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Sept. 26, 2025 - Health Ranger - Mike Adams
55:40
John Miller: Understanding Dogs, Training with Purpose, and Being Your Best DOG PERSON
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Time Text
There's always a way to fix something in dog language.
Dogs are not her babies.
They're not your children.
Belgium Mallingwall, you have right there.
If that dog was babied all the time, you would have a monster.
You know, having especially a large dog comes with a great responsibility.
And they so many people just shouldn't really have those dogs in the first place.
So come on up.
Yeah, okay, good boy.
Welcome to today's interview here on Brighttown.com.
I'm Mike Adams with my sidekick, Roadie here, who's joining us because today we're interviewing an expert in uh dog training and also a man who helps people with so-called problem dogs, but actually, as you know, a lot of time it's a problem human that's uh but we're gonna talk about that.
Uh his name is John Miller, and he's with a company called Texas K9 Rehab.
And that's the website.
I've got it up here, Texas K9Rhab.com, where K9 is the letter K and the numeral nine.
All right, so welcome to the show.
Today, John, it's uh it's great to have you on.
Thanks for having me, Mike.
Uh, I've been watching you for many years now.
Started watching you when I was 18, 19, um 37 now.
So it is an honor to be on your show with the Mike Adams, the health ranger, and I'm excited to talk to you about dogs today.
Well, I I love this topic, and thank you for those kind words.
And uh, you know, of course, I've got my dog with me here today.
This is Road for everybody.
We have a side shot.
I don't know if we've got a side view.
He's he's just gonna hang out here until we ask him to do something.
Um I've got other dogs, and I've I've always had dogs since I was uh a child, and you know, I have great empathy and compassion for animals.
And um yet sometimes they don't do exactly what we want them to do, right?
They they are their own dog, right?
They have their own personality.
So tell us about how you help people get along better with their companions.
So anytime I'm working with a client and they're having an issue with their dog, I always try to ask myself, how would this issue be resolved in a pack of dogs if there were no humans present, if humans never in this picture, because there's always a way to fix something uh in dog language.
Um so really the key is understanding dog behavior.
Um understanding how it is similar to human behavior in some ways, but in many ways it's not.
Um and we need to understand that we should not be humanizing dogs.
Um and we need to try and understand them from an animal perspective and from a predator uh perspective uh first and foremost.
And one thing that I really like to um reiterate all the time to people is that you know, dogs are not fur babies.
Um they're not your children, uh, they're not your cuddle babies, even though, you know, obviously sometimes you want to uh, you know, cuddle up with your dog and everything.
I'm not saying you can't cuddle your dog.
It's just that a lot of people have um sort of made dogs seem like this cute, cuddly thing.
And in many ways, that's just not true.
Like, for example, the um uh Belgian Mallingwall you have right there, if if that dog was babied all the time, uh, you would have a monster uh on your hands.
So, you know, having uh especially a large dog, any dog really, but especially a large dog comes with a great responsibility.
And I feel like people need to either have experience owning dogs before or spend a lot of time with dogs before they decide to get um such a large dog.
And there's so many people that have large dogs, and uh, you know, you hear about bad things happening, and they so many people just shouldn't really have those dogs in the first place.
So I'm always trying to teach people how does how does a dog fix a problem?
Um, how would a pack of dogs fix an issue?
And then once we know that answer, then we can start working with the dog.
And the main way to communicate with the dog is with your body language.
Um, and I see I see a lot of my clients whenever I first meet them, they're they're speaking a lot.
And that's because we're like primates and we we use our mouths a lot and we like to chatter a whole lot.
Um, but for a dog, the way that they communicate for the most part is with their body language.
Yeah.
Okay, um, Roadie has a question.
Um The question is uh for people who want to own uh large dogs, um talk about the the space requirements because of course I live on a ranch, so it's perfect for a dog like this.
We get to run, he jogs with me, he gets to swim.
It's a daily thing.
He's I mean, I I run him so hard because I'm also into fitness.
But many people don't have that those opportunities, they don't have the space, or they may themselves not be as physically active, and yet they have a dog that demands a lot of physical activity.
Talk about the importance of matching those two together.
Yeah, so if you're considering getting a large dog or even a lot of small dogs that have loss of energy, um, you really need to consider how how active of a person you are.
Um, and if you're not a very active person, you need to ask yourself how you're going to exercise this dog and how are you going to meet his or her needs.
Um, I'm on five acres and we have a lot of room for our dogs to run around.
And so, as far as the exercise aspect of things, it's it's a lot easier for me here than if I were an apartment.
Back when I was um about 20 years old, I had a Doberman and I had an apartment and I had to walk him down the stairs multiple times a day.
And I would go on long walks with him to make sure that uh he was well exercised.
But that's the thing.
Uh, you know, if if you're working all day um, you know, five days a week and your dog is cooped up in an apartment, um, you really need to think uh if you're able to keep a large dog in that situation.
And then even in even with that said, even if you have a small dog, you're still gonna have to get plenty of exercise for that dog.
But you know, a dog like yours, a uh, you know, Belgian Mallow, German Shepherd, Rottweiler, there's just so many that are not going to be able to stay inside of a cooped up house all day.
So you really need to ask yourself that question if you're even able to take that dog on, because then you're gonna be in a situation where you have to give the dog up, and now the dog has behavioral issues because it's been cooped up in your apartment for so long, and now it's even more difficult to get rid of the dog.
Um, so you really need to ask all these questions before you take on such a uh big responsibility.
Let's talk about uh personality fits too, because this my dog here is a trained, you know, security dog, went through a couple of years of uh very aggressive training.
I'm actually uh I've learned a lot since um having him about really how aggressive some of the training is, and some of it might even be called uh cruel by some people.
And uh I I've seen some of those traits come through that I've had to reshape.
But one of the questions uh what uh when I was considering getting him, and he's got a European passport, by the way, he came from the Netherlands.
So he's he's actually a European citizen, which is why he doesn't speak English very well.
Um not Texan anyway.
But um the people were asking if I can handle this dog because he's uh an intact male and he has his own mind.
He's he's very you know strong-willed.
And that's also a very important consideration, is it not?
Absolutely.
Um, you know, as we said before, you have to ask yourself, do I have the time and and uh space to deal with a large dog?
And then on top of that, within the category of large dogs, you have dogs like yours that require even more um expertise and knowledge to work with them.
You really need to know dog behavior if you're taking on a German Shepherd or a Belgian Mallon Wall or a Rottweiler or a Pit Bull or anything that's large and powerful, especially a Belgian Mallon Wall like you have, because those dogs are uh chosen specifically to help with security and police work and military work.
Uh, they they want a job to do all the time.
Oh, yes, time that they don't want to work is if they are completely exhausted, and that doesn't even last very long.
So um, you know, you you gotta realize you know, you know, some people saw the newer John Wick uh movies with and they had two Belgian Mallon Walls in there, and everybody wanted a Belgian Mallow because they're so awesome at attacking people and uh all the commands that they learn and stuff.
And it's like realistically, most people just don't have the time um to work with their dog that much to get them to that point.
And most people just need to be working on socializing their dogs.
Um That's that's the biggest thing I try to teach my clients, uh especially clients with young dogs, is that it's more important to socialize your dog than it is uh per se to train your dog because you can take an eight-year-old dog that doesn't know how to sit, doesn't know how to come when called, doesn't know how to lay down, and you can teach them all of those things in one day.
But if you have a dog that wasn't socialized, you're not working on sit and stay and things like that.
You're working on getting the not the dog to not be afraid of people or attack people or pee on themselves when they see someone or all those things.
Those those problems typically can't be fixed in one day.
And that's where you're in a situation where you're doing way more work than you ever thought you would if you could have just socialized the dog uh first and foremost, socializing the dog with all different types of people, different ages of people, different races of people, um putting your dog around uh a country setting and putting your dog around a city setting.
Um, you know, going in and out of stores, uh, just really, really focusing on socializing your dog with different environments and different people and different animals.
Um, and then also at the same time on the side, we want to be training them how to do their basic commands.
But it's absolutely crucial that a dog uh needs to be socialized because if you, you know, the larger the dog you have, more drive that dog has, the more of a dangerous position you're putting yourself in, or you're putting others in because that can either be become aggressive or because it could become fearful.
Um it's just it's just way easier to socialize a dog for the first year or two of its life versus having to deal with a headache for its whole life because it was never socialized.
Absolutely.
Well, and I've been very fortunate with Roadie here because whenever I take him out in public, I take him shopping with me, etc.
Uh, he's been great even when children reach out and want to pet, he's fine, or other dogs get aggressive, he backs off.
Well, he's not looking to fight a dog.
He's looking to bite a human that's attacking me.
Absolutely, 100%.
He's not looking for fights.
Uh, tell us about where you're located in Texas.
So we're in North Texas, we're about an hour north of Dallas in a town called Van Alstein.
Okay.
And then do people do you board dogs for a training period?
Or how do you work with clients?
Yeah, so we do boarding trains.
Uh, we'll keep your dog for a few weeks, um, cover all the behavioral issues that it's dealing with.
Also, we do basic training as well.
Um, we do home sessions.
Uh, we'll come to your house uh or wherever you are and spend a few hours with you working on your dog, you with you and your dog.
And and actually um, you know, we can get a lot done in a few hours.
Uh most of my clients only need a few uh private sessions because it's it's not so much like a lot of work per se.
It's more so just knowing what to do.
Like when my dog does this, how should I act?
What should my body language be that?
So 90% of the work is not you know running your dog or doing all this physical work.
It's just knowing uh uh how to be aware of your own uh body language and how your body language is communicating with your dog.
So yeah, we do trains, we do regular boarding, we do daycare, I do private sessions.
I also travel for sessions, uh, and then we also do Zoom sessions as well.
Oh, Zoom session.
Okay, so anybody watching this anywhere in the world can take advantage of that.
Absolutely.
Okay, so let me give out your website again.
It's TexasK9Rhab.com.
And that's the letter K and the numeral nine, Texas K9 rehab dog boarding and training services, including uh Zoom sessions, uh etc.
All right.
Well, that's that's really good to know.
Um it seems to me that along the way, and I I know you want to be kind about you know people and your clients and so on, but one of the things that I've observed is that problem dogs often stem from problem people or who just don't know, they're reinforcing the wrong things.
Absolutely, yeah.
Um I deal with are people with good intentions and they're doing the wrong thing.
So without effort, there's putting up the wrong effort.
Um, and and they have good intentions.
But for example, uh, let's say someone has a dog that is growling at people, just for no good reason.
They're just every anytime someone comes around their owner or around them, they're just growling at that person.
They might want to bite them.
And then their owner comes in and pets them and says, It's okay, you're gonna be okay.
Um, or they might even get advice from another trainer that's trying to tell them to give them treats to be distracted.
I've seen that too, where wow clients hire a trainer that's one of these like positive reinforcement only trainers, which doesn't actually exist.
I could go into that.
Um, and that's just where they flood the dog with treats and distractions, but then the dog is really being reinforced.
It's being told, yes, I like that you're being aggressive.
Exactly.
Um I've had it's it's mainly people with good intentions and they're just doing the wrong things, or they've received bad advice.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's a really good point.
And so that gets us into the training method.
Now, when I first got roadie, uh they gave me uh uh a collar, you know, a remote with a collar.
And of course, that is not a punishment collar, it's an attention collar.
So there's a very small amount of electricity.
I I always test it on myself, but I I put that collar on him if I ever go out in public, and I almost never actually use it.
Right.
But once the collar's on him, he knows that it's it's like it's not playtime.
Right.
But he was trained with the collar, but but I please explain this because sometimes they're known as shock collars.
Well, kind of, but they're not punishments.
There it's dogs are distracted every two seconds.
So talk to us about the role of the responsible use of a collar in training.
Yeah, absolutely.
Um, so when I've been training dogs for 17 years, I've worked with thousands of dogs.
Um, and my first two years of training dogs, I I didn't use an e-collar because I kind of had this ego thing where I was like, I don't need to use an e-collar, I don't need all that.
But then I finally started uh using them and I realized how beneficial they can be and how much faster you can train your dog and work with your dog on things.
And I'm talking about, you know, um use like for example, using an e-collar in a situation versus not using an e-collar could be a matter of fixing an issue in one or two days, or it could be three or four months.
Yeah, right.
They're they're very helpful tools.
And I like to um tell people that uh it's really not electricity, it's uh if you've ever had a tens unit used on you, which is like if you've been to the chiropractor and they put these little pads on your muscles, and they can't causes a twitch of your muscle.
Yeah, it basically just kind of massages your muscles.
It's the same technology.
Totally instead of there being these big pads that would go on us, there are these little points, um, usually two little points that will uh go onto their neck.
And it's the dog's not actually being electrocuted, it's just feeling a stimulation.
Um, and for 99% of the uses with e-collars, we don't really need to crank it up.
We just need to uh make it to where they're they're just barely feeling a sensation on their neck.
That's right.
So either we can get their attention.
Like, for example, if the dog is running too far away and we're trying to work with them on off-leash training, they're uh the dog's going the wrong way too far, we're gonna say the word no.
Then after we say the word no, if the dog keeps going, then we're gonna hold that button down.
And then the moment that the dog redirects, we let the button go.
And then whenever the dog comes to us, then we reward the dog.
So in that sense, we're really using uh negative and positive reinforcement.
And that that's really what I try to educate people on is uh we live in a world of positive and negative, and the dogs live in the same world that we do.
Um, and and no dog and no person has ever lived a purely positive life.
Um, like we live we learn through our lives and and dogs learn through their lives from positive and negative reinforcement, what is good and what is bad, what is safe and what is not.
Um, so you know, like for example, some of these positive reinforcement only trainers will uh you know, they'll have a dog on a leash and the dog's pulling really hard on the leash.
Well, technically speaking, they just created negative reinforcement for the dog because the dog is pulling on the leash now, he's uncomfortable, and they're the one that put him in that situation.
But they pretend like they're purely positive because they're not the ones tugging on the leash and doing all that stuff.
Um, so it'd actually be much more positive if you Can fix that problem, and then the dog has a positive experience instead of continuing on its negative um experience.
So stay stay clear, especially if you're dealing with like a behavioral issue, um a dangerous issue, or it is severe anxiety, severe aggression.
If you're dealing with behavioral problems, be careful with those positive reinforcement only trainers.
Well, that's that leads me to sorry to interrupt, but the the question of establishing dominance and some people are dominated by their dogs, right?
So and I want you to talk about that, but let me give it uh an example of how I've established you know, respectful dominance though, with my dog.
So when I'm walking out of my office with my dog, he comes with me and then he looks at me.
He's waiting to watch me, see if I'm gonna say something or do something or throw something or point or whatever.
He's like tuned in, like, what am I doing?
What do you what should I do?
That's the right relationship.
And then I give him things to do.
Here, you know, you're gonna load up in the vehicle, you're gonna you can have fun.
You can go fetch this toy, or you're gonna stay right here.
You're gonna stay here while I go do something.
Like he's looking for direction because I have the brain.
He's got the the teeth and the feet, and he can climb trees and whatever, but I've got the brain that he doesn't have.
I'm the planner.
But what happens when humans flip that around and then let the dog dominate them?
So uh usually whenever a dog has dominated or taken control of their environment and or their owners, um, the owner most of the time doesn't realize it.
Um they they'll they'll often just do, you know, let's say they they get on the couch all the time, they knock things over, they jump on everybody, they get what they want all the time, they get food all the time.
There's uh they do what's called free feeding, and the dogs has 24 act 24-7 access to their foods just sitting there at all times.
Um, and so the the dog really doesn't have much of a sense of purpose.
Um, and it's it's taken over, and and deep inside the dog wants someone to have control.
But what happens whenever there's no one in control, whether it be another dog or a person or even a cat, I've seen a lot of situations where there is a cat in the house that's very confident and has that uh energy, and it actually makes the dog chill out.
And then I've seen where that cat may pass away or or or leave that situation, and then the dog has all these issues, and then the person hasn't even done anything different.
It's just that they're just that cat or whatever it is, may put maybe putting off that energy of being calm and in control.
Um, and so the first thing I I do with my clients is I talk to them about their body language and I talk to them about their energy.
Um, and if they're putting off a nervous energy, then that's how they're communicating with their dog.
For example, let's say you have a dog that whenever you walk them on the leash, if they see another dog, they want to lunge at that dog, and whether it'd be aggressive or they're just overexcited, and they're just like immediately react and lunge at that dog.
What I've seen often happen is the owner, they see the dog first.
They see the other dog on the other side of the street first, and they know that their dog is going to react.
So then they start getting nervous and they start tensing up on the leash, like preparing for the dog to do that.
And that's telling the dog, okay, my owner was comfortable, but then when there's these other dogs or people around, they become uncomfortable.
So they're not in control and they're not confident, and there's something wrong.
They're everything was fine before these other people and dogs came around.
But as soon as they come around, my owner gets nervous.
So there must be something wrong with them.
And so then I need to become even more reactive and more aggressive.
Now I need to take control of the situation because my owner is not calm.
So that's why we need to stay calm in every situation, even if your dog's being aggressive or being anxious or whatever it's doing, you want to stay calm uh throughout the whole thing.
So if we're trying to get a dog to stop doing something, we don't want to be like, no, no, Max, no, stop doing that, Max.
Hey, because the dog just sees someone chattering and all this energy.
It needs to be and then fix the problem silently immediately, and then it's over.
And that's the great thing about dogs is um, you know, dogs can get in a dog fight, and then literally two seconds later, they're fine with each other because they resolve problems fast.
They they don't let things drag out.
And that's what happens whenever uh, you know, dogs are living with humans, is we tend to drag out problems too long because we don't have a pack of dogs that's gonna fix the situation.
May just have one or two or three dogs.
Um, and that that that real pack dynamic of a balanced pack is not there.
Um So yeah, we we need to always be aware of our body language and aware how are we acting when whenever a dog has an issue, how am I acting?
Am I acting different than I would have if I was calm and confident?
And if I am, I need to kind of reassess how I'm acting and start being a little more quiet and a little more calm and in control.
So it sounds like what you're saying is that part of being a responsible but also an effective pet owner is to be a better person.
Like and have have more mindfulness of what you are doing and how you're reacting to the world around you.
Absolutely.
Um and you know, one little tip that I'll give to people, um, you know, let's say you have a dog that is pulling on the leash or gets distracted on the leash is all over the place.
Um there's there's quite a few things you can do to help that.
But one thing you can try, and I have everyone do this is stop looking at your dog while you're walking them because you're whenever you're looking at your dog while you're walking, your dog sees you looking at them, and they're thinking, well, they either want something from me or this they're just watching me, and they're not actually walking with purpose or determination because they're looking at me.
So when you walk your dog, walk with purpose, look in front of you and walk confidently and don't stare at your dog the whole time.
Your dog is going to check in with you, guaranteed.
Whenever your dog checks in with you, he's gonna look up, he's gonna say, wow, that person's confident and they're determined on where they're going, and they're way more likely to follow you and walk with you if you have that energy.
Um, that energy of determination and control.
And and really we're we're we want to tell our dogs that this is our walk, and you get to come with me on my walk.
Even though secretly it may just be for the dog, and you just want to walk your dog to help your dog, your dog needs to feel like you're going on this adventure and and you and they get to come with you on this journey.
Uh-huh.
Okay, that's that's a really good and important perspective.
Thanks for mentioning that.
So my dog is uh having a great sleep right now, and he doesn't mind that I'm messing with his feet.
Nice.
He's like totally, totally comfortable.
Look at this.
He doesn't care.
Oh yeah.
He's like, wait, what are you doing?
He's like, seriously, man.
Huh?
He's like, seriously, man, my feet.
Yeah, that's that's exactly what he's saying.
Um that surprised me about this dog is that he does not react to pain like other dogs.
Like one time he had a very bad laceration along his ribs uh from jumping into the pond.
And I guess he he kind of cut himself on a branch or something that was there.
I didn't even know about it until a couple hours later.
I'm like, oh my God, like your your side is opened up.
And so, of course, I I treated it.
We we use some super glue to put it back together after we cleanse the wound and everything.
But he wasn't reacting to it at all.
Whereas I have another dog that is just the worst wimp ever, that any little thing is like, ah, like it's the end of the world.
What is it that in your experience, what why is there so much variation in the way dogs interpret pain?
Uh so your other dog that you said is more of a wimp.
What kind of dog is he?
Uh blue healer.
Okay, blue wheeler, interesting.
Yeah.
So um, you know, a dog like a Belgian Malinois or a Pitbull, German Shepherd, and and quite a few others, uh, whenever they feel pain, it, you know, they were bred differently and they were bred to be more tough.
Whereas if you have uh, for example, a dog, I have a chihuahua, I have uh seven dogs, and our my smallest dog is a chihuahua, and she's so sensitive that like you don't even have to touch her.
If your foot just lands near her, sometimes she will scream.
Uh, but at the same time, she will play rough with my Rottweiler and she doesn't scream.
So it's really this this uh you know, sensitive, more sensitive, more reactive thing with each uh different breed.
Um and certain dogs, certain dogs were bred to be more tough and be more strong, like a Belgian Malinois was bred to uh herd uh animals and live On the farm and it wasn't bred to be in the house all day.
Whereas if you had like a shih tzu or uh, you know, a um uh a Frenchie or something like that, those dogs are not even going to survive outside.
Um so they're just naturally more sensitive.
Um there's probably some truth to this where the further away from the wolf or the domesticated wolf that became the dog wolf basically thousands of years ago, um, the the further away you get from that and the more me differently mutated they are, the the more the different they're gonna perceive things and and react to things mentally and physically as well.
Like uh they've done plenty of studies where the more smushed in the dog's face is, like a uh like a Frenchie um or a uh a uh it's another one with uh with a flat face, like a like a uh French bulldog.
Yeah, um, they have more behavior, they have more behavioral and more uh physical issues, medical issues.
Huh.
Um and it's just because they've been deviated so far away from their natural state, and they wouldn't even be able to survive without the help of a human in their and their shelter anyway.
Um so there's a lot of different variations um with different breeds.
Yeah, uh talk to us about the uh circadian rhythms of dogs versus humans too, because of course I live in the country, and it's easy to observe that all the wild dogs, they sleep all day and they hunt all night, you know, and then they socialize, they do all the things all night.
I you can hear the coyotes.
Uh you can sometimes spot the foxes at night.
Uh in during the day, they're resting, or maybe it's even too hot, or that's just not their hunting time.
So a lot of the dogs, like my dog, you know, you think genetically they're designed to be awake all night and sleep all day.
But that's the opposite of what we do as humans.
How how does this affect our relationships with our dogs?
So actually, uh, if you look at wolves or um coyotes, or if you have a pack of dogs that's that's large enough, a nice well-balanced pack of dogs, uh, they'll never there will never be a time where they're all asleep at the same time.
As you're saying with with the rhythm, there's sort of this like natural thing where one of them has at least one of them has to be awake in order to protect the pack.
Um, and that just came from thousands of years of evolution and learning that if they all fell asleep at the same time, yeah.
That would be dangerous.
Yeah.
Yeah, then another wolf pack or or or whatever, a bear or whatever would pick up on that and they would learn their weakness.
Um that's one thing that I found out uh years ago that's really cool, is there's never a time where you have a pack of dogs or a pack of uh wolves or you know, anything that's that's truly depending on itself um as a unit to survive, they're never they're never going to all sleep at the same time.
That makes sense, yep.
But I mean, uh the the but the the height of activity that I hear from like the coyotes is after dark.
Right.
That's when they're I mean, maybe they're celebrating they've caught a rabbit and then they're fighting over the rabbit or or or whatever, or they're socializing or fighting for dominance themselves, but they they can be very loud.
And then what's interesting is my other dogs will hear the coyotes and my dogs will start howling and sounding off uh with the coyotes.
So then we have a whole chorus going.
Right.
Yeah, that's basically them uh most of the time that they're doing that, it's either a mating call or usually it's uh just letting other packs know and letting other animals know that this is our space.
And so sometimes since you said you live in the country, you might hear a pack of wolves over here, like you know, a mile away, and then it'll go quiet for maybe 30 seconds, and then way over here, like another half mile or a mile away, you hear another pack.
Um, and that's basically then them just kind of letting you know like we're here, you're there, um, and that's to keep to keep the packs from uh colliding too much.
Uh-huh.
Uh-huh.
Yeah, fair enough.
Okay.
Um next question is about nutrition and health uh uh and and behavior.
So of course, as the health ranger, I'm very much aware that what people eat affects their moods and their behavior.
And if you keep eating a bunch of processed junk food, it will affect you.
You it will change your personality and it'll change your health for the worse, of course.
How much do you get into nutrition and uh you know humans tend to choose dog treats based on what they look like?
Like, oh, it look, it's in the shape of this, and it's got this color in it.
It's artificial colors, man.
Yeah.
So what's your take on nutrition for dogs?
Yeah, so uh general rule of thumb is um when you're buying products at the store, generally speaking, not always, but the cheaper the product is, the lower the quality is going to be.
And that's not always true, but in most cases, especially with the treats, like when you look at the pepperonis and the beginning strips and stuff like that, like you said, that stuff just loaded with junk.
And if you feed your dog those type of treats every day, it's going to have some long-term health issues down the road.
Um, that's that's that'd be even worse than eating McDonald's every day.
There's some really bad stuff in there.
So you want to look at the ingredients.
If you see a bunch of chemicals that you've never heard of, it's probably not a good treat.
Um, but like for example, beef lung, like dehydrated beef lung is just beef lung.
It says it right there in ingredients, ingredients, beef lung.
So in your dog would love that, and it's a nice treat.
It it lasts for a long time.
Um, so there's a lot of treats out there that aren't too expensive that you can choose over these mainstream things that you see in the commercials and on the shelves at the store.
Um, and then another thing on top of the treats is obviously their food.
Um, the best diet for a dog would be a mostly raw food diet.
Um, and that's what I used to feed my dogs.
But then after having so many dogs and having a wife and kids and running the business and doing all these things, I went back to being lazy uh and I went with a high quality kibble.
Um and then when it comes to the kibble too, uh you you always want to look at the ingredients.
I mean, you can buy a 30-pound bag of dog food that costs $15, or you can buy a 30-pound bag of dog food that costs a hundred dollars.
And uh you can probably find something in the middle there that works for you.
Um, but when you look at the ingredients of dog food, if you're not going to do a raw food diet, which would be best, most people aren't going to do that.
So I like to educate people on the kibble.
Um what you want to look for is does it actually say the meat name in the bag?
For example, if it says beef formula, when you look at the ingredients, does it say beef or does it say beef byproduct?
Um, and in most of the cheaper foods and even some of the expensive ones, um, it only says byproduct.
And basically what that means is like they took all the meat from the cow, for example, like if it says beef byproduct, they take all the meat from the cow and all the stuff that's left over, like the bones and the guts and stuff, is just grinded down and then mixed into this dog food that's mostly just corn and cornmeal, and it's really just there so they can say beef is in the food.
And it's really just almost free junk that's left over that they get from other stuff that was either put into better dog food or human-grade food, and they're just getting the leftovers like the trash and mixing in with this cheap dog food.
So when you're buying dog food that says in the ingredients like corn, corn syrup, corn uh corn, corn, uh, and then beef byproduct, there's not actually any meat in there, and it's just a bunch of corn filler.
Um, and if if you're if your dog is on one of those lower quality foods and you switch them to a high quality food, um, you'll notice within a few weeks that they have less dandruff, that their their uh coat is shinier and softer, and they'll probably even act a little bit better too.
So I've seen some dogs that where they switched their diet and their general behavior became better just because they were on such a bad diet.
Absolutely.
This is a really critical point.
I'm so glad that you covered that in detail.
And I I've never seen a dog out in a cornfield eating a corn cob, you know.
Um really hungry, it probably wouldn't be.
Yeah, if it's really but also rice, don't forget about rice.
So there's there's corn and rice in a lot of these cheap dog foods.
And that is not what the canine digestive tract is even built for, period.
You know.
Um, what I do, because I have chickens, so they get raw eggs on a pretty regular basis.
And of course, there are free-range eggs and all organic feed, et cetera.
So it's it's like the best that they could possibly get.
Then some of my dogs, especially the blue healer, who who's very intelligent, she she hunts down and finds the eggs herself anyway.
She's just always she's the egg hunter.
She's also uh she has a nickname of the bunny gobbler because what she does is she finds small bunny rabbits, yeah, like you know, five or six inches, and she swallows them whole.
Oh, yeah.
She chew chews them a little bit and then just gulps them down.
I'm like, what the and I I showed my audience, I got a picture of one time.
So she got the name bunny gobbler.
It's like I've never seen a dog do that before.
Yeah.
But then my other dogs will uh sometimes they'll catch a rabbit, sometimes they'll find deer bones from a recently dead deer.
That's actually a kind of a common thing, and then they'll go for the bones and they'll get the marrow out of the bones, etc.
And then occasionally they'll find like a dead hog, a wild hog, and then they try to bring the stinky hog fur onto the main ranch area, and I have to get rid of that.
But they love the horrible smell of that.
They love it.
They like to roll around in it.
Yeah, absolutely.
So those are some of the things that my dogs eat.
But also, one more, and this is my question.
Many of my dogs occasionally like too much on donkey poo.
So, what's the donkey poo, which is like fermented grass concentrate, I guess.
Like, what's the donkey poo uh food all about?
Yeah, uh, I have I've noticed that too.
In fact, um uh I used to live in a different place, and we were on a farm, it was like a 200-acre farm, and my border collie at the time would love looking for donkey poop, and he would turn his back on it and roll in the ground and get donkey poop all over him.
Um, and there's something stimulating about it.
I think it's kind of similar to like cats and catnip.
Um I think it's uh something to do with the mixture of the poop and the uh the hay that's been like fermented or something, and it puts up very weird smell that they love.
Um, but uh I'm not a huge fan of it.
Um but since we're on like health and nutrition, I wanted to bring up um vaccines because um most people that take their dog to a vet and really care for their dog and want the best for their dog, they're actually over-vaccinating their dog and giving him way too many vaccines.
Um I'm glad you mentioned that.
Yeah, this is something I want to ask you.
Vaccines are pushed by vets in the same way that pediatricians want children to come back into the office to get more children's vaccines.
It's it's a it's a business model.
Yeah, and they can get away with more because they're dogs, they're animals, and there's even less testing and and and and less oversight on all that.
And you know, a lot of people don't know that the rabies vaccine, whether it says one year or three years, it's actually a three-year vaccine.
And so a dog will get a their first rabies vaccine, and then they'll come back to their vet like a year later, and then their vet will say many times their vet will say, Oh, it's been a year, your dog needs another abyss vaccine.
He only had the first year, but it's the same vaccine.
It's a three-year vaccine.
Um, and it probably works even longer than that.
But uh, you know, one thing that people can do, and and most people don't know this, is you can uh do a titer testing for your dog.
Um, and that's where they do a blood test, and they can test the antibodies of whatever virus or disease um that would that they would have otherwise vaccinated for, and then you can opt out of getting them vaccinated.
And uh there's a lot of you know, like apartment complexes or dog boarding places that will require an up-to-date vaccine sheet, and they they're a lot of places are very strict on it.
Um, and if you're not one to vaccinate your dog every single year, like like I I don't want to do that.
Um, you can just have them tighter tested, which is a blood test, and it'll show if they have antibodies for whatever it is, whether it's borderella or uh parvo or the flu or whatever it is.
And honestly, most of the time, and and I've seen dogs that haven't even been vaccinated, they do have an immune system for a lot of this stuff, and they don't vaccine uh 100%.
And I'll I'll say on the record here, now, of course, my dog Roadie received all kinds of vaccines in Europe and in order to fly and everything.
But I have never given him any vaccines, and I won't.
I don't vaccinate any of my dogs, period.
But I have a unique situation.
So number one, I do give them ivermectin for heartworms.
And I I have a pipette and I can calculate the micrograms that are necessary based on their body weight.
Um not everybody knows maybe the the right dosage and so it's a very small dosage, actually, for dogs compared to goats.
Um but I use it for dogs and and goats, et cetera.
But I I give them some ivermectin from time to time.
And then they are not I don't take them to dog parks to be around other people's dogs.
Yeah, don't do that.
That's so glad I have it written down here.
I'm so glad that you brought that up.
Um, because I have people ask me all the time, or they'll just mention it.
They'll say, Yeah, I'm gonna take my dog to the dog park, or there's this dog park that we go to so I can give my dog exercise.
Um and you know number one, there's two, there's two big reasons you shouldn't go to a dog park.
Number one, uh there could be disease there.
Uh people to bring their sick dogs there all the time, and it just like never gets cleaned up.
There could be parvo that stays in the dirt, and the parvo can actually stay in uh a dirt for like several years.
And you it has to be like bleached several times in order to do that.
Um so there's the disease aspect of it and getting sick.
But then on top of that, even if the dog park is super clean, you're really uh taking a gamble by going into a dog park.
And the bigger the dog park and the more crowded it is, and the more people that are going in there, the bigger the gamble is because there are people that will go to the shelter or wherever and they get a dog, and that dog is super friendly with them, it's super friendly with their kids, and maybe it was even friendly with their one dog, the other dog that they have at home, and then they take it to a dog park and then it kills another dog.
Um and and then, you know, it could have it could have been someone that goes to that dog park every day.
They've been going there for several weeks or even several years, and it's just all it takes is that one dog that was aggressive and wanted to attack another dog, and it can just absolutely ruin everything.
Um so the thing is you're not in control at a dog park.
Uh the best thing you can do is to, you know, walk around and be confident.
Don't stand there, don't stand around all these other people.
That's what happens at a dog park, is everybody like gathers around and they like talk to each other, and there's just like no direction for the dogs.
And it's basically just saying, you dogs do what you want.
And you know, most of the time people get lucky and there's not a dog fight or whatever.
But for me, I'm just not going to risk it.
I've heard of way too many horror stories of dogs getting killed or severely injured at dog parks or even people being bitten by dogs at dog parks.
Um, so you know, if you really want to socialize your dog, best thing to do is find a place like mine that has uh dog daycare.
Um, and you know, where your dog is in a situation where it has a professional, a dog trainer at least, or dog behaviorist that is watching over them and looking out for for bad uh for red flags behavior-wise.
Um because most places even like they'll just throw all the dogs together.
They don't know how to read the behavior, and there was actually signs of a dog that was going to bite or attack for maybe even days, and they just didn't know how to read the behavior, and then it's like all of a sudden this dog that I thought was nice just attacked this other little dog.
Um so you you really the best way to socialize your dog is in a professional environment uh where there's a professional dog trainer of behaviors that can give you guidance and look over all the dogs and uh critique you and your dog and and whatever if there's any issues going on with your dog.
Um, or obviously if you have some friends that have friendly dogs, then go and let your dog play with your friends' dogs or your or your family's dogs.
But you just don't want to take that gamble of um of going in and and there's being like 30, 20, 30 dogs in this dog park and you're just hoping for the best.
Yeah, you know, especially if you have a small dog.
You have a small dog and a large dog attacks it, it it could be fatal in in seconds.
Yeah, exactly.
I'm so glad you mentioned that.
And and for me personally, I just I don't want to Take my dog and subject them to the all the filth of the dog park.
And but also I don't go to human parks either, because I don't want to be shed on by all the vaccine jabbed humans who are just as filthy as the dogs in my view.
So I don't go to human parks either.
I do go out in public, of course, but I've also got you know protections with nutrition or you know, a healthy functioning immune system, ivermectin uh it's etc.
But I'm I'm really so glad you covered that.
Uh I want to ask you, we're getting close to the end of the hour, but I want to ask you about the benefits to people to having dogs.
So during COVID, you know, people suffered under a lot of lockdowns, and then their pets became very important companions for their own mental health.
And just speak to us about some of the benefits that you see among your clients, your your human clients who uh whose lives are significantly improved by uh having dogs and cats and other animals around them.
Yeah, well, uh first and foremost, dogs are just awesome.
Um they're they're fun to be with, they're fun to play with, they make great companions.
Um, and I would say one of the coolest things about dogs um is that they are very quick to forgive, um, much quicker than the average person, or or much quicker than even like other animals, um, quicker than a uh primate, quicker than a cat.
Um, and what I mean by that is let's say, for example, you stepped on your dog's foot.
Okay.
Um your cat might hold on to that for a few days or even a few weeks and just kind of look at you uh a weird way, but your dog's gonna forgive you like almost immediately.
Your dog's not gonna hold this grudge against you because you stepped on their tail or their foot or something like that.
Or if you told them no a little too loud and they cowered down a few seconds later, they're your best friend again.
So they really teach us a lot about forgiveness.
Um, and and one of the reasons that they're so forgiving is because there's just no time to hold grudges.
That does that doesn't help us with survival to hold on to things from the past.
Um they are basically forced to be in the moment in order to survive.
Um, and that's why I was saying earlier, like they can get in a fight with each other, and then a few seconds later they're friends again because they like to fix things when they come up and and then move on.
Uh, and and they don't like to hold on to stuff.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's key.
Um that's what's great about dogs.
Actually, there's one more thing I want to ask you too, which is about teaching dogs uh human vocabulary, words, because I've I've done a lot of research on this, and and there are uh like apparently many dog breeds are capable of memorizing hundreds of words or recognizing hundreds of words.
So I always teach my dogs the words for the animals that they would encounter on the ranch.
So they know the words for donkeys versus raccoons.
So if I say donkeys, they're gonna look on the horizon.
They're looking for the donkeys.
If I say raccoons, they immediately start looking in the trees.
If I say birds, they start looking up at the sky.
Or if I say rabbits, then they're looking down on the rabbit trails.
Like they clearly are understanding what I'm saying as I teach them.
I teach them with experience.
Every time we encounter the donkeys, I say donkeys.
And then, you know, and especially Roadie, this guy's so funny.
He likes to pick up multicolored ring toys, as he he has here, and then he'll he'll put three or four around his neck and a couple in his mouth, and he likes to frighten the donkeys by running after them with colored rings.
That's his favorite thing.
And I'm like, oh, please.
You know, but uh so when when we see donkeys, he's like, Donkeys, I get to annoy some donkeys.
This is awesome.
Um isn't it true?
I mean, talk to us about animals learning English words or any, I mean any language, obviously, but words.
Yeah.
So that all that goes all the way back to thousands of years ago, whenever uh man and dogs or wolves at the time, they're really called wolf dogs.
Um thousands of years ago, they had to learn at least a few words to help with the hunting uh whenever they're hunting for other animals.
So, like, you know, if a if a dog was hunting with other dogs only, um, it's gonna hunt a little bit differently than it than when it would hunt with people.
So uh a dog's gonna have to learn how to stay.
And preferably we're gonna want a hand command and we're also gonna want a verbal command.
Um so we might want a dog to stay in this one area while we go around while we're hunting to the other animal, and then we say another command makes the dog go or a or a hand signal, the dog starts running towards the thing that we're hunting, thing that we're hunting comes straight at us, and then we can uh kill that animal.
So it all started from things like that.
And then when it comes to dogs learning like hundreds of words, that really comes down to certain breeds.
You know, certain breeds are not able to do that, and certain breeds can do that easily, like a border collie is the smartest dog.
Um the reason that they're rated the smartest dog is uh for the amount of stuff that they can learn and how fast uh they can learn.
Uh so for example, the top 10 dogs on the top 10 breed dogs on average, you can only ask them to do something, for example, like five times, and they'll do it within those five times, versus if you had like a beagle, it might take you 20 times uh with that beagle.
Um the smarter the breed, the more words they can learn.
And you know, in your case, we're you're teaching like the donkeys and the and squirrels and all the different names of the animals on the farm.
Uh that it sounds like mostly that's just a fun thing that your dog is learning and and it's just fun for him and it's his mind being stimulated.
So uh the more things that you can teach your dog, the more that you can work with your dog, the happier your dog's gonna be, just because it sees that you want to engage with them and it gives them a sense of uh purpose as well.
Yeah.
Um look at the more things with to mention to you uh before you go, because I know you're a big AI into AI and stuff.
Um one little project that I just started working on is I'm trying to reach out to a few uh robotics companies on uh training robots how to train dogs.
Oh, interesting.
Yeah, so uh imagine that you leave for work and uh you come back eight hours later and your dog knows how to sit and stay and come when called because your robot uh taught him those things.
Oh yeah.
Robots are gonna be able to help with that big time.
Oh, absolutely.
Because you know, when it comes to most training, it's just a matter of timing and patience.
And robots are gonna have unlimited timing and patience.
Absolutely.
And as long as they look humanoid, the dog will generalize the body language.
That's right, exactly.
You know, we have a robot that says sit and does this, then come home and just copy exactly what the robot did.
100%.
All right.
So let me do a let's do a verbal test here, just see how this goes.
Without using any hand signals, I'm gonna ask Roadie to get his toys, okay?
Okay, let's just see if that works.
He's sleeping.
Hey, Roadie.
Hey, Roadie.
He hears you for sure and know it.
Hey Rodie.
Where's your toys?
Hey Rudy.
Hey Roddy, where's your toys?
Where's your toys?
Where are they?
Where's your toys?
Where's your toys?
Get your toys.
Come on up.
Yeah, okay.
Good boy.
Yay, good boy, you did it.
All right.
So um, he's got that one down.
He knows what toys are.
Yeah.
And he sometimes remembers where he put them.
But usually not.
Okay, good boy.
Yes.
Next, you gotta teach him to get a drink from the fridge.
All right.
Well, that that worked, although he he he's uh he's a little bit angry that I I interrupted his nice nap.
Now he's expecting more.
Like, do you need to throw these or do something?
Yeah, totally, totally.
He's like, what's next?
Usually there's another part to this whole thing.
Yeah, good boy.
That breed is such a smart dog.
I mean, they can just work all day.
Yep.
Well, we'll play later.
He'll he'll get to swim and uh run and chase these and catch them in the air.
And sorry, sorry we're covering your face there on this camera.
There we go.
We can see you now.
Okay.
All right.
Well, anyway, John, this has been a lot of fun.
Thank you so much for taking time with us today.
Let me give out your website again.
It's Texas K9rehab.com.
And that's uh K9, the letter and the numeral.
And uh John offers even Zoom consulting and home consulting, uh, other and also boarding and so on.
So just want to thank you, John, for joining us today.
Hey, thanks for having me.
Um, and also if you want anyone who wants to reach me on X, you can go to X.com/slash Texas Chain on Rehab uh there as well.
Okay, that sounds great.
Well, thank you so much.
And Roadie thanks you too, because he he got to sleep on the desk.
Yeah, he did a good job.
He absolutely did.
He's ready to play now.
Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna go throw these for him.
Nice.
All right, have a great rest of your day.
We'll talk to you later.
Thank you, Mike.
Have a good one.
Okay, you too.
And thank you all for watching from myself and Roadie here, who's ready for some serious playtime.
Um, thanks for watching today.
And uh treat your animals with compassion.
They have souls and they have memories and they have emotions, they have first person experience or first animal experience.
Uh so treat them with dignity, okay?
And but also learn how to not be dominated by them.
That's actually a healthier relationship when they can look to you for uh instructions or task or posture or context.
So thanks for watching today.
I'm Mike Adams of Brighton.com.
You can catch more interviews and podcasts at that URL, Brighton.com, or you can follow my stories at naturalnews.com.
Take care.
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