Dog Training: The Six Common Mistakes To Avoid
When new trainers start the training process, they tend to make a lot of mistakes in their techniques and approach. There are few mistakes that are fairly common among most trainers.
Expecting too much- True dog lovers usually expect too much and often make this mistake. This happens only when they watch the well trained dog or neighbor’s dog doing some tricks like that of any sitcom characters. This also happens when they go to the park and see all the dog owners enjoying the company of their dogs that are obedient and well trained. At that moment, they tend to forget all the time and money that has been spent to train these dogs.
Giving up Soon- It is the mistake of giving up. Unfortunately, they lack the patience or commitment to achieve the result they want their dog to do. Finally, the owners decide that their pet can’t learn to play Frisbee at all just because it could not learn in an hour.
Positive reinforcement- Many frustrated trainers go home with deprived results because they forget to reward their dogs for doing well. Rewards must be consistent, just like the training. The dog which always receive only correction and never gets rewarded will get frustrated.
Negative reinforcement- Trainer who spends his whole day during the training process will be looking for the dog to make a mistake, so that they can be corrected. This is a major mistake done by novice trainers because when you focus only in finding the mistakes of your dog, you will then fail to identify and reward all the good behaviors.
Techniques- While it important to glean wisdom from other trainers experiences, using everything you hear can be detrimental. Each trainer has different ideas of how things should be done and trying to incorporate all of them will frustrate you and your pet. Rather, choose a method that works for you and be consistent and you will see much better results.
Training Period- After certain period of training, most people assume that the training is over. Training is a learning process and there is no end to it. The dog can learn so many commands and behavioral lessons if you will be training them in a good manner. So why do you want to stop? Dog would love to learn more and more! So keep training.
With the knowledge of these mistakes that are often committed by trainers, you can recognize some of the common feelings that you might have encountered while training your dog. So it is better to stem in the initial stages itself before they become a problem.
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