Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 October 1894 — TRAINING A DOG. [ARTICLE]

TRAINING A DOG.

Useful Hints Concerning Canine Education. The training of a dog should begin very early, as soon, indeed, as a puppy is able to take notice. The first thing a puppy should be taught is | his name, and it is a bad plan to select a long one for a dog. One of a single syllable is the best, and it should have a sharp and definite sound.' There is a difference between training and breaking. The former is done by patient kindness and firm insistence. The latter is accomplished by making a dog do this and not do that for fear of a beating. Training is infinitely preferable, for many dogs are utterly ruined by too great severity in process of breaking. When a dog understands his name, he should be taught to do one thing at a time at command. When he has learned to lie down and get up when so ordered, he should be taught to abstain from taking food placed near him. These things can be quickly taught to an intelligent puppy by any patient child or grown person, and no rules need be given. Let the puppy understand that while these lessons are being given he is not being played with. To make him lie down when the master says “down I” force the puppy gently down, and persist in this, and keep putting him back in the position until he is clucked to and told to get up. The latter he will do very readily. To keep him from taking food placed in front of him, first say to the pupil, “down!” Then put the tempting food in front of him, and persist in making him sit down and refrain from taking it. This is very easily done. One can also teach a dog to beg for his food with a bark by saying to him, “Speak for it,” and giving him something he is particularly fond of when he complies with the order. With dogs that walk with their masr ters, either in town or country, it is important to teach them to follow at the heel. This can be done by using the lash till the dog understands what the command ‘ ‘to heell” means. Obedience in all dogs must be inculcated while they are young. Without this, at a later period, all efforts are useless, for it has become an axiom that, “it is hard to teach old dogs new tricks.”

Some dogs, in the work they perform, are but following this instinct. This is notably the case in the greyhound and terrier families. .The former hunt game by sight, and the latter are chiefly useful as destroyers of vermin. Good manners and obedience are about all the training these dogs require. Sporting dogs, such as pointers, setters and retrievers, do the work required of them to an extent by instinct, but before these dogs are valuable in the field their instincts have to be cultivated by very careful education. How to do this cannot be told here —indeed, it can be learned only by watching the methods of some one expert in the art. The business of the mastiff is to protect property, and of the St. Bernard to save life, while that of the collie is to watch an£ herd sheep. Each of these dogs ha* acquired an instinct for his special business, but each needs to be specially trained by those who have been accustomed to use them. But each of these dogs, even when the owner has no serious work to be done, can be easily taught to be amiable, and, above all things, obedient.