Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
Today I am going to tell how to train your German Shepherd Dog to assume the heeling position from the position of setting in front of you after performing the come command from a sit-stay or down-stay position.
The heeling position is where your German Shepherd Dog is sitting to your left waiting for a command from you before proceeding. To train your German Shepherd Dog to assume this position from any position during the obedience training class it is best to start from the sitting in front of you position.
The Heeling Position
From the heeling position place your German shepherd Dog in a sit-stay or down-stay. Tell them stay and place your open hand directly in front of their face then step in front of them. Reinforce the stay command and step away from your German Shepherd Dog to the end of the lead. Then call their name and say come. When your German Shepherd Dog comes to you make them sit immediately in front of you and offer them a treat and praise. From this position have a treat in your right hand ready to give, and take the lead with the same hand letting them see or smell the treat. Say the word “Assume” and walk them around behind you using your right hand. It sometimes helps for you to take one step back with your right foot while leaving your left foot in place.
When your German Shepherd Dog is halfway around behind you, you will need to transfer the lead to your left hand (but keep the treat in your right hand) while still applying tension to continue your German Shepherd Dog to walk all the way around you until they reach the heeling position. Once they get to your left side tell them sit and provide them the treat and praise.
This exercise will feel awkward the first several times you try it but it will become more natural to you and your German Shepherd Dog. Once this is mastered by you and your German Shepherd Dog, you should be able to give the command assume and your German shepherd dog from any position on the training grounds should walk behind you and assume the heeling position.
Saturday Training Class Working on Assuming the Heeling Position
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
The other day I recommended that you that you add fish (mackerel) to your German Shepherd Dog’s Diet. At the same time I suggested that you limit your German Shepherd Dogs adults to eating fish two or three times a week because all fishes from the ocean are contaminated with low levels of mercury. If you were to feed fish every day to your German Shepherd Dogs overtime they may bio-concentrate in their bodies dangerous mercury levels.
Your German Shepherd Dog puppy or adult needs approximately 3 ounces of fresh meat at every meal. I explained to you how degraded the protein that is found in dry-food requiring us to supplement fresh protein if we are interested in maximizing the health of our German Shepherd Dogs. While fish is probably our first choice, but we can only use fish two or three times a week, so what about the other days?
My favorite is venison, and we package and freeze approximately 6,000 pounds of venison scrap per year. We then cook 10 to 20 pounds of venison per day depending on how many boards we are kenneling and the ambient temperature. The colder it is outside, the more fresh protein, we will feed to our German Shepherd Dogs. On average, each German Shepherd Dog will receive daily 3 to 5 ounces of fresh protein.
Fortunately for Keystone German Shepherds, we have large deer processors nearby and we are able to collect their meat scraps for free. These scraps would end up in a dump if we did not utilize this resource.
If you do not have deer processors nearby, you can use beef, chicken, turkey, or buffalo as a fresh meat source. Just avoid processed meats such as sandwich meats and high salt and fatty meats such as ham, sausage, and bacon. A diet of high fatty meats may cause your German Shepherd Dog to develop acute Canine Pancreatitis. In addition, too much salt is unhealthy for your German Shepherd Dog and places undo strain on their kidneys. Never pour bacon grease on your German Shepherd Dog’s food.
With a little searching for sales, you can usually find good quality meats for less than $2.00 per pound. Buy up these good deals and freeze the meat until ready for use.
Provide fresh meat to your German Shepherd Dog and they will be healthier and love you the more for it.
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
Today, I will tell you how beneficial eggs are for your German Shepherd puppies and adults. Eggs are extremely economical when compared pound for pound to all other food sources based on digestible protein, fat, minerals, nutrients, and cholesterol.
Eggs are nature’s perfect food package when you consider that everything is packaged in an egg necessary to create a new and complete life. However, not all eggs are equal; free-range and organic eggs are going to have a higher nutrient and mineral content than your production eggs. Nevertheless, all eggs are highly beneficial to your German Shepherd Dog, even the cheap production eggs.
Eggs are more than ninety percent digestible, and no other food source is as esculent. Because eggs are so digestible, eggs are great for adding to kibble mush after a few days to help wean German Shepherd Dog puppies and to get them on solid food.
Add Eggs After a Few Days to Puppies Mush to Help In Weaning
German Shepherd Dogs love the taste of eggs, and you literally cannot feed them too many eggs unless you are regulating your German Shepherd Dog’s weight. You need not be concerned about too much cholesterol from eggs as a part of your German Shepherd Dog’s diet. The form of cholesterol found in eggs is not harmful to your German Shepherd Dog and will not clog their arteries. Cholesterol types found in certain vegetable oils are harmful and will clog your dog’s arteries, but that subject is for another day. Eggs are good for the finicky eater because they like how they taste and may improve their appetite when mixed into their meals.
Eggs must be cooked before feeding to your German Shepherd Dog. Egg whites, and albumen contains a protein, albumin. Raw albumin binds with Biotin, which is an essential B vitamin, thus robbing your German Shepherd Dog of this important vitamin necessary for growth and maintenance. By cooking the eggs, you will denature this protein making it unable to bind to Biotin. In addition, unless you raise your own eggs, a possibility exists that the raw eggs may be contaminated with salmonella or E-Coli bacteria, which can make your German Shepherd Dog seriously ill and potentially could result in death.
Therefore, cook your eggs to ensure against bacterial contamination and Biotin deficiency. Any method of cooking is acceptable. I prefer to scramble a couple of dozen eggs at a time and then spoon them out when needed. I use virgin olive oil to scramble the eggs. Virgin olive oil is beneficial for your German Shepherd Dog if used in modest quantities.
I Promise that I Didn’t Eat the Eggs Left On the Table
Add eggs to your German Shepherd Dog’s diet and watch their coats and general health improve. They will love the eggs and you even more.
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
Today, I am going to recommend that you add fish to your German Shepherd Dog’s Diet. Even though a high quality dry-food will have a good source of protein at twenty-five to twenty-seven percent level, it is still highly processed and a lot of nutrients, amino acids, and minerals found in the meat have been degraded from cooking and processing. Your German Shepherd Dog puppy or adult will benefit from approximately 3 ounces of fresh protein daily.
Heidelberg’s Ekko Loves Mackerel
A good economical source of fresh protein can be obtained from canned mackerel. A 15 ounce can from Wal-Mart cost about $1.25 per can. That is only .25 cents per serving. In addition, to being healthy for them, your German Shepherd Dog will love eating fish. An added benefit for some is that supplementing the diet with fresh mackerel may improve the appetite of the finicky eater.
Because all fishes from the ocean are contaminated with low levels of mercury, I limit my German Shepherd Dogs adults to eating fish only two or three times a week. However, for my puppies, I feed them mackerel every morning until they are approximately six-months-old. I believe that if I were to feed fish every day to my German Shepherd Dogs that they may bio-concentrate dangerous mercury levels in their bodies later in life. Also, you should avoid tuna fish, because tuna fish may have significantly higher levels of mercury contamination than mackerel. If you really want to provide a treat for your German Shepherd Dog, try pink salmon, while more expensive German Shepherd Dogs absolutely relish salmon.
Try feeding your German Shepherd Dog mackerel a couple times a week, they will love you the more for it and they may be healthier.
Heidelberg Puppies Waiting On Their Mackerel Breakfast
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
I am feeling much better today, thank you. However, I am still not completely well, therefore, today’s tip will be short, but an important approach for improving basic obedience and socialization German Shepherd Dog training classes.
Make it entertaining for the owners of the German Shepherd Dogs, puppies and adults in the class and challenging for the dogs by incorporating obstacles while performing the heeling exercise. The perfect obstacle to add is a little jump where you can have the class start out a low level and then add height to the jump every few times that you heel around your training ring.
German Shepherd Puppies Heeling Through a Jump Obstacle
Increasing the Height of the Jump Obstacle
Notice how once the obstacle has gotten too high for the people to step over the boards, they simply go to the side and allow the German Shepherd Dogs to jump over the obstacle. Adding an obstacle to the heeling part of the class keeps the German Shepherd Dogs engaged and allows them to actually to perform better at the other class’ exercises. Once you have reached a certain level, you can find the champion jumper of the class by having elimination rounds. This is very exciting and gets the entire class enthusiastic and the German Shepherd Dogs feed off of this enthusiasm by performing better at all facets of the class’ exercises. Our best classes at Keystone German Shepherd Dogs have been when we have had added a challenging obstacle.
Try adding an obstacle to your class to keep the training exciting and challenging for the owners and the German Shepherd Dogs.
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