Are you a dog owner? If so, then you will undoubtedly agree that sharing your life with a dog has it's shares of ups and downs.
There are wonderful moments, and then there are others that are extremely challenging for all kinds of reasons.
The fact remains however, that through it all, dogs are still "man's best friend" in my opinion...
it is just harder to make friends with some dogs than with others.
Currently we share our home with a very smart, and very loving little miniature schnauzer.
Although things are great with him, they weren't always.
Shortly after he came to live with us, we learned that he: 1.
Jumped and/or growled at every visitor to our house and barked at everything.
2.
Was completely and totally terrified of visiting the groomers for his monthly clipping.
So what did we do? We did some research and spoke with our vet to discover some strategies and techniques that we could use to help make him a "good friend".
Here is how we resolved these issues.
1.
The barking/growling/jumping issue took some time because schnauzers, like all good little terriers are territorial, and are adamant about protecting that territory.
Still, we could not scare away everyone who came to visit.
So we tried all kinds of reward systems, squirting water, coins in a can, newspaper, just about everything.
Nothing really worked.
Finally our vet suggested a remote training collar, and after a lot more research, we tried the Innotek Ultrasmart Remote Trainer.
One of the first things that we liked about it was that it has 9 stimulation levels so that we could start with the very lowest one first until we found the lowest one that was effective.
It also has a tone-only training option providing more versatility.
And we actually got the Innotek Ultrasmart Remote Trainer, 300 yds.
, which has a 300 yard range, allowing us to train from a distance.
The best thing about the Innotek Ultrasmart? It worked.
Within a short period of time our little guy learned good manners and our friends were no longer afraid to come visit us.
2.
Helping our dog overcome the stress of going to the groomers each month involved not really training him.
but training us.
We figured that if we could learn to do his monthly clip at home, we would be able to help him feel more comfortable, and be able to get the job done quicker, making him happier as well.
So we invested in the Oster A5 Turbo Clipper, and it has made all the difference in the world.
We chose these clippers because as an Oster product, we knew they would last forever, so we wouldn't have to buy new ones each year, and because of the reviews on what a smooth, quiet, and fast job they did.
I will say that we have been very pleased with how the Oster A5 Turbo Clipper works: other than it getting warm, which we easily solved with cleaning and changing out the blades and using Oster Kool Lube, it has been so easy to do his clipping.
Once we learned how to do home grooming, voila, no more schnauzer trauma! In fact, since our dog gets a treat at the end, I actually think he likes getting clipped each month.
Having a dog can, and should be a joy, but it often takes a little work to get to that point.
In our case, we had a little help from the Innotek Ultrasmart Remote Trainer, and the Oster A5 Turbo Clipper.
But the investment and time we took to use these tools to help make life with our dog better for us and for him have been so worthwhile.
The reward has been a merry, little schnauzer whose intelligence, loving nature, and desire to please truly make him our best friend!