Sit!

Good boy!

Buying a fur baby is one of the most precious things one can do, but without proper training, they can become full-on Gremlins. 

Not everyone needs the same training, though. Some owners like their dogs to act like a military soldier and be very trained. Others just like their dog not to go potty in the house. 

Being a mom or dad of a furbaby is hard work. The puppy stage can feel never-ending and tremendously difficult.

Hans Pluid, a junior at Lakeland High School, has a nine-year-old lab named Griz. He is a very good boy because he began his training at a young age. Griz can sit, lie down, roll over, high-five, shake with both paws, speak, shed, and bird hunt.  

He will stay right next to Pluid on a walk with no leash. After he is tired from all the walking, so he drinks from the water fountain. 

“I feel bad for the dog when it is untrained because it could be a perfectly fine dog. An untrained dog can jump on kids and the elderly, which can cause injury,” Pluid said. 

Untrained dogs can be an incredibly bad situation, and most of the time, it is not even the dog’s fault. Everyone has seen an owner trying to control their dog and failing at it; it is secondhand embarrassment. Small d0gs are one thing, but a hundred-pound monster can become dangerous with no training. 

People do not know that one’s dog is nice when it runs to them. Furthermore, many people are afraid of dogs. Dogs get attacked by fellow dogs, shot, kicked, etc., because they are not staying with their owner and instead running amuck, harming random people or pets. 

It is simply a better idea to have a dog that is well-trained to avoid conflict or danger. 

Some dog enthusiasts think that dogs psychologically take things from their humans and begin to copy them. With no pack to learn from, a dog will take things from the next best thing: their owner. 

Dustin Frank, a principal assistant, does not have a dog currently. However, he did have a German shepherd named Duchas Roxanne, the thirteenth, who lived to age 11. He was not trained great, but okay. When Frank told him to come, he came, sit he sat, shake he shook, etc., so generally, a good boy; he did not get the concept of drop, though. 

Duchas was very good with Frank’s family but not good with strangers and it scared a lot of people. How to train not to bite people, Frank does not know, but for some breeds, it is just in their nature. 

Frank had never thought about dogs looking to their owner for what to do, but it makes sense to him. Some breeds may be very protective of their owners and family because they now feel that it is their pack. 

“Every breed is different,” Frank said.

I personally have a lot of experience with training puppies. I HATE the puppy stage or puppies in general. In the last four years, I have had four puppies; they like to die in my care. Not my fault, but after each death I got better at training them. I like my dog to be able to sit, lay down, go potty outside, and not try to eat anyone. 

My beloved Willow Bee West and I are currently enrolled in a personal training program through Petco; it is the cheapest option there. She is a very good girl, but on a leash, she tends to pull like a tugboat. With property, I just let her run around at free will, but with us soon moving to a neighborhood for college, she will need to be good on a leash. 

The trainer seems knowledgeable about the training and after only one week, Willow is learning a lot. The method of teaching her is more like making her ‘want’ to walk next to me than ‘have’ to. I would recommend Petco for doggy training, and I think that after our four-week course, Willow will be a pristine walker. 

In the phycological topic, I think most things that a human feels or does will transfer onto their furbaby. With no pack, dogs are left to watch their owner. Willow does not like men at all, which does not make a whole lot of sense just because she has had no bad experience with them. This could be my fault; I am 100 percent more likely to go up to a girl in a public environment than a guy. Furthermore, if we are on a walk, we will go out of our way to avoid men. Criminal Minds made me and Willow scared of them, most likely. 

“Woof,” Willow West said.