What's so great about drive training with my dog?

Everything. It taught me how to harness that drive, channel it into a very specific behavior, and ultimately allow my dog to release it in a way I deem as appropriate.

What is drive? It's probably easy to recognize if you've ever seen a dog's eyes light up, her ears prick forward, her head held high, her neck long and straight, her body taut as a spring ready to launch forward. That's drive. It's usually directed towards a prey animal, or something that she sees as prey-like - a ball, a shammy cloth, a tug toy, your underwear, your pantleg. If you're doing it right, she'll see YOU as prey-like. No, she's not going to hunt you down and kill you in your sleep. What you're trying to achieve is for her to be attracted to you the same way she is attracted to a prey-like thing.

Drive release is ultimately fulfilling to a dog because it talks directly to her natural instincts (hence the name Natural Dog Training. ) But hey the guy who taught me about it, Lee Charles Kelley, introduced me to Kevin Behan's book, which ultimately turned everything I thought I knew about dog training on its head. And through Lee's blog, I started reading Neil Sattin's site, and learned even more.

Why drive training for me? Once I learned about it, it seemed like a no-brainer for my spazzy dog. Summer is a special case of weird focus issues. She's got erratic drive. Sometimes it's all over the place. Sometimes it's not high enough. Sometimes it's so high that she doesn't hear or see me. Well, ok, that rarely happens anymore, and it's all thanks to drive training! When I realized I could do things like build and then focus and harness that drive into a specific behavior, and still end up with a fulfilled doggy, I was intrigued. You mean she can feel happy just by fulfilling her drive without treats? Sign me up!

I still use treats - but I use it in conjunction with building drive and releasing drive now. I don't use it the way +R clicker trainers use it. I do use a verbal marker with Summer to indicate a correct position or behavior, but I believe it's actually a way to build her drive as well. Plus, a marker and treats is an easy way to teach new behaviors that seem counterintuitive to a dog. I mean, how many dogs you know will naturally do things like jumping through your arms held up in a loop? Well, ok, maybe not counterintuitive, but humans alone can be stressful enough to dogs - we're SO BIG!! But when you can learn to harness drive and be as attractive as a giant elk (well, ok to a dog, a giant elk is the be all and end all of supermodels), you can teach them how to do this.