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"New York Times" bestselling author and former Navy SEAL Mike Ritland teaches you how to give your dog the exceptional training and loyalty of a combat dog.
In "Team Dog," Mike taps into fifteen years worth of experience and shares, in accessible and direct language, the science behind the importance of gaining a dog s trust. He also offers invaluable steps for achieving any level of obedience. His unique approach incorporates entertaining examples and anecdotes from his work with dogs on and off the battlefield and tips from the Navy SEAL guidebook to teach dog owners how to choose the perfect dog for their household, establish themselves as the team leader, master command and control, employ situational awareness, and solidify their dog s position as the family s ultimate best friend.
"Team Dog" introduces pet owners everywhere to the new and distinctive authority on how to train your dog the Navy SEAL way."
- Published on: 2015-02-03
- Formats: Audiobook, CD
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 7
- Dimensions: 6.10" h x 1.00" w x 6.70" l,
- Running time: 30600 seconds
- Binding: Audio CD
Review
''After a stellar career in the Teams, Mike Ritland has gone on to train working K9s for some of the most elite units in the US special operations community. These dogs are integrated into special operations at all levels of mission planning.'' --Brandon Webb, former Navy SEAL and New York Times bestselling author
''After twelve years as a US Navy SEAL, Ritland quit to found his own company to train dogs for SEAL teams, as chronicled in the New York Times best seller Trident K9 Warriors. Here he extends his techniques to the family dog.'' --Library Journal
About the Author
Mike Ritland joined the navy in 1996, and after twelve years started his own company to train dogs for the SEAL teams. His clients include the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs, TSA, and the Department of Defense. He is the author of the New York Times bestseller Trident K9 Warriors, which is being adapted for film.
Gary Brozek has coauthored and ghostwritten nearly twenty books, including four New York Times bestsellers.
Excerpt. � Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Introduction
It all started with a black Labrador retriever named Bud. I was just a kid when we got him, and the connection between us was instantaneous. I realize now that our initial bond was a bit one-sided. I thought he was the greatest, and he thought, well, I couldn’t say for sure what Bud thought. He liked whoever had a leash in hand and was willing to take him on a walk. He liked whoever fed him or offered him popcorn. He was willing to sit, stay, speak, come, and roll over when he knew that popped treat was his reward. He also liked whichever of the upright two-legged creatures fed him, allowed him to empty his bowels and his bladder, tossed him balls, and went with him to explore the outdoors, where his nose was nearly overcome by a series of odors that pleased and sometimes perplexed him.
My dad was usually the one who took Bud on his morning walks. I did the same in the afternoons when I returned from a day at school. Bud wasn’t my own dog; he belonged to the family, and each individual member bonded with him to different degrees. It wasn’t like I didn’t have any human friends, but Bud and I really seemed to like doing a lot of the same things—being outside and exploring the neighborhood, doing anything but sitting around inside. We got along well, and the only real problem we ever had with each other was when my Rollerblade “walks” with Bud turned into off-pavement excursions, thanks to Bud’s squirrel and rabbit obsession. I probably ended up looking like a bronco rider with one hand firmly grasping the leash and the other flapping in the breeze above my head.
Bud was an amazing companion, and nothing could beat coming home from a rough day at school and having him greet me with his tail thumping on the floor and him rubbing up against my legs, letting me know how glad he was to see me. That kind of display of affection is most likely the reason why, according to the American Pet Products Association, an estimated 47 percent of households in the United States have a dog. That brings the total number of dogs kept as pets in this country to 83.3 million.
That’s a large number, and I wish I could say that every one of them is a well-adjusted, well-behaved, well-mannered dog. I’d also like to say that those dog owners have the best kind of relationship with their dogs. You’ve most likely seen some version of what I just described with Bud and me on my Rollerblades—a dog taking an owner for a walk, a hard-charging threat, a jumper, or a food stealer. Those actions don’t make them bad dogs, just dogs with bad habits. That doesn’t mean that their owners are bad people, just people with bad habits and a poor sense of their own authority.
No one in my family had formal instruction as a dog trainer; we just used the passed-along wisdom of having owned dogs before—the trial-and-error method combined with a few bits of old wives’ tales. We were fortunate that Bud was good natured, and that my dad, who did most of Bud’s early training, applied the same sense of discipline to raising Bud as he did to my two older brothers, my sister, and me. The only difficulties we ever encountered were with lax owners who let a couple of dogs wreak havoc on some of the neighborhood kids and dogs. For a long time, I had a healthy dislike for German shepherds based on my unpleasant interactions with a member of that breed who was the town bully. If you were to ask my dad, he’d tell you about an Airedale terrier who ran off his property and jumped Bud. My dad had to intervene, risking serious damage to himself, but he was able to separate the two of them. Bud was on the ropes and my dad saved him.
I share that story because it illustrates a couple of things. First, dogs are animals, and as much as we like to believe that their sweet and gentle nature rules the day, they do have a potential for violent action either when threatened or simply because their genetic makeup drives them to it. That’s true for any breed of dog, though natural faulty wiring is somewhat rare. We never found out what set off that Airedale terrier. His owner was equally mystified. To hear him tell it, the dog had no history of such extreme boundary aggression, but something none of us humans could determine had prompted him to attack on that particular day and in that particular encounter. That said, the dog didn’t just suddenly lose his mind, as I’ve heard many people say about their dogs—something in the dog’s history caused him to respond to my dad and Bud as a perceived threat.
There’s always a reason why dogs react the way they do—the trouble is that we aren’t always able to discern that cause. This book will help you better read your dog, other dogs, environments, and circumstances to prevent those kinds of unfortunate events from taking place.
The second reason I told that story is because it illustrates the bond between man and dog. Dad was willing to get torn up in order to keep Bud from suffering the same fate.
It’s beyond the scope of this book to go into the long history of human/canine relations, but at some point humans and dogs figured out that by working together they would enrich their lives in some way. I’d imagine that at some point early humans hunted prehistoric versions of dogs for food. That eventually transitioned into humans recognizing that dogs were also very good hunters and could be used as a tool rather than seen as an adversary. From the dogs’ perspective, humans had something they wanted, too. They had resources like food and shelter. Most likely that came about as their natural scavenging efforts put them more and more in contact with us. When either we offered them some scrap or they laid claim to what we’d left behind, their natural associative way of thinking produced this equation:
Humans = benefit
Similarly, we arrived at the same conclusion. If dogs could help us collect more resources and also provide us with some security, then:
Dogs = benefit
In its simplest form, that is what a symbiotic relationship is all about. We both benefit from being around and interacting with one another.
Understanding how the initial relationship between dogs and humans developed is the underlying basic principle of my dog training methodology. When you begin training a dog and developing a relationship with him, you are repeating the historical human/canine evolution in a compressed time format.
Keep in mind several points about this relationship that we’ve come to cherish:
���•�It didn’t take place overnight.
���•�It is founded on mutual trust.
���•�It resulted in dogs doing more and more things for us that they weren’t naturally inclined to do.
What’s implicit in taking this approach is that human beings took charge of the relationship. Let me repeat that: Human beings took charge of the relationship. We saw dogs’ natural abilities and then shaped their genetic destiny to a certain extent to meet our needs. Today, our needs are different from those of our ancestors, but that doesn’t mean that the relationship dynamic should be inverted. We are still in charge. When I see so-called problem dogs, the problems stem from an imbalance of power in the relationship and not from the dog.
That is why it is important that you be in command of yourself, your understanding of dogs and their psychology, and my approach to training in order to be better able to control your dog.
Dogs are intelligent animals, but in comparison to humans, they are simple-association creatures. If you’ve owned a dog, you already know this to be true. If each time you pick up your car keys and then take your dog with you to some location and he has a positive experience, then he will come to associate that sound with some kind of reward. A dog doesn’t understand that the keys are used to turn an ignition switch that results in an internal combustion engine propelling your car. What he understands is that the sound of the keys = good. In the same way, dogs came to associate humans with an expected future benefit.
We have given dogs enough resources to allow them to survive more easily, and we have gotten them to do tasks for us in exchange. If you look at any history of the modern domestication of dogs, you will likely come across discussions regarding the roles that dogs have played: hunting, tracking, herding, retrieving, and so on. At some point, because humans wanted to refine and preserve certain characteristics, breeding purebred dogs became an important exercise.
I’ve heard and read arguments that present dogs as nature’s greatest con artists. That belief states that in exchange for being furry, cute, and charming, dogs have manipulated humans into providing them with lives of luxury. When you look at the last hundred years or so of human/dog interaction, it’s kind of hard to find fault with the reasoning. I’d go so far as to say that many dogs in this country live lives of far greater ease than many human beings.
Because of my experience in seeing what dogs can do for us besides being good companions and a source of entertainment and affection, I don’t buy into that con artist theory. After high school, I joined the Navy and eventually became a Navy SEAL. Bud was long since no longer a part of my life, and I had infrequent interactions with dogs. During my time as a SEAL, I was dating a woman who had what most people commonly refer to as a pit bull. (I prefer to use the term bulldog for the American Pit Bull terrier because of all the negative, and wrong, associations many people have with the breed.) One day she asked me to watch the dog for her while she was at work. When I took the dog for a walk, we encountered a raccoon tearing through the trash. The next thing I knew, the dog had basically turned the raccoon inside out. I was amazed at that dog’s capabilities. I’d hunted with dogs before, bird dogs, but this was something different entirely. A fire was lit inside me, and I became very interested in hunting with dogs and seeing how they could test their mettle against prey.
I read everything I could about animal husbandry, breeding, and genetic theory and completely immersed myself, when I wasn’t deployed, in the care, training, and capabilities of dogs. In a way, I was going back to an earlier place in human/dog history. While I liked dogs and all the qualities that they possess as pets, I also developed a greater appreciation for what they were capable of as tools to help human beings. In my case, at least initially, the application of this living tool was in hunting. That would also eventually evolve.
In the course of my training myself as a breeder, trainer, and user of hunting dogs, I was shaped by a couple of people’s thinking. First was Dr. Stanley Coren, the author of The Intelligence of Dogs: Canine Consciousness and Capability. A professor of psychology, Dr. Coren was one of the first thinkers and writers to develop the field of dog psychology. His later book, How Dogs Think: What the World Looks Like to Them and Why They Act the Way They Do, also helped shape my approach to training dogs. The second person was Karen Pryor. Pryor also has written several books on dog training, and I think that her later book (after Don’t Shoot the Dog!: The New Art of Teaching and Training), Reaching the Animal Mind, is far superior. Being introduced to these two authors really opened my eyes, and their philosophy became the meat and potatoes of my approach to animal training, particularly as it relates to the psychological aspects. After reading those two books, I then read everything I could find by B. F. Skinner and Konrad Lorenz, among others in the field of animal behavior.
All that reading helped bridge the gap between the old-school notions I’d been exposed to in talking to other trainers to a more science-based approach. I began to better understand the anatomical differences between a dog’s body and brain functions and our own and how dogs learn.
I was interested in understanding how a dog’s mind works, how he perceives the world, and how a person could maximize his capabilities. I wasn’t solely interested in getting a dog to be obedient and well mannered. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having those goals in mind, and that is the focus for this book. But I wanted to go beyond that baseline, first through hunting with dogs and later by training military working dogs (MWDs). The emphasis for me was always in testing the limits of dogs and their capabilities to be as beneficial to human beings as possible.
The first time I saw a military working dog in action was in 2003 as part of a SEAL team deployment in Iraq. I was a couple of years into my working with dogs, primarily bulldogs, when I was deployed there in the early stages of the war. A few weeks in, we were working in support of the 1st Marine Division. The city of Tikrit had fallen rather quickly, but pockets of resistance had to be rooted out. Clearing operations of that type, especially in an urban environment, are always fraught with danger. One day, members of our team were responsible for rooftop security while a group of Marines were conducting operations in the area. That evening a report came back that a member of the Marine unit had approached a small cavelike structure, with dirt piled around a small doorway. The Marine, with his explosives-detecting canine, approached the entryway. The dog worked his way steadily forward, nose to the ground. Suddenly, his tail started flagging and then he sat down immediately, his posture erect and his ears pointing to the sky.
As it turned out, that doorway was rigged with explosives, and if the Marines had tried to breach it without the dog having done his work, at least two or three of them could have lost their lives and several others would have been seriously wounded. Thanks to the dog, an explosive ordnance team was brought in, the threat was terminated, and the operation continued.
That was another lightbulb moment for me. I knew a few things about how dogs had been used in warfare throughout history. Seeing a dog saving the lives of my fellow soldiers firsthand put a dog’s capabilities into sharper perspective. I couldn’t do anything other than file that experience away at the time, but eventually, I contracted valley fever and was no longer able to be deployed operationally. So I separated from the SEAL teams, dusted off that mental file, and decided to combine two of my main interests—preserving our nation’s security and working with dogs.
For the past fifteen years, I’ve been involved in the importing, breeding, and training of various types of working dogs. I worked for a time as a trainer of both dogs and handlers for the SEAL teams. Dogs I’ve trained have gone to work for the Department of Defense, U.S. Customs, the Transportation Security Administration, and the Department of Homeland Security as well as to private individuals who want an added dimension of security in their lives.
To be honest, the kinds of dogs that I work with daily to perform these crucial tasks are not the types of dogs that are ideally suited to be housepets. Many of them can be, but more often, they should not be. When you train a dog to be a multipurpose military working dog—to detect explosives or to track and take down (detain) bad guys—you need dogs who are incredibly athletic and aggressive. I’ll go into more about the term aggressive later, but for now imagine the kinds of dogs you’ve seen in movies and television who are able to literally bring down a human being, that kind of snarling, snapping, biting power that subdues an individual.
The purpose of this book is not to teach you how to make your dog into a Navy SEAL or other Special Forces operationally fit and skilled dog. Besides the incredible legal liabilities inherent in that, most of you reading this book don’t want a dog who is that capable. The goal here, then, is a bit different.
I want to help you develop the kinds of skills necessary to effectively train your dog. This is a book about training you to be able to carry yourself like a Navy SEAL, to develop those traits within yourself to use in interacting with your dog, to develop your abilities to take command in a way that will help you most effectively control your dog.
As a consequence, I can’t give you a step-by-step guide for every scenario that occurs when training a dog. I’d need to account for far too many variables in order to do that. A ten-thousand-page book likely wouldn’t be sufficient to reach that goal. Explaining that many concepts and analyzing each of the particular elements peculiar to those situations would be like me spraying you with a fire hose after you told me that you were just a little bit thirsty. That wouldn’t be pleasant or productive for either of us. What I can do is provide some step-by-step procedures to either prevent or address common issues. I will also teach you how to carry yourself in such a manner that you communicate to your dog by using your own body language.
The bulk of the book will be taken up with understanding how dogs think and behave, understanding what image you need to present to your dog, and how by effectively projecting authority, stability, situational awareness, problem-solving ability, and other traits—key components of what the military calls command and control—you will be able to develop the kind of relationship that will be most beneficial to you and to your dog. If you can master the skills, inhabit the proper mind-set, and understand a few basic principles, then training your dog will be relatively easy. Training yourself will be hard but worth it in the long run.
I’ve worked with lots of individuals who have asked me to help evaluate dogs, eradicate problems, and generally show them how they can restore the proper balance of command and control in their human/canine relationship. That relationship is based on trust and respect and produces a similar kind of bond or brotherhood that exists among members of the Navy SEAL teams. In my mind, that’s the kind of relationship most of us want to have with our dogs. A lot of old-school methodology talked about dominance and reinforced the idea that the only way to be at the top of the hierarchy was by making a dog fear you. For example, there were many early advocates of performing something called an alpha roll. That consists of taking a dog in the earliest stages of training, grabbing him by the scruff of his neck, and pinning him to the ground to let him know who is in charge.
Yes, I do believe that it is important to establish your authority over a dog. Dogs want, need, and seek that kind of presence in their lives. But there are other, more effective, and decidedly more humane ways of achieving that goal. It is easy, in some respects, to get a dog to fear you, but it can be equally easy to get your dog to respect you. Just as is true in human relationships, a dog will have more respect for you if you make it clear that good behavior gets rewarded and poor behavior has consequences. That may seem obvious, but I’m constantly made aware that dog owners understand this in theory but fail to execute it in practice.
You may have noticed that I’ve not used the word like or love up to this point in describing the human/canine relationship. That’s not an accidental omission. I’ve purposely not used those words because far too often I encounter people whose immediate response to a dog is to try to get that animal to like them. In doing so, they make fools of themselves in that dog’s eyes, possibly put themselves in danger because they assume that how they treat their own dog is okay with a different dog, and mistakenly believe that because of all the nice things they do for their pet, the dog should obey their wishes and desires unconditionally.
If you take one concept away from this beginning part of the book it is this: Don’t mistake liking for respect, and don’t mistake obedience for trust.
At the risk of sounding like I’m trumpeting too loudly the connection I have with the Navy SEALs, I developed this training approach, which closely parallels the kinds of training emphases of the SEAL teams, because of one indisputable fact: It works. If you do what’s demanded of you as a SEAL team candidate and later as a member of the teams, you earn tremendous rewards. If you screw up, you suffer the consequences—from getting hazed to being taped up to having your ass kicked. You don’t get a free pass and listen to a lecture or have a report put in your file. You play by big-boy rules, and if you break those rules you’ll know about it. Navy SEALs have an international reputation for a reason, and it all starts with that basic principle of expectations and consequences. You have to carry yourself a certain way, get the job done, be held accountable for your actions, and earn the trust and respect of your fellow team members. As much as Navy SEAL training emphasizes teamwork, when operational, there is one person in charge.
In working with your dog, you have to be that person in charge. Lives may not be on the line as they are in the teams, but the quality of your life and the quality of your dog’s life are at risk. So is the bond that exists between you and your dog.
Without that bond in place first, training your dog will be a much more difficult task.
I distinguish between the areas of emphasis in overall training. In the first, you will build a trusting relationship and exert your authority to establish respect, manners, and boundaries. This will help you create the proper learning environment. Think of this as command. In the second, you will do additional behavioral and formal “obedience” training to maintain that authority, solidify your relationship, and truly enjoy each other’s company. Think of this aspect as control. In the first, you will primarily use body language to communicate with your dog; in the second, it is all about using positive reinforcement enhanced by the use of a mechanical clicker to mark desirable behaviors that are immediately followed by positive reinforcements. In most cases, they are distinct phases, but in some instances you will work on the two more or less simultaneously, depending on the specific circumstances of your dog—his age, energy/attention level, and so on.
I believe many of you would like to have the ideal relationship with your dog that you’ve either seen on television or in a film or witnessed firsthand. Whether we are talking about a Chihuahua that stands six to nine inches at the shoulder or a Great Dane that reaches thirty inches in height, the theory and principles and practices that I advocate will help you take important steps toward establishing that ideal bond.
The responsibility for developing that ideal relationship is on your shoulders. The single most important aspect of building that relationship and firmly embedding your ideals of manners, boundaries, and skills is how you conduct yourself around your dog. That means from day one you have to develop and project a strong presence of authority and command. You have to exude confidence and authority. You have to take command of your body and carry yourself consciously and precisely; you have to use your voice sparingly and accurately as a tool, and you have to have control over your emotions and be able to move swiftly from expressing precisely modulated positive and negative states of mind, all in the service of presenting your most assured and confident self to your dog.
If you can master yourself you will then be the kind of master your dog is looking for and provide him with everything he wants and needs in his life.
There is no doubt in my mind that dogs are the most loyal creatures in the animal kingdom. I’ve seen and heard accounts of the amazing things they’ve done in combat and elsewhere. I’ve seen the kind of heartbreak that occurs when that human/canine bond is broken, whether it’s when a handler loses a dog or a dog loses a handler.
Because I’ve seen how incredibly beneficial this relationship can be, and because I’ve seen how my principles and practices have worked with some of the most elite military working dogs as well as more typical housepets, I will say the following:
Many people get a dog because they see other people with good relationships with their dogs, or they see a puppy and he is cute so they want one, too. I want to make it clear that having a dog is essentially adding another family member, and it is not something you should take lightly or act impulsively on. Far too many times, people get dogs for the wrong reasons, or are in the wrong circumstances to achieve an ideal relationship with a dog. You have to understand that dogs take work, they take dedication, they take consistency, and you have to do the work to build that relationship and do the training yourself.
All that means that you have to make some sacrifices in your life, just as you do when you decide to bring a child into the world.
You can’t outsource your relationship with your dog. If you truly want a dog to be “your” dog, and to bring to life the idealized vision you have of your relationship, then you have to put the time in and do the work and develop and execute the kind of work ethic required. All relationships, human and canine, require work in order for them to be fulfilling. The rewards that come from doing that kind of work far outweigh the expense of time and effort. Also, all relationships are dynamic, and you will have to continue to work through various issues and devise solutions to problems and make adjustments throughout your time with your dog.
No shortcuts here.
Most helpful customer reviews
76 of 84 people found the following review helpful.
A decent read. A balanced training approach but a little light on the "how".
By Adam W
Warning: I'm just a dog owner with a great interest in dog training. I'm not a book reviewer, I don't know Mike Ritland and I don't adhere to any dog training method or camp as though it were the gospel. I've read and been less than impressed with a lot of dog training books so my "meh" review/opinion isn't anything against the author or his methods, I just wasn’t blown away by the book. I’ve only had one cup of coffee so forgive the typos and other grammar issues.
TL;DR Version: Mike uses a balance of training methods to include free shaping, corrections, spatial pressure and lots of positive reinforcement. The book doesn’t include a lot of specific training exercises, which leaves the reader wanting more in that regard. There is a fair bit of information about things that aren’t training-related and those pages could have been better served in other ways. Not a bad book, but not going to blow your mind.
First I'd like to thank Mike Ritland for his service to our country and for contributing to the public awareness of our Military Working Dogs (MWD). I would also like to commend him for writing a dog training book that isn't overly political, campy or one-sided just to please a specific audience of dog owners and trainers who only believe effective dog training is achieved by using Method-X. I often say there is no group of hobbyists and professionals that share a common interest yet hate one another more than those involved in dog training and sadly it has generated a lot of debate (to put it lightly) and not a lot of dialogue. I have no doubt Mike will receive ridicule and even death threats for some of the methods mentioned in this book because they aren't 100% hugs and kisses.
The reason I'm only giving this book 3 stars is the subtitle of this book is "How to Train Your Dog the Navy SEAL Way" yet roughly 3/4 of the book isn't specifically training related. This is an extremely common theme in dog training books; there is a lot of theory, "what" and "why" but not a lot of "how". A brief example is many times throughout the book being "team leader" and building relationship with your dog is mentioned, yet very few specific examples on how a dog owner might improve that relationship are given. That is who is likely reading this book: people who want help in training their dog, not those who have perfect, well-adjusted, fully trained dogs. I have no doubt Mike knows what he needs to do specifically to achieve these goals, sadly a lot of that didn't make it in to the book. Those pages would have been better utilized by doing so.
While Mike is balanced in his training approach yet focuses greatly on the positive reinforcement quadrant of Skinner's model, there are a few instances in the book where he doesn't explain the proper use of tools well and it comes across in a manner that could confuse the uninformed reader about the application of certain tools. One example is he mentions using humans to figure out an unknown exercise. First they use a remote collar (e-collar, electronic collar) to correct the person for getting it wrong and that leads to a shut down person who just doesn't attempt the exercise any more. Then they use positive reinforcement for "you're getting closer" shaping of the exercise and the person figures it out. No one has ever figured it out with the remote collar in his exercise. This is a common ammunition for the anti-remote crowd; "it leads to shut down dogs", and indeed it can when used improperly. The issue with this example is anyone that is trying to teach a NEW behavior that a dog has no understanding of with a remote collar is using the tool incorrectly and no quality remote collar user is training dogs that way. This anecdote only contributes to the misunderstanding of training tools and their uses, which goes back to the debate vs dialogue from earlier.
Mike is strong on using the least invasive methods for teaching behaviors and details free shaping behaviors rather well. Motivating the dog to do wanted behaviors in a neutral yet leaning positive way is a great way to teach new behaviors. He also freely expresses the role of corrections in dog training whether it be a verbal "ah ah" or a leash correction if required. He also touches on the importance of not leaning on training tools (be it a prong collar, a head halter or a no-pull harness) to "fix" behaviors like pulling on walks. You're not fixing the behavior, you're leaning on a tool to stop the symptom. If your dog always pulls except with Device A, your dog still pulls.
Several pages are spent on diet, physical inspections of the dogs and “if you want to be like a SEAL…” statements. Those pages would have been better used on addressing specific behavior issues or how to shape certain behaviors. After all, it is a dog training book.
Worth adding to the book shelf if you like MWD books or dog training books, but it isn’t the holy grail a lot of dog owners and trainers have been looking for. I hope to see more books from Mike in the future, specifically focusing on training and training exercises in a more step-by-step manner.
54 of 62 people found the following review helpful.
Nothing New
By Dog Dude
While Mike Ritland has presented a good generalized, but over-simplified, discussion of dogs, he is simply too late to the party. Everything discussed is a rehash of existing literature. As a primer for a novice dog handler, it gives a nice overview; but the title implies a greater level and depth of information that is simply absent for anyone who has already read one or more recent similar books on the subject. The book reminds me of the phrase "jack of all trades, but master of none." It touches on a wide range of topics related to care, handling, and training of K9s, but then fails to sufficiently delve into each specific subject matter. It also gives me pause because "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing," and here, he only gives the reader a little knowledge on each subject touched upon, giving the reader a false belief that they can easily duplicate his success; when, actually, there is much more involved that what he presented.
The author acknowledged that he primarily uses operant conditioning and positive reinforcement; as discussed, respectively, by B.F. Skinner and Karen Pryor. I don't see how this author's rehashing of the well known principles and use of clicker training improves upon any of the numerous books written by Karen Pryor herself on the subject; and which, in fact, go into greater detail (both in theory and practical application); e.g. "Don't Shoot the Dog!: The New Art of Teaching and Training" or "Reaching the Animal Mind: Clicker Training and What It Teaches Us About All Animals." Books addressing K9 behaviors, such as "The Other End of the Leash: Why We Do What We Do Around Dogs" by Patricia B. McConnell, have been around for years. Discussion of sensory capabilities has been discussed in much greater detail in any one of the many books on K9 tracking and scent work. Similarly, discussions of nutrition, health, and wellness are far better addressed in "Pukka's Promise: The Quest for Longer-Lived Dogs" by Ted Kerasote.
The book is fairly short, the margins wide, the pagination spaced out, and it seems as though a much shorter (less detailed) book has been pulled out to 230 pages (yes, the book claims 256, but that would include the introduction, dedication, etc).
I found repetitive dialogue, and dialogue that was, at times, contradictory. For instance, he suggests that in evaluating a shelter dog, one must not overwhelm the dog so as to give a false picture of his sociability; but then suggests that you present yourself to the dog in an authoritative manner and to take command. Well, if you are trying to get a true picture of the dog, the dog needs to get a true picture of you, since he will adjust his attitude to how you act towards him. Picture a dog with a sign above his head: "My temperament is based on who I am; my attitude is based on who you are." Presenting a dog candidate with a false impression of who you are gets an attitude based on it. Without going into detail, I also find fault with his methodology of selecting pups from breeders in that he generalizes too much. There are many well recognized puppy aptitude tests, which he fails to discuss; moreover, he failed to even mention the age of a puppy relative to testing and the developmental stages from puppy to adult.
An example of another missed opportunity is where the author first says that: "...a healthy coat makes a dog more comfortable and less prone to skin complaints and problems with parasites." But then states: "I'm not going to spend time on how to care for a dog's coat." Basically, a dog's coat is really important (which is true), but I'm not going to address how to care for it. It's like most of the book: a little reference to something important and then a failure to follow through on the details; which also surprised me since he stated several times that the details are important to the "Navy Seal Way." Another lack of detail is when the author says that there are no BMI (body mass index) calculators for pets; but such calculators have been around for several years, such as the one at PetSci, which could have been found by the author in a quick search.
It also troubles me that the author has taken modern dog training theories, which have been published in many other books for quite some time, slapped a US Navy Seal label on it, and offered it as a fresh approach. While the title of the book infers that some new, never discussed, method of dog training is now being made available to the ordinary dog owner (the "Navy Seal Way"), the truth is that all of the information offered has been presented before, in more detail, in other books. The best way I can characterize the book is that it resembles a Reader's Digest version of topics that has been written about elsewhere in greater detail. If you want all the information, you go to the main source, not the condensed version. It's not that I completely disliked the book, it's just that I failed to learn anything that I had not already read in other books; and, as a primer on dogs, it's a little pricey for such a short and quick read.
So, do I recommend it? Well, if you have never read any of the more recent books on dog care, training & handling; and if you don't mind overpaying a bit, and you realize that after reading it you are not imbued with all the tools needed to care for or train a working K9 or pet dog, then it's a fair starter book - but then again, so are many others. There is nothing unique about this book. If you have already read books on clicker training, dog care, and behaviors, then you will be disappointed.
By "recent" theories I mean books in the past 5-10 years, because training theories have changed, drastically, from the now outdated "dominance" theories to one of trust and positive reinforcement; that is, forcing a dog's behavior is a far, far inferior training methodology than getting a dog to produce certain behaviors because it's a rewarding experience for that dog.
36 of 41 people found the following review helpful.
easy read and very helpful
By Jose E.
I started this book on the day of its release, finished it in two days. It's a very easy read to those that have no dog training experience. My dog has made awesome improvements just in the 2 days since I've finished the book. I highly recommend it to anyone that has never trained a dog in their life.
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