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Banger · Regular

In our quest to find a method for Max we borrowed the Jan Fennel book from the library and tried her methods. We tried the ignore idea on re-uniting and the bowl eating. I'm sure I could hear Max sniggering when we were eating out of his bowl.

Also we have a fairly reliable on leash/long line recall already.

Just reading back to Marrus post, £250 Surprised

gypsygirl · Dogaholic

Just curious as to what happened to Banger posting at 4.07pm It seems to end with the one I made earlier. Question

gypsygirl · Dogaholic

Ok now it is showing up on page 6 before it only showed as going to P5.

gypsygirl · Dogaholic

Eating out of the dogs bowl. Did she really say that? You are lucky Max was only sniggering. I'm sure mine would be in a full "roll on the laughter" mode..

Banger · Regular

Gypsy this woman has had a TV series, two books and charges £250 for a one off consultancy plus mileage. We have tried a lot of weird and whacky stuff including one behaviourist told us that licking lips and yawning was a good thing to try as appeasement and that was an APBC member. Shocked

gypsygirl · Dogaholic

Banger I did try to read her book but the libary here doesn't carry it and I certainly wasn't going to buy it. So all I know about her is what I have read on this thread. Sorry to be blunt but she sounds like a bit of a crakpot to me. A talented crackpot but still a crackpot. When you are dealing with desperate situation as you were you will try anything. Everyone would. Licking lips and yawing are calming signal to a dog but only useful in certain situations. I'm so glag that you have found a method that works with Max. I check your web site and he is a beautiful dog. I especially like his straight back legs. Mine have those too. I love German Shepherds but I have alway hated those (as I call them) rabbit legs that up to a few years ago were so prevelant..
Please excuse any spelling mistakes ( never my strong point) I've had a few glasses of rasberry wine.

SpeedsMum · DogChat Moderator

She is indeed a crackpot. And a dangerous one at that - Speeds behaviour got worse because of her methods!
We used to go to a BAGSD club down in Coventry, and the whole Jan Fennel Dog Listener cr*p was the way they did things - we were told to do the ignoring, "demoting" stuff with Speed, and use distraction [her favourite toy] when around other dogs and we did it for nearly seven months. i was assured it would work, was even pointed at several GSDs it had worked on.
She didn't get any better around other dogs, but nine times out of ten she wouldn't pay them any attention. Unfortunately that other one time out of ten got us in trouble. She started to only listen to eithr of us when we had possession of her toy.
She also started to be aggressive towards people, something that had NEVER happened in the first six/seven months of us having her.
i've been putting off having my say on this thread, but i can't hold my tongue any longer - if just one person thinks twice about using her "methods" it wil be worth it.
i genuinely believe that that woman's books should be taken out of print before she does any more damage to dogs and their owners. Evil or Very Mad

Annette

AquaTJ · Regular

Sorry to hear you've had trouble with Speed and her dog aggression, I hope it was nothing too grim Shocked

This is the problem with any method though, the dog still has it's own mind and even if a dog appeared 'cured' I would still be paranoid of that 1 occasion in 10 that may mean the dog decides to act on previous form Sad

I am still planning on the stooge dog route with Kelly ( who is a bully as you know ) I hope to change her attitude around other dogs but I think she needs a personality transplant first Rolling Eyes

SpeedsMum · DogChat Moderator

It was pretty grim!!! She charged at this poor lad that was just walking down the path in the park. He wasn't doing anything to distract her, and there had been many other people walk down the path with no objection from her, but she just charged full pelt at him and barked her head off!!
When she'd done barking, she came back, but charged again before i could grab her collar. The second time, she didn't just charge at him, she jumped up and it *looked* like she tried to bite him. i'm not 100% sure she did try, cos i wasn't close enough to see, but needless to say he was frightened out of his wits Sad

She's not been offlead around ANYone or any dog since!
Hope the stooge dog stuff works! Speed and i did go for quite a few socialisation walks in Colwick with dogs of all shapes and sizes, thinking that perhaps her problem was down to lack of social skills or something, and she was fine with them, so long as i had her frisbee but still had issues with others and would still explode at the dogs she knew if i didn't have her bloomin toy, so that method didn't do anything for us Sad

Do let me know how you get on though! The trainer you're going to does seem to know her stuff from what i've read about her Smile

Annette

AquaTJ · Regular

Poor you - it can be terrifying when you don't know what the trigger is going to be 'today'! With Kelly, it is 100 % bully tactics with all dogs so she is never allowed to mix but with Casper and his fear aggression, he used to be just permanently terrified but has acually improved so much in the year that I've had him, that he now only looks twice at a few people. This is actually worse to live with as you are more likely to be caught unawares! So far I am still keeping him on a lead around anyone as I still feel I will never be able to trust him fully - it is hard work. Good luck to you and Speed, I will let you know how we get on. At the moment we have a transport problem which has scuppered my plans for now but we are hoping to have an assessment next month some time Very Happy

Masairotts · Dogaholic

Speedsmum,
As you are in the midlands,i would suggest you contact Debbie Connaly at Canine Lifeline,she is one of the best GSD trainers I have ever met and no she does not use ecollars.
Paul

theswing0 · New Here

I can't believe my ears, people can be so easy to condone someone elses methods when no-one understands them. I'm sure everybody would agree to that if a personal attack was made on their training methods, they would be the first to shout out.

So why can people attack something they have not researched into?

Silverwolf has hit the nail on the head in many posts when she says;

"New owners and anyone with problems should be encouraged to explore for themselves ALL the options available: I have a problem with choke-chains, for example, because I have seen the physical damage they can do - you clearly think that treat training is damaging, and of course you are entitled to that opinion, although many will dispute it. If you genuinely believe that 8-10 weeks of stock training by your methods will suit each and every dog, no matter what their problem, then good luck to you. I must admit, when I started out, I was sure that 'my' training methods would suit every dog and would always work. Fortunately, one happy little fellow set out to prove me wrong, and once I'd swallowed my pride and broadened my horizons, I became a much better trainer/behaviourist for it. Adapting to suit the dog is critical: there is no 'one method fits all' in the world of dogs."

I won't post all the comments i agree with, but i think that one suffices for the moment.

It is easy to fall into the trap whereby one person thinks that their method is the only way (because of the 100% success rate), when the clients are vetted and rejected as being "untrainable".

I'm sure that if ALL Reward/Treat based trainers took this approach than 100% of all their clients would achieve results within a fixed period.

The grey area which falls outside the above parameters are quite often the minority of which we hear about with the "Problem Dogs" and need the help. It's a shame that we done hear of the vast majority that work out perfectly.

Sorry to bable on, I have purposely generalised in my statements as banding names about can see to offend. This is NOT an attack on any one person it is just my plea to get things into perspective as some of the postings here are making things difficult to be objective.

I have some knowledge about Jan Fennell's methods, and although not totally convinced about all of them, quite a few have proved VERY effective.

But before i make any further conclusions, i am going to find out more. I shall be going to one of her seminars. THEN i will be in a better position to make judgement on whether her methods are valid to ME.

Regards,

The Swing.

LisaLQ · DogChat Moderator

Hi "The Swing"...
I think you'll find this thread was over a year old when you replied to it - so you may not get much response Wink

Welcome to the board.
Lisa