Good Neighbor Podcast: South of the River
Bringing Together Local Businesses and Neighbors of South of the River
Good Neighbor Podcast: South of the River
EP #113 Unleashing Potential: Dog Training Secrets with Jake Strunk
Jake Strunk from River Valley D.O.G.S. shares his expertise on effective dog training techniques and common misconceptions in the industry. He believes in creating a foundation of balanced training that incorporates both positive reinforcement and appropriate structure, emphasizing that your dog's behavior won't change until yours does.
• Indoor mental enrichment activities provide valuable alternatives to walks during cold weather
• Proper puppy socialization means creating calm, neutral exposures to new experiences before 16 weeks
• Training should happen at the dog's pace, not pushing them into uncomfortable situations
• The dog training industry has a divide regarding the use of negative reinforcement and discipline
• Rules, structure, and boundaries are essential components of effective dog training
• E-collars and prong collars can be valuable tools when used correctly
• Jake's three-month leash method: keep your dog on leash both indoors and outdoors for consistent training
• Music and dog training both require rhythm and consistent practice
For dog training services, contact Jake via text at 952-215-8525, email at jake@mnrivervalleydogs.com, or visit www.mnrivervalleydogs.com.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Mark Bratton.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Good Neighbors Podcast, number 113. And today we're going to share someone that knows a little bit about man's best friend and what they can do for you. About man's best friend and what they can do for you. I'm so excited to welcome Jake Strunk, from River Valley Dogs and a great friend of mine. So, Jake, how you doing today? Doing great Mark. How about yourself? Oh, my god, I'm trying to get over this crazy below zero weather.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it is that time of year. It is balmy out there.
Speaker 2:I know Well. Hopefully you can tell us a little bit about what to do in this weather with a man's best friend and the things you do. So we already said this was River Valley Dogs. What do you do with the dogs, jake?
Speaker 3:Yeah well, I'm actually more of a human trainer than a dog trainer. The dogs are easy. It's the people that are difficult, that need the work. So your dog's behavior won't change until yours does. But usually when it's this cold and walking for long distances just isn't an option, I usually like to do mental enrichment games. You know, novelty training, pick up your toys, stuff like that, just for fun type stuff. But that mental workout and the mental enrichment is still just as valuable as the walking. So might as well take advantage of the cold weather and, you know, grow your bond indoors with your dog and train them to do some new skills.
Speaker 2:Well, I know one of the skills you see on TV once, but maybe you've done it twice when the dog goes and opens the fridge and grabs that beer and brings it over to you during the football game.
Speaker 3:Yep, go get me a beer, one of my favorites to train.
Speaker 2:So I love it. Not that difficult, I love it. Well, we all know every business has some crazy misconceptions and myths and stuff and I should give us a few of yours that people ask you when they go to train their dog.
Speaker 3:Oh well, one be be cautious of looking for dog training advice online. There's just as many opinions on that subject and just as many good and bad answers to common questions. So you really got to do watch out for that. Second one is I wish people understood what proper socializing their puppies looked like. The majority of the socializing period happens prior to 16 weeks and most people just think you should bring your dog out and just you know, let them do whatever they want to do or, you know, run them around and bring them to the dog park, for instance, to get socialized.
Speaker 3:That's not what socializing is. It's not about interacting. It's about creating a foundation of calm, neutral exposure to different stimuluses. So whether that's being handled at the vet greeting other dogs, it should all be done in a calm fashion at the puppy's pace. You don't want to force the dog into the situation if they're not comfortable with it. So I think a lot of people make that big mistake. Trauma that sticks or trauma that happens at eight to 12 weeks of age, can really stick for a long time. So you don't want to bubble wrap your puppy at all. I'm not saying you should. You do want to get them out and show them the world. You just want to do it in a calm, comfortable, neutral fashion.
Speaker 2:So, in other words, I'm not I'm not going to train my dog by saying, come and I grab the leash and pull them along the way right well I mean not step-by-step process.
Speaker 3:I'm just, I'm saying don't drag your dog into the dog park if they don't want to go. Right, that's what the problem is People force the dog into a situation they're not ready to be in. They don't listen to the dog. So that would be one of them is what proper socializing is. Trust me, it doesn't mean you should pass your dog off to strangers. That's how you create phobia, because the dog might not be comfortable with that. So everything should be done at the dog's pace.
Speaker 2:There's one right there. It's not your pace, it's the dog's pace. That's why you're a human trainer instead of a dog trainer.
Speaker 3:Yep A hundred percent.
Speaker 2:I love it. I love it. Well, how about you know, when you first started the business and stuff, or thinking about it? Because, because I know you have some other great talents which we'll talk about. But uh, why? Why? Training dogs, jake, what? What made you get into the business? Were your own, or just something was fascinating about it? Or who drove you?
Speaker 3:kind of had a knack for it. Um started out in the dog industry as just a kennel attendant about 10, 11 years ago. Um started a puppy program shortly after that and when the puppies grew up a little bit they were asking if I had a training program. So I kind of just developed the training program there, Really kind of learned everything I know just as I go. Four years later I decided to start my own business and haven't looked back. So here we are.
Speaker 2:So I and I get to hear all the accolades and stuff that goes with that. So you just learned in the field, at a dog training, but this is a lot more than meets the eye. How do you get so good at what you do? Cause I hear all the things people can say about you, Jake.
Speaker 3:You make mistakes and you learn.
Speaker 2:I always say you got to learn how to suck at it before you're good at it.
Speaker 3:I love it, just like learning an instrument. You just you got to get out there and do it um there's no. There's no replacement for the hands-on element of it. It's something you do have to work towards and you get out of dog training exactly what you put into it. So if you're not doing the work and doing the repetition and doing the drills, you're not going to see the results have you ever had any uh dogs that you just can't work with?
Speaker 3:Occasionally yeah, not very common. You know, there are some issues that I'm just not the right trainer for, in which case I'd recommend refer a friend or maybe a board and train program, which is something I don't really do a lot of. Some dogs do need much more intense training than others. For the most part, I like to say I'm a family dog trainer, a pet dog trainer, teaching dogs not to pull on the leash, jump on guests, behavioral issues like resource guarding or leash reactivity, aggression those are my common cases, but some dogs do need a little more intensive a program, so I generally just refer them out.
Speaker 2:Love it, love it, and you've got great contacts with that as well.
Speaker 3:Yep. I can't help you. I know somebody who can.
Speaker 2:Yep, I'm that way too. So now gets the fun part, because I do know some of your background. Tell us everybody a little bit about what you do in your spare time. You know what you like, what sports you might like, but more or less what you do after hours, because I've been there a few times.
Speaker 3:Yeah, lately it's music. I've just been going to dog trainer by day, musician by night, working with a couple of different groups doing a lot of different music. So it's been a lot of fun doing some gigs playing out at bars, breweries. It's going to be a busy summer on that aspect.
Speaker 2:Well, I think people don't understand what music will bring to your business. It's probably no different than dog training. You've got to get into some type of rhythm and do what you do. That was a good pun. Yep, yep, I get it. I get it. How about any? Where are you from?
Speaker 3:I'm from Minnesota. Grew up in Shakopee area, Chaska area. Went to school in Chaska.
Speaker 2:Sorry to hear about that. Yeah, I know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, north of the river. We don't want to talk about that. So glad to be back south of the river Love, prior Lake, love, making it my home. So this community has been fantastic and I've just been nothing but welcomed here and very blessed to be here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I get, you're a big part of the Prior Lake community. You serve on the chamber, you you're at every event and it's it's fun to see you out and around. We get to network together and, uh, it's just fun being around. I'm really excited that you're here. So, um, you know, just after hearing about your business stuff, what's, what are some of the challenges, or was there something that, uh, that you go through for your business that is tough to go through right now?
Speaker 3:big challenges, like I said earlier, is dealing with bad advice. There's kind of a divide in the in the dog training industry right now. Um, I don't like to pick sides, but there there is. It involves the use of of what we call positive punishment or negative reinforcements, and I think there's a lot of very harmful misconceptions right there. It's really important that you have rules and structures and boundaries for your dogs and you have to uphold that, and that's usually what we call negative reinforcement, or essentially, your dog is working to avoid some sort of applied pressure, without getting too technical, whether it be like a spatial pressure or anything like that. It's just you have to understand that incentive drives behavior and the moment that the dog's desire to do the bad behavior outweighs the reward you have to offer, positive reinforcement just fails at that point.
Speaker 3:So there's an idea out there that you shouldn't discipline your dogs or use negative reinforcements or use aversive tools like e-collars and prong collars. I'm just here to tell you as a professional that it's totally not true. I had one client I was her fourth trainer she had broken two bones and I was the first one to suggest the use of a prong collar, which solved her problem within two sessions. So I just want to reiterate that again Don't let other people judge you. It's up to you to train your dog and it's up to you to know what's going to work for your dog. The use of negative reinforcements and positive punishments are totally necessary. I always like to say if you don't discipline your dog for door crashing the car in the street is gonna so you're not doing your dog any favors by not disciplining them.
Speaker 3:They need to be told yes and no in a way they can understand. And if you ask a dog how they discipline other dogs, they bite right. Those are positive punish. So to think that you can get by without that is just absolutely. It's insane. It's an absolute rejection of the reality.
Speaker 3:Unfortunately, many of the major institutions in the dog industry have just been hijacked by that idea, including the American Veterinary Association who, last time I looked, has it as their official statement that says you should not use positive punishment at all on your dogs. Well, I can also tell you there is not a dog owner on earth who doesn't use positive punishment. So for them to say that to me is just mind it, just it just melts my brain. I cannot believe that that well-known of an institution is giving that bad of advice on dog training. So that's really the big one for me as a professional is I'm constantly at odds with people giving the exact opposite advice of what dog owners should be hearing, and I can't tell you how many times the answer to somebody's problem is discipline and structure and rules and boundaries, but because people have been told not to use negative reinforcements or not make their dog hold a place command, for instance. The dog never learns how to sit. Still, dogs need to know that they can't be a dog all the time, right? So we generally we do that with something like a place command and we generally do that. I call it because I said so training.
Speaker 3:You know you have to have that conversation with your dog at home in small, small, little intimate settings. Maybe it's dinnertime. You place your dog at dinnertime. They have to sit on their cot for 20 minutes and they're going to want to get up and you can't just keep treating them to stay there. That's not how nature works. There needs to be an incentive that decentivizes them to get off the place. That is included in the training. I like to make that skill in particular as a very fun training activity for the dog, because it's risky and it's rewarding at the same time. So, yeah, just making sure you're reinforcing your behaviors, with both positive and negative reinforcement, is super important. Now, with that being said, you don't want to be a tyrant, you know. You don't want to have too many rules or be a total dictator with your dog, but they should know that you're in charge and you do that by taking control of resources and delivering consequences to unwanted behaviors.
Speaker 2:Man, Jake, you have a lot of passion for that. I can tell you that's your adult training right there. So I know I'm going to ask you a little bit later what I really want to know later, or even right now how can we help you with that? I know you're going to be doing some things, some videos and some things like that, but what about me? What about the people that you work with? How can we help in your industry Not just you personally, but your industry has a lot of good trainers out there.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, a hot topic tool. We're going to call it an e-caller. If you ever hear somebody call it a shock collar, they're probably not using it right, but if you ever, more more importantly, if you ever hear somebody say you should never use a shock collar, uh, you should correct them and say you certainly should learn how to use that tool. It's the most, it is the game-changing tool, um, in dog training. Trust me, there's nothing new under the sun in dog training. We've been training dogs with ropes and treats and food for thousands of years. The e-collar is a game changer and it really is the safest tool on the markets, as long as you're using it appropriately.
Speaker 3:That is a tool that can be abused Most certainly, and some people do. But you can't blame the tool, blame the fool, and there is a political movement right now to ban that tool and I'm here to tell you like you're gonna see a lot of people getting bit by dogs. You're gonna see a lot of dogs being euthanized. Um, you cannot remove that tool from people's hands. While you ever would is beyond me.
Speaker 2:But again, it boils down to the use of negative reinforcements and dog training, um, and the ideology that you shouldn't do that that's crazy so well I hear anybody bashing a knee collar, correct them well I know myself just in a little time that we've met and stuff. I've corrected people all the time about dog trainers, because one of the old myths is I can train my dog myself well, I'm sure you can. Some people can Well, I'm sure you can. Some people can, I'm sure you can. I just look at them.
Speaker 3:Do you want to?
Speaker 2:Right, right, get it done. So that's pretty cool. So obviously we've had a great chat.
Speaker 3:And what is the one thing? Very quickly, short, sweet, your elevator speech that you want people to remember you in this little conversation. Okay, I would say um, if every dog owner knew how to use a leash and kept a leash on their dog for three months, whether they're indoors or outdoors, you just keep them leashed for three months, as much as you can there would be no professional dog trainers. There would not be a need for me if people knew that. So I wish every dog owner learned how to use their leash. I'd be out of a job and more time to dedicate to music.
Speaker 2:I got you. I was just going to say that, yeah, you'd be out of a job, but the Jake and Josie show would be all over the world. I love it. So, hopefully, so. So how do they get? A hold of you, Jake.
Speaker 3:You can give me a text at 952-215-8525. Text is definitely my preferred communication. My email is jake at mnrivervalleydogscom. Or go ahead and give me a call, but I generally can't answer my phone during the day. I'm usually busy in a training session so it might be a while. So I can get a hold of you. Text is usually the easiest.
Speaker 2:Yep and you're all over the web. I know Yep, visit my website wwwmnrivervalleydogscom.
Speaker 3:There's also a contact form there. You can fill out and I'll get it. I'll get back to you as soon as I can.
Speaker 2:I love it. I love it. Well, I know we're going to have you back and we'll do some segments with you. I know you're doing some videos as well, so I'll be really excited to do that. I hope everybody gets a chance to get their dog trained and enjoy life a little bit better with man's best friends.
Speaker 3:So it's a much more rewarding relationship if you're not frustrated all the time.
Speaker 2:I got you, Jake. Hey, I appreciate you and we're going to head out of here and I'm going to close with a little video. You and we're going to head out of here and I'm going to close with a little video. You have a great day and I'll talk to you in a little bit. Thanks for having me, Mark. You got it.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast South of the River. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPSouthoftherivercom. That's GNPSouthoftherivercom, or call 952-592-3737.