oldogre said:
How did you train your dog, my baby is too old to be shocked so any alternative method would be much appreciated. I could never submit the love of my life to shock training, just me. I would appreciate any advice. Also have you had any encounters with scorpions and dogs, just wandering?
To truly answer that is an extremely long answer. This Cliff Notes version won't do justice, but here it is.
You need to have a good sit, stay, down, come, etc. The basics must be established first to have a good foundation. The dog needs to know how to learn first before having decent success with more advanced stuff. Teaching boundaries is extremely important. Teaching the dog to pay close attention to you is very important as well. Having a very well developed sense of self control is a must; heeling off leash is the best way I've found to do that.
Then after the basics are accomplished, you can work on the snake thing specifically.
I don't have scorpions here, so no. She has never seen one. Porcupines, yes, but those aren't as big of a problem for me. Although, last year I sent her in front of me into a tunnel and there was a porky in there! I just about screwed up big time. (She likes porkys, too. Not good.) Called her back and everything was fine. I threw a small (1-2 inch long) rotten stick at it. I'm a meany!
I've had dozens of bad encounters with dogs. Yesterday I got in yet another fight with a loose dog. I was checking it for tags and it got all uppity with me. Lol. No one got hurt. He didn't like being choked, but all it took was 2 seconds and he calmed right down. After his hissy fit, I looked for tags, but there were none, so I let him go. Hate to do that, but I'm not the city dog catcher and am not equipped to take in aggressive possibly diseased dogs. My dog won't fight unless I tell her to or I'm down and obviously need help or the dog is on her and won't back off. Even yesterday when the dog started in on me, she waited for me about 5 feet away. I didn't need to look at her to make sure she was still waiting for me. She had fun.
We get out a lot and because of that our encounters, both good and bad, increase much, much, much more than the average person. That's the price I pay for being active and not keeping to myself with loose dogs. I've also reunited many dogs back with their owners.
