So, one day, the young bull and the old bull are standing on a
hill and there's all these cows down in the paddock below.
The young bull looks to the old ball and he says you know what
we should do? We should go down there and fuck
those cows. We should run down to fuck one
each and the bull says, yep. Or we could just walk down there
and fuck them all. Welcome again, everyone
listening in to another episode of you know, talk.
And today I have the great pleasure talking to one of the
individuals who inspired me and doing my own podcasts and this
is no other than pet Stewart from the other side of the globe
from Australia. Great to meet you pet.
Thanks for taking the time and talking to me and Joining the
interview. My pleasure.
Thanks for having me so it's a fun opportunity.
I hope so. So pet you've had quite a career
you were in the military you have been with soft unit but not
as a dog handler. I think you.
Yeah yeah. That's right.
Yeah. Yeah.
And you've had quite some action going on.
I think and then quite a bad injury so that forced you I
think to step out of The service and somehow you got into the dog
training. Yeah, that's right.
My I was in the Army for 12 and a half years here in Australia.
I was recruited directly into a Special Forces Unit.
I was on what it was, the pilot program.
It was the first, very first test of recruiting directly from
the street straight into Special Forces.
So did all the normal army training basic training,
infantry stuff, and then straight on to selection.
So I did that in. Three and of the like 48 people
that I started with three of us passed, and so they said that
was a big success and they continue doing it.
It's now it's a yearly thing that they do an intake of.
So yeah, I did that at the the unit that I went into ended up
was called second Commando regiment.
That's what it's called when I left.
It changed names while I was there.
And yeah, I deployed multiple times, you know, all around the
world did all of that exciting stuff and I finished up there in
In 2015 and I was not in the dog so that the dog cell was raised
there in 2012. I sort of had my first encounter
on a deployment with a military working dog and I think it was
2008 became really really interested in the whole idea of
employment of dogs. Then that led me to, you know,
Dog Sports and became like a really Keen enthusiasts of that.
While I was still in the Army, my unit brought in dogs in 2012
and by that stage I was I was a sniper platoon Sergeant at that
time and so it really wasn't, I couldn't as much as I would like
to have the idea of, you know, dropping back down in rank to
private Soldier, becoming a dog handler, just wasn't on the car.
So I was on the peripheries of that dog unit.
Like I helped wherever I could, and I ended up acting sort of
as, as something of a platoon Sergeant to.
Those guys helped administer it, but I was not a dog handler.
I didn't deploy with a dog or anything like that.
And so like I said, It was sort of my last few years in the Army
was heavily involved with the dog section.
But really on the peripheries in the meantime, I'd developed a
really strong enthusiasm for it, you know like in my own time and
really had gotten into dog sport even more than I really was into
the working side of things. But yeah.
So then I discharged in 2015, I end up.
I broke my back. I broke my back in 2011.
It was enough that it was a career-ending move but I was, I
was allowed to stick around for four years because I like
working in the capacity that I was, I was non-deployable but I
was actually working mostly with in domestic counterterrorism and
and then, as I say, on the peripheries of that dog unit, so
I was allowed to stay in and do that but yeah, left in 2015 to
become a dog trainer full-time. Great.
And and when was it, that you got to know the sand neighbor,
poor training system, Barb alone.
And yes, I think this shaped you there is from heartily.
Yeah, it did. So I, you know, I'm a bit of a
sort of obsessive researcher. And to be honest, when I first
started in dogs, like my first exposure to dogs to a particular
dog, while I was deployed, led me down this Rabbit Hole of
investigation and sort of wanting to learn And I bounced
around systems quite a bit. And for me it was that I knew
there was something missing from my training and evidently that
was I didn't really understand or know how to use negative
reinforcement. I started out sort of primarily
just a positive reinforcement, only guy till I hit the
limitations of that and then became you know what BART would
refer to as like a pope own a trainer.
So like I was happy to use punishment but it was like I
taught everything with Of reinforcement.
And I could make things stop with punishment, but it wasn't,
until I saw a video of bar. It was actually that video about
the thaw and I'd heard of, you know, I'd heard of him and but
didn't really know too much and there wasn't much information at
the time. This was the thing, 2013 took
like 12 or 13, something like that.
And so I started obsessively researching him and met him in
2016 and The student of his day and and really been a lot of
time training with him at studying under biotin really
invested a lot of time and energy into understanding that
knee popo system creates. Will you travel to Europe to his
client? Didn't have no, no, so no, so he
came to Australia the way it worked was we brought him out to
Australia, to do a seminar just before there were no schools.
Then at the time, the only way to do the school was to go to
his home, which only a few people end up doing.
I think that it was probably turned out that having people
live and work with you for three weeks at a time was not
something he wanted to keep. So it was when he was in
Australia, doing this seminar, it was like his last year of
seminars. He discussed how he wanted to do
these schools, the silver and gold sort of discussed it with
me about how that was the plan. And what ended up happening was
we ran many of those in Australia and sort of I
facilitated those for him when he was here which I was super
lucky to do. So like I was, you know, I did
the first schools as a student and then And back for all the
subsequent ones to to assist along the way, just
administratively, setting it up organizing the places the people
and then eventually sort of assisting in you know in the
doing of it and we're very lucky in that the Australian military
because I like still had those contacts into those places
should sort of invested heavily and then they post system.
And so I was very lucky that we did quite a lot of training with
the military and police and stuff that were not available to
Civilians. But, you know, I was
accompanying Bart on that and trained with him.
So trying to be about in a lot of different spaces in sort of
pet dog. People sport dog people as well
as military working dog people. So I was extremely fortunate to
have such, you know, such access to him, sounds great.
But now, let's get to yourself in more details.
So your company is called operant canine, right?
Yeah. And the thing I really like
about about, what you Is I think you still do normal dog,
training Peto training, but also the working dog, branches from
military, working dogs to police and border patrol all of those
things. Still, you have your own dogs.
So you had, you had a still have the spaniel I think which was a
project, which was a project. But you did a one year plus and
documentary of how to raise a puppy.
A young dog, which I yeah, it was it Wonderful idea.
And also, you have the pointy ears that you still participate
in contests with. So I saw actually your you were
the first information for me and to learn about PSA.
So we don't have PSA in Austria. It's and unfortunately, it's not
allowed here and yeah. Right.
Okay. And but now I saw that you also
did a Mondeo test. Yeah, I did your dog.
So, I have my own. Yeah I am.
I have two dogs of my own. I have a little Springer,
Spaniel named Valerie and then the Federation she's she's
coming up on nine. I got her with the intention.
I had a business partner time. Sam that I just noticed that it
was when I was really starting to get into pet, dog, training
that they're just was a gap in good information.
And what I found when I was trying to research dog, training
was there's a lot of videos and instructional stuff out there,
but you can always Tell very rarely, is anyone teaching you
how to train a dog? They're showing you how their
dog is trained and they're saying how it went down, but
very few people show the process.
Or certainly at that time, like 9 years ago, they just was a
Content like that. So the idea was that we got her
and she just was randomly purchased off the internet, it
wasn't like we didn't use our own network within the dog space
to get a puppy that we knew would turn out a particular way
or from a bloodline that we knew I just like Springer Spaniels.
So We got one of those and, you know, showed how to choose a
breeder and filmed every training session of the first 12
months of her life and we turn that into like an online course
that we sold for many years. But I ended up making it free
just a few years ago because my own training had progressed and
changed so much. And it was when I like, I still
think that it's a very good resource for pet dog, owners for
sure, but I think as I developed a little bit of a name for
myself, And got a little bit known in the industry.
What I realized was people was buying that cause thinking that
they were going to get information that was new and the
type of way that I trained currently, which is just wasn't.
It's very basic pet dogs off. So, I decided to make that free
and just put it on YouTube and anyone can watch that.
Now, it's on my website. People can see it, but I still
have her. The plan was just to keep her
for 12 months and then I just fell in.
Love God. Then we were gonna give her away
as like a pdsd. That was the idea we're going to
train her to be like a Aaron's, PTSD assistance, though, but I
realized pretty quickly should give your pdsd before she helped
you with it. It's so I decided to keep up and
yeah, then I also have a Malinois of my own, you know,
I've raised and trained and dealt with a lot of there's over
the years but I kept one is named schramko.
He was one of the first dogs that I like, I got out of the
army and had the option to keep. So like, I've raised dogs and,
you know, in syndicates with people to sell and that kind of
Stuff. But he was given to me and I
could do whatever I wanted with him and I wasn't sure that I was
going to keep him. But he had a couple of injuries
pretty early that meant that he would be difficult to sell.
And so I decided to keep him myself that and I quite like the
dog. So yeah, we've competed with me
and him have competed in four different sports.
We have a pH. We we competed in PSA.
That's that was like his purpose.
That's why I got him and wanted to compete in PSA and we got
into Level 2, we go to first leg of a level 2 before covid, and
so that put like a big hole to our ability to continue
trialing. So we haven't traveled in PSA
since 2019. And so just recently as I say
the Sydney Mondo Club held a trial that they invited.
They told me I was welcome to come at and so I did I failed
miserably the first time around because my dog wasn't prepared.
So that I went back to the drawing board and actually did
some like more Pacific Mondeo trading and we got through.
So we got the first leg of a Mondeo one, but we also would
that dog, I do gr C, which is like a, the gameness
relationship controllers, j-jax sport.
So we have the entry-level, the SR test.
We also have a couple of titles in the spring pole and the
what's it called? The Mill racing and stuff like
that. So he's a pretty utility like
he's really, he's a great dog, but he's been a project dog for
me, you know, like I think all of my dog's I think that's the
kind of the case with most dog. As write their own dogs, are a
their training lab that Stokes of endured a lot of, a lot of
training that has been me, learning to train, our dogs are
trying out new things. And many of the things that I
tell people you should never do is because I've done it and I
did it at those dogs. So they're not perfect not by
any stretch of the imagination but they're mine and I love
them. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's very true. The dogs I have for myself Elf
they have to learn way too many things and and there are
multiple purpose, but there are no specialist.
So and that's that's the other side of the coin.
But it's a fun thing to try to try as many things as possible.
I think, as you say, just to gain some more experience and to
be able to tell others, maybe was not so smart too and to put
on your dog as well. Yeah, absolutely.
Where is aramco coming from? Is it an Australian line?
So he's a both. His parents were imported from
Holland so he's a line breeding on Yahoo book house.
So he said both his mother and his father were both imported
from Holland together to with the intent of doing a mating
here in Australia. And really nice dog, really?
Well put together, but he gets injured a lot, which is kind of
a real pain, but a very stable Dog, nice, nice and complete
like he's like I that's why I wanted him so much and I wanted
that bloodline. Very pale skin.
It's a came through the air completely Blurred Lines here.
So, not super agile. He's a bit of a tank, you know.
Not not a lot of Endurance on him, either he be asses out
pretty quickly, but very powerful.
Very stable. Great nerves.
I've never really hit any problems of nerve issue with
him. He takes any amount of pressure
and the work and also like, quite a I won't say social
because he doesn't ever seek out attention from people but a very
stable like not a not much aggression in the dorm, right?
So like plenty of prey enough to work through whatever I need him
to enough aggression to stay in a fight but also very stable
dog. You know, I have a family, I
have two kids, he lives in the house and he's a nice stable,
sort of like he's a very, you know, people outside the working
space. Would look at him and say that
he's an extreme dog. But I think as far as like, you
know, Molly's going, Yeah. He's a nice medium, very well
put together. Sort of complete and drives dog.
Not not off tap, not not wild, none of those things but just
sort of a nice stable dog. Nice.
And how old is he? He's just about to turn six.
Yeah, which is, it's kind of a bummer like he has had a lot of
injuries so he's aging out pretty quickly, which is
upsetting, but that's just reality.
Unfortunately, it's six would be an ice age where you find some
experience in the dog and for performing but also for myself,
the Corona and all the lockdowns, really broke her neck
for sports, I have That became PV Malinois and a German
Shorthaired Pointer, which I did and search-and-rescue
competitions, with and nice, it would have been great.
But yeah, I don't have to tell you every, yeah, it's a bummer,
all these opportunities lost. And that was one of the most
heartbreaking things I found, you know, it's my own ego
speaking. I had things that I wanted to
achieve with that, dog. I like it when I wanted to get
so far. I wanted to do certain things
and as I was just, you know, watching him, turn your turn,
food into dog, poo. I was thinking this dog could
have been so much more, I buy it, or he doesn't care.
You know, he's happy. It's my own ego.
That's just upset about it. More than anything.
Sure. I totally understand so pet
Being with officials or being with the military forces and now
also with pulling K-9 handlers Etc, is there a nickname that
sticks to you that you can't get rid of?
There is an actually I've never I've never been allocated one
I've had a few. What happened?
Initially was when I first got to my unit my nickname was the
fact Commando and that was given to me by because you No, I never
had that year. When people picture that special
forces guy, they feature, you know, the jacked cut up, you
know, superhuman looking guy and I've just never been that, okay.
I'm more about toughness rather than Fitness.
That's always been. I think I don't have to be super
fit. I can just put up with a lot of
pain which is probably why I broke my back.
You know, like I probably wasn't the best person to be there but
so that's probably the only nickname I've ever had really
that that I wasn't super fond of and I was given that Nine by the
guy whose nickname it was before me.
So he was in the unit and he was the fact Commando and then
fortunately, I was able to pass it on to someone else as well.
So of course, I wasn't a fattest Commando.
I was one of them, but I wasn't the fattest.
All right, all right. And is there any particular tick
or habit that you have that people know you for Maybe now
for teaching or training? Yeah, I know everything that we
sometimes we seem to be very nerdy to normal talk people.
So, yeah. But is it for sure.
Like I think the take that I have is everybody's always
talking about how touch my hair, I'm constantly keeping my hair
back and I have to admit it. He's like a it's not a nervous
twitch but it is like a subconscious kind of thing that
I do. When I'm it's like saying to me,
you know, When I'm searching for an answer, I always find myself
sort of playing with my own hair as I do it.
There's a lot of jokes that get around about doing that, but I
think in the dog industry what I'm known for is I'm I'm a
pretty good teacher. I think that I'm a better talker
than I am. Dog trainer.
I'm pretty good at training dogs.
I'm not amazing not by any stretch of the imagination, but
what I am good at is sort of understanding really complex
things. I'm pretty good at learning
myself and I can usually read between the lines quite a bit.
So even when people are not necessarily trying to teach me,
I have a pretty good way of being able to break apart what
they're doing and understanding what they're doing and why and
then you know formulating that into a cohesive set of
instructions that I'm pretty good at passing on.
So I get sort of the truth is, I get more credibility in the dog
space than I probably deserve as a dog trainer, if it weren't for
my skill set in passing on the knowledge that I have the
knowledge. I have would probably be
somewhat unimpressive. It would be, you know, I fits it
in a sea of many, really good trainers, but what I'm good at
is passing that on. So that's my skillset.
I'm very lucky to have it and I'm very appreciative of it and
I take advantage of it as much as I can.
I try to pass on as much information as I possibly can.
I've been incredibly Lucky in my entire life, not just in my
lettuce in dog training, but in my military career as well, I've
been, I've had some amazing mentors and I've had a lot of
people put a lot of time into me.
And so I think you know behoves me to do the same to try and
pass on as much information as I can.
And I have platforms like this. I have a podcast that many
people listen to, I'm invited onto things like this is with
you, which is always an honor for me to do.
So it's always a always take it quite seriously, that that's how
portunity to pass on the information that's been given to
me. So is this the your motivation
to give others? What you have received think?
So, I think so, like, I don't want to You know, it sounds like
too too much, like you do it for others, like it's intrinsically
motivating for me. I really enjoy doing it.
I enjoy teaching. And I enjoy the process of, you
know, understanding complex things, and making them into
simple things. I do enjoy doing that, but there
is a certain satisfaction that comes from, you know, being able
to lift the bar a little bit of other people.
And that's, that's one of the thing that's really cool about
doing. Podcast, we, you know, we, I
think we get about 40,000 people listening to the show and so
every every week at the least, I get an email or a text or
something from somebody talking about how you know, which they
either came to understand something that they didn't in
the past or that some of them are huge, some of them are just,
you know, like I found this what you said, quite interesting.
Thank you for saying it. And then there's other ones
where I've had people come up to me at events and say, that
radical Change their life or even kept them alive in some
instances, which is, you know, that's pretty fulfilling thing
when people say that you, you know.
So like that is definitely a motivation of mine for sure.
Well, yeah. And, and you do many things,
it's the canine Paradigm. You've also recently been at the
police correcting, what was it called?
The big convention in the ICP conference conference?
Yeah, yeah. Being there with many other
great trainers and instructors. So that is very impressive and
it was a great time so medicate like I'm building a huge
supporter of the ICP I think that.
Yeah, the ICP is the International Association and
canine professionals and like I try to plug them wherever I can.
I think that in this modern world, they are the one dog
training organization. That's not trying to take things
away from people. They're just trying to protect
the rights of dog trainers and continue us being able to do You
know, what we know is right for dogs and use the skill set that
we have. So I'm a big supporter of that
ICP, it was an honor for me to be invited to speak at the
conference that was meant to happen in 2019 2020.
Sorry and got delayed a couple of years.
So it was that was the first conference.
It was just a couple weeks ago that has actually happened the
first one in the last three years.
So it was a huge it was a big deal.
It's great to get back with those people.
And and again for me it was a it was an opportunity to rub
shoulders with a Out of people that I haven't seen in a long
time, as well as meet people that I've been a fan of for a
long time. I mean to buy a school system
was there. No, you know, him and that was
for me. That was I've been a huge fan of
his from afar for a little while, you know, like I watch
all of this stuff. I mean, a mad by his training.
I think that he's amazing. So those kind of events where
you get to actually meet people in real life and talk to them
and and confirm that they are who you think they are.
I think that's one of the best things.
Like, what do you mean, you know?
Say don't meet your Heroes but for me, I've got to meet people
who I've been looking up to for a long time and they are what I
thought they were. So that's why I love those sorts
of events. Yeah.
For sure. And hopefully we will have more
of those again and not being hindered by any pandemic.
Hopefully. Hopefully we will now afford the
diesel and yeah, yeah, that's one from one problem on to the
next that's for sure. Doesn't it, does it affect you
in Australia? Russian, you can it not
directly, but for sure, it has that it's starting to affect us
more. There's definitely cost of
living is increasing in many ways.
The fuel prices here have increased, but I don't think
directly because of them at those probably other things in
the process that was causing that.
But certainly, it's affected international travel, like just
to get to that ICP conference that.
So I used to travel to and from the state's Regularly sort of,
you know, 8 times a year or something like that, but to get
to that that conference, my flights were triple what they
were pre covid. So it's the world has definitely
gotten more expensive, that's for sure.
Well. Okay, so now we make a little
jump to different topic and well, it still relates to the to
the motivation and maybe even having a hashtag of that
command. And oh, hopefully Sports means
alcohol. Do you follow any specific diets
or how do you keep yourself active it awake but this is a
rabbit hole. You know, I drink coffee, I
didn't drink coffee until I was like 35 years old.
I'm glad that I didn't I didn't drink coffee while I was in the
Army at all. And I'm glad that I didn't
because I am now hardcore addict that Doesn't function without
it. So I'm glad that that, that
wasn't at a time in my life, where things were more
difficult, or when I didn't have access to everything that I
could ever want. Like I do now.
So, yes, I drink a lot of coffee.
Just normal straight, black coffee.
That's all I have. I've had a lot of ridiculous,
diet, so my time I'm sort of a ridiculous diet enthusiasts.
Oh, okay. They're almost isn't one that I
haven't tried. I've done it all and I kind of
enjoy doing now. I'm a little bit of A data nerd.
Have you tried what you tried to deliver?
King died? I haven't, I haven't tried.
He's a specific diet but I have done the carnivore diet.
I did. Okay, that's great.
Nothing. But muscle meat for a full month
and to be honest, that was amazing.
I yeah, I found that really sustainable that the issue
though, when I did that for a full month, really strictly?
I was injured. So I didn't train a lot.
So I don't know how I've gone sort of under that performance
load. I'm not sure.
But yeah, made I've done it all and at the moment I'm on the I'm
on a seafood and eat it diet. I mean, I'm in something of a
blowout face but I need to tighten that back up.
I was just thinking just the other day that I need to, I need
some sort of ridiculous new challenge or, you know
outrageous diet because I'm I'm an extremist.
I don't do moderation very well. And so when you're like the idea
of like, if I want to lose weight, Get a bit healthier, the
idea of just eating a bit less than training a bit more.
Like I can't do that. I need to really hard guidelines
and he's like, no this is the strict diet that you're going to
eat and this is the training that you're going to do.
So yeah that's diets. I've done it all.
And right now I'm not on anything specific.
I don't really play any sports and not much of a sports ball.
Go. I did heat like a played, every
could growing up, and I think I had my fill of it.
I trained, I'm pretty big into at the moment.
Well, and for the last couple of years I really just With
kettlebells mostly, I got really kind of obsessed with Pavel
tetzel and who is the sort of original Russian guy that
brought kettlebells out of Russia and sort of to get to the
Western World. So I got really obsessed with
him and tried to complete his program, simple and Sinister,
and I got two simple and then had a giant injury trying to get
to Sinister. So that was the end of that.
So yeah, right, I'm sort of like bounce all over the place.
I like I say I'm a bit of an extremist in that way.
So I commit to things ridiculously, until I just can't
either. Can't stomach it anymore or it.
I get injured doing it. It's usually one or the other
and do you drink alcohol. I do not like a big drinker.
I used to, you know, like I think the Army has like a, you
know, binge drinking culture and I was definitely was a part of
that but I just don't recover. Like I'm 39 now and I just don't
like, I'm 39, I've got two kids. I work, I work really hard.
I just don't have time to be hungover and so is that has
significantly reduced and and my hangovers come on so hard and so
fast, so easily that I really don't have the capacity to do
that, but I enjoy whiskey with dinner, you know, now and again,
so I don't not drink, but I'm not a big drinker, that's for
sure. And send they have a brewery
culturing Australian. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah. Especially where I live, like,
in this area here. There's a it's it's quite a sort
of emerging like what we call, like, hipster bars, you know, so
there's like lots of microbreweries sort of all over
the place just really popular. They really cool places to go
because they're not, they're technically not pubs or bars.
Yeah. Brewery where you can buy
Drinks. The drinks are cheaper, as well
as you're allowed to take pets into them and stuff like that.
They're not, they're not they don't have the same laws.
So they're great to go to. They're a lot of fun.
But like I said, I've got two young kids so that like the
weekends that would otherwise be spent hanging out with friends.
Drinking beer is now spent going to five-year-old birthday
parties, you know, so I've changes, you know, yeah
obviously. But still on during the week, on
a normal working day. Are you an early bird?
When do we get up? And what does your first hour of
the day? Look like?
Yeah, good question. So I usually get out I am early
I get up earlier kind of always just been like that.
I usually am up at about 4:30 or 5:00 and I do that.
Like it's just kind of when I wake up.
So I've learned to take advantage of that, you know,
like lean into that. And so I usually try and get a
couple of hours. Worked on whatever that is.
So you know at the moment I do a lot of video editing and, you
know, production stuff. So I usually try and do an hour
of the soul of that before everybody else is up in the
house. And then I also like train my
own dogs, really early in the morning.
So, okay, I'm usually like to be out with my own dogs by about
5:30 6:00. And that way I get sort of an
uninterrupted, our with them where we can train and then go
like, spend time together. Go for a walk and that That sort
of keeps them happy for the day and it sets me up for Success.
One thing I sort of have always found is whenever I fall out of
that routine of being outdoors early in the morning I just
don't feel as good. Like I wouldn't say I feel bad
but I just don't feel as you know.
Like I don't have the power that I would have normally and that
became really evident you know a couple years ago when I started
raising dogs again and was tracking with them early in the
morning. So you know your At before the
sun laying tracks and then watching the sun come up.
And I just find that I feel much better.
I perform better that way. Okay.
And so I am an early riser, but then, you know, I try to be in
bed by about 10 usually, but that doesn't always work out.
My current health Obsession, it's been around for a couple of
years. Now is like, I'm obsessed with
sorna as well. So that's kind of, that's kind
of my daily routine is like I am up with the dogs.
Very Early in the morning, I try and get some work done.
But at the minimum want to get the dogs out of the work day.
I usually try and train in the middle of the day.
I can't, I can't really train very well in the mornings.
Myself, like just my body doesn't quite work yet, you
know. Like I haven't warmed up because
of much higher risk of injury, then yeah, I'm usually try and
hit the sauna before bed. That's that's kind of my, my day
in a nutshell. So you have your own, your own
sauna at home or? Yeah, I do.
Yeah, it's a nice red one. So only gets the like 65 degrees
He is, but it's been a huge help to be honest and what happened
was like II. There's a place down the street
from me where I went and you know, bought a few sort of
individual sessions, but it's like $50 for a session, right?
So yeah, it's crazy expensive. And I was like, I'm walking to
this place to be. I was like, I'm going to get
one, so I investigated them online.
You know, and turns out, you could get one for like, fifteen
hundred dollars. I was like, I emotionally bought
one. When I thought I could buy it
for fifteen hundred dollars and When I did some more research a
revised that the fifteen hundred dollar one has a light spectrum
that like probably gives you cancer.
The the sides of it are glued together with like a glue that
contains formaldehyde, which then going to heat up and
breathe in. So it's like, okay, turns out.
They're not $1500. They're actually more like six
thousand dollars. Okay?
But but I'd emotionally bought it.
So it was. I bought it.
I bought the sixth out of but I use it almost every day and I
really love. It's been, it's been a huge
thing for me and yeah, They're sort of yeah, besides, just my
body. It's really good for my mind as
well. Like I usually try and I mean
there for at least 20 minutes, and that's sort of 20 minutes
away from anything. Like, I try to just kind of
switch off and meditate while I'm in there and I try and do
the like I do that with off breathing, try to do that in
there. And that sort of all that could
try and it kind of keeps me just a better version of myself, to
be honest. You know, like it's, I
definitely notice when I don't do it.
It does. I wouldn't say that.
That routine fulfills me and makes me feel amazing and
whatever. But I definitely notice when I,
when I'm not doing it, I notice a difference.
So it must be doing something good for me.
So this is interesting now, and do you try to do these routines?
Also when you're abroad in hotels to your select hotels,
for Sana na. So like if they have one, I try
and use it, but I don't go out of my way to do that.
The other thing, as well as like, I find when I'm, when I am
traveling, when I am away. It's a hangover that I sort of
have from the Army's. I'm not a good traveler in
regards to like taking time off. I really don't like for me when
I'm away from my family. I want to work 24/7.
I don't want to have downtime I want.
Like I don't want to try and turn a holiday like a work.
Trip into a holiday, really? I just want to like work as hard
as much as I possibly can get as much value from that trip
because I don't really want time off by myself.
If I'm going to take time off and I want to do that with my
wife and my kids. So, I remember when I first met
Bart and I said to him, you know, you must have seen the
whole world, like what an amazing life, you've LED.
And he said, Pat I've seen airports hotels and dog training
facilities, that's all I've seen.
And I remember thinking to myself at the time.
Oh, that's ridiculous. Like I would never, that's, I
would never do that. That's, and you know, here, we
are however many years later, and I do the exact same thing.
All I have to say is airports, hotels and dog training
facilities. Could be worse though.
Exactly, right. It's always an honor to be
invited places to teach like that.
It's a great thing. So since you're a producer, but
you also travel a lot and this could be seen as a lot of to
say. Yeah, lost time.
Do you, are you an audiobook guy or do you prefer show proper
books or podcast? No, I I listen to a lot of
audiobooks at the moment. I I try to not waste any time,
right? So like I've always think of my
car as my library. So I'm usually always he's
listening to something, probably one of the best and worst things
I ever did was get a YouTube subscription, you know, so that
like I pay for YouTube rather than the free version so I don't
get the ads. But also my screen doesn't need
to be open. That was the big changer.
So like I am constantly listening to instructions.
No videos on anything that tickles my fancy, you know, like
I'm an obsessive researcher every now.
And again, I have to take a break from that and I do enjoy,
you know, not fiction, but sort of not, so text heavy stuff, you
know? Like, just something to sort of,
just enjoy the story. I'm a Storyteller myself out.
That's how I teach I teach through telling stories and I
think that I really enjoy the process of hearing stories.
I like being told. He's by good storytellers.
I like I like analyzing the way that it is told.
And, you know, coming up with like, why does certain
characters need to exist? Because it's a plot device that
allows for things to move forward, you know?
Like there's just lots of interesting things like that,
like I do the same in movies. I love watching movies and sort
of Beyond, just the entertainment value.
I like, sort of trying really hard to understand like, what's
the message here? Like, why does that character
feel that way? What is Yo one.
And I think as a As a Storyteller, I like really
trying to understand what is the function of different characters
you know like when you're writing a story or you're making
something up like every every character has to have a function
there to serve a purpose and so I enjoy that sort of fiction
stuff like that but with a strong message.
So I listen to a lot of that but I'm a terrible reader.
I'm really am a terrible reader so I don't.
Okay read, I don't read many books.
I I just have a hard time sort of a similar Relating that
information. I'm really good at understanding
when I'm when when I hear something, I usually remember it
very well, especially if it's given if I hear it in the
context of your a story about something that like if it
relates specifically to an event I'm really good at sort of
understanding things but I just am not very good at reading.
I just I find my mind wandering. I lose interest that I find
myself like reading the words but I'm not actually taking in
The message like, I can't when I listen to things, it is this
really strange that I also I read a lot actually.
Meanwhile again and I also listened to a lot of audiobooks
in some traveling as well through Europe, and these are
great opportunities to listen to some stories but it's somehow
Yeah, horrible to realize that I'm listening to a series of
books. Each book is around maybe 15 to
17 hours, and I can't remember a single name of one of the
characters, I think if, if I would want to recommend the book
to someone, well, yeah, I've just been listening to this and
that, and you should really listen to it yourself.
Okay, tell me about it. Well, well, it's a thriller, but
it's entertainment. Somehow so exactly right and I
think that sometimes you need especially for people who like
you and I and others in the dog space that are constantly sort
of striving forward. Everybody's always trying to
learn you. You, you could dedicate your
entire life to trying to understand, dog training in its
entirety and not even scratch the surface of it.
So I think sometimes it's important to to not do that,
right to sort of switch off a little bit and just be
entertained for a period. I think that's really important.
I think that, you know, all work and no play makes Jack a Dull
Boy, right? So like I think that just
allowing yourself that switch off time and just be told a
story that you have paying attention to.
I think that's important. You shouldn't feel bad about
that at all. Yeah.
Good to hear it from you but still concerning remembering
things. Is there a specific quote that
you like to tell others of that you have in your mind?
and for yourself, Ida's heaps, it depends on what I'm trying to
convey. I find myself quoting a lot of
dog trainers, all the time things that I've heard from
them. And then very often finding out
that they actually just stole that from someone else.
And so, I find myself being guilty of doing the same.
I usually give attribution to someone three or four times
before. I just forget to do that
anymore, it becomes my own quote, then.
But I don't have like a There's no man try anything that I have.
There's no strong quote that I sort of find myself repeating
over and over. I don't really but I think that
yeah there's no specific there's no one specific thing that I
would say. It's fine.
So we go on to the next one. So, You've said, you are having
two dogs, any other pets, even other pets that you have trained
so far. I know it's like, I just have
two dogs of my own. Now, I live in a really
inappropriate setting for a dog trainer, so I leave it like
quite a small town house in the city in Sydney.
And so, even to dogs is a stretch like I couldn't I
couldn't like I can, I can, I can have four dogs.
And so I have two of my own and I can have to who passing
through, you know, like being trained for whatever but that's
kind of the limit and I as much as I would love to have more
pets and I'd love to have more space.
The idea of moving in order to have those.
It like it just doesn't fit my family of my lifestyle and
stuff. Like, I think about that quite a
lot. I like, for me in what I do.
I would like to move outside of the city and I would like to
have a few Acres, you know? Oh, so have 10 kennels and I
could have more dogs that I would have all those things but
to uproot my family just because I want more animals.
Like I have I have plenty of access to training other
people's which is probably truth.
Be told like my own Malley that I have at the moment.
He's the oldest I've ever kept one.
I've never had one as long because I know I'm in the sports
now as much as I possibly can, but I like turning dogs into
something I don't really like having That thing so I enjoy the
training Journey, much more than I enjoy the destination and and
being there. So for me, it just makes sense
to keep the space in my house, to have other people's dogs
comes in, teach them what people want me to teach them and then
move them on. Wouldn't be there, or would you
have been interested in any kind of training of other animals
because I believe in a spirit you have certain see Parks or I
don't know, I don't know what possibilities you have training
with all sorts of dangerous animals that you're having down
there. Yeah, I have a, I have an
interest in it for sure, but I've never really pursued that.
I think that I think that dogs. Present an opportunity for
training that is, I think more enjoyable than most other
animals. I think that not that I have
very much experience at all with the exotic animals at all or
wild animals at all. But I think that the training of
them usually is quite transactional, you know because
they don't necessarily want to be trained beyond the reinforces
that you give them. And I think that that's kind of
the issue we Face quite a Bit in the people who educate us as dog
trainers are very often, you know, animal trainers and the
they trained a variety of species and very often, you
know, wild animals or animals that given the opportunity would
just leave, right? And so the way that you would
train them is I think different to the way that you would train
a dog. And I think that that's why I
personally really only enjoyed a train hunting and herding dogs
because Is that they want to be trained, right?
Like, they don't really know what to do with themselves
without direction from you and my take on animals, as well as
like I once a dog is within my family, I don't want to have to
lock him in the house, you know? Like my dog.
If he wanted to leave, he could, but I don't want him to and he
doesn't want to, he enjoys being there and that like the idea of
training an animal that would lie given the opportunity.
Like I just, I just don't find a lot of value in that personally,
and I think Think that like it's a little bit of an ego game
especially like I, you know, don't get me wrong.
I go to the zoo, I watched the seal show, I enjoy it.
I like watching them do their tricks.
I think it's very impressive but I think that they are just
monkey as Bart would say like they're just monkey drills.
So just things that you stopped. If you stop giving that Turtle,
it's reinforces. It's going to stop moving in the
way that you have trained it to move.
Whereas I think with, with dogs, there's an element of like, Hey,
we're in this together and and you can You're playing more
like, you know, in a more Cooperative Ray rather than it
just being straight reinforcements.
I think that that's kind of the issue.
I think that we Face very often is the people who educate us
Veterinary behavioralists and what is true of all animals?
Like, if you look sort of that 50,000 foot View, and look at
like, this is true of animals is not always necessarily true of
domesticated animals because they are built to work
differently and I think I think we see that sometimes in some
dog breeds like the more primitive breeds that really
don't like say one thing in Australia we have is Kelpies and
we have these incredible working line Kelpies but they're you
know the really good Bloodlines of those they're very primitive
dog. Like they don't really have very
much food drive at all because they're life.
Usually if they're working on a farm is that they're chained to
a tree and they get given a kangaroo carcass once.
Wake and they get uncle'. Get unclipped from the chain to
get onto a motorbike to get driven out into the paddock to
move sheep or cattle or whatever they do.
And at the end of the day, they get back onto their motorbike,
they get driven back, they get dropped off at the chain, they
get chained out. So in training, those dog,
they're a lot like a wild animal in that, they really that
they're not interested in developing a relationship with
you, they aren't there. The idea of hanging out with you
is not something they're interested in doing, you can't
really leverage food because they They are one of the few
breeds that will starve themselves.
Pretty close to death because they're selected.
Yeah they're selected for having extremely low food drive because
they don't like if they find a carcass or something in the in
the field, they don't want them having anything to do with it
that they're way more interested in the work.
So a lot of the really good high-end working Kelpies, you
almost have to beg them to eat when it's done with, it's time
to do so. So there's something more like
like the wild animals that people.
And then tell us about how to train and go and it's so
transactional. It's like, you do this several
trillion, the thing? Yeah, you do this and I'll give
you the thing and if I don't want you to do it, I can just, I
can, you know, provide an aversive stimulus and you won't
do it. Like it's really easy to
manipulate these things and they're often they're in their
Skinner box right there in their enclosure.
They can't go anywhere. They can't leave their stuck
there. So they often a participant in
the training because I have no choice.
Whereas like, I find that dogs is really different, right?
I think that you You can reinforce a dog just by the way,
you look at it and you can sort of pop your shoulder at a dog,
and invite play in a way that you just can't do that with a
wild animal. They're not interested in having
a relationship with you like that.
So it's interesting as I find to sort of get back to your
question, as interesting, as I find like training of these of
exotic animals, it's very interesting and there's much to
learn from it. I really don't have a strong
pull towards it because like I find dog training is just so
much More fulfilling because you can actually develop a
relationship with the dog and the idea that is that the dog
wants to work with. And for you rather than just
like, oh, like you give me the things and I'll do the tricks.
Like I enjoy the idea, especially with military working
dogs and police dogs. Like once they realize that
you're hunting, people like it if you would have seen that like
they something changes in the dog.
Like you teach a dog to track it, teach it how to bite people,
you teach it all to do all these things and they're just moments
of something together. But when a dog goes on its first
live track and find someone and either B them or, you know,
apprehends them in one way or another, they give up whatever
that really changes with the dog and I see that relationship
change between the dog and the Handler where the dog then goes.
Oh all this stuff we've been doing to get to this point was
to prepare for this and the dog sort of has that understanding
of like, oh, we're hunting people.
This is what we're actually doing and we're doing it
together like this. Isn't just a trick.
I'm not following a scent that leads me to getting food and
like I'm not following a track that has a ball at the end of
it. You know, like the dog sort of
has that understanding of odd. We are in this together.
We are doing it. And when you see a really in
tune handle, a team, come together like that.
I just think that that's, there's a magic to that that you
just don't, I have not observed in other species.
And like, I say, I'm not super not very well experienced in
training other animals. Just because it just doesn't
have that ulua to me. It doesn't, it doesn't strike me
as something that I would enjoy anywhere near as much as
training dogs. And I think there's plenty of
dogs for me to train. I don't need to be searching for
other species. That said, I will admit my dad
has as long as I can. Remember, my dad has always had
a wild bird as a friend and and I'm quite jealous of that and I
would like to replicate that, but my dogs hate birds.
And so I've never been out of Do it.
But like my dad has as long as I can remember.
He's a that had a kookaburra or a magpie or a team of them or
whatever that he trains, they live wild, but they come to him,
and they spend time with him, he feeds them and he develops a
relationship with them. So I will admit I'm kind of
jealous of that. I love to do that but still I
think that all those birds they just like the food that my Dad
gives them, you know what I mean?
Like I don't like him very much, I just know.
That they, they liked that, he offers them food from his hand
and they come down and take it. Yeah, yeah, I understand on the
other hand it's it's always quite impressive, especially in
the bird training and, and maybe you find the time to listen to a
pet Nolan's into with me. So he has this great story which
was also having an impact on himself, but he Yet he had a I
don't know if it was an eagle or a little bit of smaller bird, I
guess it was a smaller bird and he caught this bird in a
wildness and train the bird for two weeks.
And after two weeks he managed to let the bird fly free and
return. And and that was one of the
points where he realized, oh wow what what have we been doing to
our dog's back then to get them back to us with so much?
Pressure and and this bird could just fly away.
The bird doesn't need him at all but still he just returned of
course because he had some some, some food I guess on his glove.
But somehow, I really like this story and yeah, I've heard Pat
tell that story and it's it is profound for sure.
And I think that he tells it in the context of, you know, old
school training being fairly compulsive, right?
And and this idea of force The dog to do things and I think you
know I watch Pat stuff, that's incredible.
He might be one of the best dog trainers to ever walk the face
of the Earth but he's he has absolutely you know, been on
that Journey like he's probably he's seen dog training from what
it was so long ago to being at The Cutting Edge of what it is
now, which is impressive in and of itself, right?
That someone can be in the industry for so long and not be
left behind. Like we see that a lot.
You know people who are say I've been training dogs for 30, 40
years and you're like, yeah, but you stop learning 18 months in,
you know, like no one's having to learn from you.
Yes, you using proven techniques and it works and I can
observably. I can see that the dog does what
you're asking him to do, but not with the power and the grace
that my dog does it with, but perhaps the opposite, right?
Pat is he's done at all from the original very compulsive days
because no one knew better all the way up to, you know, really
leading the charge and how to teach extremely complex
behaviors and that distance with him.
Edible dogs and so it's a profound story but I think it
even further highlights. What I mean is that like that
the capacity for that we have for training dogs is kind of
endless, you know, like I think that there's so much more we can
do so much more we can learn about how to do that with them
and end and the more that we understand dogs that the more
opening, the more, the more we can train them in ways that are
more Cooperative, but also bring that reliability.
Leti piece and I think that's sort of the key to dog training,
right? Like everybody wants to,
everybody wants to do right by their dogs.
I think everybody that is in the industry in one way or another
thinks that they're doing what's right by the dogs.
And so I think that's like for me, what's important is that
like I continue to do that but in a way that I as I learn more
about dogs and I learn how to read dogs better and I
understand dogs better, I continue to train them in a way
that improves that like I want to improve.
For a better result and the result includes the experience
of the dog, right. I like the dog doing it and
doing it. Reliably is important to me
that's probably you know like a big chunk of what I consider to
be effective dog training but also doing it with power and
doing it with like as Bart would say with heart and soul like
doing it with desire and showing actual enthusiasm to do it
Beyond just the reinforces that, I'll give him like you're doing
whatever it is. I've asked him to do.
Because we're doing it together. I think that that's something
that I really enjoy and want to progress doing great.
There and I guess this also counts, not just for working
dogs, because reliability is needed.
Also for pet dogs and you should leave them behind.
So Pat, let's go and and play My First Response game.
So I will just throw some short phrases at you and I would like
you to give a very intuitive and short quick response.
Answer. Right.
And of course, we can afterwards pick out some of the terms and
and and discuss them a little bit more in detail.
Okay, no other rules are required.
Okay? So toys vs.
Food in training. oh, both great answer most valuable thing, or
trade you've learned in your soft times patients, Interesting
positive only Community. Well, maintaining good at rate.
Every trainer should have I'll probably get patients again.
Yeah, that's what Simon Prince said yesterday, as well.
Positive punishment. Yeah, necessary.
Your favorite breeding? Oh pitbulls actually ha.
All right, this was it and you really mastered it.
I loved your short answers. Great, very interesting.
So is there any that you would want to add something?
Or I would be happy to elaborate on the mall.
How much time do we have? Well, I also think I'm I think
even the first question is quite provocative toys vs.
Food because and of course there are there are there parts of the
training or times in training where I do or makes more sense.
But the community where I come from in search-and-rescue
actually and sometimes still has things that they only want to
train dogs with food, for example, because they don't want
their dogs to train to hunt, which is ridiculous because
obviously they didn't understand that their dogs are hunting
human beings and things like this, or using food and
developing behaviors and in training behaviors.
And then, Making bigger steps and and save them with Toya
reward or toy by his rewards. And so I like this question
because yeah or actually I just really liked your answer to it
and what are your I think about math, I think, for me, I you
know, food and toys with their reinforces, right?
We're going to use them to increase the frequency and
likelihood of a behavior and we're going to hopefully Use
them in terms of being positive reinforcement, what I think is
important in the use of positive reinforcement.
And sometimes gets killed is that we should use the
reinforcer, that brings on the appropriate level of arousal.
So, you know, for example, I can't really teach my dog, very
much in front of decoy, you know, or even that probably the
highest level of arousal, absent, the B work, if we keep
it away from that. So that it's more accessible for
most people is just a regular. This bowl in the chuckit ball
launcher. For some reason, there's
something about that that just lights my dog up and he's the
arousal level gets so high that I can control him, I can tell
him to do things. He already knows but he doesn't
have a level of clarity that he could learn anything new, he
becomes frantic almost because his desire is so high.
So I think also, my dog has quite a low food drive.
He, I've built it to look like it's much more than it actually
is. But given the, you know, given
the freedom to eat at his own pace, he's a slow eater, he
doesn't he finds no rush she just sort of eats at his
leisure. So for me, I think it's
important when I'm training a dog of any kind is to sort of
know, of all the tools that I have available to me, to train
the dog, whether it be food, but not just food and toys.
I mean, even what toys. And what games the dog wants to
play with those toys and in what, you know, setting and what
level of arousal brings on is like, I think I want to Add a
line those things up start to finish.
And I want to be able to say, like this food or toy or
whatever can bring on a level of arousal.
And if I'm teaching something, I'll choose the the appropriate
thing. And so, usually for me, like,
with most dogs, this is speaking fairly generally, is that food
brings on a level of arousal that the dog is like, most
capable of learning. I think that the dog
understands. Yep.
That's food. I want it and I'm going to
perform Behavior. as in order to get more of it and that you know
therefore it really acts as reinforcement along the way we
can use it to educate the dog but I think again, speaking
generally a dog will work for a longer period of time and with
more intensity for a game so that the toy really is the means
by which we play a game in the same way that me and you can
play Monopoly, but then we can change out and play Scrabble,
but while we were playing Monopoly and while we were
playing, Rebel will actually playing with each other and I
think that's what's important in the toy aspect.
Is that sometimes what people forget, whether I'm using a bite
wedge, whether I'm using a ball, whether I'm using, you know,
whatever it is I'm using, that's just the game that me and the
dog are playing but we're playing together.
But so I think that for the most part you'll get more Persistence
of behaviors will get more endurance you'll get like a dog
will work better for that game play that toy rather than for
food generally speaking but I think Even within those games, I
want to be able to line those up in order.
So like, you know, say with my malli, for example, if I'm
trying to teach him something new to first, couple of sessions
are almost always with food, and the moment I bring out food in
the pouch, he's like, oh okay, we're learning something new and
he becomes very thinky like he very clearly start searching for
behaviors and and while I give him food, yes.
It's satiates. His hunger.
Yes it's something. He needs to survive my dog at
six years old and the amount of training that he Stars, realizes
that it's very transactional, it's like me saying to him.
Yes. Correct.
Keep on trying like you're on the right path.
He he really truly I think anyway he really understands
that so I think I don't commit to like I'm not a toy guy I'm
not a food guy. I'm like which one of those
things is going to allow me to communicate with the dog most
appropriately in this session in this moment.
And to, you know, convey what it is that I'm actually trying to
have the dog learn and I'm going to use the appropriate one and I
think, as I say, even with my dog, like food is like, usually
We a starting point and then I go to a ball, just a straight
ball that's loose, so that there's no string or anything on
it. And I just throw it.
He very quickly grabs that he likes the chase of it.
He gives it back to me and very small throws like I just pop it
after that, I use a frisbee because same sort of deal, he
gets a nice Chase. He enjoys it after that I put
the ball on a string and now we can fight a little bit.
He enjoys the fight and then the final thing I'll you know absent
the decoy is then. I put the ball in the truck it
and for me, that's really proofing at that point.
Like Now I'm like, I know, I know you have an extreme level
of desire to want this thing but I need you to do what I have
been teaching you to do and in in order to earn this and that's
when I will call a behavior complete.
Like, that's when I say, yep, you know, it you'll do it.
I can reliably, you know, I put that in the Rolodex of things
that I can ask for. So yeah, that's my very long
answer instead of saying just both.
That's mine, you know. I think actually It is would be
worth an episode for its own food and toys in training
because so so many. First of all, there is not just
one path and there are so many different experiences and
approaches to how to how to get both into training.
So yeah, maybe maybe we find some time for this in.
Yeah, in future, I would love to do so because I just got
triggered by a few words and I would love to go more into the
deep discussion with this, but I have to stick to the script for
today. Otherwise this will escalate in
time in a sense of time. So and you gave twice the same
answer, patients and the second question most valuable thing.
If Don't in soft but also a trade.
Every trainer should have and so tell me a little more about
this. Also, as a ready mentioned,
Simon set as well, patience is one of the, I believe is one of
the most important traits, a trainer should have.
But why why in the sort of can I can I swear on your show?
Yes. I even wrote it in the
invitation. You can make sure so many years
ago in Afghanistan. No, I was involved in an action.
I wanted to go down and get involved.
I wanted to, I mean, long story short, I was hot-tempered and
wanted to go down and cause some Carnage and a friend of mine who
was much older, much more experienced than me said, Slow
Down, young bull and I was like what he called.
Like I'd never been called the ball.
It's not a nickname I have. And he goes, you're, he goes,
you're the young boy and I'm the old Bull and I was like, what do
you mean? And he goes, you don't know the
story of the Bulls. I was like, No And he says, so
one day, the young bull and the old bull are standing on a hill
and there's all these cows down in the paddock below.
The young bull looks to the old ball and he says you know what
we should do? We should go down there and fuck
those cows. We should run down there and
fuck one each and the bull says yep.
Or we could just walk down there and fuck them all and it is like
a lesson in like just slow down and take your time and get it
done properly. All right, if I can, in this
instance, I wanted to just run in for lawn.
And what would have happened? No doubt.
Because I'd done it before was, I was going to run into an
ambush and I was going to get myself in big, big trouble and
so, he was like, no, let's do this properly.
Let's go down there and do it correctly.
Yeah, I think patients is, you know, in my experience, that's
one of the things that sort of the hardest to develop.
It's a muscle that has to be flexed, you know, like, you have
to work it over time and build it like endurance, and I think
that, Some people have more of it than others, but I think it
can be learned. And so, in regards to like, in
the SF Community for sure like, a lot of the times, people think
about the hardship of the SF, like Special Forces type stuff,
like it is physically hard. There are times when it's
incredibly hard and physically demanding and that sort of
stuff, but war is in my experience, 99% boredom and 1%
Terror. And so I think that you know,
the Being able to deal with boredom is a big part of being
in that SF Community because it's like, you know, the Army
sort of refers to it as hurry up and wait, you know, like it's a
lot of like doing nothing waiting for extremely intense
periods of action but then also during those intense periods of
action, having the wherewithal and the forethought to make good
decisions. And I think that that's
patient's, right? I think that that is
understanding striking when the time is, right.
Not When your enemy wants you to which like I say I've been
guilty of plenty of times. Like I made a friend of mine got
sucked. So hard into an ambush.
One day that we actually kiss our asses goodbye.
We thought it was all over. We had to come in where two
teams had to fight forward. To recover us was a huge, big
deal and it was because we just were the young Bulls we got like
we chased the guy down and before too long we realize like
oh we're totally dislocated. There's no one else around.
And now has surrounded, you know, like and it was just
impatience. It was just like that speed of
action without thought. And I think that's what, that's
what impatience is, Right, speed of action without thought.
And so I think that like, slow down, take your time.
Do what's right? And at do what is the right
thing to do at the right time to do it.
That's what patients is. Is it also taking emotional
decisions. Yeah.
For sure. Yeah, impatience for sure.
Would like it's like this feels right in the moment.
This is going to satiate. Some immediate need rather than
like ultimately be the right thing to do and I think in
regards to training that's the same like for me, I've
overtrained every puppy I've ever had and to various degrees,
you know, like because I'm a dog trainer I like training enjoy
LaJoie trained him to do stuff. And I find myself constantly
telling people you're Too much slow down.
Let this dog grow up. And like, I'm very often the
voice of reason in that space. And I even think I am too fast
to train dogs. I think that I even don't give
them enough time to grow up and actually develop and become who
they are. This is something I sort of hop
on quite a lot about, especially in the dogs in the those T1
Special Forces type dogs. Is that I think they're
expensive, right? And as you know, and And we try
certainly in this country and many the u.s. is the same.
We want to assess green dogs young, you know, like we want to
sort of see, do they have the metal?
It sort of eight, nine, ten twelve months old.
Okay. Just think that that's kind of
ridiculous. I think that as I've said to
many guys like say it, my old unit is I was when I when I got
into the unit I think I was the third youngest person to get in.
I was I was 20 and there's since been even younger people get in.
But the average age of guys that get into special forces units is
like 25 and up and so, I think that it's kind of ridiculous
that we put a dog through a selection phase.
Some sort of, you know, selective criteria.
That is equip its own equivalent to doing a special forces
selection. And we do that with what is
essentially a teenager of a dog. And I think that it's the
problem is just like at my unit. There's there was a guy who got
in at just turned 18 but he's a freak, he's not the Norm.
He is a genetic anomaly. And so, of course, every now and
again, a dog gets through, they do the test at 10 months old and
he gets through. And so it sets a standard of
like, oh, look, that is capable. And yes, it's capable bit of a
genetic freak, not the norm. And I think that a lot of the
selection criteria that we put dogs through actually sort of
the dog couldn't pass it because he's too young but in failing
the test. It sets that dog on an alternate
pathway? He would perhaps never be able
to fart pass that test because of the experiences that happen
to him on it whereas if he was just left to be two years old
and and then given the opportunity then and he would be
a different dog. And so I think that's that's one
of the forms patients like patients in training but also
patients in like just let the dog grow up.
Let him understand this stuff. Let him let their you know, in
training and individual sessions I think that we rush too much.
I've been guilty of that but I think in general is an
overarching thing. Just let dogs mature before we
try and put them into work. I think that's important as
well. So that I get it right.
You would prefer having a racing up program for dogs up to the
age of around, twenty four months and then have some of
these assessments. Yeah.
Yeah in a way like I think that it depends on the Bloodlines of
the dogs, you know, somebody lied lines.
You know, they they they are who they are at six.
Nothing's going to change, but those tend not to be very thick
nerve dogs. In my experience in certainly in
there in the ones that I have access to.
So like my own dog, for example, at sort of 15 months, he was a
bit funny, you know, like he had a few sort of weird sort of
teenager weird habits. He was a little like he was kind
of scared of the dark, you know, like not scared of the dark but
if you took him out at night he would become a bit aggressive
and a little bit civil and he was concerned like a not in a
powerful way either like in a bit of a sort of scaredy-cat.
At way. And if he was being assessed at
that point, you'd wash him out for sure.
But six months later, there's no evidence that, that was ever the
case, like, he just grew out of it, you know, like it just
wasn't and I didn't address it. I just knew like, oh, you just
being an idiot like you this is this is just who you are for a
little while. Yeah, it's really interesting.
Also for example, my pointer with around three years, he
became a real, serious talk, and very reliable Etc.
But Think the difficulties who would, who would keep those
dogs, who would pay for them? That's the problem.
It's all money, it's all money.
And but one of the things that really annoys me mate is like
you say, look at like Special Forces, dog handler, or even a
SWAT team, like police, they're making more than a hundred
thousand dollars a year. Right there on good money
because that is a very hard job for them to do.
And so when you look at a dog, Right.
Here's a force multiplier who like radically changes, how many
people you need on the ground and does things that the people
can't do, like, really truly adds to capability and you're
going to pay, you know, depending on where you are in
the world, you pay between 10 and say, fifty thousand dollars
for a dog like that, and he works for eight years or even if
he works for three years. That's a great deal.
You don't pay him anymore. He hates a few bucks worth of
raw meat a day. You know, the baby sleeps on the
kettle floor. You pays vet bills that are you
know a couple of thousand dollars a year and whatever like
it's a great deal and so I think I think they really liked how
you dogs. Yeah yeah.
Totally and I love this comparison that you did in one
of your shows at the canine Paradigm when you said the dog
is bought for ten thousand or fifty case and but how much
money are they shooting? Out of this window.
Each month, each week and this just doesn't make sense to save
money there to have reliable talks that really save people's
lives. Yeah.
So, that's a funny one, right? So, like I spent a big chunk of
my career in what was called, the tactical assault group,
right? Like a, their National Force of
Last Resort. It's a, mostly sort of a hostage
rescue type thing. And as a result, we're required
to be lightning fast Shooters at.
Ranch like it's the sort of thing you're going to shoot over
someone's shoulder type stuff. So I would I would shoot, you
know, nine me lamination which cost like a dollar around, I
would shoot thousands of those every week to maintain my skill
set to be at that point where I was an incredible fast shot and
like I don't have a natural Talent at that.
Like it took a lot for me to learn to do it and a lot of
practice. But I got exceptionally good at
enormous cost. So like this is one of the
things where people balk and they say, our dogs going to be
thirty thousand dollars. You like mate?
Like we're all sending you. Do you like the javelin missile
is really high popular at the moment, right?
Because everybody's their dads are like being sent to Ukraine.
Not a javelin missiles worth. It's worth a hundred and ten
thousand dollars every time but now it kills a tank that is
worth millions. So you know what I mean?
Like so the we don't like We don't do the maths very well,
and I think it especially in the dog space, like I think that
units should be. This is my personal opinion and
I obviously I'm motivated because I'm a, I'm a seller of
these things, not a buyer, but I think that we should be selling
dogs at at a much higher cost. But also at a much higher
standard, I think that like a military working dog could
reasonably cost a hundred thousand dollars, two hundred
thousand dollars like they trust me, armies can afford.
Add that and and and it would still actually be a good deal
for them because when you look at the capability, the dog
provides and it's a one-time purchase, you know, like it's a
and and the dog is going to do things.
He's not going to get PTSD and require a pension for the rest
of his life, you know, he's not going to be injured and
discharged and get up and be paid a salary for the rest of
his life. Like what happens in special
forces units is, you know, probably half the guys don't
leave on their own terms, half of them admit it medically.
Judged and are therefore paid for the rest of their life.
So when they do the costings on what it costs to have a Special
Forces Unit, they can't cost it off of like what it costs to
have that many people in it. They have to cost that off of
like paying those people who are ever in there, at least half of
them for the remainder of their life because they're for sure
going to break them, right? Select yeah.
Is astronomical dollars in running those things and then we
look at dogs and go like 10 grand I'm not painting.
Yeah, it's a shame. It's a shame and here it's even
less money. So yeah, it's crazy.
It's crazy. Yeah, if we find any any, I
really like this arguments of yours because it totally makes
sense. So hopefully, and the how to say
people in charge starts to understand this, because most
often these people don't have anything to do with Ox.
And so they would just ask, why would the dog cost that much of
money? But I think times are changing
and especially podcast like this, the whole social media,
the whole networking and getting information, so fast all around
the globe. In people can't avoid anymore to
to stick to the old type of yeah attitude and mentality towards
these things. So And I hope.
Yeah, yeah, let's hope it at least.
But I'm, I'm have a positive mindset on this.
I think things will change and If you have a look at it, for
example, at the service dogs, or assistants talks these dogs have
always had a higher price class then then service dogs and
police military, for example, because obviously people
understood their quite early that, that the impact and how to
say in English yet just making life.
Better has a high cost totally and and but I think one of the
things that we need to frame that through is the the
capability that The dog provides that is no longer required from
a human who has to draw a salary.
So, like in service dogs. That's, that's very obvious.
That's a really easy thing. To articulate say, you get a
blind person who maybe would need a full-time carer that
would take them places. And, you know, that's, that's a
big story that somebody has to have to in order to do that.
Whereas you train a dog, even if that dog cost a hundred thousand
dollars but leaves like you know it stays in the service for 8,
10 years. And if it's five years, that's
still going to be financially better off than employing a
person to do that. So like just from a pure Bean
counting numbers point of view like it, the maths adds up.
Like even if you're totally unemotional you don't know
anything about dogs. If you just look at capability,
their maths adds up. And we do that, you know, like
with explosive detection dogs, you know, it's say in the
service, you know, you have a dog that finds an IED and
prevent someone from being killed.
So even if you want to look at that completely.
Lee Anne emotionally and just look at the costs associated
with someone being killed in action.
The dog is the, dog is worth every penny and then some it'll
need to prevent that from happening for sure.
Back to the game. So we had two other questions
that were connecting and it was about the positive only
community and the the term positive punishment.
I didn't take a note, but you answered the positive only
Community. Like it's it was it's well,
well, meaning. Well, I mean, yeah, exactly and
positive punishment is necessary.
So, I think the positive only Community is A phenomenon that
is that you will find it all around the globe.
And, and as I said, it's a well-meaning and I think
especially younger trainers fall into this.
I would even say trick of others.
Yeah. Because it just doesn't work,
and it doesn't make sense. Somehow.
Yeah. And not, not even, not even the
title makes sense because they talk about positive
reinforcement. Only, of course, and I think
you've already put a lot of effort in many of your also,
your YouTube channel of your YouTube videos of and very on
emotionally trying to explain you how things are the the
quadrants of operant conditioning and Yeah, just
share some well, I think I think might that we have to be careful
because I think that when like to use myself as an example,
when I first came into the industry, when I first wanted to
learn about dog training and I didn't have a mentor and I
didn't have really a dog that was suitable to train and I was
just looking at the theory. If you have one group of people
who say there's no need for anything other than positive
reinforcement, only training and you can be highly effective.
And you have another group of people that say, actually that's
not true, sometimes you will have to apply some level of
aversion to things. And with no evidence either way
just a strong opinions, I think that it makes sense that you
fall into that positive only Camp.
Because if if you think that it's going to work, why would
you want to cause why would you want to inflict pain?
Why would you want to use? A form of aversive.
Excellent. And I think so, it's like I have
a lot of understanding for how people get to that point because
I was one of them. The issue is that positive only
training, you know, and I don't like, positive only gets used as
a bit of a weaponized term because we all say, oh, it's
impossible, you idiots, you can't do that.
And, but like, even to just say, like, I don't train with tools
or I just go try and remain as free as possible, whatever,
whatever terminology, it doesn't matter.
I think that the issue Is there's limitations to that.
And some people like, of course, you should strive to give the
dog, the very best experience that is possible, but I think
some people will never meet the limitations of it.
So, if you have a really nice dog, really nice moderate.
Calm pet, dog. And you just want to teach him a
few tricks or show him how to live into how to fit into a
world that he fits quite well. Anyway, you can and probably
should just use positive. Reinforcements.
And and so, I think many of the people who are very staunch, you
know that say that nobody should use any tools or any, you know,
form of compulsion and training have one of those dogs and so
good for you to stick with it. And when I encounter those dogs,
I too will train that way, but I don't have that luxury.
You know, like I trained many dogs and I train dogs.
First of all, I often trained dogs that extreme in drives and
and you that have been selected for to be extreme in drive.
I also deal with this lot of like, extremely aggressive dogs
that are aggressive, not through fear.
I think that's one of the things that we've sort of been lied to
quite a lot, is that all, you know, all aggressive dogs are
doing so because of, like a fearful mind State, you can just
fix that fearful mind-state, like some dogs are power houses
that think of themselves as something more and dangerous to
be around, without those tools of control, and they're the best
dogs. Right, like that, the good ones.
And so I think also, I think one of the issues that we faced with
many in the like the community that is so against the way that,
you know, we might train is that I think that many of them,
there's kind of two unfortunate ways that people can become that
way. And I think first is, if they
can't imagine themselves using those tools of compulsion
ethically, or fairly. And I know many, Trainers, who
are like that and you have these conversations with them and you
talk about use of an e-collar and they'll talk about like, oh
well, if the average person was allowed to use an e-collar, they
would just fry the dog. And what I usually say to people
is no, that's what you would do because I like that's how your
brain works. And so you you don't use the
tools because that's what you would do.
And so fair enough don't use them, you don't have to.
So I think that's a real thing because the majority of people
like I have many clients who are too afraid to use any color,
they come to me because they're like, I hear that you can They
teach me how to do this properly because I don't want to get it
wrong, right? And so like it's not my
experience that people will just hurt dogs, given the
opportunity. In fact, the opposite and the
other type of people. And these are the ones that are
often the most vocal and it's why I don't get involved in any
of the arguments anymore. I try to stay away from it and
try to show as much compassion as I possibly can.
Is that a lot of those people were perhaps abused themselves.
And so, they can't imagine that punishment or tools of
compulsion or pressure could be Be used in an ethical way
because it wasn't used on them. It was used on them in a way
that we would describe as abuse, it was unnecessary suffering or
it was a pressure from which there was no escape.
And so, I think that they're, the two types of people that
there's kind of, no, there's no changing their opinion and I
think that's fair, they can hold their opinions.
And I think that, like, I'm kind of a bit of a Libertarian,
right? Like you do you and I'll do me
and so I'm fine people. Would you train a dog?
However, you Trying to do this, none of my business so long.
As you know, you're not doing anything overtly unethical but
don't tell me how I should train dogs either.
And I think that's one of the issues is that many of the
people who have these big feelings about the way that dogs
should be trained, often, haven't trained many dogs.
And, and also, I think that like the subjective opinion about
what is aversive is very different as well.
And so, So to some people any form of pressure and compulsive
to them, compulsion to them is extremely aversive and so they
assumed that dogs feel the same way and to some dogs that would
be the case, right? But I think to some other dogs
they thrive on it and the lack of guidance that comes from
without using those tools of compulsion is extremely aversive
and so like I know in myself. Like that's how I am.
Like I'm a dog that would be trained with negative
reinforcement. I don't need positive feedback.
I don't need, I don't need to be.
That I'm a good boy. I don't need what I need is to
get it right? And I have a strong fear or
anxiety of getting it wrong. And so I would rather be
compelled into getting it right then left to figure out what's
right by myself. And and if I happen to get it
right, be paid for having done it.
You know what I mean? Like that to me is like quite
uncomfortable. And I think I encountered, many
dogs that are the same. I think that a lot of dogs.
They just want the guidance and those tools of compulsion, those
tools of the version They help them get to that.
And I think that very often when they're used correctly or well,
the experience for the dog is actually more comfortable and
less aversive because of the clarity that comes from it.
And I think that we often Overlook or don't understand
the, the aversive nature of lack of clarity, I think that that
that is quite horrific thing, you know, to have no.
D what to do and be lost. I think that people sort of
underestimate however see that is and we do that on purpose, we
use negative punishment that way, right?
And and I think that you know, to sort of tie that off to your
question about positive punishment is that I think that
positive punishment is actually a much Kinder thing to do in
many instances, the negative punishment.
And I think that we've been lied to by people who would say that
- punishment because it's hands its hands.
Soph right? There's no pain involved that,
it's a kinda thing to do and I just don't agree with that.
Like, I use negative punishment. I get me wrong.
But negative punishment for me when I do it properly, is way
more aversive than positive punishment.
And it's, and in my opinion, to use negative punishment.
So willy-nilly, the way that many trainers do, like, I
reserve that for the most egregious of infractions, like a
dog has to really Do something terrible for M to use negative
punishment appropriately, right, and properly because it's the
most diverse of thing you can do.
Like to be lost with no idea of how to move forward.
Like that's how to use negative punishment properly.
You know, is where the dog is like I have I have nothing and I
don't know what to do about it and that creates an aversion to
whatever they did. Whereas like my dog would rather
me just go like hey man, don't do that.
Bang on the phone call and he's like yeah got it.
I understand that. As communication, I don't have
to Put him through some like horrific experience.
I just can can communicate to him better with those tools.
So I think you know, I think that we need more cohesion in
the dog world. We do for sure, but I also think
that we need to just let people trained dogs.
However, they want to train dogs and stop getting in each other's
way and I think like I say, I have a lot of respect, there's a
lot of really quite talented, plus our or forestry or whatever
they call themselves trainers. He do some very impressive
things at a very high skill set and they've just chosen not to
use the tools for whatever reason themselves.
But when I train with them and I observed their dogs, the dogs,
don't look any less stress than mine, the lack of guidance that
they're sometimes. Not able to give their dog
because of their unwillingness to use that tool create some
more stressful and any adverse of experience to the training of
dog than if the dog just got the guidance that it was kind of
begging for And I think that's, that's a, that's a big Point.
Sometimes when I start talking about these topics, I find
myself seeming, like I would promote punishment Based
training which I really don't. So, as I said, in the beginning,
in Austria, for example, we hear we have a very strict law of
Animal Welfare etcetera. So, we are also allowed to
participate in PSA or train piece a.
But rather because of The Civil biting and muscle links but also
in How We Do training. And I think one of the biggest
mistakes is first of all, that a punishment is, is not anything
brutal or cruel that we do to dogs.
So it can be measured. And I think it's a very fair
information and depending on how it's delivered, on the other
hand we can Put a or gained a lot of damage through just threw
out, just in rewarding the dog into total in Total Insanity
because they'd sooner or later don't understand anything.
I don't know if you know this exercise the box with 101 tricks
or something. This was decided I think better
German trainer and this was just about clicking every movement
over the hook. And it's Madness.
Yeah, it creates total confusion I think and I think there are
many very handy things on how to, to give feedback to dog's
behavior. And another thing that people
most often lie forget, is that and the dog to learn a decides
if there is a reinforcer or a Punisher and not, we do so many
people think they're not punishing, but they're also, not
rewarding because nothing what they have is a reward in any,
any way to talk. So totally think I really
They're in. As I said, there isn't an issue
of how to train but I think and that's what you do.
And what I try to do is spread some more knowledge and feeling
for what we can use and what is affair?
Purpose in dog training. Yeah.
And I think the issue is like a college prank callers.
Those sorts of things, they can have such a bad reputation.
People can dislike them so much that they are unwilling to look
at how people use them skillfully.
And and so I think I was one of this person.
I really I avoided learning about it which was a mistake and
still I can't use it. I'm not allowed to.
And maybe I even wouldn't but I really understand the power of
it and that it works is there without a doubt.
And I think that's the important thing we are.
So I think that's just a human thing to get to shut down
completely. If there is something that that
we we heard of and we wouldn't agree 100%.
That's just had a few people who've told me that, you know,
they're largely sort of Forestry trainers and they can't even
tell their dog. No, because there's often in,
actually, in every case it's been a Malinois.
Very highly strung Malinois? And if they say no, they like
withhold, the reinforced of the dog, grumbles, the dog goes like
falls apart and they say that, you know, they have to just
reward. Everything they have to find
something that the dog can, because even say no to the dog,
help it falls apart and the few that I've heard, Many times, but
the few that I have convinced to let me train their dog and use a
prong collar in doing. So are amazed by, how happy
their dogs are and a lot of the Stress and Anxiety that the dog
faces around training dissolves because I can tell the dog, how
to be right? I don't have to just keep
constantly click the dog and say yes you're on the right track
even when it's not and just create a ton of confusion and
anxiety and I don't have to use - punishment or withholding and
communicate to the dog like you're wrong.
What I can do is say that it like, hey, come over this way
and when I'm shown the dog, how to manipulate pressure
correctly, it's quite palatable the dogs fine with it, and I can
help the dog. Be right now.
They do realize it's like I'm never going to be just left
alone. Wonder and that's what I mean.
Like I think that we really it's not the case to all dogs but to
some and it like I identify because it certainly is the case
to me being left wondering if you've done the right King is
incredibly aversive to me like I don't I would rather be smashed
into doing the right thing then be left wondering if I did and I
know many dogs feel the same. They would rather be used like
hey put me where you want me, show me what you want and then
pay me with positive reinforcement, so that it's 100%
clear. I knew when I was wrong and now
I know that I was, right? It just increases Clarity to the
dog and I think like, I say, the people who I have convinced, To
let me do that. Have been all converted, because
I think a lot of people think the only use of these tools of
compulsion is positive punishment.
And I think, of course, you can use them as positive punishment,
but I rarely use any positive punishment it, like, I don't
have a lot of cause to punish dogs.
It's very rare that I find myself.
Punishing those, I mostly use those tools of compulsion for
negative reinforcement to show the dog.
What I want you to do. Rather than what I don't want
you to do how much positive punishment takes place before
negative reinforcement. Well, I mean depends on the dog
and depends on what you're teaching.
Like, but for me, like, if I'm going to use punishment, it's
usually because of some like inherent drive that the dog has
like a strong desire to do something and I don't have the
capacity to teach it to do something else.
Instead like I said, it's not like given the circumstances
given the reinforces available to me.
The dog is always going to choose that undesirable thing.
So for me then I'm like hey that's it.
It's this is a this is an opportunity for punishment.
But it's rare that I do that. Because for the most part, I
want to teach them to do other things and yeah because I
trained dogs to do. I'm not really a I'm not like
I'm not a person that trains dogs not to do stuff.
I'm a guy that you call when you need a dog to do something
specific. So I am not saying punishment is
wrong, or bad, or should be used infrequently?
I just don't have much cause to do that.
So I use like a healthy dose, not more or less than anyone
else, but like of negative reinforcement.
So, Tools that I use is mostly to guide the dog as to what I
want them to do and more than anything to help them understand
it rather than compel them to do it when they don't want to.
Like of course, I have that capacity like that that is the
happy side. Effect of having used it in a
learning phase is that if the dog doesn't want to do it then I
can use it to compel the dog to do it.
If it must for whatever reason do the thing but that's the
happy side. Effect of the fact that the
reason I will udents those tools in training is to give that
Clarity to the dog as to what I I want.
And like I said, the majority of the dogs that I trained want
that Clarity because they're high drive, they're super
motivated dogs. They want to learn that they've
super willing participant in the training, they're just like, hey
man, help me get it right? Like don't leave me.
Don't leave me wondering what? Like, show me what it is.
Pee break. I hope you have some some more
time. Otherwise let me know when it's
not. Okay.
Doing so many different things. How do you organize yourself?
Do you have any smaller? If you use or do you just have?
I'm a mess. I, I wish that I had a better
answer that, but I'm a mess. I wasn't very honest, answer
them. Yeah.
I miss a lot of emails. I constantly late for things.
I don't do things that I tell people, I'll do I have missed a
lot of opportunities. I'm a mess.
I just have a lot going on, and I probably should do less.
Yes, but I enjoy doing the things that I do.
So you know, here we are. That's well.
Okay, so meanwhile, I think you're doing the for how long.
Are you doing the good? Doc train full-time for since
2013? Yeah.
Since I left the Army, and to be
honest looked, like, when I first left the Army, I really
was a home dad for the first kind of 18 months.
I was just kind of training. Dogs was very A very pot time,
you know what I mean? It was more of a jobby than when
I really started taking it seriously after that once my son
was a little bit older so the good thing being an employee
somewhere, no matter where is that, you have holidays, that
you have to take being self-employed.
No one tells you to take some time off and do you plan free
time? I don't.
And so this is, you know, honesty.
This is the sort of air of my life when no one should look to
me for any God. Because I mean, what I do
strictly is, you know, I suppose, I was in the Army for
12 years, right? And and the, I loved being in
the Army, had I not broke my back, I probably would still be
in the Army and, and think I was happy.
I think my life now is much much better, but I love being in the
Army and I wouldn't know what I could have now had I not left,
but as a result, I don't really do anything that I don't want to
do. So, I'm a bit of a like, for me,
I know it's such a cliche, but I don't really work, you know?
Like I do cool dog stuff and I enjoy doing it.
I'm lucky that I'm Financially stable.
So I like, you know, I speak for me incredible point of
privilege. When I say that, I don't do
things, I don't want to do. But as a result at does mean
that I work a ton and I kind of realize often like, oh shit,
what am I doing, right? Like I've overdone it.
I'm I'm not like close to burn out or anything like that, but I
just realized that I've, I'm not leading a very Balanced Life,
very often. I realized that.
And so I have to sort of realign myself, pretty regularly.
And and I think one of the things that is Tricky.
For someone like me is your like, I do a lot.
I have, you know, I do a lot of different stuff but the most
important thing to me is being a dad, to be honest.
Like, I only get one shot at that to raise your kids, right?
And I think I was super fortunate.
My parents did, what I think, is a great job with me and I, I'm
trying to do the same for mine, so that sort of is my sort of
guiding priority. That's what stops me taking on
too many things is just making sure that I have the
opportunities to, you know, do the right thing by my family.
That's, that's, that's always got to be my primary motivator.
And if if people like, you know, I have sometimes people sort of
get angry at me for not doing things that they want me to do
and whatever. And it's just like, hey, like I
did allocate a lot of time to the dog training space but that
can't come at the cost of time with my family.
Emily or a destructive cost to my family you know like answer
it has to remain that they're my number one priority all the time
and I take you know like I think the issue is as well looks like
way that is dog trainers. Like parenting is the ultimate
High strikes, raising a puppy you know like I've seen how
important that yeah genetics plays its role and that's done
for sure. Like if I was A dog.
I've got bad hips or definitely shouldn't have been bred but I
did anyway. And so now that genetics
component is taken care of, it's all environment after this.
So like I take you raising my kids, really seriously and try
to make sure that I can provide for them like financially as
well as emotionally and so not, you know, having enough money
for them to buy the things that they want at the cost of an
absent. Father, that that's really
important to me. So like getting that balance,
Try it. I don't know that I'm doing very
well at it, but I'm trying really hard.
Mmm, nice. Very nice.
So maybe this is already as well.
The answer to one of the other questions I have prepared but
first, let's go to this one. What's one of the biggest
mistakes you did in training? Peace mistake, like spit like
individual mistake or sort of like by day or overarching.
Maybe overarching if I understand it.
Right. Yeah.
Maybe. Maybe it was not a big mistake,
but maybe it had a big impact on your your attitude or yeah.
I think that I haven't always been as open-minded as I am now.
And I think that there was a time when I was like, right now.
I'm pretty interested in everything anybody has to say.
And I think even when The same things that I think is
outrageous, at least it sometimes, entertains me.
And it may be confirms that I don't want to do things, but I
don't think I was always as open-minded as that.
And I think that I used to, especially sort of we dealing
with people who are trained really differently to me.
I used to sort of your allocate myself and more rigid structure
as to what kind of trainer I was and now I don't do that.
At all really like I trained I've tried.
I've learned from so many different people who have, you
know, so many different styles, most notably Bart but like I've
trained with lots of different people and I've learned from
lots of different people, I've done tons of online courses, you
know, like all the big names, I've bought their staff, I
digested, I sort of try and play with it so I think that I'm
fairly agnostic as to the way that I trained and how that I
train. But I think that that has no
Spin the, what the the way I've been in the past I think they
used to be a lot more rigid and think that there was a right way
or that there was, there was one way and I think now that there's
there's no such thing as a right way and a wrong way necessarily
there's just varying degrees of success and and that scale can
slide around and move depending on, you know, who you are with
the dog, your training and the outcome that you want.
Like, I think that one of the things that used to sort of get
me, really angry about the dog training, specialist people like
doing shit. Eddie training.
And you know what? I would say really unreliable
training. But then when I realized like,
they're just having fun training the dog.
So like, who cares about the reliability of, you know, they
don't get. So why should I so yeah I think
that's that's probably the biggest mistake I've had is that
rigidity. We're now I'm as Loose as it
comes. I sort of see the value in just
about everything, doesn't mean I can't do it but I want to know
it so that I can draw from it all and, you know, What's
appropriate? All right, so, do you pay a lot
of attention to your gut feeling in training?
But also when assessing others ways of training?
Yeah, for sure. So I think I'm fairly analytical
of my own training and others but I try not to do that while
I'm doing it. So like I think I'm at a point
now where like, I think that dog training is a beautiful Fusion.
Barton science, right? Like you have to have a feel for
it and you have to kind of know the inputs and what they're
likely to what the outputs that they're likely to result in but
not overthink that right there in the session.
I think that like sort of going with the flow quite a bit and
and there was a time when I was much more analytical and I had
asked the shock on and and like certainly like I've trained I've
been to a couple of seven hours of hers, I think two or three
and like it's Very analytical training, you know, counting the
Reps and all of that. And and I've tried to do that
with with some success but I don't enjoy it as much and I
think, then that I am not as into the training.
I become a little bit of a robot and the dog sort of feels that
and and certainly like it works. You know, I can train a dog that
way. I once I like this one puppy
that I raised, I was very, I was like a robot and and very
quickly I train that dog to do some incredible things, but the
dog Never liked doing any of them.
Like there was no power and it was just very transactional, you
know, like the don't need it to get the reinforcer, there's no
no heart and soul in anything that dog did end up having to
give the dog away because it just, we weren't a good fit.
Like, I didn't like what I had done to that dog.
So much it was purely, positive reinforcement.
Wasn't like I put any pressure on the dog.
I just lose the dog was just so mechanical.
Okay. So I much prefer that sort of as
much as I can trying to get into like a flow with the dog and
really sort of that experience with the dog.
But then I still feel them quite a lot of my training and so
reviewing that footage and then being very analytical of what I
did in a session rather than what I'm doing in a session.
And I think that like I'm at a point where I can get away with
that. Like there was a period where
like, I don't really have much of a, like, natural ability with
dogs. I don't I'm not like a person
who. Okay, I had to learn everything
that I know at didn't sort of come into him.
To me. So there was a time I think that
that analytical process in training that I had was
necessary for me but I think that I've outgrown it a little
bit and now I have just a I do have a feel for it and I can
sort of be more in with the dog and not having to overanalyze
things, but I think still there's place for that, but that
place is after the session in review of the session, not
during the session, Did you did you attend seminars with esta in
Australia or yeah? Yeah yeah yeah Esther and Hans
have come here a few times. He actually was a judge of might
be H. Nice.
Yeah he's also been on the show. I think they're both great
people and a lot of things to learn from them for sure.
But as you say it is not everything that we can take or
want to With us. Yeah, they're like what I
noticed of her training is like just very analytical and which I
mean totally makes sense, right? And and like I said, I employed
it for a long time and it was important for me.
But what I realized is like, I'm, it was a necessary step in
training for me to be able to train the way that I do now.
But now I prefer to analyze, after, not during like, I was
sort of want to go with the flow during maybe, I'm not as good.
Good. But I enjoy it more and I think
the dog enjoys it more. Yeah.
I feel you. I feel you.
Yeah. So, maybe that was one of them,
but maybe not. So, what's the worst advice
you've ever received? Gosh.
That's a great question. In dog training.
Well, General general in general, it's not about not
training. I think the worst advice I ever
had was sort of in dog training and in life.
I think really revolved around not being open-minded.
I think that the idea that being closed off and that nobody has
like that, not everybody has something to offer.
And there was a period where like I was, you know, I just
took the, I just took the, the word of others that other people
were wrong. And maybe, you know, there was a
period. Of time where I even like passed
on that, you know, like are there no good because I was told
so yeah, yeah, and I think that's probably the worst advice
I've ever gotten in regards to like, not just dog training, but
life in general. I think that, I think that if
someone wants to tell me something about someone else,
that's interesting information and I'll I'll store that and and
maybe, you know, you know, Look at that person with that in mind
but I try really hard. Not to then.
Let other people's interpretation of somebody else
influence mind too much, or certainly letting somebody
else's opinion, create my opinion.
I really want to sort of develop my own opinion and maybe I come
to the same conclusion as them and maybe not, you know, Justin
Hands-On, you know, like how it all comes to be, but I think
that's the worst advice. I've gotten is like I've got the
answers. Don't look anywhere else.
I think that's the worst advice I've ever gotten.
Yeah. And that's right.
Like, I encourage everybody to have students of my own and like
I say I encourage them to look everywhere.
And and like I say, even if it's even if it's to go and find out
what you don't like that, there's value in, finding out
what you don't like. Sure, exactly.
And I think that well, I've received the same advice is or
similar devices especially from people.
Looking at it. Retrospective is this English?
Yeah, that they were even more insecure than I was back then.
Yeah. So they didn't want me to see
something else where I might realize that oops I could learn
something over there. So they just tried before, I did
it to say it's not worth it, they're not doing a good job.
So stick to me. Charlie ha.
That's it. That's probably like for me
that's a big red flag. Yeah.
And yeah, like yeah, I know we're sort of talking personal
stuff. So back for me, I don't do well
in ultimatums if it when somebody says it's me or them,
it's always them like a because I think that anybody who makes
you choose over, something like that, you're never going to be
the choice. Because you wouldn't never put
me in. Like if you were the right
choice, you would never give me those options and like I feel
really strongly about that. That's a good one.
If you could pet, what advice would you give to your 20 year
old self look after your body better?
That's definitely something that I was to, be totally honest.
Mate. I never thought I'd live this
long. So it's very much in the candle
at both ends kind of guy, especially when I was in the
Army. Like I did so many things, where
afterwards I was like, oh wow. Still alive.
This is ridiculous. I've heard this so often from
SF, guys. Yeah, like II.
Never thought I'd make it past 35.
There's no, I'd never thought that that to me was a ridiculous
proposition that I would live that long.
And, and here we are at 39. Not that I'm old.
But yeah, if I could give advice to my 20 year old self, it would
be like, hey you stuck in this body for a long time.
Look, take better care of it. Stop injuring it so much because
you You can he gonna be in bad shape by the time you're 40,
when I, when I left the Army, I needed to have my back fused.
I meant to have like a spinal fusion.
I need both my hips replaced. I need my knee replaced, and I
need my big toe on my left foot fused and so, I chose none of
it. I chose to get none and so It's
kind of inevitable, all of. It's probably going to have to
happen. I need both my hip replaced,
I'll have to have my back fused at some point, but I'm just sort
of all those things don't really last, you know, like they, it's
not ideal to be getting those things in your 30s.
So I'm trying to wait as long as I possibly can to the point
where I can't put up with it anymore.
But actually had I realized I was going to be this position.
I definitely would have stretched more.
Yeah. So you'd rather wait for some
some better engineering and yeah, becoming how human heart
of robot. Yeah, exactly.
Well actually, right. So when I first broke my back in
a winter, a few different surgeons.
The one that I had the most faith in actually said, like,
don't don't get anything. He said, you said I can't make
you like better than you are. You'll deteriorate it.
Get worse. You'll eventually need some sort
of surgery but the hope is that by then there's something better
than I can offer you now. That's kind of what I'm holding
out Holding Out for So, apart from being alive, what are you
most proud of? That's good question.
I think my little boy, rip, is 7.
I've got one rip 7 axles. Just turned one and he's a
school boys. Yeah, two boys.
Yeah. And he's a really sweet kid.
He, he's really nice to people. He's very kind, he, he, he's
not. The smartest kid.
He's not the most athletic kid but he's very compassionate and
he is, he's very thoughtful and I'm proud of that.
Even if it is just I contribute like, even if my my raising and
training has nothing to do with that, even if it is just the 50%
of the genetics, I contributed to him and that I'm still proud
of that. But yeah, I think that that,
like I said, that to me, is a really important thing when I
was I was I was part of a recovery mission in 2006 where
I'm very short notice had to go on a one-way trip to East Timor.
So like I was eating breakfast. One day in the in the mess was
like a scene from a movie, The Cook comes running out of the
mess and says all the Alpha Company guys have to run down to
the Graz and we all thought we were in trouble.
So we go walking down there because we're thinking we're
going to get in trouble. And what had happened was the UN
compound in East Timor had been attacked by.
It was like a political Situation there.
But anyway, so it was like lots and Sirens to the airport onto a
private jet flew to Darwin. Straight off that jet onto a
Blackhawk and it was a one-way trip to East Timor says only
enough fuel to get there. There's no coming home to go and
secure this un compound because I would have been killed there.
And on that flight, I I was looking around, I realized like,
I was super excited. I was like, this is amazing.
Like, I'm gonna like Bang it in. I'd only been home from
Afghanistan for like six weeks. I was like, this is this is
great. I'm having the best time ever.
But then on the flight, in the helicopter, I looked around.
And there were a bunch of guys like you had kids in that
helicopter and like I hadn't even told my girlfriend, who's
like now my wife. I don't even told her that I'm
not coming home that day. I was like, who's so exciting.
She's gonna see it on the news. And I remember looking around in
that helicopter and thinking what happens to these guys kids,
who don't know that they're not coming home.
And so I kind of decided that day I was like, oh, I can't have
kids while I'm Ami like I can't I can't do that and I had
planned to stay in the Army, my whole life, I plan on not
getting out and so that just was off the table for me.
And then when I got injured and decided I was I was going to
leave when I ultimately sort of realize like I'm gonna leave
like we decided to have kids in it.
Like correlate it so that rip was born and I was out of the
army two weeks later and so like that was a big deal for me.
So like I say like I take being a parent like pretty seriously.
It's a, it's a super important thing.
And like I said, I think, as a person who's raised plenty of
puppies, I know that like it's a, it's like, a way higher
Stakes version of that. So I have this ahead of myself.
So, we'll see how how I can deal with human lives.
So mastering so many things, how do you reward yourself?
Um, Let's go question. I'm a bit like a dog.
I reward myself with food but you're probably shouldn't do.
Yeah, I don't know. I find most of the things I do
like, I sort of said, like I find it fairly intrinsically
rewarding, right? So like, I don't necessarily
have like, I don't have a vice that I reward myself with, you
know, I sort of like I tried to lead as balanced.
If it's possible. And so we're not really holiday
people, we don't really go away, we're not great Travelers.
So we're, you know, we just try and lead a pretty balanced
existence as it is, but for sure I eat too much.
That's, that's about as, as rewarding myself as against,
yeah, nice. Which I should learn not to do,
but that's that's who I am. We can't be perfect.
I guess exactly. Yeah.
So now I'm curious on this one. Did you have an aha moment
recently a lightbulb moment? I did actually, and it's left me
in a bit of a pickle. Like, earlier in the year, I had
kind of a low moan. I got covid in like February
March something like that. Okay.
And it hit me really bad. Really hot and annoyingly.
I tested positive like really early so before I had any
symptoms or anything because my kid had it and so I was like oh
he's got it. I'm definitely going to get it
and I test it and I had it. So like I was in isolation for
bit over two weeks because it took like I had kind of a long
version of code in the rules, in Australia was, you know, allowed
to come out of isolation until you're clear of all symptoms.
And so because I was in isolation for like a week
knowing that I I had it before I got any symptoms and then had
sort of drawn out symptoms so it's not that I had an
especially bad version of it but it really hit me and I didn't do
well with being isolated. Like I'm a very social person.
I'm out of light and being locked in the house just like my
dog. Also had two broken legs at the
time so it was like it was a tough.
It was a it was a it was a rough time.
Anyway, I got really over the dog world.
I don't know what it was but I tried to quit.
I tried to quit everything and I Okay, well I'll talk to Glenn
and I was like, my I'm done. I'm quitting this podcast.
I'm out. I don't know what I'm going to
do, but I've not done this and he he was like, no, you're not
make this is like no, you're not.
And I was like, fine, I'll put up with a little bit longer and
so I'd been sort of this year sort of a little bit.
Like I don't know, the future has for me.
It's like I don't know what I'm going to do and like I said, I
don't do anything. I don't Don't want to do like so
it's kind of like I do love this but I don't know that this is
what I want to keep doing. I had a really sort of bad bout
of sort of imposter syndrome where like I wasn't traveling
and I wasn't teaching and I was watching that happening with
other people and I sort of, I got it in my head that I was
like, who am I to do this? Who am I to think that I have
knowledge to pass on, right? And I was watching people
competing and doing really well and a lot of the people who I
had been coaching and mentoring, And getting into PSA started you
know getting more titles than me and and sort of overtaking me in
the sport because I had no opportunity to continue and it
really hit me and I was really concerned about whether like
what I was going to do and I got this job.
I'm helping a friend. So like I'm the creative
director of a sales and marketing agency.
I make a just make social media content, right?
Like I don't know how I put it. I just make YouTube videos but I
was thinking maybe I'm going to do this anyway.
So My aha moment was, I was obligated to go, it's me cat
that ycp conference. And so I had to do it.
And, and to be honest, I actually was thinking like, you
know, I don't want to travel it on.
Be away from my family. I'm not sure I want to do this,
but the moment I got I did a seminar in Chicago and I did a
like a five-day school there as well.
And then went down to the conference and within before
lunchtime of the first day out of seven hours like no, this is,
this is what I do over. Is this is what makes me happy
and it was a like, it was that aha moment where I was like on,
this is, this is who I am. This is what I do.
I do. I do have value to add.
I and there were people at that seminar that like, were really
high-end trainers with really highly trained dogs.
That were interested in my advice on how to fix things that
you know is going to get them an extra half a point, right?
And And two and dogs trained better than mine, you know,
like, much better than mine. But I was able to problem-solve
with them and probably recover that half point for them.
And so, I was that for me, was a bit of a like, ya know.
You do love this. You are sufficiently good at it
and you do love it. And this is what you're going to
keep doing. So that's that's my aha moment
recently. Now, the problem is kind of
figuring out what that looks like going forward and and sort
of finding what that Life balance looks like, but as I
said, I don't do things. I don't want to do.
So it's it was a good thing to understand.
But now it's left me with a pickle of a like, how do I do?
I clearing. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. What what does that look like
going forward? But I'll figure that out.
But to, to share some of my thoughts about what you said is
having having students or people who you work with.
And prepare them and see how they achieve more than you did
for or as I see the people that I trained to achieve more than I
did. Doesn't it give you a good
feeling Turtles? And this was one, one, one of
the maybe best things I heard from one of my first trainers
and she wasn't competitive at all.
I think also she she Me is this English?
She has hindered me on doing sport event with my dog back
then. But on the other hand, she told
me her biggest goal is to make us better than she has ever been
or to make us achieve more than she has ever achieved.
And I thought this is very inspiring.
And so, when I had some of my teams who achieve tests for
Mission Readiness test for Rubble searches abroad after
earthquakes or tsunamis or whatever things.
I never did. I was, I was really proud that I
could get them there. So I thought that a nice thing
is of the thing for sure. And, and I feel the same, but I
would be lying if I also said that it like it didn't impact me
into Thinking you know you realize these people are
achieving more than I've achieved and and that's great
I'm super happy for them like I'm absolutely yeah that's a
wonderful that that's happening for them but for a short period
there it affected me where I was like but so who am I to continue
to pass on this information? And what I realize is like,
first of all, there's still places I can help them.
But there's other people who could be brought to that same
level you do to me. So like it it was a weird.
It was a weird way to feel but I definitely felt it, you know,
like it. I understand.
Yeah, yeah. And I think really what it was
was just isolation. Like I think that it was a
period of being away from it and they do.
I I forgot how much I love it. Yeah and and I had let some of
the negativity sort of overtake me a little bit and yo I had I'd
not hadn't like in you know in had Enough not had enough
positive reinforcement from doing it that this sort of
challenge had seemed too great, but then when I did it I was
like, oh no, it's worth any obstacle.
Like I forgot I forgot that it's worth any obstacle to keep doing
this talking about others who you trained with or who trained
with you, for achieving their goals.
Is there someone who who's out there, who you haven't yet met,
but who you would really like to train with mmm or meet again to
train with all that? So many there's so many like if
I I think that if I never needed to work again and I had endless
money, all I would do is travel around training with people.
Let's all I would do. There's so many people who I've
trained. With that, you know, I'm super
fortunate that, you know, often when I would do seminars, for
example, like, I would do one like, in the state's, I travel
to America and I would do two at a time.
Usually one, one city, one weekend, the next.
And so it left me like a sort of three-day Gap in the Middle Road
off. And then train with either the
people that hosts me or you know the like a club that I knew
nearby or whatever. And every time it's it's great
like because you know, it's exciting.
Because it's new and it's not normal and to them, it's
exciting because there's a new person there.
And so like it's just that like exhilaration and, you know, sort
of immersing in it, that's what I mean.
Like, like when I'm away from home, I just want to train all
the time. And when I say work, I don't
mean like make money. Like, I mean that like just be
immersed in doing the dog training stuff and develop
skills and all that kind of stuff.
So there's so many people that I have trained with the, some of
them you've heard of and some of them you have it, you know, like
they're just good dog trainers that do.
Of any sort of profile, you never know that they even do
anything except that, there are member of someone's club and
their incredible when they bring out their dog.
So yeah, there's so many people and given the opportunity.
That's what I would love to do. Like I would love to there was a
period there where I was trying to convince my wife pre our
second kid and before my first went to school, there was a
period there. I was trying to convince her to
hit the road for six months and will I wanted to live out of a
van and just travel around training.
I'm with people. Yeah, and it just didn't happen,
you know? Like it just we just didn't pull
it off. We didn't the Stars didn't align
but I feel like that would have been an amazing six months.
Who probably would have worked turned into 12.
You know what I think. That's what she could sense and
starts to happen. It was probably never going to
come to an end but yeah I love doing that stuff.
I love training with people. Yeah there's I don't want to
even name anyone because of the Paul would leave out and you
know what I mean? Yeah, sure sure.
So now I'm left in insert and see if you if you will do a name
drop in the next question. Are there any newcomers that you
have on your eyes or that you're having your eyes on your
comments? I don't know young trainers
handlers where you think that's really interesting.
Are very skilled or very intuitive again.
I'm not sure who I would name in that regard.
So I work with disco Jazz, who she?
We started training together, many years ago, she was in the
Army and got out and had a sister dog that she was trying
to turn into an assistance dog and we trained together and she
has been a fun one to watch. Develop like she's got a
incredible skill set with dogs and gets better and better.
Every time, every dog she's better with.
Um, and last year in the you before we raised a couple of
dogs together to sell to the police that went incredibly well
and there was I was pretty involved with those stones like
a sort of helped her with it but we're doing it again now and I'm
intentionally don't have a lot to do with those dogs.
Like I'm trying to, I want her to do that by herself because
she can and I think actually should do a much better job than
me like once they're old. Enough and the ready.
I'll do all the decoy young and like, that'll be it.
But like I'm really not having a lot to do with them because
she's so capable of doing it. And I think that certainly in
that space in raising developing training dogs for service.
I think that she has a big career ahead of her and doing
that if she chooses to and I think that she could probably do
that at scale, you know like train other people to do it and
do it like with more than just two dogs at a time like in her
house. So I think that She has the
capacity to take that to a much higher level she do like, you
know, it's probably need some more access to other people
doing it rather than just getting that info from me about
how to do it for. We need to travel a little bit
more and sort of go to some of the bigger working dog kennels
and see the way that they do things more as a like you know
every time I go to select our Hill in in the u.s. yeah like
it's a it's a production facility you know?
No, like they're turning green dogs into police dogs, as fast
as that as fast as possible. And I think that's kind of, the
sort of thing. That's maybe she just needs some
more exposure to and like that kind of process because what
she's doing currently is very bespoke, you know, like a couple
of dogs at a time to an incredibly high level, but maybe
just seeing that process of green dog to working, dog.
A little bit more. But yeah, nice, she impresses me
all the time and she's definitely not that.
She's like I'm unknown and unheard of But, you know, I
think that she's definitely someone to watch and to learn
from, as well. Greet greet all the Tar.
Heel is great, Cherry was on the show as well.
I really. Yeah that Jerry's great Jarius
Jerry's our wealth of knowledge. She's one of those people that's
probably forgotten more than I'll ever know and never every
time I speak to him, I get embarrassed because of how much
I still he's content. Yeah I think that's okay.
Your I see myself as a Say in English and multiplier?
Yeah, yeah. And and So yesterday I did the
recording with Simon Prince, I had this interview, sound prints
and during the show, I just had this idea that I want to ask him
to ask a question for my next guest, and thank you.
Okay. So did he know it would be me?
I think he's somebody else think he knew it.
As you, because I mentioned that I will have you today.
So, we are trying now. Something I will just press play
on yesterday's episode. You recorded it, right?
Okay. And, and I hope you understand
it. Otherwise I just have to save
myself so we can edit it or I can edit it afterwards.
So I hope this works like this because while talking everything
seemed to be clear for me now that I Do it again?
I thought, damn it. What is he saying?
Because of the, the Dutch slang. But let's try it like this.
Next guest. Why did you ever start it to be
show in humans with animal training?
Hmm. Did you could hear the question?
Yeah, yeah, I heard it. So I always had dogs growing up
and, like everybody. And my father is quite good with
dogs. Not like, he's not a trained
eyes. Never, you know.
Like, but we just had, we always had pets that were very good
pets. You know, never any issues.
So I always enjoyed the company of dogs and then we made my
wife. Had a dog.
I was in the Army and he was her dog, you know, like because I
was gone sort of eight months of the year at least and so you
know he was her dog. He was an older dog.
When we got him he was like seven or eight years old at just
like a mongrel border collie. Kind of dog, right?
But he was the first time I lived with a dog and didn't have
like the closest relationship with the dog because there's a
kid like you know, I had these really Close relationships with
the dog and I like, we lived opposite, this park, and I would
always take the dogs there. And like I actually was very
like the dog obviously thought of itself as my father's dog.
But I always had a strong relationship with the do, okay?
But so what made me really get into it was that dog's name was
Ernie and I wanted to train a dog.
So let me take a step back. I saw a military working dog for
the first time on deployment and it was the first live by it that
I The saw and it was. So the first military working
dog. I ever saw was the first slide
bite that. I never saw like proper bite,
you know, and the level of control.
What I didn't know was looking at was, it was probably the best
military working dog I've ever seen.
And the best Handler I've ever seen.
Okay, I didn't know that because it was my first exposure to it.
And, and what I came to understand later was, they were
an anomaly at how well in tune they were and all those things.
So that is what prompted me to want to get into dog training.
I saw that and I was like, oh look at this, this is amazing.
And at the time at the time I was embedded with the Afghan
Army and this guy he was an american guy and he was also but
in a different can dock like a different Afghan unit.
But we work together quite closely and I would like I lived
with the Afghan guys. I went kind of Rogue, not Rogue,
but I went very, what's the right word?
I became an Afghani basically, my I spoke, my interpreter was
killed on the like the second, the second mission we went on.
So I very, very quickly had to learn past due and I just
completely immersed, myself. And, but there were times when I
was kind of somewhat Cerned. Like, I didn't feel especially
safe living with a lot of the guys, I was working with there
was some that I trusted, you know, implicitly, but others are
didn't, and for good reason, you know, but this guy had the dog
and he was in the same job as me, but just in a different
section. But he had the dog.
And I was always jealous of that.
And I saw that like human, the dog were in such tune with each
other and I didn't understand what an anomaly.
It was it turned out like it, it turned out.
Such a strange situation that go actually turned out to be a
really high rank. It turned out that like he's dog
was like, it's incredibly trained, dog, that he didn't
write, he actually had no business.
Even having the dog there. He just like, it was this
ridiculous situation that I just didn't put together.
Like, I didn't really understand all that.
All I knew was that he had this dog and I wanted that and so
that's what got me into dog training.
When I came home from that trip, I was like, oh yeah, I'm Into
this. And that's when I started really
researching and really diving into it.
But the problem was, I didn't have a dog.
I had this old dog Ernie who like he was like he was like he
was like 15, you know like this old blind, decrepit border
collie that couldn't walk you know.
And so like that's why my introduction to do training was
fiery only because I just didn't have dogs and it wasn't until I
got a dog of my own that then it was like, okay, baptism by fire
now. To figure it out, but that's
what got me started on it was that observing that military
working dog and I didn't have heaps to do with it, just like a
couple of times. But I saw it by at once for real
and I was like this, I mean, 21 years.
This this is going to be important and then I when I
started training dogs, when I started like getting my hands on
them and I liked what I started doing was while still in the
Army, just sort of training people in the areas dogs, you
know, like just told people I was into it and wanted to play
with. Are dogs really?
I had a feeling come over me where I was like, oh, this is
gonna be forever. Like, that's the feeling I got.
Like, I was like God. This isn't, you know, I have
heaps of hobbies. Like, I'm an obsessive
researcher, I get like obsessed with things and I, it's all I
talk about for 12 months and then I'd never talk about it
again, you know, like I'm done that with everything but I had
the same feeling like it was the first time, I think, I'd go.
Feeling where I was like, oh no, this is going to stick.
This is this is going to become a big piece of who I am.
This isn't like a passing thing and it like the same happened
when I started making content. Like when I started running
cameras and I started trying to make YouTube videos and stuff
like that. Just for myself, I had the same
feeling when I was like oh this isn't this isn't a hobby this is
gonna this is going to become a part of who I am and so I was
lucky enough, I could join the two things together, right?
I could make Make make videos about dog training but yeah.
So that's that's how I came to be.
That's that's that's how I realized that I was gonna do
more of this. Nice nice.
Where did the dog bite? It was actually it was like the
guy was running away from the dog bit him and he was cuffed,
didn't it? He's handcuffed in front because
he ran from being coughed and the dog bit him under the
scapula. So in its to this day it's the
first Lifeboat I saw and it's still the most horrific I've
ever seen. It's sort of what's this
coupler. I feel like he's the bat like on
the back and it's like show like his the shoulder blades there.
Like it got like under its lower jaw is like in under and he
fell, the dog was incredible brighter and it just kept
digging in and so like it had his entire shoulder in its mouth
and was like kept lifting the like scapula up and over to the
point where you could see the guys long and And it was, it was
horrific. Yeah, intense, yeah.
He left in a helicopter. I don't know whether he lived.
I doubt it. It was.
And what was amazing. Was the handler comes over and
he just sells a dog to out and the dog, dude.
And I was like, Wow. And just like, like was like,
yeah. Like waiting like now, and
that's what I had no idea like like oh, that's how it goes.
It's a burnt. Like, but that was such an
experienced dog, you know? And that was such an experienced
team and I just had no idea. That's what I was saying.
I had no idea that they were that good.
I just thought that was normal, too.
Evidently it's not So bad. Now, it's your turn.
What would you like to ask the next guest?
Not knowing who it is. So maybe it is Stephan baton
from the Dutch police, but this guy is extremely busy and always
finds a new job to do instead of the podcast or or someone else.
I can't tell you yet because I don't know.
Yeah. Okay.
That's a good question. I think something I'm usually
interested in with most experienced people, is it.
They have usually had some radical shift in what they do.
I think that most dog trainers, who have been at it for a long
time, have an experience that they can talk about that.
Like radically made them either aware of something or change
something, you know, like Pat Nolan.
Talks about the bird coming back, where he like, okay, so
I'd be curious to hear if the next person has a moment like
that where they sort of reflected on their training and
realize like, oh, I have to change or realized like, you
know, this is not the way to do it, if they had a moment like
that was it. Is that a question?
Did I asked a question earlier clearly?
I love it. I love it.
That's a really good one and And I'm curious on the answer so I
will I will then send you as well, the link to the next show
so you perfect. Listen, listen to the answer.
Perfect, I'm excited. Text urine.
Thank you for almost 2 hours and 40 minutes.
Yeah, this is a Joe Rogan length podcast.
This is I'm just listening to podcast with Chaco willing and
Tim Kennedy's 5 h plus. So not that not that much yet
but thank you very much. I think we hit our record, the
latest show or the longest run till now was with almond dinkler
but this I was about 2 hours 20 minutes.
So we definitely set a new record was very interesting for
me and great to get to know you better.
Finally had a chance to talk to someone that I've been listening
to for so many years now and so back.
Then I for sure you don't remember.
I sent you a message on Facebook when I think Ian's Frank back
then suggested to listening to your show and since then, since
then this was one, The weather was the first podcast I actually
listened to, for sure. You and Glen and you work.
Affected me a lot. Yeah.
And thank you very much for your work.
Well, my pleasure. Thanks so much for having me.
It's been a really fun conversation.
Very, it's a great format. You have.
It's very personal. It's very yeah.
Thanks. It was very nice.
I enjoyed it very much. That's great.
Good to know. No, hopefully we meet someone
somewhere. Yeah.
So I think I did pretty big copy paste on you.
In the end of my shows, please like share.
Subscribe if you like and you're here and write our show.
Give us some comments if you if you like what you've heard, if
you want to reach out for pets, I will put his links to the show
node. And also thanks very much.