March 27th, 2011
By Eric Letendre
A cold sweat broke out on my forehead and I could see my hands starting to shake. It was just a small shake but there it was. I knew the client couldn’t see it, but the dog was definitely picking up on it. As I tried to continue, I had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and I started to think back to a few weeks before.
The dog I was working with became more and more agitated as I tried to continue the training. It finally got so bad that I had to end the lesson and ask the client if we could reschedule. A big part of my training business was dealing with aggressive dogs. Not all trainers are cut out to deal with aggressive behavior, and that’s okay – it’s good to know your limitations.
As a former animal control officer, animal shelter trainer, security patrol dog handler and protection dog trainer, I had a lot of experience dealing with dogs that had gone to the dark side. Over the course of my career as a dog trainer, I had been bitten about a half dozen times. A few weeks before the incident I described above, I was attacked and seriously injured. I had been a little too confident with the dog and luckily, I wasn’t injured worse than I was.
A few weeks before I received a call from a single father that was very concerned about a dog that he had recently adopted. He asked if I could come out and look at the dog, he added that another trainer was there the day before and the dog bit the trainer.
When I arrived at the house, I looked at the dog and he seemed to be very nervous. He came up to me but was not overly friendly and was very aloof. The owner said that the dog had been showing some signs of aggression and he was cocncerned. He had a daughter and her friends were always over and wanted to make sure his dog was safe.
He informed me that the dog would growl around his ball, food dish and toys. He said that the trainer that was there the day before had put a choke chain on him. Everytime he growled, the trainer would lift his dog off the ground and hold him there until he just about passed out.
I spent a little time with the dog and that’s when I made my first big mistake. I asked him to hand me the leash. I immediately saw the dog tense up. I tried to get him to relax and started to walk around.
Then I made my second big mistake. I asked the owner to drop the ball on the ground. My intention was to just walk past it and see how intense he was around the ball. As we got closer to it, I could see a change happening in him. A split second before it happened, I knew that I had made my last mistake for the day.
As we approached the ball, the dog, who’s name was Scar, stopped and then launched in full attack mode. Luckily, I took that split second to put my arm out in front of me and fed him that part of my body. With the full force of his jaw, he clamped down around my forearm and even though my blood was flowing, I didn’t feel any pain.
Scar released my arm and went in for a better bite. Again I was able to put my arm in front of his mouth and then I grabbed the leash and started to swing him away from me. Before he was able to get his footing, I swung him again.
His owner was able to grab him and get him into his kennel. My arm was in bad shape and needed immediate attention. I’ll never forget his daughter sitting on their steps and crying as I was being driven away.
You would think that I would be upset with Scar. As I thought about what had happened, I felt really bad for him and as I put the pieces together, I realized that he was only trying to protect himself. In fact, when I took the leash he thought he was in for a fight for his life. I also understood why I was attacked.
You see, after working with aggressive dogs for as long as I have, I can usually avoid being bitten, but as I thought about it some more, I should have been a littler smarter about the whole situation.
Aggressive behavior is very complex but without getting into all the little details, there are a few basic facts that you need to understand about dogs going to the dark side.
Fact #1: There is always an underlying reason for the aggression.
Think about when you have acted aggressively towards someone. There was an underlying reason. Somebody was talking bad about you, they cut you off while you were driving, they owe you money, etc. Once you discover what the underlying reason is, then you can start to work on the aggressive behavior.
Fact #2: Aggressive behavior is conflict resolution.
Dogs resolve conflicts by using aggression. If you have five dogs and one bone, they won’t sit down and take a vote on who gets to chew it first, how long they get to chew it, etc. They will use aggression to resolve who gets the bone.
Fact #3: Aggression is always triggered by something.
There is a reason for the dog becoming aggressive. Dogs bite for a reason. I get calls all the time and the person will tell me, “The dog bit for no reason.” There is ALWAYS a reason, we just don’t understand what the reason is.
Fact #4: Environment contributes to aggressive behavior.
A dog that is in a negative environment will, overtime, become aggressive. A dog that is smacked for peeing on the carpet, smacked for barking at the door, has an electronic collar on, and is trained using a prong or choke collar from a very early age is going to get nasty – how can you blame the dog?
Fact #5: Dogs will give very clear warnings before biting.
Some of the warnings are so subtle and fast that we miss them. A dog will use his body, tail, face and voice to give a warning. A dog that is scared will tuck his tail, pin his ears back, crouch down and growl. This posture is of a dog operating out of fear, he will bite but he doesn’t want to. A dog that is puffed up, ears up, tail up, and growling or barking is a dog that is confident. This dog is not operating out of fear and will bite and want to win the fight. The scared dog will bite and then retreat as fast as possible.
If you were standing next to me the day Scar attacked me you would have thought that he attacked me for no reason. All I was doing was holding onto Scar’s leash when he lunged at me. Scar also gave no warnings. He did not growl or show any body postures. He just attacked.
Here’s what you need to understand. The day before I worked with Scar another trainer was there. This trainer hung Scar with the choke chain and cut off his air whenever he showed any signs of aggression. Think about this from Scar’s point of view. He’s nervous around strangers and does not trust them. Because he is in conflict, he tries to resolve it the only way he knows how – aggression. When he uses aggression he is hung up off the ground and is not allowed to breath. He thinks he is going to be killed.
The trainer tried to use force to overcome an aggression problem. This is where ego kicks in. The dog does respond to the leash correction and the trainer gets angry and intensifies the correction.
The reason I was attacked was because he was hung every time he gave a warning. You see, when he growled, the trainer hung him. After he let him down if he growled again the trainer would hang him again. THE TRAINER TAUGHT SCAR TO NEVER GIVE ANY WARNINGS!
He didn’t get rid of the aggression, he just taught Scar to never growl or give a warning, that when he felt any conflict, to attack. The previous trainer did not understand that using aggression to combat aggression will only escalate aggression. I hope this article gives you a better understanding of aggressive behavior. If you’d like to know more about this subject please go to The Dog Training Inner Circle.
March 24th, 2011
By Eric Letendre
Friday night I had just sat down and was getting ready to crack open a new Stephen King novel I just bought when I got a call from my good friend, Geoff.
Geoff invited my wife and me to a night out to the Paper City Brewery in Holyoke, MA.
Paper City Brewery is located on what feels like the top of the 80th floor of an old, dusty factory building. After walking up eight flights of stairs, you walk into a large room filled with old motorcycles, flags from different countries, a replica of a large great white shark and one bathroom for about 200 people.
Anyway, as I walked into the room to begin the night’s festivities, I accidently bumped into a guy and spilled his beer.
“What the !#$% is your problem dude?”
As I looked into the eyes of the guy standing about four inches taller than me, I quickly judged that he was not a student of, “How To Win Friends And Influence People.”
Between the tattoos covering his arms and neck and the steel earrings that covered his lips, nose, cheek, and I think I saw one on his tongue, I could tell he was not happy with me.
“Sorry about that.” I said.
“!@$% that, you got beer on my shirt, %@@*&%$.”
I thought the beer stain was an improvement, but kept that thought to myself and again apologized.
Standing there, I thought how interesting this situation was. You see, as a dog trainer, I have dealt with aggressive dogs for years.
I have studied aggressive behavior from every possible angle. I have volumes of books on aggressive behavior and have had some tough cases over the years.
The big mistake that I see beginning trainers make is trying to deal with aggression by using aggression – HUGE, HUGE MISTAKE!
When you use aggression to deal with aggression, it escalates aggression.
An inexperienced trainer will use a leash correction when the dog shows any signs of getting nasty. This usually results in the dog getting madder, which results in the dog trainer getting harsher, which results in the dog… you get the picture.
It can quickly spiral out of control.
Dealing with my tattooed, perforated friend was going to be tricky.
The first step with aggression is finding the trigger.
What is it that causes the dog to become aggressive?
A good dog trainer will find out what the trigger is and start the training process from there.
In this situation, I was the trigger. This dude was ready to brawl because I bumped his beer. I knew that if I said some choice words in response to his comments, it could quickly escalate into a real donnybrook (I’ve always wanted
to use that word in a sentence).
I wish I could say that he shoved me and I did my best Chuck Norris moves on his sorry butt, pinned him to the ground and forced him to say, “Uncle.”
But it didn’t happen that way.
My job was to diffuse the aggression and not escalate it. I apologized again and offered to buy him a beer.
I also offered to have his shirt dry-cleaned. I wouldn’t say we departed friends, but it never turned into a physical altercation.
As you can see, ego also plays a huge role in dealing with aggressive behavior. My ego was screaming at me:
“Tell this guy to shove it.” “Tell this guy the beer stain is an improvement,” ”Tell him to get stuffed.”
But…
…my training and good sense told my ego to take a hike. I have seen first-hand what ego can do in this situation.
In my next message, I’m going share with you the time I was attacked by a dog named Scar. It happened because a trainer’s ego got involved in the training process and I ended up paying for it.
See you then!
Eric
P.S. If you really want to learn about aggressive behavior check out The Dog Training Inner Circle.
August 5th, 2010
By Eric Letendre
I was sitting at home yesterday when I got a phone call from the local new station. They were calling to ask if I would be willing to go on the afternoon show and talk about dog training.
Never one to turn down an opprotuinty to go on TV, I agreed to be there on Friday. I’ll let you know how it goes.
They asked me to share with the audience some tips on dog training and behavior. She also asked me to send some key points on what I was going to talk about, so I decided to share with you first what I am going to talk about.
You see, I have been teaching for years that the focus should not be on the dog. The real focus has to be on the owner.
Years ago while attending a seminar, the great dog trainer John Rogerson stated: “If you want a good dog, learn how to become a good dog owner.” That one simple statement changed the way I looked at dog training.
I had been taught that the dog was always at fault if the training did not go well. Your dog won’t sit, down or stay?
The dog is being stubborn.
Your dog is pulling on leash or won’t come back when called?
The dog is being dominant.
Your dog won’t pay attention?
The dog is neurotic.
Everytime the dog did not perform, the dog was blamed.
Here’s a question for you.
Is it the dog or the trainer?
I was orginally taught a dog training method that was very popular in the 1950′s. Put a choke chain on the dog and give a correction. If dog does not respond, increase the intensity of the correction. If correction does not work, increase the intensity of the correction, If the hardest correction you give does not work, label the dog as dominant, stubborn, neruotic, genetically defective, or make up a label.
As you can imagine, this led to a lot of problems; dogs that developed aggressive behavior, dogs that became scared, dogs that developed destructive behavior and dogs that simply shut down.
The amazing thing is that there are still trainers out there training the same way.
Anyway, I am going to share the four steps to becoming a good dog owner on the show.
The four steps are:
1. Good management skills
2. Exercise
3. Leadership
4. Train using positive reinforcment
I will expand a little further in my next email. I’ll also let you know how the TV show goes, so stay tuned…
All the best,
Eric
P.S. If you really want to learn how to become a great dog owner, check out: The Dog Training Inner Circle
June 28th, 2010
By Eric Letendre
My dogs are dragging their butts today.
It’s hot, humid, and all they want to do is lay on the cool, tile floor.
I can’t blame them. I feel like doing the same, but instead I am sitting here tapping away on my keyboard to share another entertaining, information packed nugget of training that will help you with your dog.
Just the other day, I was working with a dog that had developed a problem with other dogs while out for walks with his owner.
Spending a few minutes with the owner and dog, I quickly discovered the problem and informed him how to fix it.
Check out this video to discover what happened:
All the best,
Eric
February 19th, 2010
By Eric Letendre
Have you Hugged Your Dog Today?
Did you know that today, Feb. 20th is Love Your Pet Day?
It’s true.and that’s why I have a video for you to watch. It’s all about hugging your dog. Now, before you think I’m nuts there are a lot of good reasons why you should hug your dog.
One of them is safety.
Another is to establish leadership. Another is trust and it develops the bond between you and your dog.
Check out the video:
Can you let your dog off leash?
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Eric Letendre is a professional dog trainer from the United States. For more than 20 years, he has been developing dog training "hacks" that have worked for dog owners all over the world. Eric operates from a home office or a laptop while traveling and draws on his experience and passion for dog training to show others how to develop a dog that is truly “Man’s Best Friend”.
Eric is the author of numerous reports, the E-Book “101 Ways to Hack Your Dog’s Behavior,” “The Amazing Dog Training Man Book,” and produced and stars in his DVD “Secrets of a Professional Dog Trainer.”
