The strategies that can be used in training a dog effectively can be divided into four groups, these are food, toys, praise and force.
In this article these strategies will be discussed in more detail.
Food The use of food in dog training has already been established for couple of centuries.
Almost all dogs look forward to a food treat.
This is the reason that most pet owners used this type of motivation in rewarding their dog after accomplishing the task that they ask him to do.
The food in dog training will build the motivation and the drive of the dog to follow your commands.
However in some cases owners fail to get the attention of the dog even with the presence of a food treat.
Giving and presenting the rewards should be offered in proper timing to bring out the result that you want.
The key in training a dog using food is to have a hungry dog.
The common mistake of many individuals is engaging their pet in training with a full stomach, which will normally result in lack of desire to follow and participate in the training program.
Toy Good candidates for training using a toy or tug toy are those dogs who have a strong prey drive.
Prey drive is an inherited characteristic.
It is an instinctive behavior to pursue and capture prey.
Some dogs have an overflowing prey drive, others do not have any and some are in between these two extreme behaviors.
This motivation is usually being used in training a drug dog.
K9 trainers are exploiting the prey drive of this dog.
When they select a candidate for drug dog they are choosing the one that have an extreme prey drive.
These dogs would normally choose to play rather than eat or sleep.
Praise Praise can be used by trainers or dog owners who have a strong relationship with their dog.
However among all types of strategies, this one is less used by many people.
Praise strategy should be combined with a different strategy such as food or toy.
The most common and sound reason why handlers do not use this strategy is because it will take some time to build a strong relationship with a dog.
Force Force is last option that you can implement in training your dog.
This is normally utilized when a dog does not have any drive for food, toy or praise.
In this type of training dog will either follow your command or it can get a correction punishment.
Fortunately there are not many dogs that have food, toy or praise drive.