Sunday, June 29, 2008

Susan Garrett Advances in Dog Training Seminar

Wow, I am such a crap dog trainer.

12 comments:

  1. No you are not!!!! Susan's job is living training dogs and training people to train dogs. She is just better than the rest of us. If she wasn't she wouldn't be able to make a living off it. You have a job. You compete in triathalons. You don't have 24 x 7 to think about training dogs. You do the best you can with the time and tools you have and your dogs love you for it no matter what.

    Amy

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  2. we all go away from a seminar with someone great feeling like that. but really. you are not a crap dog trainer. You are just not Susan Garrett. :o)

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  3. Ohmagawd, in response to manymuddypaws' comment..

    My husband says that ALL the time! After I nag him for this or that in his handling or dog training and he just laughs and says, "YEAH, WELL, I'M NOT SUSAN GARRETT!"

    Maybe we should make t-shirts????

    Elayne, I hope you found the seminar useful! Can't wait to chat with you about it at regionals!

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  4. Well, thank you all for your kind words of encouragement. I didn't mean to sound discouraged but I did realize a lot of mistakes that I'm making and how I could be so much better and that's a good thing. I learned a lot that's for sure and I'm excited to start experimenting with training things in a new way. Unfortunately I feel like I've only scratched the surface on what there is to know and I don't know anyone around here who trains that way or has that depth of knowledge so I'll have to do the best with what I've learned over the weekend.

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  5. Yes you do....Stacy. She may not ascribe to all of Susan's handling system or methods of training, but Stacy is the person who developed 2on/2off first (for Jack) and she is a phenomenal trainer and instructor. I know Fort Collins isn't close, but she's definitely worth the effort of traveling once a month.

    By the way...a friend of mine is traveling to CO for the regional from TX and I pointed her your way for some tips on mountain biking and hiking in the area because her husband is coming with her and he's a triathlete too.

    Good luck at the Regional

    amy

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  6. Yes, I absolutely would be happy to help out your friend. In fact my husband is almost certainly riding (mtn. bikes) with his friends that weekend and I'm sure they'd be happy to have him along. They are very advanced riders though and the trails they ride are hard and at high elevation (8000-9000 ft) but they're very friendly and happy to have others along. Or I can point him toward trails if he prefers to go solo.

    I love training with Stacy and the trip to Ft. Collins isn't that far for the occasional lesson but she doesn't do regular lessons anymore. She does maybe 2 workshops a year and you have to be lucky to be reading the CO agility list right when she posts because they fill so quickly. I know she has her masters camp but my dogs would never hold up for 3-4 days of training in a row. But yeah I do love her workshops when she has them.

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  7. Anonymous1:13 PM

    Maybe the shirts could say ... I'm not Susan Garrett on the front, then on the back something like ... BUT I'm doing the best I can. Ha! That would be funny.

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  8. That would be funny.

    I was thinking about it (always a dangerous thing) and when I said noone in this area 'trains that way or has that depth of knowledge' I was talking about shaping. Sorry, I realized I wasn't too clear about that. My brain is still melting from the weekend.

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  9. I went to Susan Garrett's puppy camp in Canada one year. A group of students all had tshirts that said What Would Susan Do? on them. Needless to say, she wasn't happy about it.

    amy

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  10. That is too funny.

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  11. Anonymous12:42 PM

    Most people have that reaction the first time they go to one of Susan's seminars :-) But to join the chorus, she's a genius dog trainer and it's all she does all the time and has for years. It's up to us to not to compare ourselves to her but to use the knowledge she's sharing to the best of our abilitites and time allowances. And she does have several DVDs and books out.

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  12. I'm glad that you weren't disappointed in the seminar. ;-) I love playing with shaping. There's also a fairly decent book out on the topic (disclosure: by a Bay Teamer) that gave me more good ideas and reinforced a lot of what Susan talked about. "Quick Clicks" by Mandy Book and Cheryl Smith.

    -ellen

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