Introduction
If you post or look at posts about dogs, you are almost sure to have seen ads for the book Raising Dog. It first caught my eye in a Facebook reel, where a young influencer says she bought the book to transform her dog into a service dog in 30 days. Other videos show high work drive collies and cattle dogs energetically responding to their owners’ cues.
Besides training a service dog in world record time, Raising Dog describes itself as a “revolutionary” way to train any dog, without the need to work with an expensive trainer. I strongly doubt anyone can turn a pet into a service dog in 30 days. But I decided to see if the book had anything I could use to become a better dog handler.
Buying Raising Dog
Raising Dog is purchased online by going directly to their website. It’s not available on Amazon. The novel feature is that it is customized to your dog. You are walked through a series of questions about your dog’s gender, age, and breed, followed by questions about your dog’s current level of training, behavioral issues, training goals, and much more.
Following the questionnaire, you are given a preview of your custom book cover with your name and your dog’s name on it. At this point, I would have liked to have seen my personal table of contents so I would know what I was buying. That was not available. But I was shown a pre-purchase screen with their analysis of where Koogle is today and what level I could expect him to reach if I bought the book. Their analysis was completely off. They decided that Koogle was at a basic level of obedience. He is actually an expertly trained service dog.
Once you agree to buy the book, the hard sell for add-ons begins. I lost count somewhere after 8 upsell attempts. Clicking “no thanks” so many times was so frustrating I nearly quit without buying the book. Some customers have complained of being tricked into purchasing subscriptions when they bought the book.
What You Get When You Buy Raising Dog
You receive a link to download a digital copy or your customized book once payment is complete. This is nice, because you can begin using the book right away. A paperback copy is shipped to you, and I received mine in about a week.
The physical book is large, measuring 8 ½ X 11 inches. This is much larger than other training books I’ve bought. The size allows for beautiful photography and good graphics. My book started off with a section on the history and traits of Labrador retrievers, matching Koogle’s breed. This was followed by chapters with basic information common to all dogs and the fundamentals of dog training.
Chapters on basic skills, dog commands, and shaping your dog’s behavior form the meat of the book. Unfortunately, these chapters were not actually customized to Koogle. I had indicated in the survey that Koogle is 6 years old and housebroken, yet there were sections on puppy socialization, crate training, and house breaking – obviously not a good match for my dog.
The book reads like a big infographic. It has lots of short paragraphs and bullet points. This makes it accessible to readers of all levels, but I often found myself wishing for more detail. Sections on how dogs learn and principles of dog training were very similar to what I have previously been taught by trainers at Houston DogWorks, Sirius Strides, and Canine Companions. .
The book lacked useful training concepts like shaping or chaining cues that are helpful to know when a dog is learning something new. The dog commands (cues) chapter contained 28 cues. Most of these are what would be found in an AKC Canine Good Citizen class, like “sit”, “stay”, “come”, etc. A few cues were just for fun like “play dead” and “take a bow”.
The second half of the book was made up of chapters on diet and nutrition, physical health, mental health, grooming, physical activities, dog toys, and travel with dogs. It contains useful information. However, it is not part of a revolutionary training program as promised.
Does Raising Dog Work?
Raising Dog contains pretty much all the information required to teach a dog basic obedience. It’s entirely plausible that some readers will be successful with it. My experience with dog training is that handlers run into trouble when they don’t follow through with regular practice sessions. You’ll need to be motivated to practice with your dog every day.
Working alone with your dog can be challenging without an experienced eye to correct your mistakes. Training classes are also social events, so you would miss out on interacting with other folks and their dogs.
Raising Dog could be a good text to accompany a training class. Its infographic style makes it easy to review the key concepts you learn. And, the how-to lessons for the 28 commands make a good reference.
Is Raising Dog Revolutionary?
No. I didn’t see any material that differed substantially from recent dog training classes I’ve taken. The book is customized to you and your dog, but not to the degree I had expected following such an extensive questionnaire. The claim of being able to transform a pet into a service dog in 30 days is just plain false. The most experienced service dog providers, like Canine Companions and Guiding Eyes For The Blind, start with newborn puppies and the entire training program takes over 2 years.
In Conclusion
Raising Dog claims to be a revolutionary way to train your dog, achieving results in little time. The book is unique in that it is customized to you and your dog, but the customization I received was not a good fit for my dog and my training goals.
The book’s formatting makes it easy to read, and the photography is beautiful. The training methods presented are aligned with modern methods I’ve seen at in-person classes but are not substantially different. Raising Dog could make a good reference to go along with an in-person class. Bonus sections on health, fitness, and grooming are useful. I’ll definitely keep it for when I want to look up those concepts.
Those of you in the service dog world will likely do better with the materials provided by your service dog provider. Canine Companions Puppy Manual and Team Training Student Textbook cover the same topics in greater detail and are provided at no cost to volunteers and clients. Other organizations’ materials are likely similar.