AlaskaHunter
Well-known member
I think this would be a fantastic book for anyone with their first dog.
Advanced trainers might find this book too elemental because they learned these six principles years ago.
I found this short book ($9 on Amazon) an easy read.
There were not many specific examples, but the reader can think of many that apply to each principal.
I breezed through in on a flight and enjoyed the retriever story.
Although written from a retriever training perspective, I think these 6 principals are applicable to other types
of dog training.
The Quest: Mindset Before Methods
by Dennis Hayre
The story is told from the perspective on 6 key mindsets or principals:
1) Leadership.
This chapter talks about how leadership can vary with each dog,
Trust and respect should be in balance.
Leadership should be calm and there is no place for ego in leadership. Dogs need leadership.
Without leadership, there is no teamwork and blind retrieves are typically not great.
2) State of Mind
Train with a state of mind thinking about the dog's perspective.
An example here was a handler cold-burning a retriever and then
recalling for running around a pond instead of swimming for a memory mark.
The dog the got in "fat" (more water than needed) on the resend.
The dog then had problems with a simple land retrieve because the
retriever was cold-burned for running the land on the previous water retrieve.
The handler's state of mind was anger instead of calm, ego instead of thinking from the dog's perspective.
3) Confidence.
I thought this chapter would be about the importance of developing a confident retriever.
No, it is about how the handler needs to be confident, if not lack of handler confidence and uncertainty can be detrimental to retriever training and the wheels come off in terms of retriever performance at an event.
The same can occur in hunting.
4) Productivity. Activity does not equal Productivity.
Practice does not make perfect, perfect practice makes perfect.
Great trainers get the best out of each dog.
Producing great results with an exceptional retriever does not necessarily make a great trainer.
5) The Compound Effect.
This principal is about building a retriever.
Little steps add up to big advances in training.
Doing nothing is using the Compound Effect in a negative direction.
Bad habits can quickly compound into problems.
A tiny creep in training could quickly evolve to a breaking problem hunting for example.
6) Equilibrium.
This is balance. Good training strives for balance.
Balance between success and failure, praise and discipline,
varies depending on each dog.
Balance from many perspectives.
For example, with retrievers marks should be balanced with blinds.
Too much marking and the dog may become self-employed on blinds.
Too much blind retrieves and the dogs marking may suffer.
Another example is water marks. Balance marks in the water with marks on shore.
ABC = Attitude,Balance,Control are all important in retriever training.
Advanced trainers might find this book too elemental because they learned these six principles years ago.
I found this short book ($9 on Amazon) an easy read.
There were not many specific examples, but the reader can think of many that apply to each principal.
I breezed through in on a flight and enjoyed the retriever story.
Although written from a retriever training perspective, I think these 6 principals are applicable to other types
of dog training.
The Quest: Mindset Before Methods
by Dennis Hayre
The story is told from the perspective on 6 key mindsets or principals:
1) Leadership.
This chapter talks about how leadership can vary with each dog,
Trust and respect should be in balance.
Leadership should be calm and there is no place for ego in leadership. Dogs need leadership.
Without leadership, there is no teamwork and blind retrieves are typically not great.
2) State of Mind
Train with a state of mind thinking about the dog's perspective.
An example here was a handler cold-burning a retriever and then
recalling for running around a pond instead of swimming for a memory mark.
The dog the got in "fat" (more water than needed) on the resend.
The dog then had problems with a simple land retrieve because the
retriever was cold-burned for running the land on the previous water retrieve.
The handler's state of mind was anger instead of calm, ego instead of thinking from the dog's perspective.
3) Confidence.
I thought this chapter would be about the importance of developing a confident retriever.
No, it is about how the handler needs to be confident, if not lack of handler confidence and uncertainty can be detrimental to retriever training and the wheels come off in terms of retriever performance at an event.
The same can occur in hunting.
4) Productivity. Activity does not equal Productivity.
Practice does not make perfect, perfect practice makes perfect.
Great trainers get the best out of each dog.
Producing great results with an exceptional retriever does not necessarily make a great trainer.
5) The Compound Effect.
This principal is about building a retriever.
Little steps add up to big advances in training.
Doing nothing is using the Compound Effect in a negative direction.
Bad habits can quickly compound into problems.
A tiny creep in training could quickly evolve to a breaking problem hunting for example.
6) Equilibrium.
This is balance. Good training strives for balance.
Balance between success and failure, praise and discipline,
varies depending on each dog.
Balance from many perspectives.
For example, with retrievers marks should be balanced with blinds.
Too much marking and the dog may become self-employed on blinds.
Too much blind retrieves and the dogs marking may suffer.
Another example is water marks. Balance marks in the water with marks on shore.
ABC = Attitude,Balance,Control are all important in retriever training.
