We are adopting a 4 yo yellow lab and I was wondering what would be a good book to have on hand... Thanks! Meg
I like positive reward based training and you should find lots of info about that on line. There's also Pippa's Recall book which is advertised here and is good. Depending on what training is needed, it may be appropriate to go back to basics, have you any idea what you need to do?
It does depend what you need to do...and her personality eg calm, excitable, etc. I'd say clicker training is just excellent for all dogs. For an older dog who maybe hasn't had much training, clicker training would be what I would choose to start with. So in the absence of any other knowledge, I'd pick a good basic clicker training book, and Total Recall. I very much liked "every dog, every day" by Kay Lawrence. It's about working with what you have (in my case, a nutty excitable hooligan ) rather than what you don't have....I found it helpful. More of a basic book (and a bit dated, but still very good) is Clicker Training for Dogs by Karen Pryor. If you haven't clicker trained before, this would be a good one to start with. If you are having trouble getting started with training at all, because you find a dog is not engaging, "When Pigs Fly" by J Killion is very good. For reactive or excitable dogs, I recommend Control Unleashed by Leslie McDevitt.
Thanks to both of you! She is a very mellow dog and she knows sit and down and is learning "place" (which as far as i know is the same as stay?). I will probably bring her to a training class. i just thought it might be good to have a book on hand. The internet is DEFINITELY handy
I know she isn't a puppy but The Happy Puppy book is hood to read to understand about training, if that makes sense. And there's lots of articles on The Labrador Site and here on the forums to get you started. I have the clicker training book by Pryor and it's ok. There's some good clicker training short films on line too.
thanks jane. I was wondering about The Happy Puppy book being good for all age dogs. I'll look into it!
This is also a good book, showing you the basics of clicker training and how shaping can be used to train all sorts of behaviours. It comes with two DVDs: http://www.learningaboutdogs.com/acatalog/perfectfoundation.html#SID=14
Just saw the link for pre-ordering Pippa's new book, which I did, then to get free p&p I had to order another book but quite happy as I needed a new thriller! And I didn't know about Pippa's book.
I am just reading clicker training for obedience, recommended by Pippa on the clicker training forum. If you like clicker training or the idea of it I can say that it is written clearly and precisely and is a good book to have alongside more general training books.
