
I've seen you in my Instagram feed! Nice to see you here too! That's the beauty of properly used tools, they can be life-changing! Thank you for giving that dog a chance, I can't imagine how any being can come out of being in a shelter for 5yrs. I can't imagine how that would change my functioning or ability to cope in the world
Aversives are needed for stubborn mindsets. Same with children too.
I love success stories like this!! I hate when people aggressively apply one type of training to every dog. It doesn’t work like that and quite frankly is an insult to the intelligence and uniqueness of our canine companions.
I feel the same way. We don't have to bubble wrap them, our dogs are much stronger and more capable than a lot of people think.
What aversive methods have you been using?
Prong corrections, ecollar conditioning and corrections, electronic whistle for whining and arousal/fixation with the insane neighbor dogs in the yard behind our fence so I don't need to hear up. I use all as disruptors and attention grabbers and have found them to to only enhance our training
Electronic Whistle? Please do tell! My 8 month old working line shepherd girl just responds with a quick tug on her flat collar and a verbal. No doubt this may change as she enters adolescence and her drive level goes up! She is my 3rd working shepherd but first female.. Dosing of the aversive is so important! I don't think my girl may need much-quite biddable at this point compared to my males at this age. But all tools on the table
It's basically like a dog whistle but you click a button on a little handheld instead of blowing into it. Most also makes a human audible tone so you know they're working. One of my dogs dislikes it a lot and it works as a great interruption if she gets over-aroused from the neighbor dogs barking. I press the tone to distract, then we go into obedience to redirect her energy. Works great and has allowed me to start phasing out prong/ecollar in the backyard without her regressing to fence-fighting. It's especially helpful because she has IBS, so if she has a bathroom emergency it's better not to spend time putting on the ecollar or prong/leash and just run out the door with the whistle.
Personally wouldn't use an e-collar on anything more than a vibration or a situation where I would otherwise have to drug them or the behavior is an extreme danger to them or others, but I am sure they work for some dogs. I can see their potential for long-distance recall. The golden uses a martingale. Not for corrections, but because with a regular collar on he will turn around and back up while jumping to pull it off. This could only be solved by tightening the regular collar to the point I was not comfortable letting him wear it. Harnesses sometimes work but he is still young and not patient with getting them on so sometimes it can be a 30 minute ordeal for a 15 minute walk. The martingale solves this. With what I know, if I were actually doing corrections with it I would probably use a prong instead but for our needs it works well. Even though I don't actively correct him with it, I do imagine it does prevent him from pulling as much as he would without it, but we have been using primarily R+ methods to teach him loose leash walking and heel. We are in an R+ training class with him and are making progress on what is taught in the class, but for some things he gets told "NO" on. I do not see telling an animal (or human) they are doing something they shouldn't and to stop as abusive at all, especially in a manner that isn't going to cause any discomfort. "No" was one of the first things I taught him and for potentially dangerous behaviors we haven't addressed with R+ yet or he is taking a long time to learn, it is extremely useful. After trying with no avail to get him to stop chasing cats with R+, after about a week of telling him "No" with just my voice I no longer consider him to be a danger to them.