Dog Training-The Amazing Story of Balto

When it comes to dog training, there is a non-stop controversy over what is  the best way to train a dog?

Should a dog work for treats or should we train a dog using force? Should  punishment be inflicted on the dog or should we simply try to ignore bad  behavior and then reward good behavior?

People should form their opinions and methods through a lot of experimentation and observation.

AND…

By also becoming a student of dogs. Dogs really are incredible animals and  truly are man’s best friend. One perfect example is the story of a dog named Balto. In 1925 at a time when the world was turning to machines for all of its  answers, a team of huskies were the solution to saving a small town in Nome, Alaska from diphtheria out-break. Diphtheria is a highly contagious disease that would quickly spread to all of  the people in Nome. Without the anti-toxin to combat it, there was no telling  how many people would die in Nome. Nome is about 1000 miles away from Anchorage, and trains at the time could  get to a town Nenana that was about 700 miles from Nome, still a considerable  distance away. The one plane in Nome was taken out of storage and the citizens tried to start it. The engine was frozen. The other plane in the area had been taken apart and stored for the winter. Shipping channels were frozen solid. The only way to cover the 700 miles was to use a relay of dog teams. Twenty sled dog teams came together to cover the distance and bring the  anti-toxin to Nome. It was estimated that it would take the sled dog teams about 13 days to traverse the terrain from Nenana to Nome. The sled dog teams fought fierce winds, strong enough to knock over both the dogs and the sleds. They battled freezing temperatures, sometimes as cold as 40 below. On February 1, 1925, the anti-toxin was handed off for the last time to a  team led by Gunnar Kassen in the village of Bluff, Alaska.

Kassen’s sled dog team set off to cover the final leg to Nome.

The lead dog…

Balto.

Balto was a two-year old Siberian husky born in Nome. Balto spent the early  part of his life as part of a dog team that transported supplies to miners in  the surrounding area. The funny thing about Balto is that he was considered a “scrub dog,” meaning an inferior or slow-working dog. Balto was far from being a “scrub dog” as you’ll soon discover. You see, on the last leg of the trip to Nome, a blinding blizzard began, temperatures  dropped to -50 degrees and generating wind gusts in excess of 50 mph. Kassen  found himself unable to navigate, and almost gave up all hope of making it to  Nome in time. But Balto knew the trail well, and, following his instincts, led the team  through the cold and snow. Over the next 20 hours, Balto slowly led his sled  dog team over the final 53 miles.

On February 2 at 5.30 AM, the team finally arrived in Nome. The dogs were  too tired to even bark, Kassen went to the front of the sled team and fell to  his knees petting Balto saying: “Damn fine dog, damn fine dog.”

The serum had successfully been delivered – only seven days after leaving  Anchorage, and just 127 1/2 hours after leaving Nenana.

Balto went on to become a big celebrity and even has a life-size statue in  New York City’s Central Park. The bronze sculpture is New York’s City’s only  statue commemorating a dog. The statue includes a plaque with an inscription  that reads:

“Dedicated to the indomitable spirit of the sled dogs that relayed anti-toxin 600 miles over treacherous waters, through arctic blizzards, from Nenana to  the relief of stricken Nome in the winter of 1925 – Endurance, Fidelity,  Intelligence.”

I share that story because it really helps put things into perspective when  we think about training dogs. How can you read a story like Balto’s and not  realize what incredible animals dogs are and how closely linked we are to  dogs.

When you think about it, there are thousands of Baltos walking around right now. Dogs leading blind people, dogs assisting deaf people, dogs helping people  with disabilities, dogs finding lost people, dog sniffing out bombs, illegal  drugs, protecting their owners, guarding, herding, hunting, and police dogs are  just a few examples.

Dogs are now being trained to sniff out cancer, to detect when an epileptic  person is about to have a seizure, the list goes on and on. It’s one of the  reasons why I am always preaching the benefits of positive reinforcement. How  and WHY would we want to inflict pain on an animal that gives us so  much?

Eric Letendre the author of The Amazing Dog Training Man invites you to visit http://www.amazingdogtrainingman.com for leading edge dog  training tips, instructional video clips and articles that will help you train  and understand your dog. You can also get free dog training updates with a free  Smart Dog Newsletter subscription, available at http://www.amazingdogtrainingman.com

Amazing Facts about Dogs

“Did you ever notice when you blow in a dog’s face he gets mad at you? But when you take him in a car, he sticks his head out the window.” – Steve Bluestone

This is one of the weird facts about dogs among the myriad amazing facts about dogs. There are many facts about dogs that are truly mind-boggling and fascinating.

Dogs, whose scientific name is Canis lupus familiaris, belong to the family Canidae and are the domesticated form of the gray wolf. There are approximately 700 types of dogs of pure breed across the globe. Dogs are very versatile and are of great assistance to perform various kinds of roles for human beings like protection, herding, assisting the military and police to track criminals, as sniffer dogs to detect bombs and other weapons, hunting and very recently helping handicapped individuals, especially the blind. Dog behavior is particularly associated with loyalty towards its owner. Let’s take a look at some of the amazing facts about dogs.

Interesting Facts about Dogs
Dogs are one of the most intelligent animals and can be trained to do any task. Given below are some of the amazing facts about dogs:

• There are approximately 450 million dogs found across the globe. This statistics includes stray dogs as well as pets.
• Dogs were first domesticated by the cavemen who lived during the Paleolithic Age.
• Dogs have very sharp ears and can hear sounds up to 35,000 vibrations per second.
• The first fossils of dogs were discovered in the year 10,000 B. C.
• Puppies are usually deaf, blind and toothless when they are born. When a puppy is two to three weeks old, it begins to see. The first milk teeth appears when they are three to seven weeks old.
• Dogs sweat from the pads of their feet. They also breathe through their tongue.
• All the dogs have the same anatomy – 321 bones and 42 permanent teeth.
• The average heart rate of a healthy dog is 120 heartbeats per minute, which is 50% faster than the average heart rate of humans which is 72 beats per minute.
• When a dog wags his tail, it is an indication that he is excited. However, it may not mean that the dogs is trying to be friendly.
• Dogs are not color-blind. They can see color but not as clearly as human beings.
• The nose prints of dogs are unique, just like the fingerprints of humans. These nose prints can help to identify them accurately.
• The basenji, which is an African wolf dog, is the only dog breed in the world that cannot bark.
• Laika, a stray dog, became the first ever astronaut dog to enter space in a space shuttle, the Russian Sputnik II in the year 1967.
• There were two dogs among the few survivors of the ship RMS Titanic, which sank on 14 April in the year 1912.
• The greyhound dogs are the fastest dogs on Earth, which can run at a speed of 45 miles per hour.
• The Great Dane is a breed that has its origins in Germany and is supposed to be the tallest dog.
• One of the fun facts about dogs is that an English mastiff, named Zorba is considered to be the world’s longest and heaviest dog. This dog breed weighs approximately 1552 kilograms (3423 pounds) and is eight feet three inches long when measured from nose to tail.
• The oldest dog in the world was Bluey, an Australian cattle dog who lived up to the age of 29 years and 6 months.
• The chihuahua dogs are the smallest dogs. Other breeds of small dogs are the toy poodle and Yorkshire terrier.
• The St. Bernard is supposed to be heaviest dog among the other breeds of dogs.
• Contrary to the popular belief, prairie dogs are dogs at all, but are a type of rodents.
• Dalmatian puppies are pure white at birth and develop the black spots on their bodies as they grow older.
• One of William Shakespeare’s famous plays, ‘The Two Gentlemen of Verona’ has a mention of a dog (which is the only dog to ever appear in a Shakespearean play) named Crab.
• There is a place called Barking Sands Beach, which is in Kanai, an island in the Hawaii. This place is quite popular for its peculiar dry sands that makes woofing and squeaking sounds similar to a dog barking.
• Theobromine, a substance that is similar to caffeine, found in chocolates can make dogs seriously ill and can even harm them fatally.

These were some amazing facts about dogs. Use these facts about dogs for kids to teach them the different types and the behavior of ‘man’s best friend’.

General History of the Dog

One can well conceive the possibility of the partnership beginning in the circumstance of some helpless whelps being brought home by the early hunters to be tended and reared by the women and children.

Dogs introduced into the  home as play-things for the children would grow to regard themselves, and be regarded, as members of the family

In nearly all parts of the world traces of an indigenous dog family are found, the only exceptions being the West Indian Islands, Madagascar, the eastern islands of the Malayan Archipelago, New Zealand, and the Polynesian Islands, where there is no sign that any dog, wolf, or fox has existed as a true aboriginal animal.

In the ancient Oriental lands, and generally among the early Mongolians, the dog remained savage and neglected for centuries, prowling in packs, gaunt and wolf-like, as it prowls today through the streets and under the walls of every Eastern city. No attempt was made to allure it into human companionship or to improve it into docility. It is not until we come to examine the records of the higher civilisations of Assyria and Egypt that we discover any distinct varieties of canine form.

The dog was not greatly appreciated in Palestine, and in both the Old and New Testaments it is commonly spoken of with scorn and contempt as an “unclean beast.”

Even the familiar reference to the Sheepdog in the Book of Job “But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to set with the dogs of my flock” is not without a suggestion of contempt, and it is significant that the only biblical allusion to the dog as a recognised companion of man occurs in the apocryphal Book of Tobit (v. 16), “So they went forth both, and the young man’s dog with them.”

The great multitude of different breeds of the dog and the vast differences in their size, points, and general appearance are facts which make it difficult to believe that they could have had a common ancestry. One thinks of the difference between the Mastiff and the Japanese Spaniel, the Deerhound and the fashionable Pomeranian, the St. Bernard and the Miniature Black and Tan Terrier, and is perplexed in contemplating the possibility of their having descended from a common progenitor. Yet the disparity is no greater than that between the Shire horse and the Shetland pony, the Shorthorn and the Kerry cattle, or the Patagonian and the Pygmy; and all dog breeders know how easy it is to produce a variety in type and size by studied selection.

In order properly to understand this question it is necessary first to consider the identity of structure in the wolf and the dog. This identity of structure may best be studied in a comparison of the osseous system, or skeletons, of the two animals, which so closely resemble each other that their transposition would not easily be detected.

The spine of the dog consists of seven vertebrae in the neck, thirteen in the back, seven in the loins, three sacral vertebrae, and twenty to twenty-two in the tail. In both the dog and the wolf there are thirteen pairs of ribs, nine true and four false.

Each has forty-two teeth. They both have five front and four hind toes, while outwardly the common wolf has so much the appearance of a large, bare-boned dog, that a popular description of the one would serve for the other.

Nor are their habits different. The wolf’s natural voice is a loud howl, but when confined with dogs he will learn to bark. Although he is carnivorous, he will also eat vegetables, and when sickly he will nibble grass. In the chase, a pack of wolves will divide into parties, one following the trail of the quarry, the other endeavouring to intercept its retreat, exercising a considerable amount of strategy, a trait which is exhibited by many of our sporting dogs and terriers when hunting in teams.

A further important point of resemblance between the Canis lupus and the Canis familiaris lies in the fact that the period of gestation in both species is sixty-three days. There are from three to nine cubs in a wolf’s litter, and these are blind for twenty-one days. They are suckled for two months, but at the end of that time they are able to eat half-digested flesh disgorged for them by their dam or even their sire.

The native dogs of all regions approximate closely in size, coloration, form, and habit to the native wolf of those regions. Of this most important circumstance there are far too many instances to allow of its being looked upon as a mere coincidence. Sir John Richardson, writing in 1829, observed that “the resemblance between the North American wolves and the domestic dog of the Indians is so great that the size and strength of the wolf seems to be the only difference.

It has been suggested that the one incontrovertible argument against the lupine relationship of the dog is the fact that all domestic dogs bark, while all wild Canidae express their feelings only by howls. But the difficulty here is not so great as it seems, since we know that jackals, wild dogs, and wolf pups reared by bitches readily acquire the habit. On the other hand, domestic dogs allowed to run wild forget how to bark, while there are some which have not yet learned so to express themselves.

The presence or absence of the habit of barking cannot, then, be regarded as an argument in deciding the question concerning the origin of the dog. This stumbling block consequently disappears, leaving us in the position of agreeing with Darwin, whose final hypothesis was that “it is highly probable that the domestic dogs of the world have descended from two good species of wolf (C. lupus and C. latrans), and from two or three other doubtful species of wolves namely, the European, Indian, and North African forms; from at least one or two South American canine species; from several races or species of jackal; and perhaps from one or more extinct species”; and that the blood of these, in some cases mingled together, flows in the veins of our domestic breeds.