All right, folks. Today we’re going to discuss crate training. I’ve had many of you tell me that your dogs hate their crates. And sometimes it gets so bad that you’re willing to risk leaving that dog out to get into God knows what, destroy God knows what, or potentially hurt itself just to avoid the fight over the crate. But, folks, if you understand the basics we’ve already discussed, this doesn’t have to be a fight. If you understand how to load your marker—and your marker

Let’s talk about possession and resource guarding. The two can look very similar in practice, and both can become extremely dangerous when they’re handled poorly. You may have a dog hovering over an item, clenching a toy between its paws and teeth, stiffening when you approach, guarding a food bowl, or refusing to relinquish a ball, stuffy, blanket, bite sleeve, or whatever else the dog has decided is valuable. And sometimes, if you push the issue: That dog is perfectly willi

All right, folks. I’ve recently been inundated with behavior questions. Reactivity. Dogs losing their minds at windows and fence lines. Dogs with bite histories. Dogs whose owners feel like they’ve tried everything and are looking for the thing that is finally going to fix this problem. And very often, when I start talking to those owners, I tell them: Go load your clicker. Or your verbal marker. I don’t care whether your marker is click-click, yes, or something else entirely

All right, guys. Let’s take a moment to talk about why board-and-trains are so expensive. First, let’s break it down in terms of just basic boarding costs. Our regular boarding rate here at the farm is $50 per night. That’s for us to play with your dog, feed him or her, provide exercise opportunities, keep them in a nice, clean space, monitor them for any health issues or distress, and generally make sure they have a good time and make it home to you safe and sound. It’s a lo

One of the most overlooked environmental stressors I see in pet dogs has nothing to do with training, genetics, exercise, or nutrition. It’s scent. More specifically, it’s the endless parade of wax melts, plug-ins, essential oil diffusers, scented candles, air fresheners, carpet powders, odor eliminators, and heavily fragranced cleaning products that many of us have become accustomed to filling our homes with. Humans generally experience the world visually. Dogs experience th

One of the questions I get quite a bit is what type of dogs are candidates for e-collar training. People often ask if it depends on drive, intensity, breed, temperament, or whether the dog has to be made of some special substance to handle an e-collar. The short answer is no. I’ve trained everything from Malinois and Dutch Shepherds to Yorkies with e-collars. There is a grain of truth to the idea that drive influences how an e-collar is applied. Generally speaking, the more h