5 Levels of Dog Training
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As a private trainer you have no choice really but to accept clients in order to pay the bills, being picky is not really an option!!
I realized that early on, about 30 years ago when I started training dogs and I knew back then that I could NEVER train a dog for a civilian, no matter how I tried, I just do not have the temperament to deal with people who will not listen, especially when they are paying me real money....
You need to realize and accept that as humans, we all have a brain and we can make choices, sometimes not the best ones, but, there is nothing you can do to make people think differently, the way you would want them to.
Once you accept this, things will be alot easier to deal with.
Train the dog, assign responsibility where it belongs and tell your clients that the dog will not train itself, they need to work on it...if not, just accept it and walk away, having done the best job you know how.
Hope I helped!
ADD: I understand what you mean about your rep, believe me, I do, that is another reason I cannot deal with "pet" owners!!
Patrol, narcotics and exposives mixed in with sport dogs is what I have done for the vast majority of the time, the rest of it was spent working with one of the dogs mentioned above either here in the Middle Eastern theater!!!
Dog Training Hand Signal - Train Your Dog To Sit With Only Showing Your Hand
- I don't train but a good friend of mine spent a lot of money and time to become a dog trainer about 12 years ago. She trained both of my Labs through to off leash and 30 minute place.
She was great but got out of it for the very same reason you are sighting. People expected her to to 'train' their dog without their participation or practice during the week.
I do know a young woman who is a trainer that does it a whole different way. Heather takes the dog. She also takes half of the fee, writes out a contract etc. She makes video tape of the dog's training.
When she brings the dog back, she takes one week with the owners for 5 'people lessons'. She gives them the video tape to keep for referral.
She teaches whatever the people want. She will do a simple sit/down/stay and walk well on a leash or all the way to the recall and 30 minute place. According to what people want is how she charges.
It has worked well for her. You may want to think about a different approach. - Well, that's the exact reason I was a "dog" trainer and not a "people" trainer. :-)
I trained dogs for 30 years and worked almost exclusively with shelters and rescue groups. I was an aggression specialist for at least 10-20 of those years, so I was usually getting dogs with very bad, sometimes dangerous behaviour problems, who were usually already scheduled for euthanasia.
Training dogs is a piece of cake! Most undesirable behaviours are significantly improved or even corrected in a matter of days, hours sometimes. I never needed longer than 6 weeks to work with even the most aggressive dogs. They lived with me, in my home, with my family and my other dogs. They quickly learned boundaries, and had expectations of appropriate behaviour.
But I remember having a conversation with a dog walker at one of my local off-leash parks. She asked why I wasn't a "professional" dog trainer (I.E. taking clients). I explained that I train dogs. Professional dog trainers don't really train dogs. They teach people how to train their own dogs. It was as though a light went on over her head. Training dogs is easy. Humans, not so much.
I have all the patience in the world when it comes to animals (I also worked with difficult horses, too). But when it comes to people, I just don't seem to have that same level of patience...for whatever reason. I try. I really do. But it's the precise reason why I never wanted to be the kind of dog trainer whose existence relied on getting clients.
(I also was never inspired to become a dog trainer because it just doesn't pay very well. When I was still working, I made a very good living. ...Still do, I suppose. One adorable person once told me that you could make a "good" living being a dog trainer because she knew one that made $75 an hour. I smiled, and I'm not sure how I handled that exactly. I was polite, I'm sure. But let's just say that $75/hour would have been quite a pay cut, and that's with me working 8+ hours per day. I doubt there are many dog trainers making $75/hour or more, 8+ hours a day, every day.
Those that do make a good living as dog trainers usually have to branch out into media...which I also didn't want to do. By that I mean they had to write books, columns, do radio shows, television shows, etc. You know...try to become famous in some way. And that's pretty much the antithesis of what I want out of life. I"ve authored a lot of dog-related articles, etc. But never with the goal of being famous. Sometimes, I used a pseudonym, other times I was able to publish them anonymously or through an umbrella organization.) ;-)
EDIT: RE: "Launi: Now, that is a good idea. I have been thinking about taking dogs into my home and training them myself."
You know, it's such a hypocritical thing for me. I take dogs into my home and train them quickly, and beautifully, in no time. Because, as you know if you have any competence with training dogs, the dogs, themselves, are pretty easy to train. At the same time, I would caution any dog owner not to have someone else train the dog. Even if they can trust a stranger with their dog (I wouldn't), they will likely continue to do whatever it was that allowed the undesirable behaviour to develop in the first place. The dog might come home well-behaved. But it will likely go back to old habits, or pick-up new ones, if the owner hasn't learned how to interact properly with the dog.
It's kind of 'do as I say, and not as I do'. In my own defense, I don't take dogs owned by anyone (only rare, lucky shelter/rescue dogs that currently can't be adopted due to severe behaviour problems). In fact, I have a rule that I use often, "I don't train other peoples' dogs!" (Often said with emphasis.) It's a rare, rare day where I'll agree to train someone else's dog, simply because I know it will go home, and they'll dismantle all my hard work. When I do agree to do some training, it's usually either a specific behaviour, or it's to demonstrate the dog can be trained. It's funny how many people still don't "get" that is their own behaviour that is the problem, and not the dog. - We quit doing group & private lessons over 20 years ago. The success rate is just miserable. One in a thousand people are capable of training their own dog to any kind of respectable level. About the same time, we stopped training the FuFoo dogs as well. 99.9999% of the people that own them are completely unwilling to enforce anything...thus, waste of our time. We have 50 runs here and 40 in Europe, but we only take 3 "client" dogs for training at any given time. Even with the dog fully trained, the majority just don't REEALLLLY want to do anything. What they want is the IDEA of having a dog...and of course something to show off if company comes by. Dealing with fully trained adults, I can fly a handler to deliver the dog. The client receives about 5 hours of "hardcore" instruction on how to handle him. By the time the dog gets to this level (18-24 months of training), he doesn't care how ignorant the owners are. All they have to do is feed him and clean up after him. We normally get 2-3 phone calls after delivery with "follow up" questions. I would never go back to training client dogs for a living. I'm not sure exactly what Greekgod does, but we also got away from the police almost 20 year ago. We used to oversee 15 departments. Too much red tape, too much attitude, not enough money and no way to re-acquire a dog if one of them decided to quit the K9 unit. They'd let them age-out sitting in a kennel rather than let us buy them back.
Needless to say...headaches ar few and far between now. - HAH!
Not a trainer myself but i do own a dog, and i live with my parents (who, like your clients, don't want to listen to anything i say in regards to the dog.)
I'm afraid it's up to the client, really, to follow through with the training. If they do not, then they will never have a reliably trained dog. Period. They may need to learn that on their own...
How are your lessons set up; do the dogs have to somewhat know a command/behavior for the upcoming lesson or are the times between each lesson just for "practicing" without really building on one another? I would think that being the only one in class who has a dog that does not know the commands or behaviors NEEDED for that lesson would be pretty embarrassing... yes?
So if you haven't tried it, try modeling each lesson after the previous. Example: Lesson One is a sit. Lesson Two is a sit PLUS stay (dog must know SIT to stay.)
Or (this is what we did in advanced class.)
Lesson One: dog must know down command from a distance. Lesson Two: Dog must know how to go down on command while moving by the owner. Lesson Three: dog must be able to sit/stay then come when called and go down when told (at a distance while moving.)
If the person didn't keep up with the training between lessons, the dog would not be able to do these commands. Maybe if they are the only ones who can't do them...?
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