Natural Dog Training | 
 enlarge | Author: Kevin Behan
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
Category: Book
List Price: $22.99
Buy New: $18.39
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Rating:  13 reviews
Sales Rank: 338529
Media: Paperback
Pages: 324
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.8
ISBN: 1401041353
Dewey Decimal Number: 636
EAN: 9781401041359
ASIN: 1401041353
Publication Date: October 8, 2002
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| Customer Reviews: Read 8 more reviews...
 many pearls, loved this book September 9, 2008
G. Marlene
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
this is a great book, a canine psychology book, a training book, an everything book. I've read and done alot (agilty, freestlye, clicker,obdience, hunting) and in this book there is something for everyone who loves and lives with dogs.
Best. Training. Book. EVER. August 17, 2008
Summer's mommy (Brooklyn, NY)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Positive reinforcement trainers talk about how food is a primary reinforcer and always reference how clicker style food based training has trained everything from cats to orca whales. But how many of you require an orca whale to live with you and be naturally obedient in YOUR human world 24-7? And yes you might live with a cat, but do you really require your cat to be outside with you daily and still be mindful of you and responsive to cues? Marker training with treats is a wonderful way to teach a dog a specific behavior, but do clicker trainers really require me as a dog guardian to click and treat my dog forever? Kevin Behan's book taught me how to take my dog's natural prey instincts, in other words, the very instincts that make her a DOG, and channel them into being with me. So even in our day-to-day, she is allowed to fully and joyfully engage in her natural doggy instincts AS WELL AS be with me as a well-behaved member of society. In fact, the training teaches her that the ultimate fulfillment for her natural instincts comes when she is fully focused on me.
Case in point: this morning while I was walking around our local park during the sanctioned off leash hours, my Belgian Malinois mix got a little bored with just walking around, so she wanted instead to be stimulated and energized by DOING OBEDIENCE WORK. I knew that was what she wanted because she kept naturally heeling on my left, looking up at me, asking me with her eyes, CAN WE WORK? CAN WE WORK? So I engaged her in some formal off leash heeling, some recalls, some down during recalls. The whole time she was powerfully driving into me and fully engaged. The obedience work, in other words, was like a play session for her.
There is NOTHING punitive about this training style. Perhaps the word "correction" is used poorly. I would liken it more to teaching a dog the natural danger boundaries, and that the most fulfilling, most joyful, most rewarding, most drive-flowing scenario is to be focused to her handler, whether the dog is plastered to your left side, or 50 yards away in a long sit, or even just meandering around off leash with you.
To me, this is the ultimate reward for any dog - to fully feel like she is allowed to be a dog. And yet because her joy and drive flow is fullest when she is focused on you as the handler, she will always be a fantastic dog to live with. Courteous, friendly, happy, responsive, hardworking, playful and calm. We owe our magnificent dogs that much.
Best Training Book I've Read January 22, 2008
Seattle Dog Lover
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
I must say that for those reviewers who complain about the use of corrections or prong collars etc, you've obviously missed the whole point of the book. This book is not based or focused on using correction techniques. If you use corrections simply to suppress a dog's behavior, then yes, you will cause behavior problems and possible aggression as well. But that is not what Kevin is recommending or teaching in his book. The entire premise and theory is based on building and controlling a dog's drive, not correcting a dog to suppress them in order to create a desired behavior. I've worked in the correction based methodology before, and believe me, it's an entirely different world than what is being taught in this book.
I've used dominance based training, as well as positive reinforcement and clicker training. Neither of those methodologies got me the results I wanted. Sure, they both worked to a degree. Dominance training created dogs that were under control, but they sure weren't happy. And there was always that undertone of fear and tension between us. Positive reinforcement and clicker training worked great when we were working. But it would all fall apart in the real world when there were more interesting things to do. Not to say they didn't retain some of what they learned. But they just weren't reliable when using only positive reinforcement methods. I guess if I had continued doing it for the next 10 years, then maybe they would finally be reliable all the time. But once I began using Kevin's techniques, I started seeing an instant transformation in my dogs. They started going from confused and disinterested, to paying attention and being happy to work with me. And it really was almost immediate.
I believe that all forms of training have something positive you can take away from them. Although I've learned that dominance training has little or nothing that I would want to continue using. But natural dog training has and continues to transform my relationship with my dogs. And I am convinced that it can do the same for most people.
It is fair to say that every dog is different, and that there will be dogs that may require a different form of training, or creative elaborations on Kevin's techniques. But I would also say that I have yet to find any other philosophy that works as well for as many dogs as this one.
Any training model will probably work if you dedicate yourself to it. But I think that Kevin's philosophy and techniques provide a way to get the results you want, while respecting and honoring the dog's true nature and spirit, instead of trying to suppress it. And that's why I recommend this book more so than anything else I've come across.
 Interesting theory... December 18, 2007
BonnieKae (UT USA)
1 out of 8 found this review helpful
This training guide has an interesting theory about dog behaivour being based entirely on the hunting drive, but I don't agree with some of the methods.
Ten years ago, I trained a dog using the "shock" method (corrections on the leash and an electrical shock collar) and will never use it again. I feel that is is abusive. I was training the dog with a trainer that charged close to $2,000.00 to teach me how to abuse my dog. Any time you jerk a leash against a dogs neck you are risking cervical injury. My dog, Bear, continued to have severe behavior problems that I now know were due to these antiquated training methods.
I finally had a behavior specialist (doggie psycologist) come to my house to work with the dogs. She recommended the following books and helped me with some basic positive-reinforcement training methods. Bear's behaviour improved that afternoon. We recently lost hime to renal failure, and at the time of his death, he was the most gentle dog I've ever known.
I would recommend "The Dog Whisperer" and "The Culture Clash" (Jean Donaldson) for training without punishment.
 Great Book don't take me wrong June 30, 2007
N. Yewel (Australia)
1 out of 6 found this review helpful
I have now been reading this book for about three weeks and can't get through it. It's content is of very high interest and surely some "AHA" exclamations from me when I am getting the point. It is a great book for people who are more interested in reading then getting a few picture hints. There are no illustrations in this book what so ever and I probably finding it a bit boring as it feels like I am reading a novel and not a dog training book. So if you are like me and likes a bit of illustrations don't go for this book, If you like reading only you will love this book.
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