NAC Dog Training

04/14/2025

Jilly was great to work with! If you’re interested in some dog help, feel free to PM me or head to nacdogtraining.com

03/17/2025

Jilly, Lotti, and Violet are crushing place command today 💪🏽

02/11/2025

The Shift Toward Medication Over Training
For thousands of years, dogs coexisted with humans without the need for pharmaceuticals. Today, many dogs face behavioral issues, and instead of training and structure, we too often turn to medication for a quick fix. But tranquilizers and SSRIs don’t solve the problem—they suppress it. SSRIs, in particular, don’t address the root cause of anxiety in dogs—they simply stretch the limited serotonin available without truly increasing it.

What dogs need isn’t Prozac—it’s proper nutrition and training. By supporting serotonin production naturally through high-quality foods and holistic solutions like CBD and THC, we can help anxious dogs thrive without relying on chemicals.

In a world eager for shortcuts, it’s time to revisit the basics: real structure, proper care, and natural solutions. Medication should be a last resort, not a quick fix.

For the full discussion, dive deeper on our Substack

02/10/2025

Look at any other animal species in the world—conflict happens. Fights break out, sometimes even fatal ones. Yet, for some reason, we expect dogs to be completely exempt from this reality.

The truth is, dogs aren’t just innocent, cuddly fur babies. They are animals with instincts, and if put in the wrong situation, they are capable of seriously injuring or even killing other dogs or people.

If we truly want to set our dogs up for success, we should rethink risky situations like dog parks, daycares, and random on-leash greetings. These interactions can turn bad in an instant. One wrong move, and suddenly your dog is facing euthanasia, you’re dealing with lawsuits, and you’re left asking yourself—was it worth it?

So what should you do instead? Start in the home. Give your dog structure. They aren’t happier when they have no rules—they’re actually more anxious and unstable. Set clear boundaries. Dogs, like people, need to understand consequences to make good decisions.

At the end of the day, our dogs’ behavior is a reflection of us as leaders. Weak leadership creates unstable, reactive dogs. Strong leadership builds confident, well-behaved dogs that are easy to live with. It’s time for dog owners to step it up.

10/21/2023

I hear this nonsesne from all sides of the training world. If the dog is properly trained, and properly reinforced, they will perform as desired sans tools—if you’ve trained them properly.

For balanced trainers it’s primarily a ge***al wagging argument used to try to deride the competition, and to elevate the admonisher’s sorely fragile ego. For positive only/force-free trainers, it’s primarily an ideological stance, or a gross demonstration of ignorance.

Regardless where it emanates from, the ones most negatively impacted are the innocent owners (and their dogs) who are looking to these so-called experts for guidance. And so after hearing repeatedly that having to rely on tools is a sign of either poor training or a poor moral compass, owners often view the very practical, and the very useful reliance on tools as a sign of their own failures. And so they feel compelled to try to get away from them as soon as possible.

As I’ve said many times, the goal shouldn’t be to get rid of tools, the goal should be to get rid of the problems. And for most owners and dogs those problems are best curtailed and best kept at bay by continued use of the tools which best serve the desired goals.

Are there exceptions? Are there dogs who will happily not push back against any of the rules once they know what’s expected and once they’ve been trained with lots of repetitions and diligence? Of course. Just like there are people who never speed, never roll through a stop sign, and who would never think to push back against any rules once they know them. But these are indeed the exceptions.

For most dogs, and for most people, the tools of authority (cops, laws, and the legal system for us—tools, training and owners who lead for dogs), are a necessary bulwark against our own desires and proclivities of the moment, which would often see either species—fully knowing whats expected and “proper”, make very different decisions.

Which brings us to something else I’ve written about often: knowing and doing are two very different things. It’s a simpleton who assumes that an animal (dog or human) with their own desires, drives, and unique personalities—would “do” simply because they “know”.

Put very simply, if we cannot get the highly intelligent, morally aware human to do what’s right without the threat of undesired consequences delivered by an authority figure, how on earth do we expect something equivalent or better from our dogs? Our dogs who are far less intelligent and where morals have no influence on behavior—which means they’ll be even more inclined to be opportunistic, self-serving, and impulsive. What foolish nonsense is it that would encourage owners to choose a far more problematic, stressful, freedom-diminishing, and dangerous tool-less path?

Enough listening to the “experts”. Find the tools which best help you and your dog, learn how to use them properly, and then, without shame, guilt, or self-judgement—use them as often and as long as they serve and improve you and your dog’s life together.

10/02/2023

https://youtube.com/shorts/CaGHCt8jP28?si=RAgSPj6I1DCGNUTl

09/29/2023

Good luck Duke!!!! Biggest German Shepherd I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with.

08/18/2023

This is a big one with my clients! If you want to treat your dogs like a baby, you better be able to set boundaries or you will run into trouble.

Everything has its price. Want more soft, doting, affection time with your dog, but don’t want to turn your dog into a mess? Simple, pay the price of being a solid, healthy, selfless, and disciplined leader when needed and when appropriate, and you buy your way into what you desire.

Sadly, like many things in life, most want the fun/enjoyable stuff without paying the price to have it in a healthy fashion. The price of discipline, discomfort, and delayed gratification are simply too high, and so these people’s dogs—like so many other aspects of their lives—take the hit for their inability to discipline themselves.

I personally love having my dogs on the couch and the bed, I also love being able to be super soft and affectionate and doting. But I’m not interested in having my dogs take the hit for my desires, nor am I interested in all of us taking the hit by having less freedom, less enjoyment, and more stress…simply because I want the good stuff but am unwilling to do the hard stuff.

So we have a handful of very clear rules, we are mindful of each of our dog’s individual needs/personality/limits and their personal requirements for structure, and when trespasses occur there are appropriate negative consequences that clearly resonate with each dog. This simple approach allows myself, my wife, my dogs, and all those around us, to enjoy life together to its fullest.

This stuff isn’t complicated, although as of late we’ve worked awfully hard to make it appear so. If you want the good stuff, man-up and woman-up, and pay the price. Otherwise, your dogs will. And, without realizing it, you will most certainly pay as well—just in a different fashion.

As Jocko so simply says: “Discipline equals freedom.” It’s true with dogs, and it’s true with everything else.

08/10/2023

For all of you who’ve been taught that corrections/punishment will destroy the relationship between you and your dog, and who now believe this, and are terrified to do so—let me introduce you to what you’ve not been taught.

Reality.

The reality of how your dog perceives you, and the association and relationship that develops from that perception, comes from ALL your interactions.

As I shared in the original graphic, if you were to ONLY engage in a one dimensional interaction dynamic, where you ONLY corrected/punished your dog, then you actually would undermine your relationship.

But unless you’re a sadist, I can’t imagine you’re taking on a dog only to correct/punish it. So you can relax those relationship fears. If you’re like any of the thousands of owners I’ve interacted with, you do many things with your dog—many things that have nothing to do with a negative associations. Things like I shared in the graphic: walks, play, affection, feeding, car rides, adventures etc.

When you share a multi-faceted relationship dynamic; one that is balanced with far more positive, fun, rewarding, enjoyable interactions, along with the occasional correction/punishment—which shouldn’t be fun or enjoyable—your healthy relationship is safe and sound. Your association is a healthy, balanced one. It’s both positive and negative, with the positives far outweighing the negatives.

This is why vets have it so tough. Your vet is almost always going to get the single dimensional association. Even when owners attempt to counter this association, bringing their dogs to the vet for non-visits, and having the staff give treats and pets...the scary, stressful, and sometimes painful reality of the other visits far outweigh the other positive interactions, and aren’t nearly powerful enough or frequent enough to combat the negative experience most dogs go through with typical vet visits. And so, we see the shaking, quaking, stressed out, freaked out behavior when we visit.

But back to you. Along with what I’ve shared above about relationship balance, your dog also learns that it controls its reality. It finds that negative consequences only occur when they make poor choices. Which means you are predictable in your actions, which means your dog’s world is predictable and safe...even when faced with undesirable consequences which come from you. Your dog understands that the consequences are tied to their behavior, and are anything but random. Which is also why the entire silliness about “learned helplessness” (which is also leveraged to frighten owners) is also precisely that…silliness. If your dog understands that their choices control their world, they’re anything but helpless. But that’s a topic for another day.

To sum up, if you live a normal, multi-faceted life with your dog, like everyone I’ve seen, you won’t have any fallout from correcting/punishing your dog. Zip, zero, nada. In fact, if you do a little thinking, you’ll see how easily owners accidentally create a truly dysfunctional, toxic, unhealthy relationship...by ONLY engaging in positives. Yep, you guessed it. You’ve become a one dimensional owner. One who need not be listened to, respected, or appropriately interacted with. Is that a positive association? Is that a healthy relationship? It’s certainly not how I’d define either, and it’s certainly not what I’d want for me or my dog.

Strangely, they always seem to leave these inconvenient truths out of the conversation. I wonder why?

08/02/2023

Quick story

Archer is an incredibly bright but stubborn dog. When he doesn’t want to do something like get in the crate, get off the couch, go on the place bed, he will plant himself onto the ground and bark/growl/lunge at you to get his way. The owners believe the anxiety meds made his behavior worse as he was never aggressive before starting them. He became extremely fearful outside and wouldn’t go on a walk which pre-medication, was no problem. Again, he would plant himself and attempt to flee/fight you. He is a perfect example why setting boundaries and giving structure is so important. The boundary setting was key for his aggressive outbursts. Although he was either being lazy or fearful, it didn’t mean that fighting I or his owners was the correct decision. He needed to become compliant in his obedience so that it would translate over to being compliant with his overall behavior. His job is to be the one being led, not the one determining what we’re doing. Firm boundaries kept him in check. Structure played a huge role in managing his overall anxiety. Imagine if you had no structure. You sat in your house all day, didn’t go to work, the gym, the store, etc. and you went without anything to structure your day. You would be a mental mess. That’s why it’s so important for our dogs. We want to add things to their day to give them structure. My go to is the place command (go to your dog bed and stay there until I release you). The great thing about place command is that you can have your dogs in place (giving them structure/a job) as long as you need. Although the dog is just laying down and not physically moving, their brain is working. Similar to working a desk job. Archer is another textbook example of why dog training doesn’t need to be overcomplicated and why boundaries and structure are incredibly important when it comes to dog behavior.

07/31/2023

Tuna did great with training!