Contrary to the old-school focus on commands and obedience, it’s not always necessary to tell your dog what to do. Automatic, volunteered behaviors (Defaults) are an important feature of a well-behaved dog, and ideally they start in puppyhood. But don’t stop reading if your dog is all grown up and not very polite. It’s not too late!

The mother of all behaviors, as they say, is attention. If you can’t get your dog’s attention, you can’t expect to get the responses you want. But targeting is definitely the Swiss army knife of behaviors. When your dog can target, she has a tool with an amazing variety of terrifically useful functions. Yes, soon your dog will be able to uncork wine bottles and file her own nails! Well, almost.