John Thomas Winskas

Ameature Dog Training.

2012- Bought a Puppy Catahoula; Facahatchee's Comrade

Notice: Catahoulas are an amazing animal but A Working dog is a Responsibility; Always take that responsibility seriously and if you cannot handle the responsibility, time, and effort to give a working dog the proper attention/training it needs make sure to find someone who is able to handle the animal.

Before buying a working dog or puppy:

Check out Leerburg.com-want to point out a critical source for myself in learning the best practices of selecting a working puppy and to learning about and stressing the responsibility/duty of owning a working dog; also in finding what supplies you might need for a first-time working dog owner.

Read The Kholer Method to Guard Dog Training book; Read Tom Abbey's Catahoula Training book; Maybe read some dog psychology. Planned to get a dog for months ahead of time and read/prepared and took the breed seriously. 

Once again, an invaluable resource please visit the Leerberg site especially if you are a first-time working dog owner even if you are not planning on training for competition!

Learned so much from Leerberg!

 Spent 10's to 100's of hours training; bite training; obedience training; trained dog to bite toys/rope on command; trained dog to have a piece of cheese placed on its nose and wait for my command to eat it; Trained to resist chasing geese unless order given; Indoor/ leash training. Ran with Comrade in mornings before school/work sometimes/ Leash trained to run beside me/ slightly to behind my right leg while running; Trained to heal/ignore other dogs when walking/running. Had him sit and distracted him/ gave him treats tried to make sure the dogs attention was on me if another dog approached. If talking to another walker jogger dog was required to sit; Able to train him to sit at the end of the dock with me while watching the water/weather/boats. House trained to wake me up in the morning when it was bathroom time. Flipped him on his back and held him there when he got aggressive; (didn't hit or hurt him (just held him until he stops biting/ aggressive behavior)).