The Practical Dog Listener: The 30-Day Path to a Lifelong Understanding of Your Dog

by Jan Fennell

If dog owners up and down the land were heaving huge sighs of relief when Jane Fennell's first book on tackling canine behaviour hit the shelves, they will be building shrines to her for years to come after reading her follow up, The Practical Dog Listener . While The Dog Listener proved to be a fascinating anecdotal study of the various behavioural patterns of man's best friend, many found it lacking in simple hands-on advice. This new volume thankfully corrects that and offers plenty of sound, sensible advice on training dogs in the simplest of tasks, such as walking to heel or sitting on command to more advance techniques such as curbing the over-zealous greeting of guests or introducing new animals to the house. Her style does not involve force, or raising the voice and is more about understanding what it is your dog is trying to tell you and acting accordingly, rather than forcing it to lose instinctive and in-built behavioural traits. The advice is clear, simple and easy to follow and does produce some incredible results--if you have the patience (and if you don't you really shouldn't own a dog in the first place). This is a perfect book for those who have owned a dog all their lives, or for people thinking about taking a dog into their home. In years to come it will still be regarded as an essential dog owner's manual and your pooch will be as glad that you invested in it as you will be. -- Jon Weir

Genres: Nonfiction, Dogs, Animals

192 pages, Hardcover

First published March 4, 2002

Reviews

[Ralph O'Connor · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a dangerous way of training that was debunked a decade ago by modern canine research and science. Yes, I used to believe that this was the way forward, by having dog trainers teach me these methods, all unsuccessful with my late Springer Spaniel and having attended one of Jan's courses. Now I have new dogs and have been taught modern, positive reinforcement and reward based methods, the science behind it, with amazing results that don't make my dogs' lives miserable. This sort of training Jan Fennell is still advocating, is detrimental to the dog, psychologically damaging, induces stress responses that prevents learning and makes the dogs life miserable. It also increases the risk of fear aggression. As far as I am aware, she has no formal dog training qualification and if she had, she would be updating her skills by now, not teaching her disciples to train in the same way, causing more suffering for dogs and their families as a result. Look at books by Jean Donaldson, she's an outstanding Behaviourist that has been in the field for over 20 years, but updates her knowledge and skills frequently, which any genuine, good dog trainer would, who cared about and respected dogs.

[Mary Hughes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some helpful advice in establishing leadership especially with rescue or troubled dogs. Plenty of war stories but a little bit on the twee side. Would be interesting to see more on overcoming dominance especially in older dogs.

[Jhodi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this book years ago, lent it out and never got it back (never lend a book). So I have purchased it again. We have the worlds best dog. I think this book gets some credit for that.

[Andrea James · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have yet to check if these methods are sound. I'm giving the book two stars because it's so repetitive.

[Danesdzsu · Rating 4 out of 5]

A

[Laura · Rating 1 out of 5]

Outdated information and techniques.

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

How can you not want to use this technique after reading y my handsMs. Fennell's book.

I'm a dedicated fan having read both the original The Dog Listener and now this more practical based one. I really wish I could lay my hands on her series referred to for television as I would like my husband to engage with this too, but could never get him to read the book/s. I've already started employing the techniques with promising results so far (after only a day), but may end up doing it single-handed as my husband is not "buying in" to the concepts wholeheartedly.

[Babesbean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. Some of the training asked of us went against the grain at first as being told to ignore our excited giddy dog was the last thing we want to do when we got home from work, but to establish the role of leader it was important to do. My partner & I brought a beautiful lab from a rescue centre into our home a few months ago & he had issues from day one. Here's hoping using some of Jan's techniques will help him relax more.

[Deborah Laux · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book. Excellent advice

This method makes extreme sense. We need to adapt and "speak" dog language - not the other way around. We are the more intelligent - aren't we? :-)