I often receive calls from people who’ve just brought home a new puppy. One of the questions they often ask is: “When can I start training?” The answer is, the sooner the better! Once upon a time, people were told they had to wait until their puppies were six months old to begin training. (This [...]
Think your dog would never bite someone? Think again. ANY dog will bite if pushed too far. Many people believe their dogs would never bite a person. Others know it could happen but hope that it doesn't. For others, it already has happened. Regardless of which category you fit in, you should be working to reduce the likelihood [...]
Working with shelters and/or rescue groups has always been a part of my work in helping dogs. I recently conducted a behavior consultation with a Greyhound in the Colorado Greyhound Adoption (CGA) foster program. At 6 years old, she has been relinquished twice due to issues with the other household dogs. Since we don’t have the details [...]
In my last post (October 2010), I discussed my evaluation of a dog who had bitten someone. In my evaluation, I determined that most likely this dog had been placed in a high stress situation with many factors contributing to the bite. In normal circumstances - ones without several stressful factors added one on top [...]
