The Right Equipment for the Right Job

Well, being a trial helper has really been a very interesting endeavor for me.  There is so much more than just having the dog bite the sleeve.  I have found myself reading books, watching videos of other helpers, watching video clips of myself, reading comments from handlers about different styles and so forth and so on.  There really are many things that you have to learn in order to be a truly good helper.  I am not there yet but I have my moments.  One of the things that I have learned is you really need to have the right equipment for the situation and specifically the right dog.  

I have learned that in the progression of the dog form early bite work to a complete dog there are several tools that will come into play that will help the handler and the helper move the dog up in skill.  The very first thing I introduce to the dog is the leather bite rag.  This is basically a very tough chamois. After that you run the progression of going through bite pillows to hard and soft bite tugs, and finally different bite sleeves.

Now bite sleeves are very different indeed.  There are many manufactures and also different styles.  Some of these sleeves are very friendly to the helper and protect in a way that when you wake up the next morning your shoulder does not feel like it is about to fall off.  Then there are some that present a great biting surface to the dog.  I have yet to find a bite sleeve that offers both.  I will say that the #1 choice in sleeve should ALWAYS be the sleeve that presents the best biting surface to the dog and allows the helper to position it correctly.  Comfort should be a distant second.

One piece of equipment I can highly recommend is a neoprene gauntlet.  This is worn underneath the actual bite sleeve and does add some comfort and allows me to work dogs a bit longer.  It helps prevent some bruising I would initially get when I worked dogs without it.

I feel that it is very important to know exactly what tool you need to use in each situation when working dogs in protection sport.  Knowing this allows the dog to continue to grow and helps prevent mistakes that can take time to fix

Teaching a dog to have confidence and do it right!

So you want your dog to listen but you need that "attitude" of confidence and almost an air of excitement?  Well how do people teach that?  Well I have found what works for my dogs.  A few years ago I was training a rather difficult exercise that I could just not figure out how to teach it with motivation.  So, unfortunately for me and my dog, I used an old method that would get the dog to produce the desired behavior because it had no other choice but to do it.  Now at this point in my training every time I come to this particular exercise my dog shows hesitation and no confidence at all.  So now I have to fix it but I have all that conflict stored up from when I initially taught the exercise.  The better thing to have done back then would of been to have more patience and used my brain a little more to figure out how to get my dog to respond.  Using force will save you time if you have to teach something, BUT you will sacrifice some of your relationship with your dog and will probably lose that confidence that you would have had if the dog learn in a positive nature.

Now this does not mean corrections don't have their place in a training program but if you are teaching something I suggest to find a way to make it fun for your dog and you.  This might take a bit longer but you and your dog will be happier for having done it.  One of the tools I use is a list of the top four training treats my dog likes to eat.  The way I go about figuring this out is to pull out some of those treats I think my dog likes.  After I do this I cut the treats into tiny pieces about the size of a nickel.  I will then show them to my dog, with one kind of treat in one hand and another kind in the other.  After that I will separate the the treats and let the dog pick which one it wants first. I will repeat this a couple more times to be sure of the results.  You can do this with as many items as you want, but I recommend doing 3 to 5 different items.

Remember when you are training your dog to have patience, think out what you are wanting to accomplish, and most importantly have FUN!