Great videos on behavior by Dunbar, Donaldson and others

I think the best video was with Dr. Horwitz, DVM. Yes, it was another songfest for GL. But her application is how I would do it. Reinforce only what you want. They only gave treats to the dog when she downed, which is a sign of being calm and relaxed. -P when she wandered around or got antsy, no treats. Go back and lay down, treats. And they used the equipment gently and it was a  -R process.

 ETA:

I should note that I am not religiously opposed to +P. But whatever we do should be effective. And total +P without direction or a way to reward would disastrous, in my opinion. So kudos to Jean for presenting treats for good behavior. Kudos to Dr. Horwitz for the positive lead. For that matter, kudos to that famous guy who got his whole family to give treats for good behavior on the part of a formerly DA dog. Not anyone of them is always right, or always wrong.

I watched the harness videos and I am sorry but those two videos are commercials.  No impartiality at all.  Pure advertising for profit.  Mods, where are you?

Anyway, I have purchased and tried most no pull collars and each has their faults.  Although the harness seems harmless to the dog, they actual work because they apply pressure to the dog's armpits, and I think pain.  The dog learns not to pull from punishment.  Also with harness, I have yet to see a dog not wiggle out of them.  Dog just has to lay down to do so.

lostcoyote

i think it would be best to sit down with jean donaldson, and while watching the video side-by-side, ask her what the high pitch voice was all about ----- whether it was indeed, a reinforcement, or whether it was a natural emotional reaction in a reactive situation (ya know, what most humans do by instinct) ----- everyone slips up, so what's the big deal..... so it was caught on video and brings her off this "pious" status and into the real of being human who's not as perfect as some people make her out to be ------ aren't all of us?

 I thought the high-pitched voice was used to attract the dog's attention.  I've attended some training classes where this approach was used too.  The idea being not only to distract the dog from engaging in the unwanted behavior but to also capture the dog's attention to provide information about an alternative, incompatible behavior---that is then reinforced.  I actually wish I could hit that pitch from time to time but I really can't get out of Johnny Cash territory without hurting myself. 
 

I actually wish I could hit that pitch from time to time but I really can't get out of Johnny Cash territory without hurting myself.

lostcoyote

helium balloons prior to any training exercises. then when it comes time to make a vocalization, just inhale first :))

Might as well sing

"we're off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz. Because, because, because ..."

I find it endlessly amusing that the people who so vehemently defend Cesar Millan using chokes, pinches, hanging (that jindo was much higher off the ground than Jean's shelter dog), and tennis raqcuets, are so bent out of shape to see Jean Donaldson use a GL on a dog that raises up off its hind legs for a second or two when it feels the pressure from the halter upward (which is done to close the dog's mouth and insist on "sit";).  Granted, not the way I would have handled this dog, but certainly in no way approaching some of the stuff I've seen from Millan, or any of the other more physical trainers.  I suspect that Ian Dunbar's title sums it up nicely - "Give them a scalpel and they'll dissect a kiss." 

Disclaimer: I, snownose, do not agree with everything CM does.....!

You seem to be missing the point,usually when attacks against CM, or people who subscribe to his methods or some methods take place, they end up having to defend their way of approaching things, based on the "Rough " treatment CM gets accused of......now, the +R people never ever enter that arena, and claim "Positive " and only positive all the time......that's where the hitch is......

Btw., using a tennis racket to protect against a charging dog, or backing a dog up, seems an acceptable way to me.  

spiritdogs

.  You can frame this any way you want, but what I saw in that video was a technique that I would use if I had a similar situation. 

I do believe those are your exact words.....

 Similar situation meaning a shelter dog that I needed to acclimate quickly.  And, I stand by those words.  To me, the use of the GL in that context (reactive dog) is better than using a choke or a prong.  Pressure is better than pain for those dogs, although neither is optimal.  I do think that if my reaction time was better than Jean's in that scenario, that the dog's mouth would have been closed before it ever came up off the ground, or I would have had the head back facing me and rewarded for the attention.  But, as anyone who has handled reactive or untrained dogs knows, you are not always instantaneous with your responses, any more than you would be if the person shooting the video had asked you to make the dog jump a hurdle or lie down.  Progress is how we get to perfection.  Even Jean is not infallible, but she's a darn sight closer than some folks. 

I'll turn this around......what is the average dog owner to take away from these videos......that it has the +R stamp on it, and that it's ok to yank a dog in mid jump or launch....which ...yes, it made me cringe.......no disclaimers here?

I think the average dog owner has no idea who Jean Donaldson is, and spends most of his time watching Cesar Millan or It's Me or the Dog. 

I think one thing to keep in mind is this.....just like with people who say "Just because we like Cesar doesn't mean we like everything he does", I think you need to treat this issue the same way. Just because some of us have a lot of respect for certain people, doesn't mean we bow down to every step of ground they walk on. The problem I have seen, almost inherently, is that people who are avid fans of Cesar can't seem to be able to say when yes, they felt he did something totally un-necessary or more harsh than it needed to be. Rather, there is a need felt to defend his actions, through thick and thin, no matter what he did, as opposed to judging each action on an "as happens" basis. I am perfectly comfortable pointing out when somebody does something I wouldn't do, or that I thought was harsh, regardless of who the person was. If you had shown me that video and I had no idea who the lady was, I would give the same result anyhow.

I also am not going to judge a person's entire philosophy on dogs on one sole 3-minute video .Granted, there are a few there, so you can gain a better impression for some of the people, but I'm actually amazed at how quickly people can jump to say "OMG she's horrible for doing ____" from ONE example, and at that an edited 3-minute clip! Talk about jumping to conclusions....lol. At least when I formed my impressions of the teaching methodologies (which is different from ideologies.....), I would watch more than one to get a consensus.

Some reviews on the videos myself:

"Tips for Handling a Reactive Dog"
- I wouldn't have used the happy voice that she did myself. At least not in the beginning. I would have reserved that for AFTER the dog was doing what I wanted. I do think that voice plays a huge role in how our dogs react, and often the dog will react based upon our voice and how we talk to them. I would have used a quieter, slower, more neutral voice at first, and then used a higher-pitched voice later.
- She did hold pressure on the leash so that the dogs feet were off the ground for a period of time, probably not what I would have done myself. As for pain, it's hard to say from a short clip, but there didn't appear to be any real pain involved. Pressure and pain aren't the same thing. What I did see, though, was that the feet off-the ground was very short-timed, in other words it appears to me she was basing that amount of pressure used directly to the dog's reactive state. The second the dog backed off she released enough pressure so that the dog was on all fours, but kept on some pressure so that the dog sat. And as soon as the dog sat - immediate release of pressure. Classic R-, and quite well executed.

Would I do that? Not likely......I'd prefer to start a lot farther away before the dog was reacting at all and classically condition a particular CER before working so close together with another dog, so I didn't set the dog up to react to begin with. However, because she's working with shelter dogs and not pet dogs, there is a difference between the amount of time you can reasonably expect to devote to each dog within a shelter environment. It's an unfortunate part of shelter life. And you can't say that Jean herself would do that as routine with non-shelter dogs either, I think that's a bit of a jump to assume that. You are given quite strict abilities within shelters, and aside from taking the more time-consuming way, which likely would have been the least stressful on the dog, I think this was a lot more humane and effective than a well-timed P+. Not because it's a "Gentle Leader", as most know I am not a huge fan of them myself, but because a P+ used in terms of dog reactivity can quickly turn a reactive dog into an aggressive one, and there is no place IMO for P+ in working with reactive dogs.

It's not something I would do with my own dogs, or that I would recommend when talking with people about their own dogs. So I wouldn't "recommend" its use.

But to take such a unique situation - shelter dog work with known behaviour problems with unknown history and limited time to work on a solution - and try to apply that to "Oh, well this is how Jean approaches all of her behaviour protocols" is a bit reaching. I would say, that given the circumstances, and given the time within she feasibly HAS to work, this was likely the most minimally aversive way to help that dog, and yes, I think it was a heck of a lot better to do what she did that to use another type of tool such as a slip collar or a prong collar with well-timed quick P+.

spiritdogs

Don't spend too much time worrying about this...

I think the average dog owner has no idea who Jean Donaldson is, and spends most of his time watching Cesar Millan or It's Me or the Dog. 

ahhhhhhhh, the internet wink

 now wot of the folk who spend less time watching donaldson,dunbar,millan et al and more time doing time with their own dogs?

surely, there are at least a few of those around these parts  

i m reminded of a quote:

The herd sees through it's own projections:

Seeking to prove the in-cast and disprove the outcast,

genius deviancy of the right-brain is labeled "sinister",

"mallicious", "rebellious", "out-of-control" and "unkind"

-the malcontented coyote

 I agree with Kim and others about the videos.  I only saw Jean suspend one dog for more than a second once and I think a big part of that was the dog itself.  The dog had its back tense and was trying to push *down* on the Gentle Leader, as opposed to relaxing and going back onto the floor.  Jean's hands did not change position much from the time of suspension to the time the dog's front feet were back on the floor.  This tells me the dog was doing a lot of that suspension.  This was the Working with on-leash aggression video.  She did turn quickly on the one instance when the dog took her by surprise.  The rest of her turns were controlled, with no snapping.  Just turning and walking away with the dog's head being forced to follow.  Better than the dog leaning into a flat collar and being dragged backwards while still barking and lunging.

It does seem like they are "selling" the Premier products, but they are using a tool that works.  Just like CM uses his patented collar thing-a-ma-gig. (can't remember the name of it)  Plus I like the Gentle Leader approaches to barking at the door as opposed to CM's hiss and jab technique with the little white dogs. 

I took time to watch a few of the videos posted in the CM video thread and I would not have classified any of the dogs in those videos as "red-zone" dogs.  Three little white dogs barking at things going by the window?  A bulldog that barks and nips at skateboarders?  Not really red-zone dogs IMO.

Plus, I attended a Pia Silvani seminar this past summer and she's a wonderful person.  She gave a really great presentation on class management and discussed her fiesty fido class where she works with true dog-aggressive-dogs.  Most of the dogs had head collars on for control and they were even doing some agility for fun.  Most of the dogs in the class had been in the class for months (years even?  I'd have to look at my notes again) and could remain calm and in a down while other dogs were walked past within 10 feet.

I'm glad that you all could discuss these videos in a mature fashion and I hope that future postings of videos by any trainer, can be discussed in a similar fashion. 

Moderator warning, 

This thread will remain civil...and insulting average dog owners is not civil. Please take it privately if you wish to discuss it further otherwise stick to the topic and stay civil....further back and forth with thinly veiled insults or baiting behavior will result in posts being removed or Admin's stepping in.

Thanks.