The successful training of a reliable Protection Dog starts with good education and obedience training. With this in mind, Ruud Haak and Resi Gerritsen open their book with a solid coverage of the preliminary considerations: conditions for success, breeds suitable for protection work, a look at various training approaches, and an explanation of basic concepts in training dogs. From there, they launch into basic training every dog should have, as well as thoroughly covering how to break bad habits in your dog. They also lay the foundation for protection work by showing you how to train your dog in the obedience exercises that he'll need to make him reliable. Every dog suitable to live in the community, and especially reliable Protection Dogs, must have mastered certain basic skills. For instance he must not pull the leash; on command he must sit, lay down, stand, stay, come; and he must also have normal behavior with humans and other animals. The final section of! the book deals with the specifics of protection work: raising a dog for protection work, basic exercises, advanced decoy techniques and other protection training. The overall intent of the book is to help you train a dog to work reliably in the real world as a protection dog. While the exercises in this book can also be used to train a dog for dog sports like Schutzhund and Ringsport, the authors emphasize that a working protection dog must be able to handle many situations, sometimes in ways that contravene dog sport rules. They are careful to distinguish these areas of training from those more suitable for dog sports. Read the rest of this entry »