I had the pleasure of spending a bit of time at my sister’s home recently. Like me, she is a dog lover. She has two boisterous boys named Harley and Rocky. Rocky is a small, Jack Russell sized mixed breed and is just the most social dog ever. When we arrived, we were greeted with the customary excited barking and Harley quickly retired to his toys and his dog bed. Rocky, on the other hand, wanted my attention. He wanted it now, now, NOW! He let me know this by jumping up toward me with his tail wagging so hard that he could barely keep his feet on the floor.

Having arrived in 2012, an era projected in science fiction movies decades ago, I find myself both amazed and shocked by turns at what has actually come to pass. In an era where managing my diabetes no longer means an early death and the Internet puts with worlds knowledge at my fingertips, people still believe that aggressive behaviour in dogs is breed specific and that electronic shock collars are a good idea to manage a dog’s behaviour.

Is your dog smart? I know both my dogs are. I think if you ask any dog owner, they would have dozens of stories to show how clever their canine companions can be. Our dogs seem to have some pretty amazing abilities from being able to work out how to steal an appetizer from the table while we’re not looking to knowing when it’s time to for dinner even before we do. And that’s just the stuff they pick up on their own.

After making our change to positive training, my wife and I decided on a new motto for ourselves. “Each dog better than the last.” Before we moved to training our dogs with behavioural science and positive methods, our approach consisted mostly of trying to keep unwanted behaviours in check and get a standard set of behaviours in place. We didn’t really have much more of a goal that just a dog that didn’t disrupt things too much and provided us good companionship.

Dogs live on farms, in high rise apartments, suburban homes, and even on the road with their humans. We love our dogs in all of their various shapes and sizes. But can we love them wrong? Can we love them too much? It’s an interesting question. Maybe we can love them to death, literally.

It’s fun to explore things in depth and see where they come from, where they go, and even if we can be better or smarter about them. I tend to be scientific in my approach to most things. I like to break them down, see how they work, and be able to put them back together again. But I recognize that not everyone shares my systematic approach to dogs and dog training. So why is “science” considered a bad thing by so many dog trainers? Just a thing that makes me go “hmmm” I guess.

How do we know when our dog is “doing it wrong”? The immediate answer would seem to be that the dog is not doing the behaviour as requested (cued, commanded, choose your word). On the face of it, it seems a pretty easy thing to determine. But if we dig a little deeper, we could ask why our dog isn’t performing as we expected. And this is where it gets interesting.

Part 3 of a series on rehabilitating a dog after a serious health issue. Trainer and behaviourist Eric Brad could have looked for a training solution to the changes in his dog Tiramisu’s behaviour. Instead, he sought out the help of veterinary health care professionals to help solve the mystery of why a once vibrant and active dog was suddenly shutting down. Encouragement, support, and advice from both friends and professionals ultimately came together to find a solution. And what a relief it was for both Eric and his dog!

One of the things I say frequently about dogs and their owners is , “You can’t tell someone how to raise their child and you can’t tell them how to raise their dog.” Like politics or religion, a discussion about how to train or raise a dog can invoke strong emotions and strong opinions across a pretty wide spectrum. Everyone seems to have their preferred authorities and philosophies.