Erico Cross: I am Erico Cross with Take the Lead Dog Training and today what we have been showing you is basic training for dogs. One of the other problems that folks have problem with their dogs is unnecessary barking.

What I tell folks all the time about this part is this. Number one: You have to know what the dog is barking at. So, when the dog barks you need to go and investigate and make sure the dog is not barking at something that it needs to bark it. You don t want to correct the dog from barking when it's barking at an intruder. Okay, so go and physically see what the dog is barking at? If the dog is barking at something that you do not want it to bark at then you have a recourse to give it correction, say that no. When the dog is quite then you can have a treat and you can give it a treat. So, as it knows, okay, being quite is good in this situation, no bark at that and you must be consistent. So, you have to investigate, to make sure the dog is barking at the correct thing and it s going to take some work in your part.

So, the next thing that you can do if the dog is incessantly barking, unnecessarily barking there are other ways that you can -- things you can do to correct that. You can use a pinch collar and a long line. The pinch collar is nothing but a tool that we use to train a dog. My house was not build, we are just using a Philips screwdrivers, there s a lot different tools went in to building that. Same thing would train a dog. I do not use one kind of method; I use whatever is appropriate for that dog. Now use appropriately the pinch collar is great. Use wrong it isn t.

This collars are also called training collar or a Prong collar. Now the way that I have said is that, most people use the pinch collar or a training collar like this. That has two rings that put the leash in this part and when they pull, you notice how it got small. Alright, what I do is this ring and that ring here. I hook it up to the dog and when I pull, the whole stays the same size. So, it does choke the dog off. What is does, it gives the dog a little pinch around the neck, just like in the litter, when mamma dog used to get mad with the puppies for nibbling on it or teeth too hard. So, you grab him and it s over. Okay, so that is what this collar simulates, the grab around the neck by mom, alright and that is what the dog understands. The dog does not understand language. So, what we need to do is communicate with the dog the way that they understand. Another collar that is used to stop the barking is problem is the bark collar. Now, it has different levels and you turn it up just to get the desired results for your dog. You don t want to turns up this too high or else, it s going to give you more of the same problem that you had because it is going to be stimulations for the dogs. So, you use appropriate stimulations for the dog and then you get the dog to stop barking because what the dog learns from this -- because we say that it takes -- you only have seconds to appraise or correct the dog to doing something wrong. Okay, and most people take too long to correct the dog or appraise him for doing the right thing. With this collar, it s a instantaneous correction, so the dog learns, my barking is causing that so they learn to shut up.

Another tool for training is the regular or flat collar. Okay, but this is not a correction collar and I would this collar on a dog that is very sensitive or does not require much correction. But as you see if you watch some of the other videos already in the basic obedience, you see that what I start out the dogs with is with food. There is no dog who does not like to eat and if the dog does not want to eat, what I always says this then you are feeding it too much.