AgileGSD
Posted : 8/9/2009 11:25:24 AM
I caught this show last night - yikes! Here's my review....
The dogs were two Puggles or Pug/somethings, likely littermates and both females (the litternate issue was never even addressed though). The dogs had what I think of as typical untrained, unsocialized same sex littermates. They were resource guarders, aggressive to other dogs when out for a walk, got into scuffles with each other and didn't have much need for the humans they lived with.
Mr. Trainer comes in and the dogs bark at him. So he starts yelling at the dogs and chasing them around. Then he said "your dogs are yelling at me, so I yelled back at them". Then he does a tour of the house to see what problems he can find. He said the number of leashes/collars/harnesses was a sure sign of a problem. Dumped out the dog toys and said "way too many toys - very spoiled dogs". Also commented on the pet steps going up to the bed. The owner said he got those because he didn't want the dogs breaking their legs getting on and off the bed and Mr. Trainer replied "that won't be a problem any more" (cause we all know dogs alowed on the bed become dominant...). He did very quickly make mention of the free-feeding needing to stop but that was about the only useful thing he said and was so quick most people would have missed or not thought of it.
While he was sitting talking to the owners he told them to push the dogs off the couch every time they jumped up. After a few times the dog vocalized about being pushed and he said "Want to see what your dog is really like? Push her again", which of course caused more vocalizing. He then tells the owners that their dogs are dogs and not children but shortly later asks them to describe their dog as thought hey were a person and decide if their dog is a person they'd want to be around...
Mr. Trainer then takes the owners to the zoo so they can see their dog's true nature by observing African wild dogs and wolves. He asks the zoo vet if wolves have a hierarchy, which she replies they do. He then asks how that is established and she replies "through aggression". Then the owners compare that to their dogs and see where their one dog is trying to be "alpha". Talk about misinformation...
Showing anyone actual working with the dogs was pretty limited. My husband said that the show is all "fluff" and he's right. The part where they did work with the dogs was certainly all old school, correction based training. Mr. Trainer brought a small scruffy dog that was attacked twice during the show by the Puggles - poor dog looked rather worried much of the time.
In one part to show how well trained this scruffy dog is he left him on the sidewalk in a stay, crossed roads (one road, then an island then another), called him, stopped him, called him again. I found this segment rather irresponsible, as this exercise was showcased as the epitome of a well trained dog and that his dog was so well trained he could bet the dog's life that he would always follow commands. If that wasn't bad enough...
He then worked one of the Puggles on the sidewalk with the leash dragging to show that she would listen to him as well as his dog. He got far enough away that the dog could have taken off and he wouldn't have been able to catch her. He kept her where she was by making threatening moves towards her whenever she got up, which ups the chance of the dog taking off. I found that entire segment to be extremely irresponsible of both the trainer and AP.
Overall, I found Mr. Trainer to be almost a caricature in his attitude. He seemed very much liek he could be a character in an SNL spoof about training dogs. It is obvious that AP is trying to have this be their Dog Whisper - the opening scenes are very DW-like with Mr. Trainer walking in a big group of dogs and of course, his methods. Really though, I actually think CM is better at what he does than this guy is.