Dog Obedience Training For Your Pet Dog

A dog’s understanding can be compared to that of a two year old human child. However, a dog’s senses are not like ours. Not only do they perceive shades of red and green differently than humans, but their noses are extremely sensitive in comparison. A dog’s mind also processes information in an entirely different manner. In order to limit a trainer’s frustration and misbehavior on the dog’s part, it is critical to remember these differences.

By instinct, dogs are still pack animals. They are actually descended from wolves, also pack animals, who are social animals and work best within a hierarchy where all members interact with each other appropriately.

Training can start as early as possible. For some breeds, four weeks is a good time to start. For the first several months, you should allocate at least thirty minutes per day, though a full hour is preferred, for training.

While housebreaking your dog is a bit more complicated (and we will discuss this in another article), there are a few basic dog training techniques that all training should follow.

When training your dog, you want to make it clear that you are the dominant one as early as possible. Dogs are pack animals by nature, and every pack has a natural pecking order. The top dog is the alpha. It is followed by the beta dog and so on. If you want sanity in your household and you want a happy dog who knows where he stands, you need to step up and be the alpha of his pack.

Depending on the breed of the dog, or sometimes the individual dog, the training technique that is used will be either more difficult or possibly easier. Some dogs are more outgoing, similar to humans. Attitude is what counts the most, though training tools like collars and leashes, and commands are also useful. Your dog should never be allowed to think he is in charge.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that you have to use physical force to assert that you’re in charge. Occasionally you’ll need to use proper physical restraint, but being firm and confident will usually be sufficient for training your dog.

When they are young, try putting them on their backs with your hand firmly on their chest. When their paws go down they are signaling that they recognize your authority. Sometimes doing this in combination with close eye-to-eye contact helps, since this is the language in which dogs speak.

Begin by using a short leash which will hinder the dog’s natural tendency to run and play. It is essential to allow some free time for the dog to run in order to promote good health however. Initially, this time should be scheduled before or after training but not during.

Use single word commands like sit, stay, down, in a firm tone. Always keep your voice the same or each command but make sure each of the different commands sounds different to your dog. You should avoid using double-word commands like ’sit down’ or ’stay down’ as these words are similar and can confuse your dog.

Use the same tone, look and hand gesture with each verbal command. Eventually these can be used independently of one another. It is essential, however to provide the simplest, most consistent form of communication when beginning the training.

Remember that dogs have a word understanding roughly equal to a toddler so you need to keep your meanings simplistic. For example, don’t use the verbal command “Down” to mean lay down as well as to indicate not to jump. This will just confuse your dog - stick to 1 meaning per word.

Using these basic dog training techniques, along with a firm hand, some patience and a lot of love will help you have a happy and obedient pet for life!