The more I study, follow, practice, and have conversations with friends and clients, the more I realize how truly complex dog training is. Not complex in the sense it is a difficult activity (for the most part what you put in is what you get out) — but in a sense more goes into it than just understanding what is being taught to you. It is not really a ‘copy and paste’ scenario because we are all so different as handlers. If you have a great attention to detail, are fluent with your movements, and have good timing — likely you may find more success from observing and implementing than someone else.
Many people call and say “ I need my dog trained.” Or “I need my puppy to learn the basics. My dog jumps. My dog pulls on the leash.” In my opinion, most people wait way too long to get their puppies started — and beyond that, most people are responsible for the exact behaviors they are trying to avoid or end up complaining about. I believe most pet owners when they purchase a puppy are not necessarily considering the drive of the dog (or understand such a thing exists), or long term potential. In addition, training really and truly is in the eye of the beholder. What may be “wrong” to one person or be deemed problematic — another person may not care about. Realistically, most people are just looking for a family companion and they want that companion to be a solid member of the household — and sometimes to coexist within the community so the dog can be taken out in public.
A client once said to me after purchasing a puppy, “we were out boating and saw ‘THIS DOG BREED’ and it was so well behaved so we went out and got one.” Ok, well yes…they named an extremely intelligent breed and a breed that learns quickly but could also be very challenging and would not be recommended for an inexperienced owner. They also would never be able to tell me who owned the dog because they were only captivated by what they saw on the outside. Not the blood, sweat and tears that likely went into training the dog. When they ended up purchasing the same breed, their puppy showed true signs of aggression at less than 12 weeks old. So what we run into here is another VERY common problem. Wrong breed for the wrong person. Wrong environment for the breed. Likely not enough research done on the breed or breeding (but even with a good breeding things could not turn out as we expect). I will say the true aggression is rare in such a young puppy and would be something I would immediately be addressing with my breeder.
You simply cannot take “Dog A” and say I want “Dog B” to be “Dog A.” In a sense, that would be like saying you like how a person is and you want to be that person. You can be inspired to be more like that person, but you will never be that person. We have to remember dogs are individuals. We need to identify the talent the dog possesses but also our skill level to extract those talents. This is why even with a trainer so many people continue to struggle despite making their best attempts to follow the information given.
When talking dog training — if I see something I like from another trainer or influencer of course I want to know the steps they took to get there. But what I also have to recognize is the dog I have in front of me. It is my job to simply extract the full potential out of a dog I am training to the best of my capabilities. Therefore it is a two part equation:
What is the full potential the dog is capable of
What are your talents to get you where you need to go with that dog
Any dog trainer has the advantage of putting hands on multiple different puppies and dogs. They are different ages, shapes, sizes, temperaments and the more time spent, the more learning one can achieve. The average pet owner does not encounter multiple dogs on a regular basis.
So why is dog training complex? It is complex because the answer is always: it depends. It depends on the dog. It depends on the handler. The better you are with your skills and the more driven and adaptable the dog…the more you will get.