Bite Table Training with Michael Nezbeth

Hey, everybody. As usual, before we get to the show, I want to pay a couple bills and thank a couple sponsors.

So the first sponsor of the show today I want to talk about is Next Level K9. So Tim Adams owns Next Level K9. Check out thenextlevelk9.com. He's the lead sponsor of the Colorado K9 Conference. So there's a dog vendor. Tim's doing some training, but mostly selling a lot of dogs.

So he's got single and dual purpose prospects available, keeps a lot on hand and as you've heard me mentioned here in colorado he's driven up to me i know that he delivers dogs in different parts of the country so check out the next level canine.com or give tim a call at 801-358-0120 and you can also meet and see some of his dogs at the colorado canine conference he's the sponsor and he's gonna bring dogs that are for sale and you can test and work the dogs right here in Colorado at the seminar.

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I think most people that once they look around through the product and see how they can make it their own, usually stick with it. So finally, I want to talk about Ray Allen. Ray Allen is a canine equipment. They're based here in Colorado. They've been a good sponsor of the show also. And everything that you get from Ray Allen is just known for their quality.

So by the time it hits Ray Allen's website, it's already been tested by a lot of different people that they have testing products and you know it's going to be good and if for some reason you have any issue with it ray allen stands behind everything so i've never had any any problem working out if i have a product that wanted to return or need to get reissued or something through ray allen so outstanding company check out ray allen.com.

Music. This is the Police Canine Training Podcast with Jeff Meyer. Join us for each episode to get real-world advice from canine professionals who have experience on the street. Each episode will focus on up-to-date information that you can use on the street. Spend about 30 minutes with us each week as part of your training day. Our goal at Police Canine Training is to make every canine team be the best they can be. Welcome to the Police Canine Training Podcast. I'm your host, Jeff Meyer.

Today I have another one of the instructors that's going to be out here at the Colorado Canine Conference. I have Michael Nesbeth with me. He was here last year and everybody had a great time going to his station and getting some of the knowledge out of him. Vast amount of knowledge, so just a couple of days is just going to tip the iceberg. But he'll be out here again this year doing some of the same stuff and maybe a little bit different stuff.

But I want to bring him on here and talk about different things. But specifically today, one of the topics I wanted to pick his brain about is the use of bite tables. And I know that they're very popular right now. I know probably the majority of you listening, if you're doing patrol dog stuff, you're probably using a bite table in some form or another. I haven't used one a whole lot. I didn't use one most of the time.

I've trained dogs, played with them a little bit, but it's definitely not my expertise. So I thought for other people that are in my situation, or if you're using one, maybe listen to some of Mike's ideas and see if you want to change how you're using it or how much you're using it or that type of stuff. So that's what we're going to be hitting today. Mike, how are you doing today? I'm doing good, man. How are you doing? Good. I know you've been traveling and

doing a lot of classes. You got a lot going on right now. Yeah, yeah. I've been just going around, going crazy, staying busy.

Can't complain. that's good that's good you on the classes that you're doing are is it kind of a mixture of classroom and hands-on yeah yeah so a lot those are the preference for me i like i like definitely there's some information that is easier to kind of process in a classroom setting but i think like we miss a lot if we can't then get to the hands-on yeah so yeah preferences definitely. Getting hands on my dog. Yeah. That's what, so that's what I, I like about you.

You'll be able to do a classroom here and then take those theories out, you know, and do it. You're going to do a lot of different stuff here in Colorado in July. But like I said, for, for today, I'd like to kind of pick your brain a little bit and, and I guess we'll start. Most people know who you are and they see you on your grassroots, grassroots canine stuff online. But in case people haven't listened to you before I heard you, why don't we just run over your background real quick?

All right. My background is, I would say, pretty unique for the positions that I find myself in sometimes. I have a total of zero years in law enforcement, and somehow the way the universe has just lined up and worked out is I get to do quite a bit of work with police dogs. Yeah. I always tell people, I'm like, Hey man, if you're here to learn from me to just be a better cop, I'm probably not the right guy to talk to you.

But, uh, I definitely have a passion and I would say an affinity for working dogs and dealing with police dogs and, and troubleshooting and, and solving problems on with the dogs specifically, you know? Yeah. Yeah. And how did the dog go ahead? You were going to answer. I was going to say, how did you get into it? Oh, yeah. So I got into dogs kind of by chance, man. I went to school for psychology. So more focused, all the way focused on human psychology. I thought that's what I wanted to do.

I got into a behavioral health technician job for about a year and realized that this is not at all what I want to do. During that time, I was kind of just dabbling in dogs.

I had a few dogs of my own. never really thought that it would be a career or anything like that yeah and kind of came home one day and was just like you know what i'm gonna do dogs i can't do this anymore yeah and kind of just dove in you know tried to get you know with trainers that i that i thought that i could learn from not that i was selective it was literally anyone that would help me yeah kind of fast forward i got the opportunity to meet up with

some pretty um talented people and kind of just ignited a fire in me and, uh, kind of short, that's a really short version, but that's good. And how many years total have you been playing with dogs now on a professional level? Yeah. On a professional level, I would probably, don't quote me, there's fact checkers out there, but I would say probably around 12, 13 years. Yeah.

Yeah. It's, it's, and I guess a question that would come to me is I really, when I'm training dogs, one of the things I always tell people, you know, that they're getting into it, is there's different theories and different terminology. But learning dog psychology, as much as, or I might even argue more than learning the quadrants of conditioning and everything, learning dog psychology has helped me more than some of the theoretical practices, you know, that I've learned also.

Because when the school that I went through, we had to learn, it was the Utah Post, there was a lot of drives and character traits, and we had to commit to memory those, and it became a muscle memory thing. Problem solving a dog, I just kind of look at it that way. How similar is it in the human psychology to when you start analyzing dogs? Is it something that's helped you?

I would say that it helped me. I would say like a lot of, you know, developmental psychology type stuff, dealing with children, teaching new behaviors, learning new things, you know, across the board, there are a lot of similarities. Sure. You know, learning is learning. Yeah. Now it's about kind of how we pass that information on, you know, to, to a human, we can kind of explain, Hey, I want you to do this because this is what the outcome is going to be.

Where a dog, it's a, we got to kind of show them a bit, you know, um, and let them kind of experience it. Um, which I think is also substantially better than human psychology. You know, the proof is in the pudding kind of ordeal with dogs. Yeah. Don't, don't talk about it, be about it, show me. Yeah. And I think also as a trainer, I'm sure you probably would agree that oftentimes training the dog is the easy part.

It's training the handler who's handling the dog that sometimes proves to be a little difficult. So I imagine, again, that background has got to help just being able to relate to, you know, as a trainer, we have to relate to lots of different personalities and I don't try to make them adjust to me. I try to turn out the best team I can and I'm sure it's the same thing. And I think that's, that's, that's key.

That's key for being an instructor, right? Is kind of, uh, being able to adjust your teaching style to the audience that you have before you, you know, some people are learners, you know, that's why I really like against shameless plug, but why I really like the conferences that you do, um, because there's some people that are going to get a lot more information from the classroom stuff. Yeah. And then there are people that are going to get a lot more information from the hands on stuff.

Yeah. And being able to adjust on the fly, I think is what makes instructors or some instructors very effective, you know. Yeah. And that's what I think, you know, some people, I've met some really good dog trainers over the years that are just not good instructors because they can't do the people side of things. And I think that's what separates, you know.

And then I've met some pretty decent dog trainers but are really good with people and they turn out better teams because they can muddle it through to others.

So let's jump into the stuff about the byte table. So again, it's not my area of expertise at all. I'm not anti-byte table at all. I just have never really used one and never found the need for one, but I'm sure I'm missing some really good things that it could. So let's back up and start with when did you start using one? And it seems like they've gotten really popular recently, but has that been something that you've been using for quite a while?

Yeah. Not to sound like I've always been doing it this way kind of guy. But when I, when I was introduced to dogs, bite tables or working dogs specifically, bite tables were like a part of it. A part of where I was training dogs. That was something that they would utilize quite frequently. So it's kind of always been something that has been semi kind of normal for me to deal with.

It wasn't like I was doing dogs and then the tables came in. so yeah that my first introduction to bite tables was the first day i've ever even realized that there was like bitey dogs yeah okay i was around that yeah so with the table maybe go over what what do you like about it and what what are the behaviors that you specifically want to use a table for and how do you use a table to elicit those behaviors yeah i think how about when i was first introduced to the table so

i would say there are different variations of bite tables sometimes there there are like the more open like a circle table where the back tie is right in the middle and the dog kind of has access all the way around that full circle and then they have bite tables that are kind of like a rectangle with some walls on it sometimes a back and the back tie is just in one spot so the dog only has basically forward that it can face.

I was kind of introduced to both of those variations of the table very early on. And in my opinion, when I was first introduced, at least by the people that I was introduced to it by, they utilized the table quite frequently, but it was used for only very specific things.

And and the main thing that i when i first got into it that i seen like the rectangle table closed in table used for i was kind of like defensive barking kind of trying to get some attitude from the dog's like work yeah that's how i was introduced to the table i think that the tables and the use of the tables have grown tremendously from that point i think someone told me that the original name for the table, again, someone probably used to fact-track this, but was the combat table.

And the rectangle table kind of makes sense to me that it would be more of a defensive place to work dogs. They're kind of, you know, backed into a quote-unquote corner. They have no other option but to be really forward in their behaviors. So that kind of makes sense. I think the tables now, or use of tables now, has grown tremendously.

How I've seen people utilize them how i've utilized them i've i've actually just yesterday we had i had some puppies on a on what would be considered quote-unquote the combat table not using it um for defensive work at all but kind of just having them in a different environment doing some bites in yeah i've seen people utilize it to help isolate and build the ideal bite mechanics that they're looking for again because we limit how much the dog can move around and have different options.

It can be utilized for doing that. I like to utilize it when I'm doing introductions to outs. I think same kind of thing runs through the dogs don't have so many options to like be swinging around or, or I'm getting dirty after the house because they're really like in a, in a small spot. And then the other benefit is, is, you know, it saves decoys back sometimes when they're at the dog up, up on that, that bite table, the decoys aren't bending

over so much and hurting themselves. Those are just like some quick things that I've seen. I've, I've utilized the bite tables also for some obedient stuff. If I'm trying to shape a down or, or work on some sits and maybe some really infant stages of capping, I've utilized a bite table for that. But I think it's kind of limited by people's creativity. Sure. And those are some of the things I want to get into. I think let's start with just the obedience.

And I guess I'll tell you the reason that I'm not anti-bite table, but at one point in my career, I was lucky enough and I was in an Eastern European country. And the round table I saw at a large vendor and dogs that didn't want to bite, I'm sure you've heard of it. you know, they put the dog on the table and basically kick the dog into survival and it's either fall off the table or bite. And that's how they were trying to crank out police dogs.

So when the prevalence of the bite table came back, my thought process was like, absolutely not because that was my exposure to it. So then, you know, right away, somebody's like, no, no, no, that's not how we're using it. We're using it for, and you know, first I was hearing we're using it for release work and I've heard a few people talk about now we're using it for obedience. So would you start off, you know, the dog, the dog is, is working.

You've probably done some obedience with, you know, toy or food or whatever. And you're working through that at what.

Time would you start putting him on the table in his beginning training so i like you know i have a pretty unique position in that like i raise puppies for yeah work so i have them more than people or longer than most people have them right so because i'm aware that the bite table can mentally put dogs kind of into a place like that i try and expose puppies to it very early on okay not even in the context of bite work so i just want hey you're up on a platform

i mean maybe while they're on that platform, I have some food in my hand and I'm, I'm luring them to downs while they're up there, you know, nothing super fancy or, or, or crazy, but I don't want it to have that. You know, shoot or get off the pot kind of mentality when they get up there. But for the, for the rest of us that aren't doing puppies, suppose I buy it, you know, I've got my, my 12 month old dog that I bought from a vendor and I've been working with him for a few weeks.

Would it be appropriate you know before he's got very clean obedience to maybe start working the down and the reason i'm focusing on the down is through my travels recently i've been seeing more and more dogs that are resistant to the training on the down and you know for different reasons it looks like different reasons some dogs simply don't want to go down and then some other ones i think are so handler dependent that they go into the down and then they walk they

start crawling with the handler, but I've been seeing that as a common problem. And I look at that as that's a product of people like you and I that are training a lot of people that I haven't focused on working the crack down enough, you know, to teach people how to do it.

I definitely, I definitely would use that. I think some of the other reasons why some of these older dogs are resistant to the down, I'm just kind of, it gets them into a quote unquote kind of vulnerable position, you know, if you have a green dog. So putting them up on a table, The caveat to this is that the table can't mean bite work to them, right?

If we put them on a table and they start losing their mind because they think they're doing bite work, then I probably would just abandon the idea. But I've taught plenty of green dogs that I've imported or got my hands on how to down on a table. It's less vulnerable for them. I'm not pushing over them. I'm not forcing them into it. I'm just saying, hey, there's some food here in my hand. You go and follow this food and get into a down. You're in front of me.

You can get this food and get a lot of repetitions. And I definitely support that. And so that would be the next question is if you were, again, you get your 12, 13-month-old dog, whatever, and you're going to work some of this obedience and maybe some of the drive capping before you do bite work? Because of the... Not necessarily, yeah, not necessarily before, but separately. Okay. So before on the table, yeah, I would like them to get up there and not

have the history of just getting... Yeah, I misspoke, yeah. So you're going to do that, you're not going to use the table until you've done some of the obedience, that's what I meant to say. Exactly, exactly. That way they don't get that training field effect of, here comes the bite work. Yeah, just context cues of, oh, we're on the table that means bite stuff and lose my mind. Yeah. Yeah, try and keep it separate. I definitely want them to know that it

can mean that, but I don't want it to only mean that. Yeah. And then they're on the table and once they're doing a pretty steady down, I assume on command without having to lure them anymore. Would you keep with that until you get to that point? Yeah, and I'll move away from the table for that as well. I think one of the issues, at least for me, I'm not like the biggest.

Table advocate um yeah yeah i think that there's a time and a place but i think one of the issues with the table is that sometimes we think what we see on the table transitions to operational work yeah and i i don't think that that could be further from the truth i think it works for our obedience you know for the downs on the table it doesn't mean that the dog is down at the door threshold when you're making canine and that's you know yeah i think because the dog verbally outs on the table,

it doesn't mean they're going to verbally out operational. Correct. I think even, even sometimes I'll still see the work today. Like people will be like, okay, we're going to work on some civil aggression with the dogs and they put them on a table and a back tie and have no equipment. I mean, then basically tease the dog up with no equipment. And to me, I don't think that that transitions at all. Well, the table itself is equipment in that context, isn't it?

Exactly. There's, it's a huge context cue. They're like, oh, we're doing that game again. You just don't have stuff on you. Okay. I'll be angry here. Yeah, it's the same when people- I don't think it's by the end all be all by any means. Well, and I should clarify that, that, yeah, I should clarify that, that I threw this curve at you before we started the show today, that you didn't call me up and say, hey, I want to do a table show.

I just knew that you use it a lot and I wanted to pick your brain about it. So this wasn't Michael Nesbeth wants to teach everybody how to use a table. I kind of threw this at you. But I appreciate you letting me pick your brain on it, because I think there's probably a lot of people who use it. Once you start using it for release work, and you said a lot of times you do that for the beginning release work? Yeah, for really early on. So, you know, it's a dog training.

There's never like, oh, this is where it goes every time. But usually I start trade games probably with balls outside of table work. And then once I'm moving away from the balls or the dog's being pretty predictable with trading me item for item, then I'll probably go to the table, do it with the ball again on the table and make sure that we're still proficient here. And then I'll go to something that may be a little bit more satiating to them.

So maybe like a wedge when they're doing that and just kind of progress my way through equipment until it becomes more difficult and the dog is still giving me the right responses. I want to go off on a little tangent there real quick and talk about trade games.

And when, because, and the reason I want to talk about it is I see, again, in my travels, I watch some people and when they talk about having, you know, either detector dogs or dual purpose dogs where they can't get the toy back, I show them what they're doing and they've, they thought they were doing the trade game. And what I've seen a lot is the dog, you know, the dog has one toy, they'll present another toy. And when the dog decides he wants to do it, he'll spit the toy out.

And about the time he spits the toy out, the handler will try to time Lowe's and then let the dog grab the toy and pull it out of the handler's hand. And I assume that's not how you do that.

No, that's, that's, that's not how I do it. I do let it kind of, in, in the very like infant stages, I do let it kind of be up to the dog yeah and i i don't introduce a command so i i kind of just say hey here's a ball maybe i throw it yeah they take that ball they come back to me i show them the other ball and i have the other ball maybe a little bit more active kind of a draw to them they let go of what they have and then they choose to get the ball that i have and there's there's

a ton of reps here until it becomes really predictable that the dog is going to come back and spit that item out once it's predictable Well, that's the only time I start introducing the command. But, but I guess that, yeah. And once the dog spits that you toss the toy or hand them the toy or give them a permission. The dog doesn't get to just take the toy out of your hand, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly.

I agree, yeah. But big, big generalizations. Of course, there's going to be like outliers. Yeah. My expectations of this dog are way less than what I would expect from other dogs because of how they're learning. But yeah, that's the general rule of thumb is, yeah, they get it with my permission and they out the other one when I tell them to out it. But sometimes we've got to scale it back a lot before they can even get to that. Yeah.

And the reason I bring that up is, again, that's a thing I see a lot where these dogs are extremely possessive. And then when I watch them, when the dog spits a toy, they say los, and then they let the dog grab the toy out of their hand and pull it. And it's like, that's not your toy now. It's the dog's toy. And he's running the boat. And they're building massive amounts of drive. And when I tell him that little caveat of the dog doesn't get to pull anything out of my hand ever, it's mine.

And, and then when I show it to him, it's, it, it helps a lot of them. But I see, I, I see people trying to do the trade game and instead of, you know, build anything, they're just building massive possession and the dog believes anything. And then, then when we're doing obedience, you see the dogs that are jumping up and trying to take stuff out of their hand or out of their pocket. And it's like, you, you taught him that it's, it's.

Yeah and and that that kind of transitions to what once i get to them when they're on let's say we're doing outs now on the table off of the suit i like to have a secondary behavior not because that's what i want yeah finish with but i like them to um out and then down yeah um but where i see a lot of trouble even with working outs on the on the table by the time the dog is ready for the suit um is that the decoys kind of only wait for the dog to open up

his mouth and then the decoy snatches themselves out of the mouth, if I make a sense, they back away. Yeah. I mean, to me, that's, the dog doesn't know how to out. Like out means you need to open your mouth and back off and you can't touch. Even though the decoy is accessible. Exactly. The decoy has to be accessible. Otherwise they're still not learning an out. They're just like, well, I can't reach you. Yeah. So I give up to you. Yeah.

Yeah. And I, those are those little things that I think, you know, it's just experience and I, and I tell, tell handles, you know, watch the little things. And that's a, you know, you're only talking about decoy moving six inches, but it's, it's, it's the entire difference of the exercise. The dog has to make the choice that, Hey, I can reach that, but I'm not going to go bite that until I have permission to bite it again.

Exactly. That's really where it's at. Okay. You have a good understanding of this behavior. He's right in front of me and I'm, I'm doing this behavior. And is that secondary behavior, is it usually a down or could it be a, a sit or something else or just. Yeah, just because they're on the table, I usually do a down just because it's

easier there. That's stable. Yeah. I also, and to me, one of the reasons why I like to use the table for this part specifically is because it takes, I'm removing, it makes my decoy feel a little bit safer. Yeah. So, so they're, they're less likely to be pulling themselves away. Yeah. Because like, Hey, as long as all that you have in reach is something that you're okay with the dog fighting. Yeah. Then it doesn't like, you know, don't lean your face over the line. Yeah.

But you know you can keep your i do it with outside bites so tricep to just really make sure it's good because i can really encroach on the dog boundaries there and also have my decoy be safe yeah so i really like that because we can get some really good repetitions of the dog learning like hey it's all fear game until out is given then i must not touch until permission is given again yeah and and then when i have it really proficient there i really quickly take them off the table

and trying to replicate that in other places, biting different locations and so forth. Okay. So you, you get a dog and you've, you've done the trade game, as we talked about on the table, the dog's doing that very consistently with a command at that point. Then you have the decoy come over, present, you know, a bite that, an easy bite, a bite that, you know, arm bite that the dog is comfortable with.

And I say that because this isn't the time to do a new bite where the dog has got to think it's just something and give the dog the release command and he doesn't do it. What type of correction do you prefer at that point? Yeah, at this point, by the time I get there, they probably would have already been exposed to e-collar work. So at that point, by the time they're on the suit and they're deciding to ignore the out, the out is a proficient behavior that they understand just to draw

to biting the decoy is more important to them. And they also understand e-collar pressure. So in those moments, it would be e-collar pressure that the dog says, oh, yeah, I know what the answer to this is. I'm supposed to let go. And then just kind of rinse and repeat until we establish really predictable behavior there for that out. And I think there's a lot of important points in that sentence you just said about that. It's a behavior the dog should understand.

And he's disregarding that command. So it's not a new command. And the dog understands how to, you know, what the, what the, the pressure is from the e-collar. It's not a new weird feeling. And obviously, you know, I mean, we've all seen and heard of, you know, someone throwing the dog on the, on table or doing something, trying to teach it out, throw an e-collar on him and turn it up high and hit him with it.

And, and, you know, even if the dog releases on that one, you've not shaped the dog at all. So I like the fact. create, probably created some very unintentional baggage with that. Yeah, absolutely. When he comes off the table, you're going to be wearing that. Most dogs you'll be wearing them. Just keep that behavior up. Cool. What about for like bite development or those types of things? At what point will you incorporate a bite table in and how do you, how will you do that?

So I would, um, again, the, you know, a horrible part about dog training is the answer is always a thing. Yeah. It's not like a day one, do this, do this. Uh, I probably like pretty early on, once I have the dog understand like, Hey, getting on the bite table doesn't just mean lose your shit. Yeah. I would start, doing some bite stuff up there.

I think it's really good bite mechanics development, but also some targeting development. Not so much that the dog is making the choice, but that it's easier for my decoy to, maybe a dog has only ever seen outside bites. Well, it's easier for my decoy to now have the dog on the table and show him that he also can bite on the inside, you know, take a bicep.

So I like it for that stuff as well. But yeah, I do it, you know, it's dog dependent, them, but usually it's when they're not jumping on the table and, and trying to, you know, bite whatever's in front of them, then really quickly I'll, I'll put them over it. I'll start doing it. And then you mentioned like drive capping. How, how does that look when you're using a table? Yeah. So once, once I have that, the dog has to have some type of understanding of, of self control a little bit.

And I can do, it's kind of similar to the out exercise, but you know, I can start introducing and then, hey, there's something really exciting over here that you want. Your way to getting this thing is by containing yourself. So sometimes we can use it in the other way, right? Sometimes say, hey, I want this dog to be more active. So the way to get this toy or this wedge that I have is by barking. Then I can shift my criteria without giving him commands, just letting his experience

dictate what the outcome is. Hey, you want the toy? Well, I'm pretty far away from you. Or you get quiet for a second, I walk closer to you. And he says, hold on, being quiet works.

Then he's more likely to be quiet so kind of it's it's nuanced yeah but that is like the on on a core level that's how i would do it or how i do do it so at that point it's the dog almost teaching himself like offering behaviors and what he's successful at the dog will continue so you're not giving the dog corrections you're not yelling at the dog you're not you just let and and you know yeah a correction a correction there is usually going to just drive that dog up even higher.

Exactly. And if they really lock in, like if I'm trying to get the dog to be quiet, I mean, he's very, just a, you know, a loud twitchy dog. You know, maybe I stand 10 feet in front of him with the item that he wants. I mean, he's just barking and barking and I'm not really making any progress. Well, I can also get further away from him as a result. So yeah, I don't mind stepping away from him. And then he says, Oh, hold on.

What happened there? And then they're more likely to quiet, get quiet and I'll get closer. and kind of just play the teeter-totter game. And it's that patience that a lot of us don't have a lot of times. Yeah. So, like I said, I kind of threw this at you because I wanted to talk about using it. How much, and all dogs are different, but in your training regime, if you're starting with that 10, 11, 12, 13-month-old dog, you're going to do six or eight weeks of training.

Roughly how much of that would it be you know on just a rough thing 10 25 of the the work is he going to be on a table or yeah i would say maybe 15 to 20 of the work would be on on the table and more on the front end of that of that train up yeah just making sure we have the things looking that we how i want them to look um, I'm not afraid to like bounce back to it later on if necessary, but yeah, more on the front end, probably. Yeah.

Between 10 and 20%. Uh, and do you, do you think people, yeah. Do you think that there's some people that are overusing the bite table a little bit too much or. In my opinion, probably, but I'm also the, the, Hey, if you like it, I love it kind of guy. Uh, if it works for you. Yeah. Like maybe, yeah. So I, if I, I would think, so I think the biggest thing is that, I don't think a lot of people that use the bite table so much realize the gap between what the end goal is.

And, you know, a dog that's capped on a bite table and quiet doesn't mean that they're capped anywhere else. Yeah. So if we stick there and only work on it there, then they're going to be the best bite table cap dog in the world. But it won't transition. It's like doing detection and only using boxes. Yeah. Yeah. You know, well, they have a great detection box dog. Yeah. In less than things. In a box. I think it's very simple.

Yeah. Yeah. I think it's very simple. Yeah. And I think that's, that's kind of a common thing. In fact, you know, that's like, again, when I, problem solving out on a field doing an e-collar class, you know, I've heard that a few times, well, on a bite table, he does really well. It's like, well, we're not on a bite table right now, so we've got to figure out, you know, a different way to do that. And, and yeah, your dog's not deploying on a bite table, right? So like. Yeah.

It's a good tool to have, but I mean, And it's a good tool to help start us in the right direction or even maintain some things, but it's, we have to move away from it and, and, and not just stick with it. It's okay to pop back in every now and then to tighten some things up. But yeah, I would, I try to move away from it. Obviously behavior dependent, uh, kind of as quick as I can. That's good information.

So for a few minutes, if you don't mind, I want to pick your brain because you're in that fortunate position of raising puppies that are turning into police dogs. So since there's not a lot of people doing that, I guess my first question is roughly, I mean, when you have a litter of puppies, how many of those are turning into working on the street police dogs? Yeah.

So kind of a loaded question. Sure. And I would probably, so I would say to me, I would consider a litter of puppy, a successful litter or a very successful litter. If 50% of them made it to be dual purpose dogs on the road, I would consider that like a very successful litter. There are other people's people that have substantially higher numbers, but again, I'm. It's the quality. I don't have the skill set. Yeah. I don't know what that, you know.

Yeah. what that quality is. I'm very happy if 50% of them make it to be dual purpose. And then some of them, you know, they're, they're, they're pointy ears, they're mouth-up generally. But, uh, yeah, wanting them to get to that point, uh, 50% is, is really good. Sure. And, and I guess, like you said, it was a loaded question, but I guess the reason I'm asking is it's such a difficult industry and people are always still asking, you know, why are we going to Europe?

And now with, you know, things going on in the world and everything, I'm sure that that question is going to get brought up even more. And do you see, because you're, you're involved in, you know, you're involved in all aspects of it, from the puppies through the training, through, you know, seeing the dogs that are out working the street that you're working with.

Do you see a world where in any time in the near future, these dogs are going to start getting sourced more, you know, in either your country or my country and, and making, making that trip across the pond easier yeah i i think in an in an ideal world that would be awesome yeah i think numbers wise there's i don't think that there's the infrastructure in north america to support the amount of dogs that is necessary you know i went on a

bi trip i want to say january to europe yeah to try and sort of some dogs and you know we get there and this i i get to a vendor there and they have two kennel buildings where i'm at but they have another There are four kennel buildings in the country. Yeah. And the, just the two final buildings that I was at, there was 500 dogs.

You know, like the numbers are, we're just not going to be able to, I don't think also like our bylaws and what we expect of animal husbandry in North America is very different than what is expected over there. You know, it's 500 dogs. And I think maybe there was four or five people working. Yeah. It's a very much a commodity type market there.

And I'll see it. yeah i mean i just thought you mentioned it and i just thought i'd pick your brain on that a minute because i just it's a it's a question i know you hear it and everybody talks about it but i i just don't see it changing anytime anytime yeah i think it would be great i think i think you know stuff like a part of the issue and again i'm painting with a with a broad brother but like a part of the issue with the dogs overseas is that a lot of them are being prepared

to pass a selection test. Absolutely. Yep. Where like when I'm raising dogs here or other people that, that are raising up puppies, they're not preparing them to pass selection tests. They're preparing them to be well-performing police dogs, you know? So, so I think those are two different goals. Yeah. And, and sometimes they can be counterintuitive to one another, you know?

Absolutely. And I think if you wanted to do it to scale in a large scale, then that's when you start getting private equity involved and 50% to an investor is not, there's not a number they're going to listen to. Like change that to 85 and then you're trying to sell a dog. And the problem with that is as soon as a dog program or a puppy program is the success of the program is measured by how many dogs are sold. Well, then someone, even if they're well-intended is going to make sure that

they hit 85%. And that means pushing dogs through that probably shouldn't be through. And I know you've sent you, I know one time I was in Europe talking to one of the vendors, not buying dogs, I've never done that, but I was with people buying dogs and I commented on what a nice dog, somebody was selecting a dog and I was like, that's a really nice dog. And the vendor said to me, you know, can you sell that dog?

And there was a dog that looked kind of sickly, kind of over off to the side of one of the kennels. I was like, no. And he's like, a good vendor can sell any of those dogs. And I was like, not me. You know, so it's a different, it's a different world, you know, and I just, like I said, I know you're doing some puppies, but it's a, it's a, that's a tough, tough business project. By the time the puppies settle, you know, you're not, I'm not really making it. Yeah.

It's for fun. I think that I also don't selfishly to me, I don't measure the success of the program just based off the dogs that have sold. I think that the experience that the trainers get in those moments from those, even the dogs that don't make it are, is also a part of the success. Absolutely. It's like, well, you've got your hands on this kind of dog. That's just another dog that you know how to work with.

And, you know, so I think that there's success that's outside of just the percentage of dogs. Yeah. It's like anything else in dog training. You, if you could train a puppy that that's experience. I know training pet dogs is, I think, harder than training a police dog most of the time.

If you get good at that, it certainly does. Yeah, I would agree with that. They're challenging sometimes in different ways, but overall I would say pet dogs are much more difficult to deal with. Well, this is all good information. I appreciate you sharing it. And like I said, just for the listeners, I'll reiterate again that this wasn't the Mike Nesbitt wants to preach about bite tables. This was Jeff Meyer wants to learn.

Jeff Meyer wants to learn about bite tables and he's got Mike Nesbitt on the phone, so I'm going to take advantage of it. So I kind of threw the curveball at you, but I appreciate you. We can make it more polarizing. You could say, Mike, that's it, it's pro-bite. Yeah, and we were going to discuss it. Yeah, that's how I'll write it up. No, it's good information. And it's definitely, I've got some friends down here that you met last year that are utilizing them a lot more.

And I'm very open to it. It's just not been something I have. So I think I'll definitely start taking advantage of, you know, it's just one more tool in the toolbox. dogs. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, and I think it's, it's like a lot of things in the, in the dog world, you know, like not one thing makes a dog, you know, it's, I think it's a combination of all of these things.

And we just have to make sure that we, we stay kind of consciously aware of that because there, there are things that pop up that are very, uh, kind of like, uh, I don't know the right word for it, but can be like a, like a little salesy, you know, like new technique is and you know it's there's there's nothing that makes yeah dog no it's a combination of things that that makes sense and we go from there yeah and we've all seen that the the handles you chase the shiny

objects and and never really end up with that good of a product because they're changing changing things so some sometimes sticking with what you know and with people who know how to do at least that technique and do it well is better than chasing all the new stuff so. Outstanding. Well, I'm looking forward to seeing you in person here in a couple of months and being able to pick your brain a little bit more. So I appreciate the time today.

That's a good out there, man. It's always a good time. Sounds good.

Thanks, Mike. Thanks for the time today. Not a problem. You have a good one. All right. That's going to wrap it up for this episode. I want to finish by thanking a couple more sponsors. So Kevin Sheldahl owns Canine Services down in New Mexico. Kevin does everything canine. So whether you need to buy a dog, get trained, get training there in New Mexico at his site, or he'll come to you and he'll do training and seminars and department evaluations at your site.

And if none of those work, he's got some online courses. So if you check out canineservices.com, it's k-9services.com, or give Kevin a call at 505-250-4576, and he'll give you all the information. So his online detector course is a really good course. If you can't come to him, he'll bring the course right to your computer screen. So check out canineservices.com. And finally, it's warm weather, so it's time to make sure your heat alarm's

working. I say at every show, your heat alarm needs to be tested at least weekly. It should just be part of your training day. So make sure that everybody's heat alarm is tested on your training day. You guys witness each other's heat alarms working. And the only heat alarm I ever recommend is acecanine.com. So acek9.com has got the best technology and the only one I know that has a cell phone feature to it. So the heat alarm will talk directly to your cell phone and stay in touch.

So there's no connection issues with it. And if there is a connection issue, there's so many redundant features in it that once it knows that it's not talking to your cell phone, that will also trigger a warning to let you know there's something wrong and you need to go check your dog. So really well thought out product, works really well. Give John Johnson a call or check out acecanine.com for your heat alarm needs. Thanks, everybody. Be safe. Music.