The Happy Hound offers Behavioral Consults, Private Lessons, Classes, Boarding,and Board and Train.

I have a strong commitment to positive reinforcement.  This does not mean that I am permissive.  Far from it! But I do not use choke chains, prong collars, shock collars, shake cans, or anything that employs fear or force to “make” a dog do or not do something.

Dogs do what works. Pat Miller, of Peaceable Paws, has a wonderful three-step solution to solving a dog problem.

1. Envision the Behavior you DO want

2. Prevent the Behavior you DON’T want

3. Consistently and generously reinforce the behavior you do want

It’s a deceptively simple solution.  It requires imagination and vision on our part. For some reason, it’s much easier to put things in the negative and say what we DON’T want.  As in, “I don’t want my dog jumping up on people.”  For some reason, it’s much more difficult for us to say “I WANT my dog to sit politely while people come over to pet him.”

We have to imagine and envision the behaviors we want our dogs to perform in lieu of obnoxious ones AND we have to have the vision to “catch” them doing the right things.

Imagination is required again in the second step, preventing our dog from doing the obnoxious.  After much thought, hand-wringing, and lamentation, some annoyingly simple solution almost always comes to mind.  How did I prevent Fred from jumping up on company as soon as they walked in my house?  He learned that if he went to his crate, then company would come inside and make a fuss over him!  Once I hit on this solution, Fred was easy to train…my friends were a little more of a challenge.

My Beagle is even easier to manage, she is tethered to her spot in the kitchen.  My friends are instructed to ignore her until she has all “four on the floor.”  Beagie has learned that sitting still and looking adorable gets her TONS of attention and LOADS of baby-talk.  She no longer has to flip back and forth between jumping up and groveling.

And how do I manage Callie the Kitty–to prevent her from jumping on people’s laps while they’re having dinner at my house? Pure and simple:  she’s banished to her den where there’s food, water, a litter box, and more cat toys than you can shake a stick at!

With every client, I look for the rewards that each dog values in a particular situation and then look for management solutions so that the dos and owner both get what they want.