The Association of Pet Dog Trainers Top Tips from Top Trainers: 1001 Practical Tips and Techniques for Successful Dog Care and Training Reviews

Top Tips from Top Trainers is an A-Z compilation of training tips submitted by members of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers. Grouped by category, this is a fun book to dip into depending on your topic of interest.

Although many of the tips were familiar to me, every once in a while I'd come across something new and say, "Gee, that's a great idea!" One such tip was the suggestion to gently blow in your dog's face when teaching them to "give" an object. Another, that I've used before, works so well I was glad to see it included--smearing peanut butter in your tub to keep your dog occupied during a bath (isn't that what the soap dish is really for?).

The book has an excellent index so it would be easy to find references to whatever topic you wanted to find.

One odd note to the book--it was apparently sponsored by the Nylabone company. There was a full page ad on the inside back cover and nearly every picture of a dog toy in the book had the word "Nylabone" printed across it. The Association of Pet Dog Trainers is a nonprofit organization so I guess they needed additional funding to bring this project to publication.

I may be slightly biased because several of my contributions are published within, but I was very pleasantly surprised when my copy of the book arrived. I wasn't really sure what to expect, and feared that the book might end up as a sort of random hodge-podge. To my delight, I really like the fact that this book contains 1001 short tidbits of information that are organized into a little encyclopedia of useful categories. Not only do we not lose value from the tinyness of the tidbits, but rather, they combine into a useful grouping of different (and often similar) perspectives on a given topic. This wouldn't substitute for a comprehensive 101 book for a brand new dog owner, but it's terrific supplemental reading and would be ideal for dog owners who are never, ever going to sit down and read a comprehensive 101 book. Because of the contributory nature of this book, it captures some of the most important gems of dog owning and training without wasting a chapter or three in the process. The most important gems are covered more than once by different trainers, and that serves to 1) emphasize their importance, and 2) provide different presentation for the same concept, each of which might reach a different person more effectively. As a trainer, it also has value to me as I've enjoyed scanning through the book for new ideas or perspectives on (to me) old topics, and this is a book I'm likely to keep handy if I'm looking for inspiration on a way to handle fireworks phobia or to come up with different wording to describe proper use of a leash to a client.

Separate from the content, I'm very happy with the production value. Photos and color are used attractively throughout, and I like the feel of the paper stock that is used for the cover and the pages.

This is a nice compilation of tips. However, don't expect to find every training problem addressed. It just seems like bunck of random it with no rhyme or reason to what included. Some topics only have one entry, some have mutliple pages.