Ruff Love by Susan Garrett- anyone read it or tried it?

Here is a link to a review I found and it explains some methods and what the book is about:

http://www.agilitynet.com/reviews/rufflove_bookreview_christinemoodie.HTML

  Ruff Love has some good ideas and an outline for a training program to improve your dog's focus and attention. I have read it multiple times and have taken bits here and there from it. That said, IMO the training program is nearly too extreme for all but the most dedicated trainers to follow 100%. It is an isolation program, where you become the dog's entire life - the source of all food, toys and fun.

 During the first phase of the training program (I believe it suggests this will be at least a couple months) is very retsrictive. Your dog is not supposed to have free access to any toys, treats or any type of play or reward. Play or reward would include playing with other dogs, being allowed to chase critters, dog holes or any other outside activity or being unsupervised at all. In the first phase the dog is to be crated unless you are directly supervising and all rewards or fun things happen under your direct control (ie: dog sits to be let outdoors or sits to have a toy thrown). If you have other dogs the Ruff Love dog is not to have any contact with them during the first phase - no playing with them and should not even be crated in the same room as them.It doesn't suggest crating for X hours a day and encourages the reader to take the dog out often for exercise and training. If you can supervise the dog one on one for most of the day the dog can be out most of the day.

 The phases become less restrictive as you move through them. I dislike that part of the program involves the dog wearing a GL constantly for I believe the first two days. After that the GL is put on when the dog comes out of the crate. All in all I don't know too many people who would be able to follow this program exactly, even if they wanted to. Multiple dog owners would find it especially difficult.

 I would suggest Control Unleashed as an alternative training program if your dog needs to work on attention and focus.  The book is set up as an 8 week lesson plan and has a lot of great exercises in it. CU is not an isolation or restriction based training program and IMO is much more practical.

I found Ruff Love to be horrific. It's basically a sensory deprivation/brainwashing program- you cut the dog off from everything except the handler. It's the "dog in the closet" idea that some trainers still follow to force the dog to think the human is the be all and end all of life.

S. Clothier talks about it really well here:

http://www.flyingdogpress.com/hostage.html

Thanks for your replies! 

That is pretty much how I felt when I heard about it.  It seems extreme.  Plus, I would not be able to get DH on board even if I could do it.  Plus, we have 3 other dogs and I just couldn't do that to Benny. 

I will look into Control Unleashed and I'm looking into Click to Calm.  Benny's problem isn't so much his focus on me while doing agility, it's being around larger strange dogs and sometimes people; even just walking by them or approaching them (or them approaching us) is an issue.  He wasn't socialized enough as a puppy (I got him at a year and 8 months old).  He won't attack, but he sure does make a lot of noise (lots of barking) and pulling the leash.  Otherwise our walks are great...no pulling, stays focused on me, etc.

georgie4682

I will look into Control Unleashed and I'm looking into Click to Calm.  Benny's problem isn't so much his focus on me while doing agility, it's being around larger strange dogs and sometimes people; even just walking by them or approaching them (or them approaching us) is an issue.  He wasn't socialized enough as a puppy (I got him at a year and 8 months old).  He won't attack, but he sure does make a lot of noise (lots of barking) and pulling the leash.  Otherwise our walks are great...no pulling, stays focused on me, etc.

 He sounds PERFECT for Control Unleashed, as it really is for dogs with reactivity issues (as well as dogs who are easily distracted).

Thanks!   I just looked up some info on Control Unleashed and it does sound just like what we need.  I'm so glad I didn't buy Click to Calm while I was out today. 

Can I only buy Control Unleashed online?

georgie4682

Can I only buy Control Unleashed online?

 I got mine at a dog show from dogwise.com. Barnes and Nobles or Borders bookstores will order any published, in print book you wnat for pick up in their store (and I believe it is no extra cost).

georgie4682

Thanks!   I just looked up some info on Control Unleashed and it does sound just like what we need.  I'm so glad I didn't buy Click to Calm while I was out today. 

Why? Click to Calm is also a great book, well written and in a nice step by step format.  I think both are good, and belong in every serious dog handler's library.

 When Selli was about 22 months I took her to an agility class and she was not that enthused, one of the trainers asked why she seemed so tried and I told him that she had spent the day chasing frogs at our pond (it was the cutest thing, she was swimming after them for hours).  He advised thatwe get Ruff Love and follow that program.  I looked at some info on the book and was apalled.  I consider agility to be our extra-curricular activity, something she does for me, not her life.  Her life is playing and sniffing, chasing bunnies and the more she entertains herself the better.

Yes the trainer who recommended the book gets his dogs through classes faster than Selli and I have managed, but I think we have had more fun!

 There's some merit to having a dog that learns to earn, even if doggy pursuits like chasing bunnies are still there.  If she's chasing a bunny and you call, will she come???  If not, her life could be over from some accident.  Don't necessarily discard the idea of NILIF just because one trainer's method wasn't quite your cup of tea.  Training, even NILIF, can be fun for both the human and the dog!

spiritdogs

 There's some merit to having a dog that learns to earn, even if doggy pursuits like chasing bunnies are still there.  If she's chasing a bunny and you call, will she come???  If not, her life could be over from some accident.  Don't necessarily discard the idea of NILIF just because one trainer's method wasn't quite your cup of tea.  Training, even NILIF, can be fun for both the human and the dog!

Oh believe me, Selli knows all about learn to earn!  I can call her off a bunny, squirrel or groundhog.  We are still working on deer, but we are VERY careful about where she is off leash when there may be deer around.  I have used positive reinforcement for training Selli to the excellent B level in agility in less than 1 1/2 years of occasional trialling and boy does she have fun in the ring, but she wishes her handler could remember the courses!  Hopefully next weekend, she will earn her cd in her third weekend of obedience trials.  She has half the open exercises down, but we are still working on the retrieve.  We will start with Adele Yunck's Positively Fetching program this week.  If that doesn't work, I will start taking lessons from Cathy Cox who teaches play training and owns many of Selli's relatives.

I have no problem with NILF and I don't dismiss its techniques.  I did have a problem with the idea in Ruff Love that ALL fun had to come directly from the handler.  I enjoy seeing my dogs be dogs and experiencing their environment to the fullest.  Their main job in life is make me get out and enjoy nature daily.  I learn so much from watching them enjoy what they are doing.  Although Selli enjoys agility, if we never trialled again, I don't think she would miss it, she does it for me.  I am the one who cares about ribbons and titles.  Ruff Love, as it was presented to me, and to some possibly great extent as it was intended by its author is to create a better performance dog, one who wins ribbons and earns titles.  That is for the humans, not the dogs.

NILIF and Ruff Love aren't the same thing. A dog on a NILIF program gets to be a dog when the handler isn't around or doesn't want to focus 100% on the dog- for example, a NILIF dog can run around in the backyard sniffing and chasing squirrels while the owner does yard work. A dog on a Ruff Love program gets to sit in a darkened crate doing nothing when the handler isn't around. A dog on a Ruff Love program gets to sit in a darkened crate while the owner does yard work.

GoldenAC

spiritdogs

 There's some merit to having a dog that learns to earn, even if doggy pursuits like chasing bunnies are still there.  If she's chasing a bunny and you call, will she come???  If not, her life could be over from some accident.  Don't necessarily discard the idea of NILIF just because one trainer's method wasn't quite your cup of tea.  Training, even NILIF, can be fun for both the human and the dog!

 

Oh believe me, Selli knows all about learn to earn!  I can call her off a bunny, squirrel or groundhog.  We are still working on deer, but we are VERY careful about where she is off leash when there may be deer around.  I have used positive reinforcement for training Selli to the excellent B level in agility in less than 1 1/2 years of occasional trialling and boy does she have fun in the ring, but she wishes her handler could remember the courses!  Hopefully next weekend, she will earn her cd in her third weekend of obedience trials.  She has half the open exercises down, but we are still working on the retrieve.  We will start with Adele Yunck's Positively Fetching program this week.  If that doesn't work, I will start taking lessons from Cathy Cox who teaches play training and owns many of Selli's relatives.

I have no problem with NILF and I don't dismiss its techniques.  I did have a problem with the idea in Ruff Love that ALL fun had to come directly from the handler.  I enjoy seeing my dogs be dogs and experiencing their environment to the fullest.  Their main job in life is make me get out and enjoy nature daily.  I learn so much from watching them enjoy what they are doing.  Although Selli enjoys agility, if we never trialled again, I don't think she would miss it, she does it for me.  I am the one who cares about ribbons and titles.  Ruff Love, as it was presented to me, and to some possibly great extent as it was intended by its author is to create a better performance dog, one who wins ribbons and earns titles.  That is for the humans, not the dogs.

I have the same problem with that concept.  It's like telling a married woman that all her fun has to come from her husband.  So, she doesn't get to go watch her daughter play soccer.  This type of philosophy is often espoused by people whose motives are tied up in the dominance or obedience model, and not in the learning model.