You Can When You Implement Management!
Are you looking to prevent your dog from engaging in unwanted behaviours? By implementing control and management strategies, you can effectively address these issues while you teach your dog the appropriate thing to do. Control and management should be a key part of your dog training plan.
Control and management involves setting up your dog’s environment to deter undesirable behaviours before they even happen. This approach helps prevent unintentional reinforcement of unwanted actions. Set your dog up for success by proactively managing their surroundings.
Management is the first thing to look at when you are working on solutions to prevent or change an unwanted behaviour. You would use management, while the dog learns a new, more appropriate behaviour.
Training and behaviour modification, change behaviour but good management prevents the behaviour from happening in the first place.
The more any behaviour is practised, whether it’s a behaviour you want to see more often or if it is an unwanted behaviour, the stronger that behaviour becomes.
For example; if your dog jumps on guests as they walk into the house. This can be highly rewarding as they get attention from guests when they are jumping.
Appropriate management would be to either have them in another room doing something calming like a stuffed Kong or have them on a lead as people enter.
In the meantime you would be training a behaviour such as ‘settle on a mat/bed’.
Until they are able to do this without control and management in place, you might bring them out on a lead to practise first so you are setting them up for success.
Five Common Behaviours That Control and Management Can Help With
- Jumping up at the kitchen sides or table when food is around. Stealing food if given an opportunity.
Control and management solution: Baby gates, pens, or put your dog in a separate room while you are preparing or eating food.
Keep food off the sides when you are not supervising your dog. Stealing food is highly rewarding
Training solution: Teach your dog to settle on a bed or mat when food is being prepared or eaten.
- Puppy is chewing items like shoes.
Control and management solution: Remove any prohibited items out of puppies reach such as shoes in boxes or storage, children’s toys put away when puppy is around. Restrict puppies’ access to safe zones, such as gated or penned areas.
Training solution: Teach a really good drop and exchange cue so the puppy drops any items that they might pick up.
- Dog doesn’t come back when called.
Control and management solution: Have your dog on a long training line so that you can control how far your dog goes and practice recall training safely.
Training solution: Start a recall training program. See my blog on recall for tips on how to improve your recall.
- Your dog barks out of the window at people passing the house.
Control and Management Solution: Buy window film for the windows to stop the visual of being able to see the person passing.
Training Solution: Behaviour modification programme to help your dog be less stressed when people pass the house.
- Your dog barks when you are on the phone.
Control and Management Solution: Stuffed food puzzle toy such as a Kong or West Paw Toys when you use the phone.
Training Solution: Train a calm behaviour like settle on a mat/bed, that your dog will eventually do while you are on the phone.
If you are struggling with any unwanted behaviour with your dog and would like help with how to address them. Book in for a free call below.
