Snapping when disciplining-help!

[Claudia807]

My Boxer is almost seven and she gets into the garbage every chance she gets. Lucy is a Canine Good Citizen, Certified Therapy Dog, and has two obedience titles and two agility titles.

It doesn't matter if I am just out of the house long enough to grab the mail from the mailbox - she WILL get into it. We can't win this one, so we just put the garbage on the counter. Voila!

 

[Bers]

I think the majority of the replies to your post here were meant to be helpful and supportive and not at all "snooty". I personally only had the best interest of your dog in mind when I replied to your post. Even though I was disgusted by your out-dated methods of punishment, I still replied in a straight-forward way that I thought would best help you understand why your current course of action is not working, and maybe provoke enough thought on your part to try something different. We do not have a magic solution to trash eating. If it's a problem for you I suggest you train your dog (this does not mean abuse your dog) or manage his environment better. My dog eats trash, too, so I cover the cans and keep him away from areas with uncovered ones. If he gets into the trash, it's MY fault, not his. He is only a dog. If your dog gets in the trash, it's YOUR fault, so next time try knocking yourself over the head for punishment instead of abusing your pet. And yes, hitting and holding down by the neck is abuse. By definition, any punishment that does not result in reducing an unwanted behavior is abuse, plain and simple. Many would argue that any physical punishment at all is abuse, even if it does produce the desired results. I will tell you that I have never hit my dog, and you can take it to the bank. I also don't think my dog is ever bad, only that he has normal doggy behaviors that are incompatible with living with human beings, and if I don't like those behaviors I can take the time to modify them or learn to live with them. So you can whine about everyone being snooty and keep hitting your dog and making lame excuses for it, or you can open your mind and learn something. It's up to you, but your poor dog doesn't have a choice.

 

[Rocco850]

Katie,
Oh my goodness.... where to start...
Just as everyone has stated here, hitting your dog or "holding him down by the neck" is WRONG! What kind of training is that??? Holding him down by the neck? Thats terrible! Have you ever been held down by the neck? I am so surprised that your dog has not seriously harmed you.
I can honestly say that I have NEVER EVER hit my dog. There is no need to. There is so much information here on BW and if you read the rules you would have seen that BW does not promote negative reinforcement.
"Going days without hitting your dog"... are you proud of that? Training your dog without abusing your dog is something to be proud of. Take the advice here on BW or pick up a book on positive reinforcement such as "Culture Clash"
If you don't want trash cans on your counter, then put your trash can in a bedroom and shut the door. If thats too much to ask, then don't leave your dog unsupervised. This is part of training a dog. I know its not easy but this is something you should have researched before you ever considered getting a dog.
No one here is being "snooty", we're just concerned for your poor dog. Everyone is giving you advice but you don't want to listen. Please stop abusing him. I really hope you'll change your training method. :(

Becky350: Olly clearly puts in his rules, that we are all required to read before joining BW, that the advertisements that you see on google are not advertisements from BW. He clearly states to send him the link (which he also explains how to do in the "rules") and he will have those advertisements filtered out. This is something that has been brought up numerous times and you can find a few threads in the Contact A Moderator forum. It is very frustrating when people do not read the rules that they agreed to before they decided to join BW. Hope that helps.

 

[Wooof Wooof]

I think she got the point also. Katie I hop you read some of the training tips here on bw. There are alot of ways to deture your dog from gitting in the trash whit out hitting him. I know a lot of people and trainers who still do but I would shugest you refain from doing so. If you think about it a dogs skin is about 3 times as sencitive than a humans and if you hit your dog it herts alot more than what you may think. That is probably the reason your beeing bit when disaplining him.

I do hop you don't think we are snooty we are truly trying to help you.

 

[gmacleod]

While I do NOT condone ever hitting a dog, I do know that some people spank as a form of discipline (it's just as much a controversy with children as it is with pets today).

Actually, I don't care if some people spank their kids as a means of discipline. If they do, then they shouldn't go to a website that is against that form of treatment, ask why their kids hit back when they're being hit, and expect people not to tell them that it's their own bad behaviour that's causing it.

Boxerworld, for anyone who hasn't bothered to read the site rules, promotes only positive training methods and does not allow coercive or pain-based "training" to be promoted on this site.

Moreover, since this person is moving rapidly toward a scenario where she is likely to get herself badly bitten by the dog in question, I think it is far better that she be given that advice even if it isn't what she wants to be told.

As for your shock collar question - you did not ask what the collar was, you asked if you could solve a fence jumping problem by using one. Strange question from someone with no idea what sort of collar they were talking about (incidentally, you claimed then that it was "suggested to you by a lady in your neighbourhood"). You were asked whether you were talking about an electric shock collar and told perfectly politely that it was unlikely to help, and that in any case, promotion of that sort of device was not allowed here.

Frankly, I have no patience for people who don't bother to read the rules, or just ignore them and then complain. You can go elsewhere.

For anyone else who suffers under the delusion that physically dominating your dog is an appropriate or effective way to "train" it, or that it mimics in any way natural dog behaviour - that is a 1940s concept that has long since been shown to be both wrong, and dangerous. These articles may provide some useful insight to the stupidity of such thinking: http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2001/dominance.htm
http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2001/macho.htm
http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2001/hierarchies.htm

And to avert any possiblity of people misunderstanding the Rules about what can and can't be posted on this website, I suggest you read them. Of relevance right now is this part:

Topics inappropriate for discussion on this site include:
- Discussion of deliberate use of devices or practices that cause or have the potential to cause physical trauma to a dog. Boxerworld does recognise that people do have genuine questions regarding training tools (choke chains, prong collars, mousetraps etc) and methods, but we support and promote wholeheartedly positive training and behaviour management, that is, teaching the dog what to do by using positive methods, not teaching a dog what not to do by causing it discomfort and pain. Any threads which appear to promote "negative" training and methods will be closed.

Anyone who wishes to promote hitting their dogs as a form of training is on the wrong website and should go elsewhere.

This thread has run it's course, and in keeping with those rules, is now closed.