Personal Protection Dogs

Family, Home and Business Protection

Personal Protection Dogs are a great asset for your home. With the ability to not only protect your home and property, but having that extra blanket of comfort knowing your family is under constant protection will bring you peace of mind. A Personal Protection Dog can not only be a great house pet for the family, but can also provide your family with valuable time to get to safety, should an unwelcome person enter your home in the middle of the night. Always on Alert … Always willing to give their life to save yours and Always loyal … A Personal Protection Dog is a must have for those with children in the home.

 

The Big Misunderstanding

Many believe that a biting dog is a mean dog. Many believe that if you own a dog that possesses the ability to bite or attack on command, that they aren’t able to integrate into a family environment or they aren’t safe to have in public. This is completely FALSE! Dayton Dog Trainer prides ourselves on providing the very best of working dogs and protection dogs. Our dogs are bread with that specific concern in mind. We only provide socially acceptable, well balanced dogs, that can not only perform a task upon command; even if it is a command that causes the dog to bring out their ferocious side … but can also be part of the family as well as socially acceptable.

Simply put … our dogs are well balanced, mentally sound, extremely loyal and can be turned on and off like a switch, when the situation calls for it.

 

Personal Protection Dogs

  • Human Protection
  • Business Protection
  • Home Protection
  • Property Protection
  • Child Protection
  • Guard Dogs

 

Before you contact us, please read the following …

WE DO NOT …

  • Train any dog for protection work that we deem are aggressive or posses behavior associated with mental instability.
  • Train house pets for personal protection work.
  • Train any Pitbulls, Bully’s, American Staffordshire Terriers or any other name you want to give them, unless purchased through us.
  • Train dogs for anyone who has been convicted of fighting dogs, animal cruelty, or are known or suspected of fighting or cruelty.
  • Train dogs for protection work for anyone with a criminal background containing ANY felony or domestic violence misdemeanors.
  • Turn over any highly trained protection dog to anyone that has not gone through our specialized K9 handler course.
  • Care how much money you have, as this will not change anything mentioned above.
  • Refer you to anyone else who would, as we do not associate with those type of entities.

 

WE DO …

  • Put out only the highest of trained dogs to our clients.
  • Purchase only guaranteed working dogs.
  • Offer several different breeds for personal protection such as … German Shepherds (GSD), Belgian Malinois, Dutch Shepherd, Belgian Tervuren, Czech Shepherds, Belgian Laekenois and many more.
  • Take our handler course very serious and expect you too as well.
  • Provide a guarantee on all working dogs.

 

We receive many calls for people interested in our Personal Protection Dog Training Program. Most people believe that because they have a more aggressive type dog, that they want to have their dog trained in personal protection. The fact is, we do not train aggressive dogs for personal protection. This type of training is designed for well balanced dogs with lots of play and prey drive.

Dogs that are aggressive in nature, usually are aggressive, because they are scared or unbalanced. These dogs are what we call “fear biters”. A fearful dog is a defensive dog … and a defensive dog is not 100% controllable. The perfect situation would be to have a dog that is well balanced and can be trained to bite and release in an offensive manner. An offensive dog can be turned on and of like a switch, because they are stable minded.

An offensive dog that is trained to bite and release is more reliable and will accept this type of training as play. Remember … when you properly train a balanced dog to bite and release, it is not personal to them. They do it because it is Play. Because it is what they are trained to do. Therefore, it is controllable. They bite and release out of offense and not defense.

About 90% of the inquiries we get for personal protection, are turned down. It does not matter how much money you have or how much you believe your dog can do this type of work. If your dog doesn’t evaluate perfectly for this type of work, we have to turn you down. It is not personal … but we refuse to train an aggressive or scared dog to bite. It becomes a huge liability for you and us.

The evaluation for Personal Protection, is much different than our obedience evaluation. The cost is a little higher for this type of evaluation. If your dog does evaluate for personal protection and makes the cut, you can expect to pay up into the thousands of dollars … and train for many months to perfect the training.

 

What do you get?

When you purchase a personal protection dog from Dayton Dog Trainer your dog will …

  • Obedience Training – Your new dog will be completely obedient on and off leash. The dog will walk by your side and obey every command, without hesitation. You will be able to drop your dog to the ground, walk in any direction, including circles and command your dog to go to any spot.
  • House Pet – Your dog will be completely stable in and outside your home. This would include allowing your children to play with your dog, rough house, kick, punch, tease, and all the other things that kids do when rough housing with your dog. This would also include falling on the dog or jumping on them, as sometimes happens with kids.
  • Like a Switch – When it is time to get busy, your new dog will not only protect you when a threat is present, but you will also be able to send your dog in for the bite or take down. You may also send your dog in for the bite and call him or her off at the last second and have your dog either drop to the ground, on guard, in front of the person, or return to your side in a heal position.

 

NOTE: For those interested in this type of training, you be required to provide Dayton Dog Trainer with in-depth information on who you are, why you would need such a dog and in some cases a background check must be performed. Not all who apply for this training, will be accepted. We don’t care how much money you have or are willing to pay … you must pass a certain criteria, before we would ever consider conducting this type of training or providing you with such a dog.

 

Sporting Dogs

Schutzhund, IPO, KNPV, French Ring

What is Schutzhund & IPO?

The origins of the working, protection or sporting dog, such as Schutzhund or IPO, are based in Germany. These canine training tests were developed as the primary method for producing top level working or sporting dogs, such as the (GSD) or German Shepherd, Belgian Malinois, Dutch Shepherd or even a Czech Shepherd. They were geared to identify the suitability of each individual dog, utilized for work in several different formats and/or environments …

  • Stamina and Endurance
  • Agility
  • Temperament and Nerves (how the dog handles pressure or stress)
  • Courage
  • Intelligence
  • Handler Loyalty
  • Desire to Work

 

Max von Stephanitz, (responsible for the German Shepherd Dog breed, is an ex-cavalry captain and former student of the Berlin Veterinary College and an ex-member of the Phylax Society), believed that these tests were necessary to continue to produce dogs of the highest caliber of working ability and to weed out those that couldn’t hack it, from the gene pool.

 

There is virtually no difference between Schutzhund and IPO, as both were developed for the same purpose. IPO is the international standard, and at one time had a different set of rules as determined by the governing body of FCI. Following rule changes in 2004, where the SV (via the VDH, all breed Kennel Club of Germany) began conforming to FCI rules for Schutzhund, the standards are virtually the same.

Belgian Malinois, Dutch Shepherds, Czech Shepherds and German Shepherds seem to dominate many of the Schutzhund shows although a wider variety of breeds can participate and often do in IPO shows. Any breed can technically be trained in Schutzhund, but as any trainer knows, not all individual dogs and not all dog breeds are suitable for this type of work. It is a test that requires a high level of ability in several areas.

 

Components of Training & Trialing

Many times, the public has a misconception about what this type of training is. They often see photos of dogs doing bite work and see an aggressive and potentially dangerous animal. What they don’t know is how well controlled and how stable these dogs must be … opposed to some police dogs and personal protection dogs that don’t require quite as much provocation, Schutzhund dogs are required to be tightly trained and as a general rule, are quite safe around our families and around the public. Most people are actually amazed when they meet one of these working dogs. Often, people don’t realize that training is comprised of three areas, with protection being only one of those areas.

 

The Elements of Schutzhund

  • Obedience: The obedience work is of a high level that is designed to test the dog’s intelligence, desire to work and please its handler, its ability to take directions from its handler, and its ability to work under stress (heeling around other people, during noises like gunshots, etc.). The obedience work includes heeling work, retrieval work (including over an A-frame obstacle), recalls, send outs, stay, along with position related work such as sit and down. It is important that the dog be a happy worker and interested in what he is doing.
  • Tracking: The depth of difficulty differs based on the title being worked towards, but tracking is all about testing a dog’s ability to not only scent but also about his ability to stay focused enough to follow the scent without distraction or frustration. It is also a test of how confident a dog is and how well he works in front of his handler. Tracking is not something that a dog can ask you to hold his hand during! The dog will be required to properly identify articles (by alerting in some fashion such as lying down on or near the object) to his handler that have been left on the track by the track layer.
  • Protection: This is the most misunderstood of the three phases of training and is normally the one the general public focuses on. During training and trialing, there must be a ‘helper’ to do protection work. A helper is the person that will be wearing the padded bite sleeve. This person will also be concealed behind a blind and at more than point during the test will either attempt to escape or pretend to threaten/attack the dog or handler. Initially the dog is required to locate the helper when he is hidden and hold him there for the handler. When the helper attempts to escape or threatens the dog or handler, the dog is to actively apprehend the helper by biting the bite sleeve. A dog must be confident enough and strong enough mentally to handle this work, but he must also be sensitive to handler commands and release the sleeve when requested. It is hard to call a dog off when he is working at a high, excited level (or in high drive mode) so it is imperative that he is trained well enough and is responsive to handler commands.

 

It is important to note that temperament is a very important aspect in all levels.  There are multiple things that are integrated into the testing for evaluating temperament.  If a dog cannot pass these elements (by showing fear, nervousness, extreme aggression, sound reactivity, weaker nerves, etc.) he will not be able to pass a test.

 

Levels of Dog Titling

There are multiple levels of titles that represent progressively harder levels of work.  For each title, there are 300 points available (100 points in each of the three components of obedience, tracking, and protection work).  In order to title, a dog must successfully acquire at least 70 points (70%) in tracking and obedience and at least 80 points (80%) in protection.  Of course the goal is to score as highly as one can!

 

Dog Titles

  • SchH 1 / VPG 1 / IPO 1: Beginning level of Schutzhund (obedience, tracking, and protection)
  • SchH 2 /  VPG 2 / IPO 2: Intermediate level of Schutzhund (obedience, tracking, and protection)
  • SchH 3 /  VPG 3 / IPO 3: Advanced level of Schutzhund (obedience, tracking, and protection)

 

Additional Dog Titles

  • FH: Advanced tracking work.
  • BH: This is a first level for everything else.  It is to test obedience and traffic sureness.
  • WH: This is a watchdog test for alertness.
  • AD: This is an endurance test to test a dog’s physical ability and stamina.
  • SchH A: This is only obedience and protection work.

Dogs should be 15 months old for BH testing, 16 months old for FH and AD testing, 18 months old for SchH A and SchH1, 19 months old for SchH2 and lastly, 20 months old for SchH3.