Socializing a new puppy is possibly the most crucial thing you can do to insure that you will have a prosperous search dog. It is highly crucial that your search dog, in the end, will be totally fearless, courageous, exploratory, and curious. It is equally essential that he will not permit any distraction to interfere with his focus on looking.
When you expose your puppy to all kinds of happenings, you are exposing your dog to anxiety and this is crucial. It is an automatic stressful scenario for a dog when structured routines are not followed, when daily schedules are not rigidly followed, when diverse points are introduced into his environment. In today's contemporary world, occurrences which can trigger tension are much even more widespread than they employed to be. A dog in a natural state, like all animals in the larger scheme of nature, is an animal that follows the old axiom of "survival of the fittest". The dog that can respond to stressful circumstances is more likely to survive trauma if he should really ever be injured. There are many breeders who will purposely stress an infant with the everyday ritual of turning the puppy upside down for a few seconds, laying the puppy on a cold surface, and pinching slightly between the toes, all of these are procedures which tend to mimic the kinds of stress a puppy will undergo when born in the wild, and have lengthy been identified as techniques to desensitize the puppy to stress even though early in life.
The search dog will end up in precarious situations. He could some day have to walk across highly unstable surfaces. He may be exposed to huge crowds which incorporate ATV's (all terrain vehicles), horses with riders, helicopters, consumers in extreme situations who are afraid, anxious, hurt or in despair....all of these issues and far more. He could be attacked by loose dogs or have to go by means of areas where livestock will surround him. The search dog will need to be able to sort all these numerous things out and face circumstances calmly and still focus on the job necessary of him.
Exposure at an early age and continuing exposure to all kinds of circumstances is vital. Do not miss out on opportunities to introduce your puppy to people of all kinds, from the elderly and infirm to the rambunctious and noisy children. If you don't live in areas where you can get to places where there are many people, then make the effort to take your puppy to these areas. County fairs, parking lots at malls, neighborhood softball games, parades, flea markets, any location where there are crowds of people today are suitable places for exposure for your puppy.
Exposure to other animals in urban and rural areas is also necessary. The smell of deer and wild things should be introduced to your puppy and you should take the opportunity at that time to correct the dog against being overly interested in such things. Furthermore exposure to other dogs and domesticated livestock teaches him early that these things are prevalent occurrences and will not hurt him. To that end, although you are "socializing" and finding your puppy out and about, you can train him to ignore certain things. Cats and neighborhood dogs must be left alone. Quick corrections on the leash whilst walking the dog are important to teach him that he must pay attention to your command rather than the distraction. If you ignore such sudden situations as umbrellas opening, elevator doors closing, large trucks going by....all of these noisy and possibly frightening points will be faced by your dog calmly if you face them calmly.
Above all do not touch your dog and praise your dog if he shows fear. What you are in fact performing is reinforcing fearful behavior by petting him and reassuring him. What you must do is be fairly matter of truth and calm when your dog shows fearfulness about strange or unusual things and enable the dog to investigate and figure out for himself that it is okay. Knowing that YOU are not afraid or upset translates to the dog that it is okay and he will lose his fear.
Search dogs require to be able to focus on the one factor that they are trained to do, to come across living humans or dead human tissue (cadaver). Focus is a lot improved when the dog will not be distracted by other issues. This is why exposure to all manner of issues is critical in the early training of your search dog. It is needed that your search dog have a 1 track mind and that he does not allow other points to turn into much more intriguing than the search. Exposure and socializing make it significantly less complicated to train him that certain points can be disregarded. A Search dog that will devote his entire mind and body to the purpose of locating his human must be your final objective.
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