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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Many troubling errors and omissions,
By A reader (New Zealand) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Complete Idiot's Guide to a Well-Trained Dog (Complete Idiot's Guide to) (Paperback)
"The Complete Idiot's Guide to a Well-Trained Dog" is a book that tries to cover everything a new dog owner needs to know. There is a questionaire to help you determine your dog's balance of drives, an extensive section on training basic obedience commands, a section on nutrition, chapters on various dog sports including obedience and agility, and a chapter on correcting behavioural problems. The tone is friendly and cheerful, and the book is easy to read and understand. In fact, this would be a good introduction towards training a dog, except for the many problematic mistakes and omissions made by the authors.The training instructions for the most basic commands are adequate, if rather old fashioned - being mostly based on initial food luring and/or repetition. However, the authors do not explain the difference between teaching,training and proofing phases of learning. There is no mention of using a bridge or marker to help your dog understand what is required of him. Neither do they give any troubleshooting advice for the various problems you may encounter when following their instructions. In the chapter on training equipment, the authors instruct us how to fit a choke chain or prong collar on our dogs. However, we are never told when or how to use these collars to correct the dog - rendering the use of them pointless. The nutrition section rightly tells us that dogs are carnivores and need a high percentage of meat in their diet. However, the authors neglect to tell us how to analyse pet food labels to ensure that the food contains a high percentage of high quality meat, and don't explain the critical different between meat meal and meat "by-product". The brief foray into competition obedience sensibly points out the difference between "loose leash walking" and heeling, but then recommends that you teach your dog a competition heel by making him follow you repeatedly round a sportsfield! This is extremely unlikely to produce a motivated, enthusiastic, reliable competition heeling dog. Anyone looking into competition obedience would be well advised to use a more motivational method, such as the one outlined in Dildei and Booth's "Schutzhund Obedience: Training in Drive". In some ways, the authors seems to be attempting to strike a middle ground between the old fashioned correction-heavy Koehler method and the new positive-only clicker techniques of teaching advanced obedience, but fail dismally by missing out the most important aspects of either. Whereas the Koehler and clicker methods both work by motivating the dog (motivating him to avoid a correction or to earn a tangible reward, respectively) the Volhard's method uses few motivators and no corrections on the dog. The section on behavioral problems gives some sensible suggestions for dealing with aggression, but does not explain how to tell if a situation is dangerous enough to necessitate calling in a professional trainer. Neither does it draw any distinction between human and dog aggression, or mention that these two behaviours are often exhibited independently. One of the Volhard's basic premises is that dogs have three motivational "drives" that can be used in training: prey drive, pack drive and fight drive. The premise is good, but the definitions are faulty. A particular concern is the way that the authors include food drive as part of "prey drive". For training purposes this is quite inadequate. Any decent dog trainer can tell you that for most dogs food and prey rewards are not interchangeable. Instead of being motivated by food and prey equally, most dogs have a far higher desire for one or the other. Not only that, but prey and food rewards often elicit different types of behaviour in dogs - food is a much calmer drive than prey. Unfortunately, this failure to seperate food and prey drives makes the Volhard's questionaire all but useless for determining the best training motivator for your dog. The Volhards also point out that it is possible to enhance training by building a dog's prey and food drives - but in one of their most annoying omissions, neglect to give their readers any information on how to do that! All in all, this book is not an adequate introduction to dog training. Not only are there some troubling omissions, but many sections are positively misleading. This may not be the worst dog training manual out there, but with so many great dog training guides on the market I feel that "The Complete Idiot's Guide to a Well-Trained Dog" is a complete waste of money. Instead, I'd recommend a novice dog owner purchase "Purely Positive Training - Companion to Competition" by Sheila Booth, "The Other End of the Leash" by Patricia McConnell, and "The Culture Clash" by Jean Donaldson. I'd also recommend "Your Puppy 8 weeks to 8 months" and "Basic Dog Obedience" from the Leerburg.com website.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Volhard Accomplice,
By Roger the Consultant (San Diego) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: The Complete Idiot's Guide to a Well-Trained Dog (Complete Idiot's Guide to) (Paperback)
I trained my dogs with Jack and Wendy for many years when I lived in upstate NY. Under their direction my Landseers and Border Collies became sensational pets and additionally earned obedience and agility titles at the highest levels.I've purchased this book to give to friends who are new to dog ownership or who are experiencing issues with getting their dog to behave in the way that they desire. It contains no-nonsense techniques and advice to help anyone with pretty much any dog.
5 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hate the name - LOVE the information,
This review is from: The Complete Idiot's Guide to a Well-Trained Dog (Complete Idiot's Guide to) (Paperback)
Thanks Jack & Wendy! At last most of the knowledge and understand the Volhards have shared in one easy to read and entertaining book. The chapter on drives with simple follow up and educational information to help the owner and the dog. Nutrition, understand behavior, it has it all. A great book for everyone who loves their dog! C.J. Landry All About Dogs Lexington, SC
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