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Anxiety
What is Fight or Flight in dog behaviour?
The fight or flight response in dog behaviour is an automatic response to something that is, or is perceived to be, scary. When dogs become reactive to something, their flight or flight response has been triggered. Sometimes it’s referred to…
Changing Dog Behaviour using Behaviour Sequences
Behaviour sequences are pretty powerful things when it comes to dog training and behaviour. Dogs recognise them quickly and use them to predict outcomes – good and bad!
Sympathy vs Empathy in Dog Rehabilitation
People often suggest you can reinforce a dogs anxious behaviour by showing sympathy, but is that true? And if you aren’t being sympathetic, does that mean you don’t care? There is a big difference between sympathy and empathy when it…
Do dogs feel guilty?
Many people tell me that their dogs feel guilty about stuff. Maybe they’ve come home to find something has been chewed or broken, or perhaps a little “gift” has been accidentally deposited in the hall! But, can you really trust…
The dogs advocate
Whether you call yourself pack leader, caregiver, dog mum/dad, or owner, today dogs need us to advocate for them more than ever before.
Food guarding in dogs
Food guarding in dogs is a big problem. At best you’ll be on alert much of the time, and at worst it can be dangerous to you, and your dog. But where does it come from, and how can you…
Why you shouldn’t use punishment as a dog training tool
I thought long and hard before writing this blog because I don’t want to be misunderstood. So before I start I want to make it very clear, I do not support the use of punishment as a dog training tool.…
Using Predictors to Reduce your Dogs Anxiety
Dogs are very good at noticing behaviour sequences. Once they spot one, all the steps in that sequence will become predictors of the trigger. If you can figure out the sequence, or create your own, you can often use these…
Is there such a thing as a dominant dog?
The short answer is yes, there are dominant dog, but also no! Yes, because the word dominant actually refers to a role within a relationship. But, no, because I suspect the reason for asking is because the word dominant has…
Why Dogs Guard
There are lots of reason why dogs guard, but they all boil down to the fact that the dog believes something they value highly is at risk of being taken away from them. Whether it’s their favourite person, their security,…
Can dogs experience loneliness?
Dogs are sociable creatures, just like us. So it stands to reason that a dog might experience loneliness, just like we do. But what does that mean and how might it look?
Canine Trauma Rehabilitation
Canine trauma rehabilitation is not quite so straight forward as just desensitising a dog to a trigger. Experiencing trauma (PTSD) will affect the dogs overall mental health. It puts a dogs brain into a higher state of alert making them…