About jan fennel not respected In the dog training community

Why is jan fennel not respected In the dog training community

Hi ibhande in answer to your question because her methods are not liked by many.

It is years since I read her books (a gift) I found her methods to be based on outdated pseudo-scientific theories related to wolf behaviour.

Too much "pack leader" and ''dominance'' for me.

I don't like her books because I don't agree with her views on packs and dominance. I regard my dogs as individuals in their own right with their own unique strengths and weaknesses and train them accordingly.

Ms Fennell used to be on our local radio station, before she was famous, her "Amichien" bonding is based on domination & belief in humans being part of the dog's "Pack". She claims to have invented reward training. She os what we call "A one size fits all"training, because she has only one method of training dogs.

I saw her with one of her "Alsatians" at Crufts(can't bring myself to call them GSDs, because they are such poor specimens, nervous & very reluctant to be handled)hardly the type that gives customers confidence

I take the complete opposite view, and this is based not on 'theory' and 'what a human wants' but rather on observing the behaviour of the two dogs we had. When Baruska was alive she showed she was the pack leader, it was in her genes. After she died I came to realise that she never wanted anything from us, she tried to the best of her ability to provide food, to protect us from what she saw as potential danger, and most important she tried to recruit other dogs into the pack (provided they were subservient to her) as this increased the chances of the pack surviving.

So you are applying 'human' standards to a creature which is not 'human' ask yourself, are you just looking at them as children in fur coats

I believe that Jan Fennel gets looked down on because she came into the dog world by sad personal circumstances and not by any academic route.

For those who view her in this way I would urge you to read the works of Prof. Stanley Coren who is a professor of psychology at the University of British Colunbia and a world wide authority on dog-human interaction who has written more than five books and many papers on the subject.

He supports the 'pack leader' and 'dominance' theories and for my money he is far more believable than those who just have a pet theory and a personal desire to make their dog into something it isn't and treat it like a human.

Why do you think this is the case

A few comments on an internet forum means absolutely nothing, think about it, people from all over the world, who are they how much education have they had what are their qualifications

Like all the millions on all the social networks out there, no one really knows anything, yet just because you can 'chat' electronically you assume that there is some 'authority' to the posts. Well sorry to tell you but there ain't

Losos mine is based on 50 years of working with dogs and observing them and this includes in large kennels with many dogs. I started in kennels aged 15 working full time and progressed to part owner and manager of a large show kennel all of which provided lots of opportunity to observe dogs over a long period in many situation.

I have seen just about every training 'fashion' come and go.The tried and tested methods I found worked for me don't have any fancy names but are based on reward and positive reinforcement.

I don't believe in all the dominance and pack stuff and I am happy to say my beliefs were tested and confirmed fairly recently by Bradshaw, Casey & Blackwell at Bristol university and made available in the paper "Dominance in Domestic Dogs - Useful Construct or Bad Habit?"
A copy of the research was sent to me by a kind member here.

Losos you stick to the methods of JF if you wish and outdated concepts , she is not for me.

As that comment was directed specifically to me, my answer is most emphatically NO ... I don't and never have regarded any of the dogs I've owned as "children in fur coats". I'm well aware they are dogs and I'm a human and I'm certain they're aware that I'm a human and not a dog!

If there's one thing I've learnt in the 60 plus years I've owned dogs, usually multiple numbers and with a few exceptions, several different pure bred dogs at the same time, is that every dog is different ... a Great Pyrenean is not a Tibetan Spaniel or Miniature Schnauzer, and a Springer Spaniel is not a Border Collie, a GSD or a Shar-Pei (all of which I've owned as well as other breeds), and in that respect I train them all slightly differently taking into account their different temperaments and abilities.

Barbara I guess you have found Mini Schnauzers are a law unto themselves anyway each of mine has been very different ...

Agreed . . . thank u