This is the blog where I will be putting training tips, show schedules, sporting events schedules and everything I can think of or find out that pertains to the competitive dog.

Some of the training tips will be tricks you can teach your dog, but there is a method to my madness. Teaching tricks to your dog also teaches obedience and helps the dog learn his place in the pack. Afterall, if you're teaching a trick, that means YOU are setting the rules for it, therefore, you are the leader. Make sense?

Many of the tricks will require some basic obedience, such as sit, stay, down, and come. If I haven't taught it to one of my own dogs, I'll just be doing reviews of the training. Much of the training I'll add to this blog will be from training I have used on my own dogs.

There are two basic commands you will want to teach your dog from the beginning. The Come command should always be used only to get the dog to come for rewards. DO NOT use it to then correct the dog for anything. He will associate the correction with the come and will avoid you. So, it must always be for "good" things. If you must correct the dog for some reason, go to him.

The other command you want to teach is important for the dog to learn to focus on you during training. Teach the dog to "focus" or "watch me" or "actung" or whatever command you want to use for this, but it should be a word you do not use in common training work. It's especially easy to teach when you're preparing to feed the dog. Get his attention while you're holding the food and then reward him for looking at you.

Remember, this might take a while, as "staring" is considered a challenge in the dog's world, so he might have a little bit of shyness about looking you in the face. If he even glances at you at first, reward him.

Oh, yes, there is one other command you'll want to teach the dog--free dog. That is a release command to let the dog know that bit of training is complete. You can use free dog, whatta dog, anything that is not usual in your training work. I don't suggest you use words like "finish" or "release" as these can be used in the show ring and you will be penalized if the dog responds to the judge's words rather than yours.

I welcome discussion, comments, and any tips you'd care to share here. If you have show/rally/event information, share it here. Please feel free to visit our sponsors, too. Even though Blogger is a free blog site, eventually there will be a website for much of this information and more, like links to show registration sites and such. It would help pay for the hosting.

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See ya at the shows,
Christi