From adorable puppy to canine delinquent.

“How did we end up with a dog like this? Where did we go wrong?”

“You didn't….You probably did what you thought was the right thing to do
to get some control over your dog.”

Control is something a dog understands, they live with it every day. Or rather they try and live with our controls and commands, our routines, and our perceptions of what our dogs lives should be. That's fine, if our dogs think like humans, but they don't, they think and behave the way only they know how, like a pack animal which has it's survival structure based on hierarchy.

It's not until we unknowingly upset this balance of co-operation that our dogs begin to show the types of behaviour we find undesirable in our everyday lives, in the home, when out walking, in the car or when people visit.

We then try to train the dog to accept what we want them to do, either at training classes or by making ourselves more dominate so the dog has to accept that what we say goes. Where do you go when all we have tried fails?

In a dog's social pack, leaders are elected.

Your dog is just 0.02% in its DNA away from a wolf.

When a wolf pup is born they do not go out of the den until they are three weeks old after they have bonded with their mother. They are then introduced to the rest of the pack who teach them how to respect the hierarchy of the pack's structure. This respect has to be established for survival and there are caretakers in the pack and each member has it's role to play.

Wolf pups don't meet other packs or other pups, they don't go on walks, they are not expected to protect or feed the older wolves but most of all they are taught to respect their Alphas.

These two Alpha members of the pack make all the decisions for their survival, when they eat, where they sleep, how they play and when they play and who they play with. They lead the hunt for food. They protect them from danger and they provide food. It is 9 months before the pups now adolescent young go hunting with the Alphas sometimes longer.

Alphas are the ultimate leaders and their decisions are never questioned by subordinate pack members, all achieved by nurturing respectful relationships where fear and force play no part.

“You can take the dog out of the wolf, but you can't take the wolf
out of the dog.” - Jan Fennell.

We take a puppy away from its pack at just eight weeks, earlier in some cases and expect it to know how to fit into ours, a human family. If we are not giving him the correct signals that he understands and recognises then there is no elected pack leader. They have no choice, there has to be a pack leader, so they take on the job at just 8 weeks old, whether he is capable or not.

“Would we ask our children to run our family budget at 8 years old, let alone provide for us, keep us safe and feed us?”

We may have changed the way our dogs look, changed their colour, their coats, their size and shape to suit our needs, be it a working terrier, a guide dog or a sheep dog or a poodle. What we haven't changed is the way it thinks.

Which is why Amichien Bonding works for any breed. Your dog doesn't know he's a Retriever or a Boxer, what he does know is he's a canine and he thinks like a dog!

Your dog does not wake up each morning with one thing on his mind…to make your life as difficult as possible; he first thoughts are “where do I fit in the pack now?”

How do we reverse your dog's role from being the leader frantically trying to train you to accept his role - to you being a leader that is effective and he can trust completely?

“The role of the alpha is one that's endured, not one that's sought.”

Dogs don't have to be what I call ‘parrot trained' to sit, stay, down, leave, wait, and heel etc. our verbal commands only confuse our dogs.

At just 8 weeks old when we go a pick our puppies from a litter, or older when they come from rescue centres, they have an already established pack hierarchy. We've even been advised by tradition to buy the fittest, boldest and strongest looking pup, but the boldest pup may not be the pack leader.

If they know this at 8 weeks they'll know it at 8 months and they definitely know it at 8 years. Even if your puppy wasn't the Alpha with his litter mates, when he's introduced to his new family pack and we don't show the correct signals he/she recognises (not dominance) then he'll have to be the leader even at such a tender age. There has to be a pack leader.

I will teach you Amichien Bonding and you can learn to recognise these specific set of signals and use them everyday to gain control by your dogs own co-operation.

Just as a wolf pack nurtures it's youngsters without fear or force, so we can, without shouting, commanding, pushing down bums and yanking on leads, using ever more expensive gadgets or clickers or training schools, raise our dogs using the correct signals to gain their co-operation thus taking away any stressful behaviour that manifests itself in too many ways.

Sounds too simple?

Time after time Dog Listeners all over the world are using the method of Amichien Bonding created by Jan Fennell with remarkable results in kennels, as groomers, in vets and animal sanctuaries and rescue kennels.

Over ten years ago she developed this method and was encouraged by Monty Roberts, the man who listens to horses, to bring it to the world. His book, The Horse Whisperer is an international best seller. If non confrontational methods could work for horses could it work for dogs?

You bet! She studied the behaviour and pack structure of the wolf and adapted that behaviour to our own domestic dogs with remarkable results, and we are learning more everyday because education never stops.

How does it work?

That's what I teach at a consultation, we don't want to keep this a secret! Which is why this method has to be in own home, your dog's natural family pack!

• Does it use any gadgets?
  • NO.
• Do I need to go to training classes?
  • NO.
• Does it work with any breed?
  • YES, the breeds may be different but the behaviour is still the same.
• Is it hard to understand?
  • NO.
• Do I have to use it every day?
  • YES.
• Why do I have to use it everyday if the dog has elected me leader?
  • Your world changes everyday, so does your dog's - walks, holidays, kennels, visitors, etc.
• Will he accept me as leader outside the home?
  • YES.
• Will it work 100%?
  • If given the correct signals and you are consistent YES.
• Will it work with rescue dogs?
  • YES.

We think of rescue dogs as having problems…when in fact they find themselves in centres because they have been let down by humans for one reason or another. Either due to bereavement, or being considered as wilful, or in many cases untrainable. So, where do we go from here, more of the same, to end up where, being put to sleep?

It's never too late!