Be the Alpha Dog!
The Alpha Dog: Be Pack Leader Your Dog Wants.
We’ve got coyotes.
And we’ve got a big German Shepherd.
The coyotes come and go. They follow the deer who love our old apple trees. And the rabbits, squirrels and chipmunks who live around here. And sniff around the beaver pond at one corner of our property.
We always know when the coyotes are back. Mocha, our GSD, begs to go out and, panting like an old locomotive building up steam, flies like a cannonball to the rabbit trail at the foot of the snowball tree. That night, we’ll hear the coyotes a’howling in the forest.
With us, Mocha’s as gentle as a kitten. When we call her in during one of her coyote harangues, she comes in right away — but with a look clearly saying, “Are you stupid? There’s COYOTES out there! It’s my job to scare them away!”
But we call her in. And she obeys. And lays down with a big sigh. She knows that we’re the pack leaders. As stupid as our pro-coyote behavior seems to her, she obeys. And waits for her next command to Stand On Guard…
We’re being the Alpha Dog Pack Leaders our German Shepherd wants. Right?
Here, from our fave dog trainer, New Zealander Daniel Abdelnoor, is a Guest Blog Post on that very subject. Listen!
“Be the Pack Leader Your Dog Wants You To Be”
In this post I’m going to reveal two very important facts about your dog…
The first is about whether or not you really need to be the Alpha Dog — Leader of the Pack. And the second is whether the pack leader must be aggressive.
For example, is it necessary to thump your chest, shout and smack your dog to become the alpha dog? The answer to these two questions could change your relationship with your canine companion. Almost instantly, and forever.
Question 1. Do I really need to be the pack leader? Lets examine the facts…
Dog are pack animals. There are leaders and followers. Loyalty is an essential part of their makeup. A big reason early Humankind took wolf cubs into their families so successfully. Followers and leaders: you can’t change that. It is simply how dogs work… and it works extremely well.
The pack leaders make the crucial life-and-death decisions and the rest follow. Simple. In the wilderness, dogs are pack animals. They’ve descended from those wolves. And what most people don’t realize is even in your home you form a pack. Sometimes there are other members in the pack, maybe children, more than one dog, even a cat…
The fact remains that dogs will view all these beings as members of the pack, and the pack leader in their eyes must make all the big decisions.
In many families, there are dogs who are just too happy to please, tales a-wagging. They simply do as you ask without any questioning. They are easy to train and the owners are convinced that it’s all due to how successful they are as dog trainers.
You may even know people who believe this. They have this amazing, easy, placid dog and you can’t work out how because the owner doesn’t seem to do anything special. In fact you might even be angered that, in comparison, your dog causes you so much grief.
What’s happening? How can it be this way? Well, allow me to let you into a secret. The fact is this… It usually has nothing to do with how good the owners are. Some canines are simply much easier to train others. That’s it!
Trust me…if you have an easy dog then you can get away with so much – and many people do. But if you’ve got a difficult, very smart, driven dog then you have to know fully what you are doing and the messages that you are sending your canine.
It’s much more difficult to train these dogs if you do not know what you are doing.
The secret to training these types of dogs is… to ensure that YOU are the pack leader in the home. Only then will they listen to you. And the difference between these easy and difficult dogs has nothing to do with breeds. It’s all about character and personality.
You’ll never be able to tell until they’re in your home. Kind of gripes us, right! But it explains why you are struggling. It’s why you are constantly bribing your dog, battling with them. It’s like trying to swim upstream… the struggle never ends, they never give in, and you’re exhausted. It’s all because in your dog’s mind you are not the pack leader…YET !
But hold on. Here’s the good news… I can help. You see if you are struggling…I can promise you that becoming the pack leader is the first thing you need to do. And I have just discovered a fantastic resource which shows you how to become the pack leader in the most amazing gentle way. But let’s discuss the next point before I tell you where this fantastic solution is…
Question 2. Is the pack leader aggressive in their behavior?
You’ve got to realize that the best pack leaders are calm and consistent. They’re firm but fair. There is no screaming, no shouting, no hurting, and no need for smacking. Forget the rolled-up newspaper. All those things that used to be associated with being the pack leader many years ago are now obsolete.
Old school dog training used to teach that you needed to physically dominate your dog. It involved a lot of force and confrontation with your dog which would often turn ugly.
The best dog training is where people are taught how to actually win their dog’s obedience in a calm and gentle way, so that their dogs accept them as the pack leader through choice, not fear.
This new dog training method is set to revolutionize the way we work with and train our dogs in the home. By learning how our dogs see the world we can then adjust our behavior to communicate clearly to them in a way they understand. It’s crucial that we give them the right messages, rather than simply applying human psychology to a dog.
Lets face it, we would never apply cat psychology to a dog.
Cats are a whole different animal. So why do we always apply human psychology? We are primates, evolved from the apes, but your dog is a canine evolved from the wolves and there are some subtle but crucial differences!
Conclusion: “When you understand your canine’s mind and where they are coming from there is no need for fear or aggression in training… if you are struggling then the chances are that your dog does not see you as the pack leader.” [1]
Thanks, Dan, for your clever, cognitive canine counsel.
“Live Free, Mon Ami” – Brian Alan Burhoe
And be sure to read my popular online dog short story…
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[1] Alpha Dog Training: Read more of Daniel Abdelnoor’s canine articles at The Online Dog Trainer.
Updated Nov 12, 2024.
