British ‘dog godfather’ Graeme Hall has recently come under some criticism from the Pet Professional Guild Australia which has raised questions about ‘archaic, quick advice and adverse dog training methods’.
The PPGA questions the show’s title Dogs are (very) bad in Australia blames the problem behavior on the dog.
Talking podcasts Recharge TVHall explained that the problems invariably fell on the landlords.
“Technically speaking, it’s not really dogs that misbehave, or at least if they misbehave, it’s because humans made them that way. But actually a show called Dogs are misbehaving because their humans made them misbehave Australia, it’s not going to go into your programming guide, is it?” he said.
The Yorkshire-born Hall, who does not profess to be a vet, was persuaded to work on behavior by a dog trainer who noted his skill with pets and owners.
“This guy said, ‘Why don’t you take it professionally?’ So I said, ‘Okay, well, this is an interesting thing. Why do you think I’d be good at it? And he surprised me because he said, ‘Are you good with people?’” He recalled.
“Okay, well, that’s good to hear. But I thought you might say, Cani,” Hall replied.
“And he said, ‘No, you’re good with dogs. Most people are good with dogs. “But that’s the key thing—he never left me—you can only fix dogs through their people.”
“So you have to take the side of the people. Also, it’s not good for me to become some kind of dog handler, do magical things, show off and say, “That’s it.”
“It’s very much about ‘Here’s how it works. But you can too. And I’ll tell you the secrets of how I just did it.’ That’s really what the show is about.
PPGA also encourages dog owners to use no-force techniques that focus on positive reinforcement and says “quick fix” advice doesn’t address the underlying problem and will fail in the long run.
Hall, whose British series has enjoyed 6 seasons, told TV Reload his work was just the beginning of changing the dog’s behavior.
“It’s really a case of ‘Okay, I think we can change some things. We’re going to make a big transformation here,’” she explained.
“It’s what you see, most of the time. There’s always an undercurrent at the end of the show, which is: keep practicing. You have to keep doing it. You need to keep this stuff up. Because if you don’t, it will probably slip.
You can hear more here.
Dogs Behaving (Very) Badly Australia airs Thursday 10th at 7.30pm.
