[QuickSilver]

Okay, so I watched the bulldog episode on Hulu. Here are my thoughts:

* It was good to see that Cesar recognized that she was getting more keyed up by the prong collar, and he switched her to a gentle leader.

* He gave some good explanation of her body language in the beginning.

* The vibration collar seemed harmless.

* This really bugged me: Bella was billed as this hyper-aggressive dog on the verge of being PTS, but she really was not all that aggressive! She had food guarding issues, which tons of dogs do, and she was dog-aggressive, again, which tons of dogs are. The owner admitted that he had never worked with a trainer. She had not been given a stable home, so of course she had some issues. The real problem here was completely clueless people.

* Cesar provoked her unnecessarily by hitting her, kicking her, staring at her, etc. It's a self-feeding cycle: Cesar claims the dog is aggressive,and behaves aggressively towards the dog. The dog either submits, and it's a win for Cesar. OR, the dog gets aggressive, and it's used as proof that oooooh, this is a scary, crazy dog. The real hero in this episode was Bella, who endured the shenanigans of her owner, and then of Cesar with typical canine flexibility and grace.

* The techniques Cesar used to reduce food guarding are fine (though again, no hitting, please!), but I can imagine Victoria Stilwell working with Bella and getting great results with far less drama. Which is perhaps why she is less popular.

* Overall, it was a mishmash of good and bad training, and it's hard to sort out. I think Cesar is an okay trainer, but I just don't get why he is a household name when there are much better, more educated trainers out there using more modern, more gentle, and more effective techniques. That really bugs me.