Edie MacKenzie

Edie MacKenzie is a published author, traveler, dog lover, and tortoise enthusiast. Passionate about what she does, her books provide peopel a firm grounding in the dog breed and their unique characteristics with a nice touch of humor.

How to Cope With An Over-Excitable Dog

December 26, 2011 by admin Leave a Comment

Dogs are just naturally boisterous, excitable characters. However, if your dog is an out of control dynamo, it probably comes down to one of 3 things – not enough exercise, anxiety or leadership issues.

I hope you’ve noticed the common thread here. All of these are things you control.

Helping A Bored Dog

A common factor for many over-excitable dogs is that they are simply bored. The dog gets no regular physical or mental stimulation. He lays around all day waiting for your return, and when you arrive he explodes into action.

Fortunately, the solution is simple – your dog needs to be exercised. All dogs, regardless of size need it, but very few get enough.

How much exercise do they need? That depends on breed, age and physical condition. If you have a Bulldog, you’ll probably get away with a leisurely half-hour walk around the block daily, if you own a Husky, be prepared for 2-3 hours of high intensity work (at least!).

Dealing with Separation Anxiety

A common cause for over-excited behavior is separation anxiety. This is particularly true of dogs that are left home while the owner goes to work. Here are some things you can do to address the behavior;

*Stop Rewarding Your Dog – By this I mean stop giving attention, whether positive or negative, while the dog is running around, jumping up and barking. Once the dog has calmed down, give attention and maybe a treat to re-enforce the desired behavior.

*Mix-up Your Routine – Dogs pay a lot of attention to your habits. Your dog will know in great detail, the drill you go through each time you leave the house. You may not even be aware of it, but your dog is, and every time he notices it, his separation anxiety is triggered.

*Limit Access – Don’t give your dog the run of the house when you’re away, restrict him to a smaller area. You may even want to consider training your dog to stay in a dog crate when you’re not around.*Provide a Distraction – Keeping your dog occupied while your away will significantly reduce his anxiety. Something to chew on or a puzzle to solve, like a Kong toy, should work well.

Be the Leader

A dog that is uncertain of his place in the pack hierarchy will always be anxious, because he’s not sure how to behave. What can you do about it? Give him some basic obedience training like “sit”, “stay” and “down”.

Training provides discipline and mental stimulation. It also establishes your leadership. Once your dog accepts this, he’ll naturally calm down.

Applying these 3 principles will have a noticeable effect on your dog’s hyper-active behavior. Keep in mind that not all dogs were created equal. Some dogs (and some breeds) are just by nature more boisterous than others.

There’s lots more about dog training, dog care, types of dogs and other interesting dog info at www.dogsanddogtraining.com

Filed Under: Dog Information Tagged With: 3 Things, Address, Bored, Bulldog, Common Factor, Common Thread, Dealing With Separation, Distraction, Dog Control, Dog Crate, Dog Obedience Training, Dog Training, dog training tips, Dogs, Dynamo, Exercise, Half Hour, High Intensity, Leadership Issues, Mental Stimulation, Running, Separation Anxiety, Training Your Dog

What people do not know about dogs, service or Service Animals

October 16, 2011 by admin Leave a Comment

Basically, a service dog or animal is the same as a dog that goes a lot of training to support people with disabilities -. Mental and physical properties can also be the best friend for people with severe depression. Service dogs can be specially trained by the organization a service dog to work or perform tasks for a disabled person. However, the owner may also be training the animals. Some dogs are donated from different breeders, and some are abandoned dogs from local shelters payments. However, not all dogs can be dogs services. Things like temperament, ability to learn complex tasks, etc. You are welcome to play in the training of dogs. But each breed or mix of breeds of dogs may be able to give a representative of any service work. In short, depending on the breed, a dog can have all these qualities in terms of health, temperament, trainability, and physical condition. These features can lead to more than just a dog, but the service dog / animal instead.

So what you can expect from the dog certified? Frankly, for most, the owners expect them to be treated as animals and animals to changes in working in public places. Why? Simply because every security holder solely depends on the ability of dogs to service disruptions. During training, your dog is ready to distraction as much as can especially when wearing their stuff and they are also trained to relax and friendly, when the equipment is removed. Owner’s consent is necessary before other people working with the dog while in public places.

What may not know is that you can actually train your dog services. Currently, more people are choosing to train your dog, as it happens, that training programs are simply not able to train a dog to its owner’s individual needs. However, not all countries allow this type of training. Fortunately, it is allowed in some countries including the U.S., but there are certain criteria taken into account. Coaches must possess skills that allow them to understand that their experience in training dogs advanced services differ from the average dog training simple obedience skills. Owners may need to hire a professional coach or organization that is willing to train a dog owner. Owner instructors usually start training your dog while they are still a puppy until they reach the appropriate age for evaluation. The only downfall is that it is difficult to deal with emotional conflict in the rare cases where the dog does not evaluate and decide whether to re-home the dog and start over, or simply keep it as a pet.

On On the other hand, professionally trained puppies have been raised properly by very careful study and also had to undergo a regime that has a lot of strict guidelines and above all taking into account the success rate of 85% or above after evaluation, which is much higher than owner-trained puppies / dogs. Why is that? This is because the coaches are experts in genetic manipulation or stimulation early to tell if the puppies that are dogs.

If services business plan to get a dog, do not have to worry about bringing them to where you are. In fact, as soon as the dog, but registered, they can go wherever you go. You can feel free to adapt them to any restaurants, buses, schools, taxi driving, take planes, shops, cinemas, sporting events, watching concerts, visit the doctor’s offices and other public places. Legally, it is a requirement of federal law and state that you always have a dog with him. What makes it more exciting is that you do not need to wear any identification tools do not need to wear a vest as well. So everything, perhaps even the owner of discretion. The truth is that many service dog owners choose to dress their dogs in costume vest and identification in order to avoid questions and confrontations in public places. So in this way, it makes their lives easier and also helps to keep dogs away from the distractions as much as possible. If you bring your dog anywhere else, remember that it is illegal to ask for specific identification of service dog partners. If someone does not tell me it is not permitted by law. You can make cards with you, but remember that you must do so voluntarily, again, it is not required and should not be expected.

0px 12px