Teach Your Dog to Target

Lisa uses nose targeting to teach Willow where to stand on the standup paddle board

Targeting is the first thing I teach my dog. It’s also one of the first things I help a client teach their dog. Targeting is easy to train, dogs love the exercise, and once trained there are myriad of uses in daily life. But what is targeting? When I describe the goal of targeting—teaching your […]

The Changing Face of Dog Training

A virtual dog training session in progress

It’s a virtual world. I used to think that term only referred to playing “virtual” video games, but it seems to be a part of everyone’s life these days, no matter where you live in the world. I started working virtually in 1998 as an executive recruiter. When I entered professional dog training in 2004 […]

How to Prevent Your Dog From Begging at the Table

Do you feed your dog from the table? If you answered “yes,” you’re not alone. That act alone doesn’t necessarily mean your dog will beg for food while you’re eating.  With Thanksgiving around the corner, no one wants a begging dog at the table. It’s not the fact that you feed food from your plate that […]

The Poop Patrol. Steps for teaching your dog to help clean up.

Is your dog a member of The Poop Patrol? If you teach your dog to “find their poop” then it makes cleaning up much easier!  When we were on vacation visiting Bob and Susan Ryder of Pawsitive Transformations some time ago, I watched Daisy help Bob clean up. I thought it was so fun that […]

Tug of War, What is it Good For?

I actually prefer the term Tug of Love. It’s hard to imagine that it was once thought that playing tug with your dog would cause him to become aggressive. Thankfully, we now know that’s not true. What “is” true is the number of benefits derived from playing tug with your dog.  There are many! Let’s take […]

New Year’s Resolutions

An estimated 40 to 45% of American adults make one or more resolutions this time of year. By far, the top 3 new year’s resolutions are: – weight loss, – exercise program, – stop smoking. Other popular resolutions deal with debt reduction and better money management in the year to come. But what about including […]

Why Sit? | Train Your Dog to Sit

Sit. This seems to be the first behavior people think of when they start training their dogs. Have you ever wondered why we teach sit? Some say that its goes back to the competition obedience ring. But what if you don’t compete in that sport? Why should you train your dog to sit? The reason […]

Catch This! How to get more of what you want from your dog.

What do a phone, a remote control, a clicker and a jar of treats have in common? They’re all within easy reach! What does your dog do? Here’s question for you: does your dog ever do something you like, on her own, without being asked? For example: Does your dog sit politely when you’re working in […]