Thank you - Page 1

Maywood wrote this in another subject:

Yeah, maybe you’re right Rik.  Animal abuse is a pretty serious accusation and I shouldn’t be so flippant about it.  Thanks for the reminder.

OK Steve you are cleared of all wrong doing from me.  I apologize with extreme humility, no bullshit.  Although I didn’t like the way you guys handled that dog on the table in that video, in all honesty I guess I wouldn’t call that true animal abuse really as I have seen much worse for sure.  I got no problem admitting when I’m wrong and I’m very sorry for this if I caused you any ill will.  My bad!

Just so you know, I don’t take any of this stuff too seriously when I post them and I sometimes forget there are people out there who may not share the same frame of mind that I’m making my posts in.  Something we should all keep in mind prior to hitting the submit button I guess.

If this is a sincere apology, thank you very much, Maywood. 
I would like to explain some things:

For many people, the video you saw could easily be considered very rough.  However, a few more views will show you a lot more facts.  But first, I believe we have to understand what is on that video.  This was a police dog.  His reliable performance could literally mean the difference between life and death, both for the deputy, any other responding deputies, and for the dog.  We can't lose sight of that fact, or we're not being logical or realistic.

Second, the dog was scheduled for re-certification.  This is a critical point in the life of any K9.  If he does NOT re-certify, he is not permitted, by state law, to perform as a police K9 - this means he can't even get into a LE vehicle anymore.
Some agencies will allow a second test, but meanwhile, the dog is prohibited from working - very much (but far more serious) - like having no driver's license.  The law says "No license (re-certification) = No drive (work as a police K9)".
A MUCH better example would be a police officer who was fired.  Turn in the badge, gun, police ID.  You're a civilian now.  You're not a police officer anymore.  
 
Now we take that a step further.  In many areas (mine included) a former police dog that cannot work will be euthanized.  I've asked, "Why?"  The answer is that the dog has been trained to bite a human, and the liability will immediately fall on the law enforcement agency IF this dog ever bites a human again.  So he can't be "adopted" (at least not around here), it's very rare that an agency will allow the handler to "keep the dog after retirement" - and there's nothing left.  The dog dies.  I find this quite ridiculous: if the "brass" (superior officers) would have been willing to give the dog and handler some TIME to get the problems straight, there's no reason the dog couldn't certify and go back to work.  But the LE agencies have their own little political world. 

Back to the video - compulsion was used ONLY because it was necessary at that moment.  The dog was not physically harmed or abused in any way.  Without question, he was mentally stressed for several seconds - we can see the submission all over the dog following his short "flight". 
Well - what is a severe correction supposed to do?  Isn't a correction intended to cause submission?  Maybe you choose not to believe me, but this is true: The dog never needed to "go off the table" again, and - on the day of that video - we were doing bitework within 60 minutes.  You'd never know he went off the table at all - his bite drive wasn't affected in the slightest.  (The long table and round table were about 8' apart - so the dog was looking at the long table during bitework.)  I'll also add that we repeated the "down" exercise (both off and on the table) about 50 more times that day.  It seems to me that the dog just needed one SERIOUS correction to get past the problem. 

Yellow Rose was kind enough to spend 2 weeks at my home in 2007.  She saw non-stop dog videos, and talked with Gene England several times.  I'm sure she knows what she saw and heard.

I'm a lot of things.  Some things could use improvement, which I won't deny.  I am not cruel, inhumane, or abusive with dogs.  I never was.  I'm also honest.  I have nothing to gain by lying.  Regarding dogs, I closed my school in 2002.  My health prohibits any more training - I don't even own a dog anymore.

Thank you for reading all this,
Steve Leigh

Steve - we don't know each other, and I am too much a novice in the intricacies of work/sport to get into too many debates about Protection, table training etc -  but what I did see at the very beginning of the video appeared to be a handler who thinks the way to get a dog to Sit(z)  ...  is to push down on the middle of the spine.

There are much better ways to get a Sit than this, they don't involve the risk of a back getting damaged, and they've been used by dog trainers - at least here in the UK - in both Pet Obedience and dogsports for years.  I am talking
of course about things like teaching a lure hand signal (starting off with food and toys) to bring a dog into the Sit;
or using your fingers in his 'pockets' in the loin to get him to fold up his legs into a Sit. [ Or clicker-training, even !]

Anyone who uses the short-cut method of pushing the dog into the Sit forcefully risks setting up even more
resistance to that exercise (and therefore probably others following/dependant on it). IMO: Amateurish.
 
 

“Regarding dogs, I closed my school in 2002.  My health prohibits any more training - I don't even own a dog anymore.”

Once a dog man always a dog man Steve.  But if you can still function normally and take care of yourself you should have a dog with you at all times.  They keep us healthy and alert.  I can’t imagine life without one. 

Go get a new dog (a nice one) and use the relatively new motivational techniques being used nowadays.  That shit is fun as hell with no compulsion whatsoever and it’s good for your health too.  You don’t have to train it as a police dog or for schutzhund.  Basic obedience and tracking is good enough as you get older.

Bang this one to the top.

I'd like some honest comment on my message.
I sure spent enough time composing it - and I'm well on my way to having paralyzed hands.
THAT means I made an effort.

Is it too much to ask for RESPECT?  Honesty IS respect.

That's not too much to ask for - is it?

Steve Leigh

I WAS giving you an honest comment in relation to your message.  May not have been what you were looking for /
wanted to hear, but thats tough.  If the dog was on the table because he wasn't going Down properly, and if you
are/were  using the same sort of methods for the Platz as you are 'teaching' to get a Sit, you are way behind the times.
Pushing and shoving isn't training, and it IS counterproductive.  Slamming a dog around with or without a table
and whether or not he really hit the wall is about as relevant as chocolate is to teapots.  Maybe you aren't  being
"cruel or abusive", that is a matter of opinion.  But you are being amateur. And your video encourages other "know
nothings" to be the same.  Don't care its already a serving K9;  if you rescued a dog tomorrow and "trained" it from
scratch the same way, it would still be amateur.   But I am sorry to hear about your hands.  Perhaps a few less dogchains in your life might have helped prevent that ...
O, and of course the dog in the video exhibited that he was stressed at that point;  he'd just gone flying off the
table and been none-to-gently brought up short.  I suggest you'd be stressed after that.  Nothing to do with
anything.

 HUNDMUTTER:

 Steve has leukemia and has had 3 strokes and is home bound. HE was a keyboardist(Hammond B3)Stax and also for Ike Turner/  since 14yrs old and had many other jobs if you would read his website, that his hands have done far more than most of us..... and a very avid DOG trainer, titling and working for years , in Florida and going to Germany and putting titles on many hard FRIE dogs brought back that others could not get successfully trained. And he still played concerts while doing that in Florida. HE can still play but does not. I got to hear 2 weeks of playing, but doubt the Hammond B3 has been turned on since I left

.HE is in his 60's now and yes the dog was a K9 ,that already knew all his commands , very well, just was needing his attitude changed. which many of the dogs sent to Tampa had to be conditioned for their jobs and had mega problems when shipped or trained improperly.  Steve's hands have traveled more miles than the Continental USA could triple in time 7 fold. NO need to start the snippy remarks about chains..THAT was uncalled for. Steve has more ability to read a dog , if in doubt call Gene England.. STEVE cannot train anything now. HE can type, but he is home bound and could offer some good advice here but to start on a video that was the start many years ago of bitter remarks and has led to a lot of meaningless waste of time to criticize, it needs to end.

Before you start criticizing or offering up what you think, it might be a good idea to just rethink..THAT was a long time ago, and he was experienced , in redirecting the mind of a dog that was a very very hard dog, not the kind most would have contact with, and that was just ONE session..... LOOK at the date of that training.

The point was made that the subject is HELSER and the person who gave him the dog brought forward by the poster seeing an ad not how Steve put his hand in the back of a dog that needed its thinking redirected. The average JOE doesn't handle dogs of that caliber, they get sent to GENE or back then Steve, and today , Nate, or Steve House or Miller or Larry FILO and a few other trainers that can re direct the brain of a problem dog. IT got corrected. So now you have part of the rest of the story.
Steve has made it very plain in his website...YOU CANNOT LEARN TABLES from the internet or his website but he can give  you an inside look at what can be done or how to build a table.

Same principle still is used for the same reasons today . Steve did not write the book "How to make and win friends" he was a dog trainer, and he will share ideas, but if it gets hip high , just share ideas and agree to disagree. I am not gonna referee and hopefully Steve can remain calm.. Anxiety attacks and agoraphobia people get on the defense real quick so we all need to RESPECT...his honesty he offers as a explaination of his training techniques.

WHEW,,,now my fingers hurt.
 YR

Dear Steve,

there is no way to talk about "real" police dogs with the "normal" dog owner on this board. These people are used to pets or prey monsters only, they do have years of time for correcting any wrong behavior, in the worst case they loose some points on a trial...no reality at all...

For all those who are not used to "real" work ( and this doesn´t mean SAR, SchH, Mondio...) -

Do you really want to read in the newspaper:

German Shepherd wounded 12 year old kid that had stolen an apple running away from police, because officer Joe Doe wasn´t able to stop his police dog ???

A German Shepherd during police work is similar to a weapon, the officer ALWAYS must have the possibility to decide about its engation or not immediately, no mistakes allowed!

What are you guys dreaming about?

YR
Wasn't really being 'snipy' about the dog chains, although I can see on reflection how it might look that way.  What I meant was (oh its hard to write anything without 3 pages of backstory 1st !) was that if Steve was the 'oldfashioned' dog trainer he appears to be, hanging onto dogs of whatever calibre with loads of chain leads and pinch collars etc etc CAN do your hands in - he made it sound like he has arthritis in his hands which I can identify with.   And I'm old enough to have started out using other than motivational methods and tools, so I've been on the other end of that chain, I know it can do damage !

As I said at the beginning of my post - I do not know Steve Leigh, I do not know 'of' him either, except insofar as words about him appear on this board - and I tried to disregard those completely because some were 'pro', some
'anti'.  Nor because I'm not living in the States & not training dogs in the States do I know about him - or his health
misfortunes - either.  He wasn't hiding behind them, to his credit.

Therefore, all I can comment on was what I actually saw with my own eyes in the video [which if it is so out of date
perhaps should be taken off / not brought up for people to take note of ?.]

Steve asked for an honest response.  Maybe the honest answer he WANTED was just : "No Steve the dog does not actually slam into the wall".  Sorry if I saw something else worthy of comment first.
As I said, I do not get into the merits of table training, it was not something I was even aware of as a method until
I hit this board.  I can see the argument that tables, used properly, can be saving on the handlers' backs.   But
then of course one could argue that use of more motivational than hands-on techniques can also do that.

Don't misunderstand me -  I am not saying that older style methods do not work ;  of course they work.  And I am
not saying that one would not try another more forceful / compulsive method with certain dogs with certain problems,  if better methods had gotten inconsistent results.   But we are asked to believe the dog in the video (already fully trained) had exhibited problems going Down, whether of speed or duration or both not specified, and the table technique was a cure for that.   Well I saw someone from the get-go using a method to get the dog to start from a Sit, which I know full well will just make a lot of dogs 'push' rightbackatya.  No references for the 'audience' as to what else had been tried or why or when, and no attempt to show that practised on the film first.   And I have been around long enough too to know a bit about the human race, & that 'what you see is what you get', often as not.

Linda.
 


 

Oh, and Susie, a) we do get cases where Police do not have full control and end up biting someone they shouldn't,
don't we - as evidenced by a recent case reported on this board - where was that cop's instant Down ?
and b) when I teach an instant Down I expect to get it, not cos someone is giving me points or because my dog
may bite, but because if I don't want a 10 ton truck to run over him, he'd BETTER stop dead.
 

Point a) Police tries to avoid this, that´s the reason of training ...
Point b) We are talking about police dogs right now - different responsibility...

You seem to be German - there is the possibility to watch police dogs during training, ask about it in your state ( NRW Stukenbrock ).
Afterwards you´ll have a different point of view...