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(I promise to add pictures when I'm back in the office.) About three years ago, my parents were adopted by a big stray Rottweiler that turned up at their house on Lake Anna. He was a mess – he looked so bad I didn't even want to touch him! Almost hairless, covered in fleas, and skinny as a skeleton, he was in sad shape. Ultimately, he turned into a beautiful, big, loyal and friendly family dog who lived with my parents until he died last December.

My dad's been hinting that he'd like to have another Rottweiler, so today we visited the local shelter (and I'd done some reconaissance and knew they just happened to have a little Rottie girl up for adoption). He took a liking to her and so she came home today.

A tiny thing, very underweight, and quite shy, she's nonetheless very pretty and energetic. She met our four dogs without a hitch (always a good thing – getting along with our dogs, as we'll wind up dogsitting for her often). She's more than a little afraid of the lake (she fell in, first thing). We had a heck of a time giving her a bath (lots of fleas from the shelter), but we managed somehow.

She's had a litter of puppies recently, judging from her appearance, but she was picked up as a stray and they didn't find any pups nearby. Her coat is awful: it's thin, very coarse, and not healthy looking. She needs to put on about 10 – 15 pounds; she's skeletal at the moment. All of her ribs and her hip bones are protruding.

She's young and doesn't have any training so far, but we'll take care of that in short order.

I'll keep you updated (and post a picture) as she continues to adjust and fit in. Our vacation is over on Saturday, so we'll be out of the picture come Sunday morning and my parents will be left to teach her all by themselves. That in and of itself will be quite the saga. Stay tuned!

So the dogs have been swimming all day, every day since Saturday. And they've been walking for at least an hour each day, too. And guess what? They're finally getting tired. It's been three full days of activity and only NOW are they showing any signs of slowing down.

This is why I sometimes laugh when people say "He gets walked twice a day for an hour – surely that's enough exercise, right?" Wrong! Most dogs can go and go and go. And then go some more. And it's not just the young dogs. Lily is six years old and has shown no signs of slowing down. Tango is five and is in his prime – he jumps off the dock all day long to retrieve his bumper. It's only around 5:00p that he actually begins to lay down between retrieves.

(There probably won't be any pictures on the blog this week. I'm using dial-up and it's waaay too slow to load pictures!)

We're hoping to get the dogs a little "lake time" this weekend. My parents have a place on Lake Anna and we try to sneak off as often as possible.

Lily will fish, Tango will swim to retrieve the bumper, and Nemo will annoy both Tango and Lily as much as possible. It'll be a fun time, and the dogs will be exhausted!

The weekend weather here in the mid-atlantic is supposed to be absolutely gorgeous. Get outside with your dog and enjoy this rare August weather!
*That's husband, Dana, with Lily, Rocky, and Nemo — they all want to be held in the water. Lily will actually fall asleep!

Take a look at the August edition of Your Smart Dog. It's a free newsletter delivered to your email box on the first Wednesday of every month. Each month brings a new dog-training or dog-behavior related article, as well as updates to Smart Dog course offerings and local news as well.

August's article focuses on the three keys to a well-behaved, well-mannered, and well-trained dog. If you don't work with your dog on these three concepts, you're wasting your time trying to train him.

If you like what you see in the newsletter, be sure to subscribe — the links in this post are only to the article. You don't get the extras (Smart Dog news and updates, course offerings, and local happenings) if you don't subscribe. Subscribing is free and easy, click here to subscribe.

I went to the local county fair over the weekend to watch the draft horse shows. Always a fan of the biggest horses, I thought it would be neat to see them up close and personal. And it was phenomenal – those horses really are something to see.

I was more than disappointed (disgusted, really) when I saw how the horses were being handled in the ring. For the first class, the handlers were on the ground, not riding the horse. Almost every handler carried a stick, and used it to poke the horses into the correct position.

The handlers were pretty rough with the horses, giving them stern halter corrections, too. Unfortunately, not only were they unnecessary, none of those punishers were timed correctly, which really fueled my frustration. Generally, the punishment came after the horse either got a little antsy and was fidgeting. To correctly use a punisher, it must be delivered during or immediately after the behavior. Not two, three, or even four seconds after. But there’s no need to even use a punisher. Using a punisher incorrectly is almost inhumane.

One woman actually used the stick to hit her horse in the face every time he would raise his head. She’d hit him. In the face. With the stick. And later, she’ll wonder why he’s suddenly head-shy. Honestly, it was almost too much for me to watch.

The day was saved however, when I watched a man handling a Belgian mare. Unlike the other handlers, he didn’t have a stick. He would simply tap his finger on the leg he wanted the horse to move. Voila, the horse obliged and moved that leg. He was so calm, so still, it really caught my attention.

After he came out of the ring, I went over and talked to him about how he handled the horse and he said he taught all his horses using gentle methods. He said he had no need for the stick in the ring, and he doesn’t use one outside the ring either.

I didn’t trust myself to speak to the woman who was hitting the horse in the face with the stick — I probably would have said unkind things. If I’d been able to ask why she hit her horse in the face with the stick, I’m sure she would have said something to this effect: If you’re working with horses who are taller than you are at the shoulder, and who weigh 2,000 pounds, you’ve got to show them who’s boss.

I hear this all the time in the dog-world. People believe that because the animal is bigger and stronger, that justifies using force to control the animal.

I don’t buy it. And here’s why: I’ve watched a 10,000 pound elephant (5 times heavier than the Percheron horse) offering his gigantic foot up for a nail trim. Volunteered it. No sticks, no cattle prods. The keeper says “foot,” and the elephant offers his foot. All for a slice of an apple.

If the keeper of a 10,000 pound elephant doesn’t need to use force, surely a person working with a horse, even a draft horse, doesn’t need to use force. Behavior is behavior, whether it’s an elephant, a draft horse or a person. And force doesn’t have to be part of the equation when working with any of them.

Today was our R.E.A.D. program debut at the local college that hosts a summer reading program for kids who are having a little trouble with reading. We were a bit nervous — well, ok, I was a bit nervous. It looked like Tango had been doing this all his life.

He said a polite hello to his canine colleague (another yellow Labrador also involved with the program) and then got down to business.

Maybe it was the fact that he had a vest on – Tango spent the first year of his life in training to be a service dog for physically disabled people. (A bum shoulder sidelined his career and let him live with us.) He spent a year or so in an office setting with me (before I made the full-time move to training) and was always business-like when wearing the vest.

He entertained each of the children with a sloppy dog kiss on the cheek or the nose before settling in to listen to whatever book they brought to read to him.

He got a little too comfortable once or twice and wound up on his back, feet straight in the air, for a rousing back scratch (which turned into a belly scratch as soon as the child noticed).

We had a terrific time with the kids, and I hope they got as much from the session as we did! We’re looking very forward to the new school year and working with the county schools and the reading specialists!