The Human and The Hell Hound

Hello, dog peeps. Jack here. Just a quick one before we get into this episode. You may or may not be aware that when I'm not talking dog stuff with Max, I in fact interview people who are incarcerated in prisons across the United States on a show called One Minute Remaining Stories from the Inmates. And that show has been nominated for an award in America. And I would love your support if you've got 60 seconds to click the link in the show notes of this episode and just vote for my show. That would be amazing if you could. Thank you very much indeed. Oh, and don't forget to verify your email address. Otherwise, the vote does not count. Thank you. It's the Dog People Podcast with your host Jack Lawrence. Secretly, I decided to start this podcast for some free dog training advice. You know, Malinois seem to be like the dog at the moment. Like, I think people see them on Instagram doing these incredible things.

Yeah.

Go, oh my God, that's awesome. And then they get one like, oh my God, what the fuck have I done? And Max O'Neill.

You would not believe how many people I meet And I go, what made you want to get, say, an Aussie Shepherd? They go, I don't know. I go, had you met one before?

They go, no.

If you want to ask me how often I walk my own dog a week, it's only twice a week. It's the Dog People Podcast, a podcast hopefully giving you a no-nonsense approach to dog training so you never have to shout, it's okay, it's friendly. My name is Jack Lawrence. I'm not a dog trainer, but that's why we have Max O'Neill, Down Under Dog Trainer, the man with everything to do with dogs, knows it all. And speaking of Nose, nose.com.au, an insurance company by pet lovers for pet lovers. Make sure you check them out. They're an amazing company. nose.com.au, issued by Pacific International Insurance. But Max, it's not just us today. We have a special guest joining us in DogPod HQ.

Yeah, we've got one that we've got, tried to bag for a while and we're happy to finally have in the studio. We've got Sarah from The Human and the Hellhound, who also operates here on the Gold Coast. Welcome, Sarah.

Thanks, guys.

Happy to be here. The human and the hellhound. That's fascinating. So do you have a dog that is classified as the hellhound?

I do. She is a black Malinois.

Oh, okay.

Say no more.

There we go. A black Malinois. Oh, even better. Yeah. I mean, it's funny. I've got what I would classify as a hellhound, but she's certainly no Malinois, but she's certainly given me trouble over the years. Did you— so obviously we're going to get into your story and I'm going to kick that off for us. How did you get into dog training? Was it getting hold of a hellhound and going, I need to learn? Like me, I got hold of a hellhound and went, oh no, I need to know what's going on here.

A little bit of a different story, actually. So I still— Max and I have had this conversation a few times. I still struggle to call myself a dog trainer because it wasn't really something that I ever planned to get into.

Yeah, sure.

So my background's in rescue. That was where I kind of started. So I saw a lot of hellhounds in there, obviously. So many behavioural issues. And especially, you know, as the industry with that has kind of progressed, a lot of the balance training has been pushed out and more dogs getting euthanased than actually like rehabilitated because you can't use a lot of aversive equipment and things. So I figured there wasn't really a hell of a lot I could do in rescue. So I started to come out and do a little bit more dog training. No formal qualifications, but a lot of experience. So I've had a lot of mentors that I've worked under, some pretty well-known.

Yeah. 20+ years, eh?

22 years.

Yeah.

Professional experience, which is crazy.

I've had 8.

But you also have every certificate known to man. What a man, like honestly the most educated human being on the planet, which he puts— I'm actually glad you're here because I mean, I'm someone who's not educated whatsoever in anything I do. I dropped out of high school. So I mean, yeah, I mean, so it's nice to actually have a brethren among us, Mr. Certificate over here who's got it, who knows it all. So, well, that's great. So with doing the foster stuff, or, you know, so did you have like an agency yourself or a foster company, or were you just helping fosters?

No. So I've worked, I started at the SPCA in New Zealand, which was way, way, way back when. And then I've worked for a few big rescues here and a few of the smaller ones too. So, you know, taking dogs in that can't necessarily be in shelters or not really for the average hand. So I worked with a lot of what we call red zone dogs that just cannot, they're a massive liability. They don't really tend to foster those ones out anymore. They kind of, yeah, which is a little bit sad because you see some pretty cool transformations with those types of dogs.

Yeah.

Similar to the things that we're going to be speaking about today. Knowing everything that I know now, yeah, it's just crazy how much people don't know in that industry. Everybody's got beautiful intentions.

Yeah, it's so true. And that's— I have a similar background in the fact, obviously I haven't gone into it as you have, but that's kind of— that's where I came from. Like, we lost a dog and then we decided to foster and we started fostering a lot of dogs. And you do realize how much, again, these people have the best intentions at heart and do wonderful things to save these dogs, but they truly don't seem to have a lot of education in respect to what the dogs need.

Yeah.

Like, one of my biggest frustrations with the fosters I was working with was this whole, you know, the dogs are not to leave your property until all the vaccinations are done, anything like that. They stay in the back of the property and all this sort of stuff. And to me, you know, and I was getting dogs with such high drive. The dog I have, super high drive, you know, and at the time I didn't think I was going to keep her. So I play by the rules and didn't take her out into the world and show her the world until we'd done the right thing. And eventually I got to the point where I was getting— one time they sent me a German Shepherd cross, what was it, cross Kelpie. 2 hugely high-driven dogs. And it was a puppy. And I was like, guys, and I emailed them and said, look, I really think this dog needs to get out in the world. Like, obviously I'll do it carefully. And they're like, no, absolutely not. And I broke the rules.

Yeah.

Because I'm like, I don't care because I've seen this before. And I know if this dog doesn't get out into the world and see things, it's going to be reactive as hell.

Yeah.

It's just, just one of those breeds. So that, that is, you know, something you do see a lot. Do you think, you know, that through education that can change, or do you think it's just one of those things that will always be ingrained in that sort of—

I think, you know, much like sales with anything, you sell on emotion.

Yeah.

Right. So selling, you know, a high drive dog that will work great for food and, you know, they put it in a harness and everything looks great, you know, for reactivity and things. Yet you start talking about e-collars and prongs and stuff and people are like, absolutely not, because it doesn't sell. Right. It's too much of a strong point of opinion. Whereas half those dogs could be rehomed if they used those types of tools. So I think you only know what you know, and then when you know better, you can do better, right? I think it was like some Lady Maya that came up with that quote. And education is definitely important. But much like we see a lot in the industry is that if somebody challenges what you believe, it's not always met with, wow, that's so cool. Like you and I are very open-minded about like, I didn't know that.

Like, that's awesome.

I always learn.

Yeah.

Whereas other people are like, nah, I'm not even going to take that information in. And You know, a lot of dog lovers in rescue, obviously, like I said, nobody gets in there with malicious intent, but they're also very emotional people a lot of the times. And sometimes feel like, you know, maybe euthanasia is the best thing for that dog because that makes them feel better than seeing an e-collar used on that dog.

Which is wild, really.

In my opinion, I agree.

We'll put the dog down. Like, I mean, you know, I think ultimately I'm My dog Kira is, you know, and I'm not blowing smoke up my own arse here, but I think she's very lucky she got me.

Oh, 1 million percent.

Because if she didn't, she would either be confined to a backyard, never off a lead, or she could have even gone down the path of being put down because she's not aggressive and reactive in that way. But she, when, you know, when that's how Max and I first sort of met, she was hot. She just wanted to chase everything and she chased a motorbike down the highway and, you know, she was just running off. She was running away from my place, you know, going streets away. Could have got hit by a car, all those sorts of things. Just a problem dog. And, you know, I've had my own history with a problem dog years ago, which we've spoken about many times on this podcast, which I did rehome. And that guilt of that has obviously, you know, made me realize that I need to work harder myself. But, you know, this is the thing. I think they go to all these houses with these good intentions, but, you know, people aren't willing to, you know, they hear things like punishment and stuff like that. And it's like, oh no. Bad words. But, you know, I saw it even on the Instagram post the other The other day, a guy was training a very reactive Great Dane and he spoke about punishment. Just that word in the comments section, like people just think punishment means you're whacking the animal. You know, it's something, it's abusive. You know, it's just like this word. But anyway, we're going really down a different track here.

No, but you're right. Like, you know, one of the things we're doing at the moment is reaching out to rescues and offering like massive discounts to particularly fosterers. 'Cause like, hey, this is not even your dog long-term, but if you want the best shot at getting this dog, you know, adopted, let us help you. Like, we'll do it at cost. Like, let's just like do our bit. We've reached out to rescue organizations like, hey, I'm happy to come in, like upskill your staff, like free training days, do offer this like massive discount to your, you know, your fosterers and rescuers, etc. Let's like, let's try and get dogs out the system. Oh, sounds lovely. What sort of training style do you use? Are you positive only? And you go, no, I'm not, but I'm not going to. Oh no. Thank you for your time. I really appreciate it. It's like—

100%.

Oh yeah, it's, it's insane.

Which, you know, I know personally and can vouch for that, that I know exactly where those dogs end up.

Yeah. Oh yeah. So in a freezer, then the ground.

I was going to say, I didn't want to say it.

No, no, no. Say it how it is. Yeah. Well, like another, another interesting thing, you know, if the theme of this conversation is like good intention doesn't always equal good outcomes, right? So like, you know, we did a reel the other day that popped off a bit about, you know, Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce getting a Samoyed and everyone was just lighting up in the comments. It's an interesting read. And people going like, oh, you know, the whole adopt, don't shop thing. And I'm like, yeah, like, I get that. But people can still get the wrong breed and have the good intention. Like, I've, you know, I've met people who are rescuers with great intentions and they go, oh, we just wanted to get the dogs out of there. So we got 3 of them.

Yeah.

And they got, you know, a German Shepherd, a Doberman, a Husky, or this and this. And it's like, yeah, but that doesn't always equal a good outcome. Like, again, those dogs just fought and this and that. And it's just— Yeah, education's everything.

And that's the thing. And, you know, fostering dogs is such a great thing to do. And I've mentioned it on this podcast before. Like if you're thinking about getting a dog, foster a dog and all that sort of stuff. But at the same token, you know, in saying that, you know, as you said, you've got these fosterers who've got such good intentions. They want to do the best by these animals. But again, you know, the animals are coming in the house and they're sort of running amok. There's no sort of boundaries put in place for these dogs and sort of stuff. So you're kind of almost setting them up to fail again.

Yeah.

You're lowering their adoptability.

Exactly. Because, you know, these people, again, they've got the best intentions at heart, but it's just like, and they're not you know, wanting to punish, you know, there's, you know, and that sort of thing. And you just see the, again, it's that cycle of, you know, every time I fostered out a dog from, from here, I always said to people taking it, please, if you have any issues, please just call me and bring the dog back here.

Yeah.

Because don't, don't, you know, whatever, I will not judge you whatsoever. If there's any issues, bring them back. Never got a call back. I mean, I don't know whether that's because I set the dogs up nicely or whether they just, you know, were too embarrassed to call, whatever. But, you know, and I think there's probably not enough of that either that goes on in that sort of situation. Whereas with breeders, as we know, you go to a reputable, very good breeder and you have issues, they will take their dogs back. We've spoken about that. Yeah, the good ones. The good ones will. And we've spoken about that a number of times on the podcast as well.

Yeah.

So anyway, so we've obviously taken this conversation in a very different angle than we were sort of thinking about. The other thing that we've spoken about a lot on here as well is with these bigger rescues as well. There's one near us that's— I always talk about it doing the fire sales and they do this weekend, every dog. $50 or something and you're just like, what are you doing? Yeah, I think that needs to be regulated as well. You can't be selling dogs.

The whole industry is unregulated.

Yeah, it's wild that these dogs are just— because as we've said before, like on the weekend the kids are bugging dad and they go, I need to see it. And he's like, I'm not spending. But I'm going to say $50, you know, screw it, we'll go get the dog. Spend $50 on the dog, the dog becomes a problem, they just get rid of the dog because it was only $50, you know.

And it's just a thing.

Yeah.

You know, like I think that's another thing, even going into what we're going to be talking about, the nervous system, is that like they're living, breathing sentient thing. Like they have, they have all those feelings. And in rescue, I can't remember the exact terminology, but it's like a 3 by 3 by 3 rule, right? So like the 3 days, the 3 months, and then 3 years or whatever, 3 weeks, sorry, 3 months, whatever it is.

Yeah.

You probably know a little bit more about that.

Yeah.

Is that dog comes home, maybe it's a little bit shut down, unsure. And then all of a sudden, 3 weeks later, behaviour problems start happening. 3 months down the track, dog bites someone. And it's like, because that dog's become more like, okay, this, this starts to feel like a bit of a safe place for me because at the end of it, we all want to feel safe with our nervous system. And then that dog gets returned and now it's got a bite history. It gets put down.

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So you've got the Malinois. Was that— was your Malinois not your first dog? No.

Not my first dog. No, I definitely don't recommend getting a Malinois as a first dog. Maybe get a Cavoodle, but even then they can have some pretty extreme drives.

So been bitten by more Cavoodles than Malinois.

Yeah, Labradoodles are my—

And can you say your dog's name again? This one I always butcher.

Technically it's Mims is what we call her, but Mimi.

You're even struggling to pronounce your own dog's name.

You don't even have your head wrapped around that.

My breeder will kill me for that one. So a bit of a backstory of her. She was originally meant to go to a guy who unfortunately passed away before he was able to get her. He was in the army and very close with the breeder, and they sent her up to the army and she just wasn't a good fit for a number of different reasons that's not my business to talk about. So she came back to the breeder and I was actually inquiring because I'd met a few of her, like, littermates. And she said that she had her and she was a very sweet girl. And yeah, she came to me and took her a little while to settle in because same kind of thing. She'd been moved around a couple of different places and stuff. So her name actually means— now it could be one or the other. I'm probably going to butcher that. Either always remember or never forget, but same kind of principle. And she is named obviously in the legacy of her original owner. So yeah, so I just kept the name and we just call her Mims, which is obviously a lot easier for everybody to pronounce as well.

Yeah, it's like saying, you know, that anemone.

Anemone.

Yeah, that's where I get stuck.

So as someone who owns a Malinois, because we, again, we've spoken about this before, obviously Malinois have kind of become— they kind of exploded because of, I mean, I think Instagram Really, and the reels you see. I mean, they're incredible dogs. They're incredibly smart. They can do some insane things. And people see them on Instagram going, oh, wow, I want a dog that does that. You know, for someone who's maybe going, I'm going to go and get a Malinois, like, what would your advice be to someone who's thinking about getting a Malinois?

I'll probably be scrutinised for this, but I definitely would say that if you're a softer person and very much into your, like, positive-only training, you're probably going to struggle. quite a bit. Not to say it's impossible.

Putting yourself in danger.

Yeah, there's definitely some trainers out there like, you know, that I've seen on Instagram that do wonders with that. But like, where do you draw the line at positive only? Because I know a lot of positive only trainers that are like, pin your dog. And if I don't know about you, but if you've tried to pin a Malinois, that doesn't end up very well.

Also, that doesn't sound overly positive.

Not overly positive, is it?

I mean, you know.

Bit of alpha bro.

Yeah, that's interesting.

So yeah, I would say like, I mean, any, again, reputable breeder is not going to sell a Malinois to the wrong person where they're like, you can kind of tell personality-wise, like, And you really do, like, I have to put my emotions aside a lot of the time because she has some very big emotions some days. And much like us, you know, female dogs versus male dogs, as you know, like the males generally tend to be a little bit more emotionally stable.

And I can vouch for mine, it's a female.

Yeah.

Yep.

And so much like us, you know, we can be a little bit more emotional and obviously our cycles go up and down and that, you know, same thing, regulation becomes a little bit harder. Coming up to her heat cycle, she's an absolute bitch. And then—

I'm staying well and truly away from this conversation.

I'm not commenting. I'm letting Sarah comment on this one and go.

Yeah. But, you know, once she's in her cycle, then she's super sooky. So there's a lot of, you know, I try— I know we try not to humanize dogs, but there are a lot of similarities.

I say this all the time, like, we always go so far away from anthropomorphizing or humanizing that it's just like, it's the best way for people to understand it. Sometimes it's like, They are so similar. We're both mammals.

They have the same type of system.

I always, I always relate my dog back to my children. Yeah, it's really in a lot of ways very similar to having young children, you know, boundaries, limitations, rules, you know, even down to when you've got a puppy, nap times and stuff like that. It's like it's all the same.

You know, when your kids eat shit food, they have shit behavior.

Yeah. And when they don't burn energy, they start getting cranky and they start getting up to mischief and all the rest of it. It's no different. You know, so obviously Malinois, they are Technically easier to train in the sense that they're very smart and stuff like that. But as you said, you have to be more of an— I don't want to say the alpha, but you have to be a strong personality.

Yeah, you can't take shit.

Yeah, you can't be a pushover. You know, you can't be someone that allows the dog to get away with murder because they will take advantage of that and they can get out of control pretty quick.

And they're so smart that like they know if you know what you're doing or not. Like she's taught me a hell of a lot. Like she— I would say that I'm a— I would say I was a pretty good dog handler. I think I'm a better dog handler than I am. probably a more competent dog trainer, but she has made my skills go through the roof because of the things that I've had to learn very quickly.

Yeah.

So, you know, you can be a little bit more spatial pressure, pushy with some dogs, a little bit more correction on a lead and things like that. And most dogs will tolerate that. With her, absolutely not. She will come back for you. And it's all a mutual respect thing with her. So we have very clear markers, clear expectations, like you mentioned, boundaries. She's on a great diet, her needs are met, um, you know, which keeps her pretty stable and happy. And she respects me and I respect her.

It's like driving a Ferrari. If you're a shit driver, you'll get exposed much quicker in a Ferrari than you will in a Corolla. And same with the Malinois. It's just like, you can get one as a beginning doggo if you want, but you're going to find out very quickly that you're not as good as you think you are. And you know, where an out-of-control, uh, Labrador might steal the cake off the table, an out-of-control Malinois is going to make someone look like Swiss cheese pretty quickly.

So Yeah, interesting. You said something there I just want clarification on. You said, I'm a better dog handler than I am a dog trainer. Or do you think you are?

Probably, yeah.

What's the difference between the two?

For me, I think just being so heavily in rescue and not having a lot of that terminology, like as you said, some people are really into the nuance of everything, the words of things, right? And that's probably, I would say, a weakness of mine is I'm not very good with the terminology. But in terms of showing you how to do something, I'm an exceptional dog handler, and especially working with red zone dogs. Speedy, very, very speedy reflexes, very good at reading dogs and explaining that in like we spoke about layman terms. But if you put me in a room full of other like exceptional dog trainers, I'm probably going to seem like the most incompetent person there based on the language that I don't quite understand either, whereas owners don't either, you know. So it's not always like that's what makes you a good one. But I think like you said, we get caught up in this whole like, you know, who knows how to explain it in the most scientific way.

Oh, trust me, I watch some reels and I'm just like, swipe. I'm like, you lost me.

Yeah, there's a lot of dog trainers guilty of just trying to appease the other dog trainers and impress them. It's like, well, they're not the ones, they're not your client.

Yeah, 100%. It's like Joe Blows like me who just do not, I just want, I want it broken down in simple terms. Like keep it simple, stupid for me because, you know, I get confused. Speaking of, again, another question here. You mentioned red zone dogs for people listening going, what's a red zone dog? Can you explain what you mean by that?

They are, you don't really see or hear of them a lot anymore, but basically the high bite risk dogs. So high flight, high bite. So you open that door, they're either coming straight for you, or they'll come for you and then try and gap it straight past you. Um, they are, I would say, very good at hiding how they're feeling because they've been like— you don't just— a red zone dog doesn't just come out the womb like that, right? Like, obviously you have neurological issues and stuff where you do have those neurological type dogs, but these ones have been through a lot of shit.

Yeah.

So much like, I guess if you compare it to people, it's like, you know, you had a traumatic childhood and then that continued on in relationships and then like you just abuse after abuse after abuse. And a lot of these dogs kind of much like if you got bullied your whole life and then they kind of turn around and they're like, you know what, I've had enough of this shit. And then it works. Now that dog knows that they can bite to get their way out of that situation. And that's quite— that takes a lot of patience and a lot of trust to build a relationship with either a person or a dog like that to be able to rehabilitate them, which is what I personally love doing, rehabilitating those types of dogs.

Sure.

And just because that dog might be good for me in my home doesn't necessarily— that's not going to mean that that's going to be a liability to rehome to someone of the general public, right? Because if you miss that one signal, that could be a very serious— and it's not like a bite and get out. They will do some serious harm.

Oh, 100%. I mean, I look at like that, the probably the most serious bite I got last year by that Mal, maybe in the leg. Like the thing I walked away from going like, I am glad that I'm a physically able physically strong person who was able to overpower this dog. Because if you weren't, or if that dog got the better of you, like, it wasn't stopping. And same, like, when we talk about these red zone dogs, like, we're not talking about a computer going like, stop brushing my ears. Yeah, it's like, hey, I don't like people anymore. Like, you know, I've climbed that ladder of aggression. I've seen a nip doesn't work, this doesn't work. Like, I'm just gonna rag you all the way.

They don't trust people. Yeah, you know, and they've just been let down so much generally by people. Or they could just be those dogs that are left— like, sometimes it's not even a trauma thing, right? It can just be no exposure to things. So like those dogs that live on a property that that have never seen somebody and they're like, you come in here and I'll actually eat you, you know. Um, still technically classed a red zone dog because they're still a liability, um, and they just don't know who you are or what you're about. And they have like maybe that one person that feeds them, and even then they could still have a bad relationship or no relationship at all. Like, we've been to seize dogs from properties where they've never had any human interaction. They're just in cages. And some of these dogs were like being bred as well, which was—

Yeah.

Like crazy, right? So they take the puppies, they'll usually sedate the dog with the food and stuff to take the puppies out of the kennel and stuff. And now those dogs are, you know, we wonder why we've got aggression cases and things, but no human interaction whatsoever. They just throw food over a fence and that would still be classified as a red zone dog, even though nothing necessarily bad's ever happened, but they just don't rely on people. So. Yeah.

Well, look, if anyone wants to reach out to you that may need some help with a potential dog like that, where can they get you?

Instagram, usually. I'm not a very technology type of person. But yeah, Instagram, through Max, through you guys, whatever to be pushed through. But yeah, Instagram, human@thehumanandthehellhound. It's a long name.

The Human and the Hellhound. We'll put the links to all this in the show notes of the episode. But you are going to stick with us because we're going to do another episode with you about— will you explain what we're going to be talking about coming up in the episode?

A little bit about the nervous system. So just what I personally see in dogs I think that's lacking these days. And I think the thing that we hear a lot is do more, whereas I think we need to do the opposite and do a lot less.

Okay. All right. Get ready for that next episode because it is going to be one not to be missed. It is the Dog People Podcast. As always, don't forget, if you've got any questions, jump in the Facebook group, the Dog People Podcast, or on Instagram, and we'll get them answered for you. The podcast is a Mashed Pumpkin production hosted by Jack Lawrence and Max O'Neill. Edited, produced, and audio production by Jack Lawrence. The new Red Bull Dragonberry Energizer is now at McDonald's. Made to lock in.

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