Cesar Millan is Not Going Away

Cesar Millan is hanging up The Dog Whisperer after 150 shows.

I am not entirely surprised. Filming TV shows, and doing a lot of personal appearances can be pretty grueling.  Millan's divorce has probably made parenthood more complex as well.

The Dog Whisperer, of course, will not be going away. In the television world, you are eligible for rolling syndication (i.e. on TV forever) with 88 shows, and you are solid with 100.

The Dog Whisperer has 150 shows in the can, making it one of the longest running (and most popular) television shows ever.

The original Star Trek, by comparison, had only 79 shows filmed, while Victoria Stilwell's show, "It's Me or the Dog" has a total of 62 shows in the can filmed in the U.S. or the U.K. (as of June 2012), and counting all 4 specials.

Along with Millan's TV show, of course, there are also the CD sets and the books, and the Kindle and I-Pad downloads of the same. Without a doubt, Millan's fortune is set and so too is his place in the history of dog rehabilitation and socialization.

Stripped down to its most basic elements, Millan preaches a very simple Gospel:

• Dogs need exercise and time.
  .
• Dogs need boundaries and clear consistent rules.
  .
• Dogs need earned affection, and they are not surrogate children.

Millan has never claimed to be a dog trainer, and dog training is actually not what most people go to a "dog trainer" for.

What most people go to a dog trainer for is to fix their dysfunctional relationship with an adult dog.

What they get, too often, is someone whose expertise is in teaching puppies how to walk at heal and come when called.

Those are fine things to know, but they are not the remedy when two dogs are locked in a bitter grudge-match, or when a dog is resource-guarding, or when a dog has a phobia.

The click-and-treat dog trainer tells his new client that if he comes to two sessions a week, at $30 per session, for four months, then maybe some progress can be made.

The client quite naturally asks what leash control has to do with the fact that his anxious dog is eating through the drywall while he is away at the office.  "Cesar Millan doesn't seem to take four months" he notes dryly.

And there it is -- the comparison every dog trainer loathes. "You're no Cesar Millan."

The most common response from a beleaguered dog trainer is not to listen to the client (what Millan does at the start of every episode), or to show the client how to fix the problem (which Millan generally does in most episodes), but instead to berate Millan for his "techniques."

And yet, Millan does not really have any techniques.  What kind of collar does the owner want to use?  Millan does not care and he does not choose.  Whatever the client wants to use is fine with him.

Millan does not walk around with a clicker in his hand and a bag of cheese on his belt.  What Millan does is not device centered, but dog centered.  He gives earned affection and his timing is impeccable.  The result is that dogs tend to pay attention because Millan is communicating a few simple things to them, and he is not drowning his message with false signals and confusing unearned rewards.

At the core of Millan's work with dogs is the power walk -- exercise.  Millan knows that dogs need to smell, to see, to socialize with other dogs, to spend time with their owners, and to drain off their bottled energy.  Walking does all of this, and more.

Walking, of course, is walking. It is not a slow saunter around the block letting the dog decide when to go and when to stop.  When Millan is walking a dog, he is going somewhere, and he is often going somewhere fast. The dog is simply being allowed along for the ride.  This is leadership, and when it is given, most dogs quickly develop followship and a new balance starts to swing into place.

There is more of course -- 150 episodes worth.  At its core, however, is the iron triangle of exercise, discipline, and earned affection.  Focus on those three basics, and you cannot go too far wrong.

So what's next for Cesar Millan?

Well, believe it or not, its another 12-part dog show with National Geographic to be called Leader of the Pack. This one will be filmed in Europe.

Having conquered America, Cesar is about to "go global."

Will America and the rest of the world tune in? Count on it!

• Related Posts:
  ** Your Dogs are a Mess (and your kids are no prize)
  ** Calm and Assertive Clicker Training
  ** The Truth About Consequences
  ** They Invented Animal Training
  ** Harry Potter Dog Training     
  ** A Dog is Neither Shovel Nor Child
  ** The Three Parts of Operant Conditioning
  ** Your Dogs are a Mess (And Your Kids Are No Prize)
  ** Clicker Training Does Not Require Empathy
  ** Killer Whales and the Limits of "Click and Treat" 
  ** Catching a Mexican Wolf With a Y Pole    
  ** A Balanced Trainer for Unbalanced Dogs
  ** Milking Stools and Operant Conditioning
  ** Do You Need a Trainer or a Rehabilitator?   
  ** Victoria Stilwell Solves a Biting Problem      
  .