Once again we took off for a 3 day seminar, this time in Hamburg which is about 960 km away. I was sure that we would have a lot of fun as we were a perfect team with Hans, Bryndis and I and also it was the last seminar before I would go back to my desert home. Because of the long drive and our tight schedule in Hamburg, I left Liwa at home this time with the effect that instead of spending some time with Liwa in the evenings, I had now more time to concentrate on eating and drinking...Indeed, the 3 of us were an explosive combination: Hans the lonely wolf, Bryndis the Viking goddess and I, the alpha bitch as we named each other after a short while...
The seminar started with an evening lecture by Hans which as always, was very well received. Then, the second day was about dogman ship and people could come with their dogs to learn how to establish a solid relationship with their dogs instead of just a superficial bond that fails as soon as the first cat crosses the street. People usually listen to Hans and are very impressed with what he says but then have difficulties in believing that this could actually work with their own dogs. In the morning people arrive in a quite desperate mode with their dogs that mainly pull on the leash, run away if off the leash, bark at anything that moves or generally ignore any commands they would be given by their owners. Same thing here in Hamburg. So the most effective thing to do is to teach those people the hose technique which generally solves any problem (except more complex problems such as aggression etc.). It is a simple technique but still people take time to learn it. Therefore, I was in charge to do exercises with the group without the dogs, so people can get more confident with the technique. Once this was done, Hans divided the people into 3 different groups: dogs that pull on the leash, dogs that are aggressive against other dogs and shy/unsecure dogs and we instruct and supervise the people with their dogs. At the end of the day it is extremely satisfying to see how happy and proud people leave the seminar. They literally leave with a smile on their face. At this point they still cannot believe what they have achieved in just one day. Sometimes, a person for example would have been pulled around by his dog for maybe 7 years and suddenly, it just stops. Or he would have never been able to take the dog off the leash and here he goes with the same dog who would suddenly not go further away than 3 meters and immediately come back when he calls him. Well, what I want to say is that this is a very rewarding job because you can see the immediate success for your work and make people very happy...
The next day, was not as idyllic as the first as we had some trouble makers in the group. This day was dedicated to different work patterns with your dog to keep him and his owner happy and balanced. As we started with the theoretical part, we asked everybody to leave their dogs in the car and this is when trouble started. A mother with her daughter appeared with their 2 dogs in the class room although they had heard the instructions and the rest of the group was already telling them off. So I went to talk to them and also Hans explained again that this was not possible. They were very upset because they didn’t want to leave their dogs in the car. So we suggested that they could put them into the guest kennels outside. As this was not acceptable to them either, they had no other option but put their dogs back into the car. After the theoretical part was over, the first thing they did was to take out their dogs again, this time outside on the training field and again we had to point out to them that there were certain rules on a professional training field as otherwise it would be a complete chaos if everybody would run around with their dogs while we would explain sth. The rule on such a field usually is: You can either put your dog on the side of the field if he is capable of lying down quietly with you going away, or if your dog cannot do this, he has to stay in the car. In the meantime I had build a circle on the field as my task was to instruct half of the group how to have their dogs run in a circle (like the horses) around them while Hans would teach the other half of the group how to retrieve. Unfortunately, I had the 2 trouble makers in my group and as I started to work with everybody, their two dogs just came running into the circle. At this point, I got upset and told them quite firmly to put their dogs into the car. But instead of doing what I had asked them to, the mother started explaining to me why the dogs got up and that they usually would stay down quietly etc. At this point I just said that I was not interested in knowing the reason why they got up or discussing this any further as we had to go on with the lesson and the instructions were clear from the first moment they arrived. Then they both sat down on the side of the field together with their dogs, watching us from a distance instead of participating in the lesson. Since they didn’t participate in the lesson, I just ignored them and let them sit where they were. After maybe 1 ½ hrs Hans joined our group because we came across a quite challenging dog, a young Doberman, who would bite his quite desperate owner while not following anything that she would say. So Hans took over the dog and started working with him. The dog quickly understood who was the boss and followed Hans like a lamb. The owner thought that is was magic but our two trouble makers who were observing everything from the distance, finally left saying that the way Hans had worked with the Doberman was not ‘nice’(obviously it was ok for them that he would bite his owner), that it was unfair that we had spend so much time with the Doberman and that I was lazy for not taking care of them. The funny thing here is that we later found out that the daughter was a psychologist!! They indeed were completely mad! From the moment they left the positive energy re-emerged and everybody had a great time.
The seminar started with an evening lecture by Hans which as always, was very well received. Then, the second day was about dogman ship and people could come with their dogs to learn how to establish a solid relationship with their dogs instead of just a superficial bond that fails as soon as the first cat crosses the street. People usually listen to Hans and are very impressed with what he says but then have difficulties in believing that this could actually work with their own dogs. In the morning people arrive in a quite desperate mode with their dogs that mainly pull on the leash, run away if off the leash, bark at anything that moves or generally ignore any commands they would be given by their owners. Same thing here in Hamburg. So the most effective thing to do is to teach those people the hose technique which generally solves any problem (except more complex problems such as aggression etc.). It is a simple technique but still people take time to learn it. Therefore, I was in charge to do exercises with the group without the dogs, so people can get more confident with the technique. Once this was done, Hans divided the people into 3 different groups: dogs that pull on the leash, dogs that are aggressive against other dogs and shy/unsecure dogs and we instruct and supervise the people with their dogs. At the end of the day it is extremely satisfying to see how happy and proud people leave the seminar. They literally leave with a smile on their face. At this point they still cannot believe what they have achieved in just one day. Sometimes, a person for example would have been pulled around by his dog for maybe 7 years and suddenly, it just stops. Or he would have never been able to take the dog off the leash and here he goes with the same dog who would suddenly not go further away than 3 meters and immediately come back when he calls him. Well, what I want to say is that this is a very rewarding job because you can see the immediate success for your work and make people very happy...
The next day, was not as idyllic as the first as we had some trouble makers in the group. This day was dedicated to different work patterns with your dog to keep him and his owner happy and balanced. As we started with the theoretical part, we asked everybody to leave their dogs in the car and this is when trouble started. A mother with her daughter appeared with their 2 dogs in the class room although they had heard the instructions and the rest of the group was already telling them off. So I went to talk to them and also Hans explained again that this was not possible. They were very upset because they didn’t want to leave their dogs in the car. So we suggested that they could put them into the guest kennels outside. As this was not acceptable to them either, they had no other option but put their dogs back into the car. After the theoretical part was over, the first thing they did was to take out their dogs again, this time outside on the training field and again we had to point out to them that there were certain rules on a professional training field as otherwise it would be a complete chaos if everybody would run around with their dogs while we would explain sth. The rule on such a field usually is: You can either put your dog on the side of the field if he is capable of lying down quietly with you going away, or if your dog cannot do this, he has to stay in the car. In the meantime I had build a circle on the field as my task was to instruct half of the group how to have their dogs run in a circle (like the horses) around them while Hans would teach the other half of the group how to retrieve. Unfortunately, I had the 2 trouble makers in my group and as I started to work with everybody, their two dogs just came running into the circle. At this point, I got upset and told them quite firmly to put their dogs into the car. But instead of doing what I had asked them to, the mother started explaining to me why the dogs got up and that they usually would stay down quietly etc. At this point I just said that I was not interested in knowing the reason why they got up or discussing this any further as we had to go on with the lesson and the instructions were clear from the first moment they arrived. Then they both sat down on the side of the field together with their dogs, watching us from a distance instead of participating in the lesson. Since they didn’t participate in the lesson, I just ignored them and let them sit where they were. After maybe 1 ½ hrs Hans joined our group because we came across a quite challenging dog, a young Doberman, who would bite his quite desperate owner while not following anything that she would say. So Hans took over the dog and started working with him. The dog quickly understood who was the boss and followed Hans like a lamb. The owner thought that is was magic but our two trouble makers who were observing everything from the distance, finally left saying that the way Hans had worked with the Doberman was not ‘nice’(obviously it was ok for them that he would bite his owner), that it was unfair that we had spend so much time with the Doberman and that I was lazy for not taking care of them. The funny thing here is that we later found out that the daughter was a psychologist!! They indeed were completely mad! From the moment they left the positive energy re-emerged and everybody had a great time.
Yay to the Alpha Bitch!!! Yay Yay!!!
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