It is interesting to see how long various ideas and approaches to training have been around. Many of them appear painfully obvious and yet need to be repeated almost ad nauseam to be remembered and applied. Colonel Konrad Most Training Dogs” (Popular Dogs, 1954) was originally published in 1910 and I want to quote a few sentences from the introductory part, The Theory of Training, to demonstrate this point.

“Individual dogs differ widely both physically and psychologically. For that reason methods of treatment must also vary, not only as between dogs of different breeds, but also between those of the same breed.”

No one would argue with that observation, at least not successfully and it is one of the very first tenets an instructor is supposed to know which makes it all the more surprising how frequently it is seemingly ignored. In many training classes, all exercises are approached in identical fashion for all dogs. The instructor will explain the exercise to be learned and how it is to be taught. Only in the event a problem arises is an effort made to approach the exercise in a perhaps slightly different manner thereby giving explicit recognition to the fact that individual dogs differ. By that time, however, the damage may already have been done; it would have been preferable to apply different methods of treatment in the beginning so that the occurrence of the problem could have been avoided.

“When the dog first starts to learn, only a mild form of compulsion should ever be employed, so as to avoid intimidation and to accustom him, so to speak, to whatever routine behavior it is desired to impose upon him. If then, as training proceeds, stricter compulsion becomes necessary, the dog is already familiar with the routine and can thus much more readily evade the stricter compulsion than would be the case had it been applied at the outset.

When strict compulsion is being used it may not be possible wholly to avoid intimidation. It should, however, be transitory, for strict compulsion must be relaxed or stopped altogether as soon as the object the trainer has in view is achieved.”

Another good point frequently ignored. In many training classes the dogs are introduced to exercises like heeling and the recall, for example, by means of strict compulsion in the form of a sharp jerk, without regard to the fact that this should be avoided when the dog first starts to learn an exercise. As the author suggests, compulsion in the beginning may actually confuse the dog which in turn means that the training will take that much longer. And yet there are still quite a few people who are convinced that the only way to teach an exercise is by means of a sharp jerk, that is, a form of strict compulsion.

“Erroneous application of compulsion is a deeply rooted evil in training.”

If this statement proves anything it is how little things change because it is as true today as it was in 1910. Then as now, much of the training was needlessly harsh and needlessly physical. Some progress has been made over the course of the past 60 years, but not nearly enough and we still have a long way to go. In the words of Colonel Most, “good training needs a kind heart as well as a cool and well-informed head.”

©1974 J.J. Volhard