Post by taylor on Oct 24, 2007 5:37:13 GMT -5
A guy over on Als board had a problem with his dog, he has a two year old Airedale that is 75lbs and will not fight even to protect him self. He has even backed down from a cat ( house cat ) and he posted something to the order that I wish my dog had some nuts. I posted him back and told him to give me a call and I would try and help him . I got some feed back that gave me the impression that I was trying to keep info back from every one of acting as if I had a secrete way so this is what I wrote back may be some one here can use it some time ( or some thing like it ) And know I dot have the market cornered on training or any thing of the like
. Taylor Johnson Re: I wish my dog would grow some ....s
« Reply #8 on: October 23, 2007, 08:22:46 PM »
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Boys I sure don't have the market cornered on training my self but most the time a dog has a switch some time you can turn them on or you can turn them off but with out knowing this dogs history it would be hard to bounce ideas off one another and see if we can figure it out . I asked him to call me not to keep any thing a secret but to talk to him about his dog and on top of that my typing skills are pore to begin with and know that I am rehabilitating my hand and arm it is piss pore to say the least very stiff and sore . Like I said the little I know about this dog it is hard to say much about him , on the surface I would say that he has some weak nerves but I don't know how old he was when he started trying him on something as far as fighting goes. I my self think that there is little to know excuse for a terrier of any type to act this way at the age of two but there are some extreme things that can happen to a dog to destroy his confidence before he is grown. This dog might be a very immature dog for his age ( I think this would be a fault to ) . We could go on and on about if this dog has got faults worth dealing with and if he should ever be bred ( I have strong doubts about this ) . If he was mine I would probably get rid of him and get a different dog ( again with the little I know about him ) but I would bet Mike does not want to do this or he would not be asking for help . There are things you can do to build a dogs confidence it is slow and a lot of work but it can be done it would all depend on how much time Mike has to fool with his dog. As far as being sure fired and training dogs goes NOPE , sure wish that I did but as far as dogs go from what I have seen at best you can improve your odds with a for ever changing creature ( the creature being the dog ) .
I had a Plott pup that I got at a dog swap one time and he was a monster , way bigger than the ones that we had raised out of are stock that were about the same age. He was a beautiful dog and seemed to have a good out going personality , was not with drawn around other dogs but would not fight to save his life it did not seem . All the pups would start to fight and carry on and he would just get away from them if it got rough at all . Ones I started working them on coon it was the same thing , he would bark a little but mostly just run around behind the other pups it was like his head was not even in it . My Dad and every one else told me to put some lead in him and to quit messing with it , we had to many good dogs that were tearing hide up to be wasting time with a dog like him . In all reality he was right but I was 16 years old and had all the time in the world plus I was bull headed and didn't want any one to tell me I could not do some thing. I started working him by him self on coon and he was very stand offish about the hole thing . It went on like this for some time ( many weeks ) . This pup had one female that he would hand with all the time when they were loose together if you seen her he would be right behind her. She was one of the pups that we were going to keep so as the other pups went to there new homes she got more one on one time as far as working her would go. I noticed that if I loaded her up and let him he would get real cranked up but if I was leaving her home and taking one of the other pups he would bark and carry on a little but his heart was not in it he really did not care ( kind of like when he was around a coon in a roll cage . So I thought I would try some thing , I trapped a coon and put it in a roll cage and hauled it way out in the woods to an old gravel pit and I left it there. I then went home and loaded up Moose and the female that he likes so much . I drove them around in the back of the truck for about an hour on back roads stooping every now and them to take them off and walk them around a bit until I hooked a lop back toward the coon in the gravel pit. I drove up to the pit and turned the truck aloud and backed up so they could see the roll cage at about 50 yards or so . This time I just unloaded the female and walked her over to the coon and let her bay him all the wile telling here that she was a good girl and making a big fuss over her. Moose was about to loose his mind in the back of the truck but I just left him there by him self . I let that female bay and raise cane for about 5 or 10 minutes then I took her back to the truck and hauled her and him home and tied them up . I did this three more times each and every time parking him a little closer to the coon and the female that he looked up to and just made him watch her work. This seemed to be working it was getting him worked up in fact he was getting agitated and new what was coming by the time I turned the truck around Moose was already getting pumped up and ready to go and he didn't even know why for sure. About the 4th day I took him and tide him to the bumper wile the female got some contact with the cage wouldn't you know it he was acting like he might want a piece of that coon but i did not let him have any yet. He had a few more sessions like this one and then I let him by the cage but I did keep him on a leash to hold him back ( some time a dog has a lot more confidence if they are held back a little bit, ya know what there are a lot of guys like this to ) . After some of this he was right in there foaming at the mouth and baying like a champ. Ones he got a chance to bite a coon it was the same thing I held him back until his buddy finished the job then I tied her up and put the dead coon right in front of him so he could just about reach it but not quit . All this holding him back was making him hate coons , driving him nuts , and most of all giving him confidence . Not one time in all of this did he get bit up or hurt in any way so he thought he was pretty tough and there was know reason for him not to think this way heck he was a big tough dog he just did not know it for sure ( just like Mikes dog probably ) . By the time he got to stretch a coon with that female he was nuts and when it bit him it just pissed him off , now it was not a big bad bore it wasn't much of a coon at all but he thrashed it like a champ and I will tell ya by the time he was an old dog he had killed more coons than most hounds out there and a bunch of them were big and bad . For some reason he lost confidence or did not have it but I took it upon my self to try and get him some back and it worked. Would I put that much time into the same dog again these days ? Probably not . I had a reason for doing what I did and that was to show my Dad that I could do what he said I could not do and it was my dog that I paid for with out any help and I did not want to fail or admit that I was wrong and on top of all of that I liked the dog. Mike has to decide how much he likes his dog and how much time and money he wants to put into his dog , me or know one else can answer that queston for him it is up to him but if he wants to put the time into his dog and if I can help him out than I sure will try . I have seen some guys make some pretty sorry dogs get the job done out of necessity ( just because it was the only dog that they had and they wanted to hunt bad ) . But once again I have know sure fired ways of doing any thing and I sure ain't trying to keep any secretes , just didn't feel like typing . I would still think it best if I could talk to Mike about his dog , all of these written words back and forth leave a lot to be desired in comparison to good old fashion bull sessions . Taylor Johnson
