Dog training: on your own or with a trainer?

You have become the proud owner of a puppy or an adult dog and are eager to start teaching your pet a variety of tricks. It remains to solve the fundamental question: train the dog yourself or with a trainer? Both options have both pros and cons.

Pictured: puppy training

Dog training yourself: is it possible?

If you have at least minimal experience, an understanding of dog behavior and an initial contact with the pet, you can handle it on your own. This option has its advantages:

1. With the right approach to training, you will strengthen your bond with your dog, spend more time with him, and form a bond faster.
2. Training is a kind of “pair dance”. The dog will communicate with you, and you will learn its “language”, you will begin to understand your four-legged friend better.
3. By gaining experience in self-training, even if you later decide to use the services of a trainer, it will be easier for you to find a specialist who is right for you and your dog. In addition, you will better understand what the instructor is doing and why.

This option also has disadvantages:

1. If you are included in the process (and when training a dog you are completely absorbed in the process), it is difficult for you to notice flaws that are clearly visible from the outside. For example, insufficiently clear gestures, conflicting commands, or untimely reinforcements. We are all human and make mistakes, but many mistakes can be prevented if there is an opportunity to look from the outside.
2. Sometimes when training a dog on our own, we find ourselves in a dead end, not knowing how to resolve this or that situation. A professional can suggest a simple and elegant way out of the impasse. And thereby speed up the process of dog training.
3. If domestic training is most often available to a non-professional, then, having decided to engage in special types of training (for example, one of the types of cynological sports), an amateur most often encounters difficulties.

Training a dog with a trainer: a panacea?

Some owners, not being confident in their own abilities, prefer to trust a professional. But this option also has its advantages and disadvantages.

Benefits of dog training with a trainer:

1. As already mentioned, this is a view from the outside – sometimes this is a very valuable thing. Yes, you can film yourself, but it’s better if your actions are corrected “here and now” – then you can focus solely on the dog.
2. The trainer, due to his experience, has dealt with a large number of different dogs and in case of difficulties, a good instructor will offer a variant of overcoming difficulties that is suitable for you and your dog.
3. A good trainer knows a lot of techniques, exercises and games that you probably haven’t even heard of, but that your dog will most likely enjoy and make the training process more enjoyable for all involved and more effective.

But this option also has disadvantages:

1. There is a risk of making the wrong choice of instructor. This trap often falls into inexperienced owners or those who are not too well versed in the behavior of dogs. The trainer may use techniques (such as cruel methods or inhumane ammunition) that will undermine, if not destroy, your contact with the pet. Are you willing to pay that price for dog training?
2. Instructors who work with the “in-line method” sometimes “blur their eyes” and use formulaic methods without taking into account the individual characteristics of your particular dog.

Pictured: dog training

What to do? Each owner makes his own decision in accordance with his “coordinate system”. 

In any case, whether you choose to train a dog on your own or with the help of a trainer, it is worth studying the literature on ethology, zoopsychology and cynology. 

Recently, a lot of new effective techniques have appeared, and at the same time humane, and familiarization with them will allow you to act with open eyes. Then you will be able not only to train the dog yourself, but also, if necessary, to choose the right trainer who shares your values ​​and works according to a system that is close to you and your dog.