Stop Dog Chewing

By Armen Ghazarians

One of the key principles of dog training is the principle of "conditioned response." The idea is that you can set up your dog's environment in such a way that it learns to abandon its destructive behavior through its own mistakes rather than by your instruction. Below is one common example of problem dog behavior and how the princple of "conditioned response" can be used to resolve it.

My dog chews my furniture, my shoes, and my valuable belongings. This is destructive. How can I stop dog chewing?

Go to your local pet store, and purchase a spray bottle of bitter apple. Remove your dog from your house and do not allow it to see you set up its environment. Spray your valuables (i.e. furniture, shoes, and socks) with bitter apple and place them in locations that your dog can easily access. Then allow it to come in and let the trap do the rest.

As usual, your dog will go back to its old habit and start to chew its favorite shoe or furniture. But now, it's going to get a bitter surprise. Your dog will associate the condition (chewing) with the negative response (bad taste) and it will stop its destructive chewing habit.

It's important to remember, however, that all dogs need to chew, so you must repeat this process a second time.

Now, you must place your dog's favorite chew toys next to the items that were sprayed with bitter apple. This time, your dog will be reconditioned to chew its own toys rather than your valuable possessions.

Thus, by conditioning your dog, you can positively reinforce a good habit (chewing designated toys) over an undesirable one (chewing your valuable possessions).

As you can see, by applying the principle of "conditioned response" you can teach your dog exactly what you want without ever getting frustrated with the training process.

More dog training articles are at www.HowToObedienceTrainDog.com.