" 'Old Tricks' For A 'New Puppy':

An Early-Training System To Establish a Life-Long Bond, Begin Basic Obedience, Create a Sense Of Dominance, And Develop Cooperation With Your Young Dog."
By Jerry Thoms

It was a dark and stormy
night. Really, according to
Jim Rieser. "One of those mid-winter nights in east central Wisconsin when the temperature was 30 below zero, the wind blew snow in gusts up to 40 miles per hour, and the wind-chill dropped to the minus 50º range," Reiser recollects.
"Sonny, my new German shorthair pointer puppy wasn't enjoying any of this. Only 12 weeks old, he had never seen bare ground because of constant snow cover and he had never spent much time outside because of the deadly cold. His brief exposure to the outdoors was quick and painful as the winter wind and the numbing temperatures made house-breaking a heart breaking experience with the shivering pup searching for in the spot in the snow to pee and poop in a hurry," Rieser vividly remembers.
"As a result of these weather conditions, I ended up spending a lot of time indoors with the pup, playing with him in the kitchen, letting him chase a tennis ball in the hallway ­ and sitting with him in my lap in front of the television set with the sound turned up to drown out the moan and whistle of the winter wind. 'Poor little guy,' I at first thought. 'He's missing so much by not being able to be outdoors romping in the yard, running through the fields, chasing flying leaves and butterflies, and enjoying the summer sunshine.'"
"Because of this brutal winter weather, however, I spent much more time with this pup in an 'up-close and personal' way than I had ever before experienced with any of my other gun dogs. And as a result of these weather induced conditions, I developed a sort of 'early training' procedure for this pup. Since then, I've used this early beginning approach for starting all my young dogs on an in-the-house, in-my-lap 'basic training' program. This system has worked pretty well to create a bond between the pups and me while also beginning basic obedience, establishing my dominance in our relationship, and developing cooperation," Rieser has discovered.
"The idea of this 'early training' method is to put a new puppy and yourself into a comfortable location in the house (in my case this is the lounge chair in the living room), then hold the young dog in your lap for a couple 10 to 15 minute 'mini-training' sessions each day," Rieser says.
"All the components in this training program are simple, natural, non-violent, and long-lasting," Rieser emphasizes. "None of these 'training tricks' are new," Rieser says, "It's just that their application is a little different because these early training' steps are more concentrated, formal, and thought-out than other methods," Rieser assures puppy owners.