West Coast NDT'ers

[Sang]

Hey everyone, just wanted to reach out and find out how many west coast NDT people there are here. I started a West Coast NDT group on facebook for those of you who are on facebook. If you live on the west coast, or just want to join in, let me know and we can connect on facebook and add you to the group. We plan on having west coast get togethers, and the NDT West facebook group page will be where we make announcements of upcoming get togethers and stuff.

Anyway, just wanted to put that out there.

[Dan]

Hi Sang,

I'm not too far from you in Portland, Oregon. I'm a beginner who built his box last week for a 6 month old mini Australian shepherd.

I've read Kevin's book and watched Neil's DVDs. We've been working on pushing for a couple of weeks and just started on the box several days ago.

-Dan

[Sang]

Awesome Dan. We just had an impromptu NDT West get together last weekend, and will be having more in the future. Will keep you posted as we get closer to our next get together date.

Are you on Facebook? If so, I can add you to the NDT West group there to keep you better in the loop.

[Dan]

I'm not on Facebook. How many were at your meeting and where did you meet?

[Sang]

There were 5 of us total. We met here in Mukilteo, which is about 20 minutes north of Seattle.

Here's a link to just a few of the pics.

Picasa Web Albums - Jenya - NDT West Oct ...

[Dan]

Sang,
Thanks for the pictures. I'm wondering now if I can get my dog to jump up on her crate.

I looked around for a while for Portland, OR natural dog trainers. I'm glad there are other people doing this in the northwest.

[Sang]

Yeah, there aren’t many of us out here on the west coast, but the numbers are growing. I had to spend time with Kevin on the east coast since there wasn’t anyone out here doing NDT when I first got started in it. Since then the number has increased, but it’s still pretty small. I’m just glad to know that there are some other people out here now.

Since your pup is still a youngin’, start with a lower box. As he grows you can move up to a box or raised platform that is higher. But for now, don’t really worry about doing any actual “training” work with him other than helping him learn to settle on the box. He still has a very open temperament, and you don’t want to put any emotional blocks in his temperament by working on trying to get specific behaviors or teaching him to do specific things. That will all come in time once he’s developed a stronger emotional foundation, which will be when he hits about a year old. So just work on the settling on the box/platform, play hide and seek games, and if he wants to bite things, play a little tug with him. Not too hard since he’s still young. You just want to give him an outlet for channeling his desire to bite things into things you want him to bite, ie a toy.

Ok, I know you didn’t ask for any advice, but I threw that out there anyway

And for teaching your pup to settle on the box, if you haven’t seen this already, here’s a link to a video of Kevin working with a very energetic puppy, teaching her to settle on a rock. Hopefully it will help you get a better feel for how to do this with your pup.

Kevin Training Hero The Official Natural Dog Training Website: News, Discussions, Advice, Training Tips and Techniques from Kevin Behan

[Dan]

Thanks Sang!

Great advice. I've probably been doing too much. I've read other training sites which say you can start right away except for corrections. They recommend you wait until the dog is six months old.

So would you recommend just working on pushing and settling on the box? Is that all the training until she's one year old?

Thanks!

[Sang]

I always remember this Michael Douglas line in the movie A Perfect Murder, where he says “Too much education pollutes the soul”. Same for the pups. Too much training early on suppresses the dog’s drive, and then you have to spend a lot of time and energy later, unraveling all the knots that the early training created, to get back to the puppy’s natural temperament so her energy is accessible again so real training can take place.

So yeah, don’t worry too much about doing any actual training with her yet. The box/settle work is the most important thing right now, and maybe a little bit of pushing is cool, with a little tug thrown in for good measure. But at this point in time, the key thing is to not overdo anything. She can only handle so much input, so lay off her as much as you can.

Also, and this is a tough one for lots of people, but don’t overdo the attention either. A bit of it is fine, but don’t put your face in her face, or kiss hier on the head, or let anyone hug her, etc….that kind of stuff, though satisfying for us humans, is only going to build a charge in her and then put a kink in her system, which will have to come out later one way or another.

Hope that helps