A Positive Approach to Dog Training by Kelly Oden Google “COVID Puppy” and you’ll get a slew of results with titles like “Our Pandemic Puppy was a terrible idea” and “When Your Pandemic Puppy Doesn’t Work Out.” The idea that a puppy would help to alleviate the loneness and boredom of the pandemic, particularly during lockdown, was a popular one. Record numbers of puppies and dogs were rescued from shelters with some areas even seeing a rise in dognapping due to the lower availability of canine companions. For many new adopters, however, the reality of bringing a new pet into the home was a bit different than the fantasy. Admittedly, I am one of those pandemic adopters. In the fall of 2020, my daughter and I were on the brink of insanity. We had lost my mother earlier in the year and we were still reeling from the grief. My daughter was struggling with remote learning while I did my best to work from home in between the calls for “Mooooom” from the other room. We were sad and lonely and frustrated, like so many others around the world. So, when my daughter sent me a link for a cute little puppy up for adoption at a nearby shelter, I caved. I knew it was bad timing and a bad idea in the grand scheme of things, but I also knew it would make her happy. Plus, we already had a dog, two cats, two chickens, a bearded dragon and three goldfish. How hard could one more pet
Tiffany Jourdain of Positive Splash Dog Training works with one of her furry students.
be? A lot harder, it turns out. I’ve always had well-behaved girl dogs that believed they were people rather than dogs. This little cutie was all boy and all dog. Potty training was difficult, he chewed and got into everything, he didn’t listen, he was nippy, he chased our cats and our chickens, he was playfully over aggressive with our other dog and he ate absolutely anything he could get his mouth on—anything. His only saving graces were that he was pretty dang cute and really sweet at heart. He was just a puppy—a boy puppy. After about six months of constant puppy chaos, my ever-resourceful daughter sent me a link to a dog trainer with the message, “We need to do this.” She was right. We
needed to take control of the situation. We are the type of family that believes when you adopt an animal, it’s forever. So, rehoming wasn’t an option—yet. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think about it. The link my daughter sent me was for Positive Splash Dog Training. In particular, she wanted us to do their board and train program. This program has you drop off your dog for a few days, or a few weeks, while the trainers work with them. The dogs live with the trainer and receive multiple training sessions a day. Owner and certified trainer, Tiffany Jourdain, explained their positive reinforcement training method to me over the phone.
MAY '21
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