How a Mouse Led Me to Epigenetics

How a Mouse Led Me to Epigenetics

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Is Your Dog’s Water Bowl Really Killing Them?

Is Your Dog’s Water Bowl Really Killing Them?

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APGI 10th Programme

APGI 10th Programme

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Feeling the fear and doing it anyway...

Feeling the fear and doing it anyway...

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What makes a good gundog trainer?

What makes a good gundog trainer?

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Getting Back to Normal Life with your dog after the Shooting Season

After the Shooting Season

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Trigger Stacking

Video on Trigger Stacking

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Natural and Learned Behaviour

Natural and Learned Behaviour in our dogs

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Keeping your dogs cool

Video on some recommendations on keeping your dogs cool during hot weather🐾

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Misinformation on the Slip Lead

Can a slip lead really be kind? Yes... when the hands at the other end know what they’re doing. That’s where the focusshouldbe 🐾

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The Harness

With an increasing number of scientific studies on harnesses, we now have more data to support the concerns I’ve had over this piece of equipment. As the harness is exponentially increasing in popularity and has started to be marketed as a 'must have' fashion accessory for your dog, it is more important than ever that we realise that there is a negative impact on our dogs' well-being.

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Out with the Old

Looking back over 2024

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Emrys's Road To Recovery - Part 3

Emrys's recovery is ongoing and he had the joy of meeting Faelan

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Settle Down

Having a puppy, and then a dog, that can’t switch off and settle down is so stressful, not just for you but for your puppy too...

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Rest and Digest

When your dog is lying with his eyes open and staring into space, don't think for a minute that he’s sad, bored, lonely, or unhappy… as it's just the opposite.

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Emrys's Road To Recovery - Parts 1 & 2

Emrys starts his recovery journey with stem cell therapy

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Dressing Up Dogs

Dressing a dog for bad weather with a warm waterproof coat, a neoprene vest for protection, or when coming back home with a drying fleece is one thing, but dressing them up and parading them about is another.

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Habit Stacking

I’ve always recommended that an easy way to incorporate a bit of training in a busy day is to do a little while you’re waiting for the kettle to boil…

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Say hello and wave goodbye

While it might be a great title for a song, when it comes to dogs, a calm silent interaction works best...

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Let's Talk Balls...

If you have got a ball like this, that has got holes going around it, especially if the hole doesn't go all the way through like this one, then don't leave it down for your dog...

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Red and Yellow and Pink and Blue...

Using coloured dummies in our training can really help to set our dogs up to succeed...

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Never miss an opportunity to train your dog

Every time you interact with your dog you’re training him on one level or another... so never miss an opportunity to train him...

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The Advanced Pet Gundog® - Book Award

This year I received one of the best birthday pressies ever. I logged on to an email announcing that The Advanced Pet Gundog® had won the 2024 American Legacy Book Award.

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Not You! command...

A command that I use a lot that you may find valuable with your dog is ‘not you’. It means quite simply that you don’t want your dog to come with you, but he doesn’t have to hold a set position

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Why dogs bark at the postman…

Watching dogs react to the postman is always interesting as it speaks volumes about the relationship that the owner has with their dog.

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Operant Conditioning

There are so many posts on operant conditioning but the one’s that I’ve seen the most of are looking at it from a human perspective rather than from the dogs which, in my mind, can really muddy the waters and lead to confusion and it always seems to document using food, harsh handling and various bits of equipment, however this isn’t always the case.

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Should I Stay Or Should I Go

I was reading a post in a Facebook group yesterday where a woman shared that she was going to euthanise her dog as it was being aggressive. It had bitten her and her husband a few times, both needing hospital treatment, and she had a five month baby in the house. She’d contacted rescue centres but,

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Taste, tongue and teeth

Like us, the dog can taste sweet, salty, sour, and bitter and, like other carnivores (humans excepted), dogs have special receptors for tasting water, which I find particularly interesting as when dogs drink, they use the underside of their tongue, curling it under into a flattish ladle, and then scooping the water into their mouth… one of the reasons why a narrow deep water bowl is better than a wide shallow one – that and it helps prevent the amount of water that ends up on the floor.

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Posturing and Scent Marking

I tend to get out and about with the boys a couple of times a day; walking them individually or as a pack, or doing some training with them. When Emrys got to around two and a half I became aware that, while still sharp on the whistle, was starting to range further than I like when he has some free time off lead.

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Let's Talk Copying and Copyrighting...

I know I’m not the only person that this is happening to, I’ve seen it over and over again with colleagues getting whole chunks of their website copy lifted and used, as well as videos of trainers dogs being passed off as someone else’s

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Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning is when someone, or something, has an ‘ah-ha moment’ and makes an association between two things that aren't linked, so in Pavlov's dog’s case, a bell and food...

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Just Messing About In The Water

I normally introduce dogs to water without any kind of retrieving and just let them pootle around and have a wee play.

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Just Walking The Dogs

When the weather heats up get out of bed earlier and walk your dog. If for whatever reason you can’t walk early, walk late… do both... or do neither.

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Acute Caudal Myopathy (Swim Tail)

The condition is known as Swim Tail, Swimmers Tail, Cold Water Tail, Limp Tail and Limber Tail, but it’s correct term is Acute Caudal Myopathy and is more often seen in young, adult male working breeds.

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Harnesses

I absolutely love this video by @dutchie.daemon.
Not only does it show the negative impact of harnesses on our dog's gait with tension from the lead, but, most importantly, it also shows it without.

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Step Up and be the Leader

During this time of uncertainty and change, it's easy to get caught up in the 'must do this and must do that' with our dogs, trying to do the latest exercise, latest challenge, be interesting, be exciting and generally 'amuse' our dogs.

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APGI training workshop 2019

Another fabulous day on the APGI training workshop and as well as finishing the presentations for the week, we got to talk about one of Lez's favourite theories - the Dunning-Kruger effect; it's in every profession and in every walk of life and once you're aware of it, you're really aware of it.

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S-t-e-a-d-y

Steadiness is so important for so many reasons; you want to be able to take your eyes off your young dog when he’s in a stay without worrying about him getting up and chasing something, or to take off after a rabbit, or a cat, when you’re walking him.

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Teach Your Puppy To Do Nothing

You want your puppy to think that hanging around with you is the best thing in the world; when you’re on the move he wants to be too, when you’re doing nothing he wants to be too.

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How Learning takes place

When we do something, nerve cells in the brain, known as neurons are fired up. They talk to each other in a way similar to passing a baton in a relay race, forming a pathway; a neural pathway. Just like passing the baton becomes quicker and more fluid with practice, so too the more an action is repeated the more established the pathway and the quicker and easier the action and reaction, until it eventually becomes an automatic learned response like driving a car or riding a bike for example.

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