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Is a bullmastiff right for me?

Loverboy Skyline

Well-Known Member
Why would you hit your dog in the nose? If they are chewing on furnature it's boredom and or separatation anxiety. Just give them a bone or Kong to chew on everytime you catch him. Then just spray your furnature down with apple cider vinegar. If your dog lunges at anything for any reason you don't have control of him. Positive only is simply not using shock or prong collars, not hitting them for any reason, not rubbing their nose in mess spots(they have no idea wtf you're doing when you do that anyway) not doing the stupid ceaser Milan side kick to "distract them" all that shit does is make a dog aggressive. Since 90% of people don't know what they are doing and just want to be "dominant" and be "alpha" and just make an aggressive dog and look like a complete bafoon. Unless you're training a military level personal protection dog you don't need any of those things.

Now if you need to nudge a dog or grab their collar to move them you can, as long as you're not hitting or hanging them to do so. I've trained all my dogs and had proper training, including when I was in the army. I never had to use anything like that. The only caviat to that is during a dog fight. I prefer a bite stick or just the wheelbarrow method(which I usually use) all that you have to do a dominance roll and show dominance and be the alpha you need to show them who's boss is so stupid it drives me crazy, let alone has been disproven tremendously.

All dogs are like small children. Do you beat the shit out of them if do something they don't understand that's wrong until they obey out of paralyzing terror? Or do you teach them what you want and praise them when they finally get it? It's literally that simple.

Well I did train at a high level of protection so I did need those compulsive measures in the past. I don't now. I put away the prong collar because I don't need it to teach my house pet precise heeling and obedience anymore. He just needs enough training to be a good pet, and anyone with half a brain can train positively at that level. However, if he's going after a Cain Toad I draw the line. I'm not going to go back into the house, open up my bag of treats and offer it to him to come in!! I'm going to do whatever it takes to get him away from that poisonous toad because I don't want a dead dog.

BTW You don't come in here suggesting that anyone beats the sh## out of dogs when you don't even know them! There's also such a thing as tough love. I had a gf who never ever disciplined her son, and I couldn't stand visiting her house because he was such a spoiled brat! You can easily go wrong by being too weak in discipline also. My AB was the dog who got the most corrections because I trained him at the highest level, but he performed because he did it for me! Ask anyone who trains a dog for weight pull what's the most important trait in a weight puller. It's not necessarily strength that wins, it's the desire to please your owner. He beat an IWPA Gold Medalist in one of those competitions. He could have easily given it a good try and stopped, but he reached in and gave it that 110 pct to win. That dog would do anything for me, and you don't get that by beating a dog unnecessarily and losing his trust!
 

Boxergirl

Well-Known Member
More rambling thoughts from me, lol.

The thing is that prongs are not needed to teach precise heeling or a competition heel. Plenty of trainers do it without those tools. Compulsive measures aren't absolutely necessary to train protection sports. That was the point of posting the titles achieved by +R trainers. Also, there is no "purely positive" or "positive only." Those terms aren't used in the +R community by trainers that understand the four quadrants of learning. There are consequences in reward based training, they just aren't the same physical kinds of consequences that many compulsion based trainers use. Positive is NOT permissive. If someone has a bratty dog it's because they aren't doing it right and need someone competent to help them. Rules and structure are absolutely part of positive training. The most important part, in my opinion, because dogs do what works. Following the rules gets them what they want.

Some thoughts from a reputable trainer on purely positive and another article that explains progressive reinforcement training.

https://www.clickertraining.com/positive-reinforcement-trainer-thoughts
https://www.clickertraining.com/node/988
https://progressivereinforcementtraining.com/manifesto/

And lastly, I find many people in certain sports and with certain breeds can be particularly set in the idea that many things aren't possible with reward based training. I'm not pointing the finger at anyone in particular or anyone on this forum, just making a general observation from years of promoting positive methods. Trainers of the largest and fiercest animals in the world use positive reinforcement and cooperative care to administer treatment and to train these animals. For instance here's a wolf doing a chin rest, cooperative care with an alligator, and a voluntary blood draw with a honey badger. We've learned SO much in the last couple of decades. I am a crossover trainer, so I've done it all. I will no longer use compulsion or aversive training methods. There are better ways that teach lasting behaviors and cause no harm. That's a very important phrase. Cause no harm. Poorly timed corrections can have disastrous results and can ruin an animal. Poorly timed rewards just mean that you don't get the desired behavior.

https://video-ort2-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v...=cf9181ff14648491a4547ffdcf73cadc&oe=60ABD7BA
https://fb.watch/5HtIiip_RB/
 

Loverboy Skyline

Well-Known Member
More rambling thoughts from me, lol.

The thing is that prongs are not needed to teach precise heeling or a competition heel. Plenty of trainers do it without those tools. Compulsive measures aren't absolutely necessary to train protection sports. That was the point of posting the titles achieved by +R trainers. Also, there is no "purely positive" or "positive only." Those terms aren't used in the +R community by trainers that understand the four quadrants of learning. There are consequences in reward based training, they just aren't the same physical kinds of consequences that many compulsion based trainers use. Positive is NOT permissive. If someone has a bratty dog it's because they aren't doing it right and need someone competent to help them. Rules and structure are absolutely part of positive training. The most important part, in my opinion, because dogs do what works. Following the rules gets them what they want.

Some thoughts from a reputable trainer on purely positive and another article that explains progressive reinforcement training.

https://www.clickertraining.com/positive-reinforcement-trainer-thoughts
https://www.clickertraining.com/node/988
https://progressivereinforcementtraining.com/manifesto/

And lastly, I find many people in certain sports and with certain breeds can be particularly set in the idea that many things aren't possible with reward based training. I'm not pointing the finger at anyone in particular or anyone on this forum, just making a general observation from years of promoting positive methods. Trainers of the largest and fiercest animals in the world use positive reinforcement and cooperative care to administer treatment and to train these animals. For instance here's a wolf doing a chin rest, cooperative care with an alligator, and a voluntary blood draw with a honey badger. We've learned SO much in the last couple of decades. I am a crossover trainer, so I've done it all. I will no longer use compulsion or aversive training methods. There are better ways that teach lasting behaviors and cause no harm. That's a very important phrase. Cause no harm. Poorly timed corrections can have disastrous results and can ruin an animal. Poorly timed rewards just mean that you don't get the desired behavior.

https://video-ort2-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v...=cf9181ff14648491a4547ffdcf73cadc&oe=60ABD7BA
https://fb.watch/5HtIiip_RB/
I actually do have experience with clickers. I watched the forced retrieve being done, and it made me sick to see it, so I used clicker training to do it with my AB who was not a natural retriever. The first session you click and reward when the dog looks in the direction of the dumbbell and you repeat it several times. The next session you click and reward when he looks at the dumbbell. Get the picture? He doesn't even bite the dumbell until the 4th or 5th session. Yes, I did skip a few steps when my dog progressed quicker on his own, but it took a lot of time and patience. So the trainer is left with a dilemma. Get it all done in 1-3 sessions with compulsion or take 10-15 sessions with positive only. The deadline for the trial is coming up and your dog needs to be polished in a month. What do you do? This is what the trainers face for better or worse. The judge doesn't care how you trained your dog, but he does want to see a happy enthusiastic dog at the trial, so there is a good built in incentive to train motivationally.
 

Boxergirl

Well-Known Member
I actually do have experience with clickers. I watched the forced retrieve being done, and it made me sick to see it, so I used clicker training to do it with my AB who was not a natural retriever. The first session you click and reward when the dog looks in the direction of the dumbbell and you repeat it several times. The next session you click and reward when he looks at the dumbbell. Get the picture? He doesn't even bite the dumbell until the 4th or 5th session. Yes, I did skip a few steps when my dog progressed quicker on his own, but it took a lot of time and patience. So the trainer is left with a dilemma. Get it all done in 1-3 sessions with compulsion or take 10-15 sessions with positive only. The deadline for the trial is coming up and your dog needs to be polished in a month. What do you do? This is what the trainers face for better or worse. The judge doesn't care how you trained your dog, but he does want to see a happy enthusiastic dog at the trial, so there is a good built in incentive to train motivationally.

My post wasn't directed at you, Loverboy Skyline, so I wasn't insinuating you don't know how to use a clicker. I know exactly how compulsion training works, being a crossover trainer, just like I understand how clicker training works. I do get the picture. It's my strong opinion that if someone needs to use compulsion training to get a behavior for a sport trial with a deadline then they planned poorly and should skip that trial and wait for the next one. Unless it's truly a matter of life and death I don't see the need to forego positive training for punishment based training. To me that makes it about the ego of the trainer rather than the well-being of the dog. This is my opinion. I suspect we'll have to agree to disagree. Hopefully someone lurking will gain some good information from our discussions - whichever way they lean in training theory. Differing opinions aren't a bad thing.
 

Loverboy Skyline

Well-Known Member
More rambling thoughts from me, lol.

The thing is that prongs are not needed to teach precise heeling or a competition heel. Plenty of trainers do it without those tools. Compulsive measures aren't absolutely necessary to train protection sports. That was the point of posting the titles achieved by +R trainers. Also, there is no "purely positive" or "positive only." Those terms aren't used in the +R community by trainers that understand the four quadrants of learning. There are consequences in reward based training, they just aren't the same physical kinds of consequences that many compulsion based trainers use. Positive is NOT permissive. If someone has a bratty dog it's because they aren't doing it right and need someone competent to help them. Rules and structure are absolutely part of positive training. The most important part, in my opinion, because dogs do what works. Following the rules gets them what they want.

Some thoughts from a reputable trainer on purely positive and another article that explains progressive reinforcement training.

https://www.clickertraining.com/positive-reinforcement-trainer-thoughts
https://www.clickertraining.com/node/988
https://progressivereinforcementtraining.com/manifesto/

And lastly, I find many people in certain sports and with certain breeds can be particularly set in the idea that many things aren't possible with reward based training. I'm not pointing the finger at anyone in particular or anyone on this forum, just making a general observation from years of promoting positive methods. Trainers of the largest and fiercest animals in the world use positive reinforcement and cooperative care to administer treatment and to train these animals. For instance here's a wolf doing a chin rest, cooperative care with an alligator, and a voluntary blood draw with a honey badger. We've learned SO much in the last couple of decades. I am a crossover trainer, so I've done it all. I will no longer use compulsion or aversive training methods. There are better ways that teach lasting behaviors and cause no harm. That's a very important phrase. Cause no harm. Poorly timed corrections can have disastrous results and can ruin an animal. Poorly timed rewards just mean that you don't get the desired behavior.

https://video-ort2-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v...=cf9181ff14648491a4547ffdcf73cadc&oe=60ABD7BA
https://fb.watch/5HtIiip_RB/
You make a good point saying there are no positive only trainers. I think all trainers fall somewhere in a scale with 1 being primarily negative and 10 being primarily positive, and you can still be a 10 if you have to step in with force to save a dog from danger. Honestly I think I'm a 7 or 8. My Schutzhund President was probably a 3 or 4, but his dogs still looked really good at the trials, and I'll also say he was far better at it than me. I look for positive methods when I can but I don't rule out the use of other techniques when they are effective and the dog doesn't get traumatized over them. I don't think a pet owner needs a prong collar at all, but I can see why competitors use them. It's not good enough that the dog follows your lead, he also has to line up precisely with you and be straight, which kind of bothers me because it's unnecessary, but that's how they separate great from good. If someone can accomplish all this being a 9 or 10, then that's really impressive, my hat's off to them. I'm not the bad guy here. I've seen the people you would label as bad guys, and I knew them personally. They weren't bad people and they loved their dogs. They just happened to be very competitive and worked regular jobs and didn't have tons of time on their hands.