Dogs can be such gorgeous companions—lovely to come home to, fun to play with and a good reason to take a walk every day. As long as they are well-adjusted, relaxed and well-behaved, dogs are an absolute joy to have around. We might focus our attention on good dog behaviour, but it is the behaviour of their owners that is the real key.

Training dogs is absolutely not just a matter of rewarding good behaviour with treats. That could just as easily result in dog behaviour that is quite obnoxious—like the one that leapt onto my desk and devastated my keyboard recently. This dog could do flips, but he could not behave himself in a way that made him good to have around. He hadn’t been trained, he had been taught to do tricks.