Happy New Year! With the start of the new year, I want to wish you a great year and hope that all your struggles of last year become your great victories of this new year. How can we help that happen? Here’s 6 ways to succeed with your dog in 2024!
- Stop using punishment. Ditch the scolding and the prong and shock collars. Take the fear out of your relationship and focus on what you’d rather your dog do instead and reward those good behaviors instead.
- Use high value food. And be generous! Food is your dog’s paycheck. If we expect them to work, they must be paid a fair wage. Don’t be stingy!
- Lower your expectations.Behavior modification takes time, with dogs and with people. If changing habits and behaviors happened quickly, we wouldn’t need New Year’s resolutions.
- Don’t set your dog up to fail. Manage your dog’s environment and interactions to set them up to succeed. Allowing your dog to practice unwanted behaviors can make them stronger.
- Let your dog be a dog! Expecting robotic perfection is going to disappoint everyone. Dogs are animals, not computers. They need opportunities to use their innate doggy skills they’re hardwired to do.
- Hire a qualified professional. There may be some skills you can DIY but for fear or aggression, the risks of your dog getting worse are far too great. Your dog deserves qualified professional help, and so do you.
Let’s work together this year and help you and your dog succeed. You can schedule a session so we can review things in more detail.
Happy training!
