It's in the news today, but it was actually on TV Reload, the podcast past Deep their line Welcome back guys to TV Reload. As you may know, my name is Benjamin Norris and this is your podcast to get all the inside goss all the popular TV shows you may be watching from around the world. Undeniably, our TV sets are a major part of our home entertainment, and yet very little is known about how our favorite shows
get made. So each episode, I've been finding guests that want to dive just that little bit deeper into the shows they're currently making, so that you can hear all their exclusive stories and gain access to the biggest names in Australian television. I want to thank you for downloading or subscribing to this podcast however you've found me. I love hearing your feedback, so make sure you leave a
review or a comment on your chosen podcast platform. On today's podcast, I have Graham Hall, otherwise known as the Dog Farmer. He's talking to me from the UK. He's a dog behaviorist from Network ten's latest lifestyle series Dogs Behaving Very Badly. Graham has helped more than five thousand people and their furry companions in the UK now arrived in Australia ready to turn his hand to Australia's most
chaotic canines. Narrated by TV week Gold Logi twenty twenty three nominee Julia Morris, Dog's Behaving Very Badly Australia is holding Australia's naughtiest poochas and their owners to accounts. But will Graham's mantra any dog, any age, any problem bring true down under. I will talk to Graham about whether or not it's fair to call all the dogs naughty when in actual fact, most of the time it seems
to be the owner's fault. Graham will talk about how we came to specializing in dog's behavior and where the nickname dog Father came from. I will find some tips for you and your dog, and you will get some insights that will change your relationship with your pet for life. Plus we will get plenty of exclusives from behind the scenes of Dogs Behaving Very Badly. Which premiere is this Thursday at seven thirty on Network ten and of course you can catch up on ten play if you miss it. Anyway,
let's bring Graham into the podcasting guys. I really hope you enjoy this very insightful episode of TV load. Hi Graham, how are you. How's the weather over there?
I'm very well it's summer here, so smer is what you describe as winter basically in England, as you probably know. But it's okay.
Yeah, did you get good weather while you were here in Australia?
I did?
Do you know?
It's a funny thing because they planned to start filming the show initially in January.
February.
Right, You're going to go to Australia January wearing a tweed jacket and a waistcoat and a cravat, and you're going to be filming there. And I said, hang on a minute, you know what the weather's like in January and Australia Rice. So we actually started filming in March, but got to Sydney and everybody saying it's unusually warm March this so yeah, thirty eight degrees one day.
I could have done like a you know, a cross promotion with Bondai Rescue and we'd have to rescue Graham on the beach from hate stroke. You know.
Yeah, that'd be the kind of thing.
Yeah.
Now, I got very used to SPF fifty on the screen slip slip, slap slosh. Is it? What's the thing?
You say? Yes it is.
I got very into that, so no, we had lovely time. And then I discovered Victorian weather, which was very different. You know everybody says four seasons in one day in Melbourne. Well I think it's not so much that as if you don't like the weather right now, just wait ten minutes because it could be different.
I'm talking to you right now from Melbourne, and I like to describe the weather here is bipolar. So right, it's about right now, it's about right. So yeah, this must have been really fun to come over here and share your knowledge on dogs because you're so recognizable at home. But you know, how did this show come about for you in Australia?
Yeah, well I think the story goes the boss at Network ten was chating to the boss in Channel five in England about television shows, and the boss here, who's a big fan of the show of themselves, basically said you want some dogs behaving very badly in Australia, and you know guess what That became the title. So it all went from there. Somebody got in touch with me and said, hey, hey, how do you fancy going down
Unders to do the same show. So I had to think about that for about a millisecond before I said yes, and here we.
Are, well our dogs behave badly, just as badly, very badly compared.
Do you know the question everybody asked me is that we're our dogs worse the UK dogs. Generally speaking, I would say people are people are dogs are dogs pretty much wherever you go, right but but big bus and it's a good buss. What I did find in Australia is is real positivity from people. You know, you get it here in England, but you do get a few sort of like it's never going to work you out a bit of that The phrase for me that defines Australia.
And it's not all the things that the Brits think that Ozzie say, like faired income and all that malarchy. It's actually I'll give it a go because I would say to people, this is the problem, this is what I think we've got to do. Bear with me with this, and the thing I heard almost every single time was yeah, okay, man, I'll give it a go. And that's Australia to me. It's a country of people who give it a go, and I love that.
I love it as well. Do you know what's so funny about the title of this show? Though? For me? I mean, we can't call it this because it wouldn't work, because it's would get people that give people the wrong idea. But I feel like it should be humans behaving badly because after I watched a few episodes, I didn't really take task with the dogs. I started taking task with the people. I was like, is this a dog problem or is this a person problem? Yeah?
No, you're absolutely right. Funny enough, I've said that myself in the past over here in the first couple of series. You know, come on, technically speaking, it's not really the dog's behaving badly, or at least if they are behaving badly, it's because the humans made them that way, you know. But actually a show called dogs behaving very badly because they're humans made them behave very badly. Australia, it's not going to fit on your programming guide, is it.
I don't know if that's is that longer than I'm a celebrity, Get me out of here, you know, Do you know what I mean? It's getting there?
It probably is that one. We just shortened it to I'm a celeb, don't we so? But yeah, now, but you're absolutely right. It is about the people. And an old dog trainer one said to me, it's actually the guy who got me into this because I was doing
it as a hobby. I had two rot volus of my own, young dogs, young male dogs, and I thought, right, these two have got to be immaculate, because you know, Rossie's got themselves a bit of a reputation, probably unfairly, so I thought, right, these two are going to be trained to the nth degree. And then this guy said, look, why don't you take this up professionally? So I said, okay, well that's an interesting thing. Why why do you think i'd be good at it? And he surprised me because
he said, you're good with people. And I thought, okay, well that's nice to hear, but I thought you might say dogs. And he said, no, no, you're good with dogs, and lots of people are good with dogs. But and this is the key thing, and it's never left me. You can only fix the dogs through their people. So you've got to get the people side of it. And it's also not good enough for me to just turn up as a sort of dog handler, do some magic stuff, show off a bit, and then go there you go,
I'm out here. It's very much about that's how it works. But you two can do this and I'll let you into the secrets of how I just did that. And that really is what this shows about.
I was going to ask you, is it like being a psychic median and like just one day you have a spiritual awakening and like ace venture, a whole lot of dogs just followed your home, or you know, had you been sired in some way, But really you're just a psychologist.
Yeah, it's very largely logical, right, but there is a tiny percentage of I don't know how I knew that. And I'll give you an example. We were we were with a dog. This was a New South Wales as a dog who didn't like getting into cars would not get into a car, and it was it was having a big impact on the owner's life. And we just sort of assumed that this dog was being a bit stubborn because he was a greyhound. He could have jumped over the car right let alone get into the back seats.
So I'm just looking at him think, oh, he's just he's just yeah, he's just digging his seals in theth do it. And then I sat in the car because I thought, right, what I'll do is I'll show him. I go in the car first. It's fine, and then he can follow me lead and then others follow. Right, Why push a dog from behind when the dog's thinking, well, you're not getting him, why should I? I'm going first. Because I was in first, I could see his eyes as he's looking at the car, and everything changed in
that moment. It went from he's just been stubborn, so I could see him kind of going, I don't know how to do this, you know, And it's like, oh, I get it. So yourmom, you you could do it. I know you can do it, but you don't know you can do it. You're scared, and there's so there's a lot of logic to want to do, but there is that moment where it's a bit of feel. You know, you just look at a dog and I can't explain exactly how you'd know this, but you just look at
me and go, oh, mat I get it right. You need a bit of help. So then the logic kicks back in. It's like Okay, how can I make a stepping stone for this guy to get in this car?
Right?
How can I sort of convince him that he can do this? I put the front seat forward a bit so he could get onto the into the footwell of the of the back of the car, if you imagine you, and then jump on the seat from there. So do this first, then do that, do this, do that, do this? Do that?
Right?
Two or three times of that, and he's like, I wouldn't do this, Yeah, yeah you can? You always good? Oh, jump in there you go, and there's a lovely moment. The lady tried it for herself. Dog jumps in the gar next to her and she was really emotional because that's all all he needed was me, Yeah, there you go. So that you know, there's two sides of your brain, the sort of logical side and the creative Beeley side, you know, the touchy feely bit. You need both sides.
Actually it's not all logic, but it helps to think with your head a bit as well.
I just like the fact that people call you the dog father, Like this is the coolest nickname for you. Did you self impose that? Like were you having a wine or a Sherry with the missus and you just dawned on you. Does someone Did someone give you that nickname? No?
I did sort of give it to myself. It was the case that somebody would be a bit more honorable if somebody else. Now I'll tell you what it was. I started the business. It's an interesting story. I'd been working for a big breakfast cereal company, wat to mix. You got wheat, it's wheat bixing, Yeah, idiots, Yeah. And I was pretty senior with them, and I jumped out with the package, as you do. I thought right onto the next start of my life. And I was going
to do something else, not dog training. Long story, but I thought, right, Okay, I'm going to do this dog training thing because this guy said, you know, maybe I'd be good at it. I need a catchy name, you know, and because you know Graham Hall dog training. You can't forget it, don't you. And I was sat walking my dog, sat in the car abank to get my dog out to go for a walk at the local dog walking
spot where everybody goes. Lady turned up who was a professional dog walker, and in the back of the steak car she'd written her name and the dog mother, two separate words. And I looked and I thought, the dog with dog mother. You missed a trick there, because it should be one word, shouldn't it really? Dog dog father? Dog father? Are you beauty?
Kind of got Graham there for a second that you were going to say that you leaned back in the car and did the godfather accent to the dog walker.
Well, well, I did a quick surge online. Oh, turns out the website's available. Nobody's got dogfather dot com. Nobody's calling themselves the dog Father, So I'll do that bit of fun right. The first website was to your point was, you know, give us a ring and we'll make you an offer you can't refuse. But I realized it sounded a bit aggressive.
But you know, no, that's when you knock them off and officially became the Godfather. You got to hit on them. You own that nickname?
Now, do you know it's funny because over the years I've kind of gone, you know, maybe it's just a bit too cheesy. Maybe I should step away from it, and nobody lets me step away because everybody's like, I love that name and let's roll with it.
Then you need to keep it you need to put that on a pin and you need to keep that. Have you found dogs that you haven't been able to fix? And I'm sure you have, And what do you do? Is that a let down amongst yourself? Do you feel terrible that you can't fix this dog? I mean, what happens when you find yourself up against the impossible?
Yeah? No, you're right, and there are things that are pretty much impossible, right, So I would always say you can always improve things, that's for sure. There's always something you can do right. Very rare that you're going to go to somebody's house and they're doing everything right, okay, And I don't mean that in a funny way, you just it's literally, Look, if we can find things that you're doing wrong that we can improve on, then that's good,
isn't it. You see my point? However? Right, and you knew there was a big book coming in you. There are situations where you look at a dog in a particular household and you just think, do you know what? This is not a match made in heaven. So let me give you an example. Let's say I go to a house and it's a dog they've just rehomed. He's a bit aggressive. You know, he's you know those dogs that you can't quite tell that you can almost hear
the Jaws music in your head. Dumb dump dumb, dumb, dum dumb, and then you know, as it go right and in this house, and I can think of one that happened in the UK like this. There's a baby who's ten months old just started to crawl and I can see this dog giving them side eye, and I'm thinking, look, I can improve things here. I could give you false hope it's going to be fine, but in my heart
and hearts I know it's probably not. Actually, and I want to be able to sleep at night and I want you to be able to So the right thing to do in rare circumstances is to say, do you know what the best thing for everybody is? Probably you go separate ways. Actually, yeah, very home. The dog, we have a Yeah, the dog will have a better life somewhere else. You'll be okay, you baby, you'll be safe. I'd be doing the wrong thing to say, hey, we can fix everything, you know.
Yeah. The thing I was going to say about that, you know, which I find really interesting, and I was wanting to talk to you about is is it hard to be the person who has an opinion on dogs and to be an expert. I mean, you're putting a lot of pressure on yourself to be that person and you are going to give people information that sometimes can be uncomfortable. What is that like for you? Do you find yourself in some awkward situations?
You do, and you kind of learn to I suppose to impart that news in the right way. And it comes back to that thing about having a bit of sensitivity for people, you know and reading people. The glib answer to that is I'm a yorkshreman, right, and we're famous for having an opinion on everything.
Right.
You can always tell yourman, but you can't tell him much, right. So it comes naturally to me to say, yeah, okay, I've got an opinion on this, and it's this. But there's always some logic and some reasoning behind that. But this is It's a bit like being a vet. Now I'm not a vet, but there are times when a vet has to say to somebody, I'm afraid it's not good news. Okay, here's the outlook, here's the things we
can do. We can manage this situation. I can't cure this right, And that's often the case with me, often not so often as vets. Actually, more of the time it really is a case of, Okay, I think we can change a few things and we'll make a big transformation here. And that's what you see most of the time. There's always an undercurrent at the end of the show, which is keep practicing. You know, you've got to keep at it. You've got to keep this stuff up because
if you don't, it will probably slide. No surprise, I guess.
Just having a strong opinion, though, leave you open for criticism, and how do you deal with that. I'm only asking you this because I'm a very opinionated person and I find if I hang my hat on something, it's not a one size fits all and being an opinionated person can allow yourself to be open for you're wrong. Do you know what I mean? So, just having a strong opinion leave you open for criticism?
Well, it absolutely does, of course, And you've got to be intelligent about this. I mean, it's not a one size fits all for all dogs. But there are general principles, right, So let's say, for example, a general principle you should always reward good behavior well, not very controversial. That don't
think I can get criticized on that one. Another principle might be, Look, if you want to reduce an unwanted behavior, whether you're a human or a dog, that behavior either needs to have no outcome at all, in other words, tensioncy you can ignore it for example, or in an appropriate way. Right, very important that there needs to be some sort of consequence. Right, So if you or across the line somewhere, there's going to be a bit of a consequence. Otherwise we don't learn, but that consequence is
going to be appropriate. Now, some people might take me to task on that, but I'll defend that one. I think I'm right. But ultimately you get to a point where you say, you know what, You've got your opinion, and that's your way of seeing it. I've got mine. We're all entitled to an opinion. Nobody's necessarily right, nobody's necessarily wrong. Somebody might like what I say and vice versa, and that's the way of the world, is it?
Well, you might be like me. I mean, I'm opinion of it, but I also really like opinionated people. Strange part to my personality though, is I'm a bit like Hannibal Lecter, I actually had a good analogy. I don't eat people, but I find in conflict that I love opinionated people. But I never see someone being right or wrong. I don't see myself as being right or wrong necessarily because someone can argue with me and raise a point
that can change my mind. And so therefore I love good comp I love an opinionated person because I'm never taking it personally.
You're right. That's really interesting. That's very much like me, because what I've always said, if I get into an argument, I say argument, I'm mean argument in a sense of discussion. You know, so you're putting your point for they've put their point. Four they make a really good point. You think, hmm, I'm very happy to go. Do you know what, You're right? I hadn't thought of that, and I'll switch me the thing. So again, it's quite a fun thing this. People say,
you're always right, you're always right. Yeah, that's because if I ever discovered, if I ever discovered that I'm wrong, I'll change my opinion. I won't be wrong for long.
Yeah, you know, and you know what's so weird, And sometimes I'll be really belligerent I'll sound really opinionated, which contimidate, you know, can intimidate people a little bit so they sort of back away, but I can then be swayed. So it's an interesting way to be I think it's just a part of my maybe dominant personality to portray things that way. But as I said, and like you said, you know, give us the right piece of information and we'll take it on board.
It's interesting in this conversation because it also reminds me one of the other things I discovered about Australian and Australians if I make and that's that you love to
just call it like it is. It came over with the guy from England I've been working with for years directly, you know, works behind the camera Lola, and he was having a discussion with somebody in a meeting and they came up with an idea and he said this very English this he said, hmm, now, my only concern with that is and everybody looks a bit perplexed, And I said, Michael means that's a bad idea, And everybody's like, well, mate,
just tills it's a bad idea. That's fine, you know, And I love that about or it's just like just nobody's going to take your friends and just just say it like it is. And you know what, that's a bit like dogs. Dogs are just like, look, if I'm naughty, tell me, if I'm good, tell me that. How else am I going to learn? Don't couch it? In lots of sort of gray fluffy terms, we don't get.
That had to the chase, you know, god to the chase. Dogs, I have the chase. How close do you think over your time with dogs? Like? How close to human behavior are our pet dogs at home? Because I swear my pet dog is close to I mean, his personality is so big. I feel like he's close to talking to me, and I relate to my dog and I can see my behavior mirrored in some way. So I just thought, you know, how close to human behavior is dogs?
Pretty close? A lot, a lot more close than people traditionally would have your belief right, So when I first answered this, it was very much the kiss. And when you study any animal behavior, they really tell you must not anthropomorphise. I humanize dogs or animals in general, right, different, of course they're different, but they run it down your next so much you'd be forgiven for thinking that never the twins shall meet anything that you're ever going to
learn about human psychology, dang going to apply. Ah, that's completely different with the dog. The truth is it's not the sort of botmand of human psychology is the simple stuff. What motivates is, you know, why we do things more because it feels good, why we do do things less frequently because it doesn't feel so good. That's the same with dogs. So there's we've got a lot in common.
And interestingly, when you even things like medicine, right you talk to a vet about dog medicine human medicine, things like paracetamol, it's the same thing.
Right.
They get chicken flavored and be flavored, by the way, we just get ordinary paracetamol. A lot of our DNA is actually shared. But back to your points. You look at the dog and you think, yeah, I think I know what's going on. Talking to them too much in great, big, long sentences. They don't get so much. You know, they get to in a voice and they get facial expressions. So we know in the last few years because they've used very clever video track sort of eye tracking technology
showing dogs videos and working out what they're thinking. By looking at a screen with a person's face, right, we now know that they understand what a frown is and a smile and all that kind of thing. So yeah, there's loaders. We don't know about dogs, but the more we learn, it seems to me the general trend is we find similarities. So again, example, we're on a human's face, do you reckon a dog is focusing to figure out what we're thinking, what mood we're in.
Have a guess, I would say the eyes, you would.
I would have said that as well. That's also what people tend to see. Next matter, you know, love this it's your forehead.
Well that, but my partner's got botox, so like I don't understand. He must be really confused. You must have no idea.
You go, well, that does happen? Actually, yeah, the forehead, right, the muscle across the flat muscle across the front's got the frontiers muscle, and it's that muscle that drives your eyebrows. And that's the bit that makes your eyes expressive, because your eyes themselves, all right, your pupils dilate, But really that's not a big deal. The thing that we think makes eyes expressive is it's your eyebrows. So when I said to you, where do you think you know? It's
not your eyes, it's your forehead. Your eyebrows went oh, right, So if you think about your frown, it's that I'm not happy with this really. Oh and then there's say oh, I love you who sort of eyebrows? You know, So dog's focus there and they go, okay, I get it. Secondly, you're going to love this. Your knows right, we're not so aware. But when we're scared, our nostrils flare just slightly. We're talking millimeters here, right.
Oh, no, minor a lot. I can literally pick up foxtelp from my house, like from my nostrils. I've got a big nose though.
Well, because the dog's down there looking up there, like being at the dentist, you're always looking up their nose. Right, So a dog looks at you and you know, so let's say it's a dog you haven't mess and you know you look at them and you go, oh, CROI and this is a big dog. Right, your nostrils flare. The dogs are you're scared, right, So they're picking up on all these little things about humans and they understanders
kind of more than you realize. And that's just the visual thing, you think of all the other senses, they're pretty good at picking up human emotions.
So yeah, my dog actually does like my partner a little bit more. And yet so while he's away, I sometimes get my phone out and video chat the dog, and the dog does not respond. Even in this line. It's nothing audible at all, even though that's his favorite person's voice, like Oscar could give no care to the phone whatsoever. And it's almost as though he can't hear my partner, only can't see his face what's going on?
And I'm trying to video what'sapp my dog to my partner while overseas very unsatisfiedly.
The answer to that is that's one of those things we don't entirely know.
Yes, we'll get there.
What I will tell you is some dogs do get it and some don't.
Right.
I think it's something to do with the electronic sort of medium, Right you and I look at a screen and go, oh, okay, yeah, that's that guy and that you know, and that's his voice. Some dogs absolutely get it. Some don't. So I give a good example of that. I used to have these two rock Violer's Axel and Gordon.
Right.
Axel never watched the tell. He didn't get it, didn't understand why everybody's looking in the corner of the room. Everybody's mad. Right, He'd walk off and go into the kitchen. Gordon would sit there, he'd watch the tell. He'd love it. You could see his little head go from left to right or something across the screen, you know. And then one day Dad gotta tell levision program, So we put it on the first night, it's gone out right, Gordon's between me and the telly, as you imagined. Right, So
on comes the show. On comes Dad's face. Dad starts to talk, right, and it was hilarious. He looked at the telly and then he looked back at me, and then he looked at the telly, and then he walked out of the room. He just couldn't.
Two of them.
So what we do know is that some dogs do get it and some dogs just don't like yours. And yeah, why we don't entiety know.
Did you get a chance to meet Julia Morris. She does a fantastic job. She's hilarious narrating this show. I'm sure you've seen in the first few episodes. Did you get to meet her in the flesh?
You know, I didn't, And that's one of the It's one of those things about working in Telly. Often you don't meet those of the people. It's such a show. Maybe if I come back, I mean, what we've got to hope is that everybody loves the show and then they want a second series, and then maybe I'll get a misa.
Well, maybe we'll get you to come back here just to I don't know, say what, see if you can time a dinger. You know, we've got other things for you to do.
I had to go an Aussie cattle though, so and you don't see many of those in the UK.
Yeah. Well, well, the last question I have for you is something to ask everyone who joins the podcast. I think this is episode like two hundred and ninety eight. What is something from behind the scenes, something that we won't see, maybe kind of like a bit of a behind the scenes secret of you making this show, maybe even in the UK and now here in Australia.
Oh that's a good one, isn't it. People often ask me, do you really fix this dog in a day? And I always say no, Actually I don't probably in about an hour to two hours, because what you see of the whole day, he probably took ten hours to film.
Because the bit in the morning where I'm in the car going today, I'm going to this place to see this kind of dog, Well, we've probably filmed that a couple of times because I stumbled over to me words or a bus went past, or what you're on the yuman, then yeah, you're on the human yet, and then you're going to see that card drive past, don't you. So the person who was with me in the car had to jump out with some case trying pod ready. We drove past two or three times, and back in the car,
go to the house. Then you're going to see me get out of the car, and then you're going to see me knock on the Do you get the idea. By the time I actually meet the people, it's probably ten ten to thirty in the morning, and then we have to talk about the problem, and then I've got to see the problem. The actual training bit, you know, typically takes about two hours in the afternoon, So I believe, Yeah,
it's real pressure, it's I reckon. It's one of the trickiest jobs in Telly, because you're not just presenting a show. You've got to make a difference to a dog such that the owners who aren't access of course, hopefully at the end of the day are going to say that's amazing. It's like a different dog, you know. So all day long I've listened to the problem, looking at the dog, thinking can I really do this? And I've already got maybe a couple of hours to bring that change around.
So yeah, do I fix it in a day? No, I don't, mate.
I just want to say thank you so much. I have really loved the first few episodes of this show. I think Australia will too. You're an honorary Australian if you ask me, and I look forward to talking to you maybe in twelve months with series two.
Hey, let's up, sir, honor Australian. I'll take that. That's a great feeling. Thank you.
We'll have to speak to the missus and see if she wants to move here permanently.