The idea of discussing how to remove a tick is not pleasant for anyone.  Truth be told, I’m a bit grossed out by the entire topic.  But it is something that needs to be addressed.  Summertime is here.  You are outside more often than during any other months increasing the odds of ticks leaching on to your pets.  So you need to learn how to quickly, effectively handle the situation preventing further complications from arising.  Here are a few tips on how to remove a tick from your pet.

Wear Gloves

Never remove a tick with your bare hands.  Always wear gloves.  The reason being is a tick carries nasty, infective agents that penetrate through your skin and seep into your body causing havoc upon your system.  Prevent this from happening by just wearing gloves.

Find a Place to Put the Pest to Rest

The best place to put the tick after removal is an airtight, screw on top jar filled with rubbing alcohol.  Throwing it away does not kill it.  You need to keep it in a place where it cannot escape or cause further harm to your pets and others in the house.

Grab Tweezers

Grab a pair of tweezers or find a tick removal kit for pets, and start removing the tick from your pet’s hair.  Try not to turn the tick or squish it for the fluids inside may be released and harm your pet.  The idea is to minimize additional infection from occurring.

For more tips on how to remove a tick, talk to a Florida dog obedience instructor or a k9 obedience trainer today.

Dogs dig for different reasons.  They dig to bury stuff, stay warm or remain cool during the summer. Then there are dogs that just enjoy digging.  They dig for entertainment.  This type of dog makes resolving the digging issue a tough one.  You have to think about how to stop the behavior in a means that will put the digging to a halt.  Here are some tips to help you along the way.

Place Noisy, Safe Products

The idea is to deter your dog from digging.  One way to do it in a safe manner is by placing items that make loud noises in the areas where the dog likes to dig.  But the products have to be safe to the dog.  This takes a little research.  There are dog-training items, which appear like mousetraps, make similar sounds to mousetraps but do not harm anything.  Alternatively, you could place these same products near your flower beds ensuring your dog does not dig up freshly planted flowers and leaves the vegetation alone.

Install Fencing

If you pride your garden and wish your dog to stay out of it, construct fencing.  It will protect your flowers, plants, vegetables and fruit from being destroyed by your dog’s digging.  In addition, if a dog sees fencing, then an internal debate occurs regarding if it is worth climbing over or going through just to dig.  And normally a dog decides the physical effort is not worth it and moves on.

To find out more information about how to stop your dog from digging, talk to a Florida dog obedience training professional or a k9 obedience instructor today.

Many of my friends own dogs, and turn to me for advice on how to correct negative behavior.  There is a constant inquisitiveness about how to attain positive behavior in dogs.  Thus, we discuss at great lengths about how positive reinforcement in dog training works.  One such discussion focused on what do if your dog tears up the house while you are gone.  This conversation taught my friends something new, and I’d like to share it with you too.  It should help you understand why negative reinforcement never works, and why positive reinforcement is the training method of choice amongst owners and dog trainers alike.

How a Dog Translates Negative Reinforcement

My friend started the dialogue by describing how every time she leaves the house the dog tears up everything in sight.  She comes home from a dinner out with friends and it looks like she returned to a ransacked house with furniture flipped over, pillow stuffing laying all over the place, and her dog the culprit of it all.  And to fix the problem she thought coming home and scolding the dog would be adequate.  Then she would leave and the same thing would occur again.

Well, scolding or using any negative tactics on your dog does not work.  The biggest mistake is you are not correcting the problem immediately after it occurs.  A dog will not correlate you coming home and the negative behavior you instill as punishment for tearing up the house.  Too much time has passed so the connection is not made.  Thus, it does not work.  A dog needs to show the correct way to act, provide praise immediately afterwards and the connection between the positive praise and not tearing up the place is made in the canine’s mind.   Positive reinforcement always triumphs over negative reactions.

To find out more about why never to use negative reinforcement, talk to a Florida dog obedience or a k9 obedience professional today