The Prepper Broadcasting Network - Tactical Dog Training w/ The Next Generation

Episode Date: January 13, 2026

Colin and Ryan Buford take on dog training in this great episode from DEEP in the archives! Pick up their book Pint Sized Prepper Projects!! https://amzn.to/3NfzuEcBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/prepper-broadcasting-network--3295097/support.BECOME A SUPPORTER FOR AD FREE PODCASTS, EARLY ACCESS & TONS OF MEMBERS ONLY CONTENT!Get Prepared with Our Incredible Sponsors! Survival Bags, kits, gear www.limatangosurvival.comThe Prepper's Medical Handbook Build Your Medical Cache – Welcome PBN FamilyThe All In One Disaster Relief Device! www.hydronamis.comJoin the Prepper Broadcasting Network for expert insights on #Survival, #Prepping, #SelfReliance, #OffGridLiving, #Homesteading, #Homestead building, #SelfSufficiency, #Permaculture, #OffGrid solutions, and #SHTF preparedness. With diverse hosts and shows, get practical tips to thrive independently – subscribe now!

You've just joined the Prepper Broadcasting Network, where we promote self-reliance and independence. The views and opinions expressed are strictly those of the host or their guests. Visit us in the interactive chat room at Prepper Broadcasting.com. Welcome to the Next Generation Show, where we delve deeper into the little things in life. Here we explore the lost art of fatherhood, parenthood, and fundamental preparedness for the world today. I'm your host, Ryan Buford, along with my co-host, Young Master Cohen, and today we're broadcasting from the heart of the Pacific Northwest. Thanks for joining us today. There's not a moment to lose, so let's get right in. For those of you listening on blog talk radio, we ask that you switch over to prepperbroadcasting.com, where you'll find the best audio and an amazing chat room experience.

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So today we're going to be talking about tactical canine training. And this is something that I thought was an interesting way to get started, or an interesting way to follow up on the previous episode where we talked about, we did a tribute on Veterans Day for K9 units, canine dog units, past, present, and future. And one of the things that kind of drove that show home was the following week. It was the week before Thanksgiving break. And I got a message from my son's school. It was a text message that was alerting me to a lockdown in progress. And, you know, naturally, I freaked out a little bit for a moment until I read the rest of the message. And I realized that it was just a drill.

So thankfully, you know, it wasn't, there was no harm and nothing came from it. But it was kind of a neat concept that I hadn't really taken to heart as much as a parent. As a kid, you know, they were just starting to use canine units in schools. And we, I later found out that during that drill, the police had the opportunity to take canine units in to check lockers for whatever paraphernalia or weaponry or whatever it may be, whatever their sense were trained to find. And luckily, nothing was identified during the search, which is a good thing. But it's definitely a, for me, it was a little bit comforting in a way

because of the way the drill worked out. And it was an interesting safeguard that's rarely recognized in kind of the in all of the mass media coverage of school shootings and police on schoolyards and things like that. And it's a neat, to me it was kind of interesting in that respect, but it also kind of drove home this idea that, you know, our dogs had this innate ability to search and find everything, everything from, you know, drug paraphernalia to, you know, firearms or frisbees or moles underground or people or whatever you can think of. You mean, you name it and they can find it. And to me, it was especially interesting to think that, you know, these dogs that they use for police activity is,

they're obviously very well trained, and they're trained, and their skills are honed daily, and they're worked every day. But those skills are no different from a German shepherd to a German short hair, to, you know, some other dog that's out there doing its thing. And one of the neat things about that is that across the entire canine spectrum, they all have very similar traits in their ability to track and use their skills in order to help humans. And as a tactical advantage, this is where I really got interested. And this particular skill reigns supreme when it comes to having a tactical advantage right at your side.

Now, I have a few dogs, and some of you might know that one of the dogs that I have is deaf. She can't hear, and she has... She's partially blind, so she's definitely got some disabilities. But it has been an interesting challenge to train her because of some of the way things have happened over the course of the last few months. And to me, it's become a really rewarding and eye-opening experience. And it really showed me that, you know, it's kind of,

while canine units are very well trained and they know what to do, in the time when a time comes to do their task but seeing this deaf partially blind dog take to certain fashion they it's it kind of led me to believe that you know maybe the dogs that we have at home are a little bit more capable than we give them credit for now this particular dog was born deaf and was partially blind because or has some lack of vision because of a condition. And she's missing at least one of her key senses and one of another. The breeder that bred these types of dogs did the wrong form of breeding and they were going to put her down.

It was a condition known as lethal white or, you know, basically because of this breathing flaw where they have no pigment. And as a result of that, they generally have something on that gene is also related to their hearing. And sometimes their vision. But in all reality, having this partially capable canine has really been a surprise to all of us despite her disabilities and has proven, as I've mentioned in previous shows, she's proven to be a lethal rodent hunter. She's also become skilled at seeking out her favorite toy in any environment, day or night,

sometimes with a simple hand signal. One of the ways that we've trained her is by using hand signals, and we've trained her to sit, to lay down, to come, to stop, and even to open and close doors. And she's only a few months old, I'd say probably eight or nine months old. And just with some basic training, it's surprising to me how well she's taken to these things. And all of it has been done with the silent but efficient method of hand signals. She's still a pop and she has the long way to go.

But given this lack of hearing and coloration, she's not likely to, you know, know, take best and show, but she still shows promise as a search and rescue candidate, given her ability to find things on command. And as far as I'm concerned, she has the potential to earn her stripes in a different way. What does this matter when it comes to prepping? Well, we've talked earlier this month about the basic skill sets that are often bred into dogs, and they're bred in behaviors. We've also given some time to the heroes out there who have seen the front lines of combat,

disasters and life-threatening scenarios. Now we're going to combine these two principles, bring them into our own homes, and get into some key training advice and skill sets that can elevate your canine companion to a whole new level on your team by training them to search on command. Now by taking on some very simple training techniques you can train your dogs to find everything from family members to food, fire, firearms, or even fuel. You know, whatever might be needed in a time of disaster could be tracked or uncovered with the help of your faithful companion.

And if you're able to train them ahead of time, then if something should prevent you from accessing materials or supplies, you'll have one of the best resources around right at your side, ready to go. So on today's show, Colin and I are going to be talking about a special book that was written by an author Amber Higgins. And let's see, the book itself is called, for those of you who are interested, it's called Family Disaster Dogs. It's by Rinkled Pups Publishing, and I just picked up the Kindle version. Now I ran into Amber on social media, and she wound up getting in touch with me after one of the previous shows, and we were going to try to have her on tonight. She might still be available, but from the sounds of it, but I think she's traveling for the Thanksgiving break.

If she winds up coming on, we'll definitely bring her on to see if we can have a candid conversation with her on the phone. So, let's see, before we get too caught up in some of these specific training skills and techniques, Colin, would you like to share your fun fact of the week? Yo, yo, yo, fellow listeners. I am the co-host of the Next Generation Show, Colin, speaking with my father and the host of the show, Ryan. And today, we're going far with Saar, Search and Rescue. But before we get too far into that, I'd like to quickly cover the Crafty Call and Fun Fact of the Week. For those of you who aren't aware of the Crafty Call and Fun Fact of the Week, it's a segment on our show that gives you a fun tidbit of information that's usually related to the show topic.

Some of you might have already known, and some of you might have had no clue. So without any further ado, to get right into it. Today's Crafty Collin Fun Fact of the Week is, depending on atmospheric conditions, a well-trained air-scenting dog can detect a scent source from a distance of up to a quarter or even more mile away. An air-scenting dog being a search-and-rescue dog, that's especially trained to locate any human by scents. That's awesome. And that's an important fact to keep it. mind, especially on today's show, because of the distance that it's air scenting, right?

Yeah, air scenting. Air scenting, right. Because there's a big difference between scenting and tracking. And we'll try and get into that a little bit later with some of the specifics here. But I guess we may as well get started on what some of the handling and, you know, handling and requirements that you would want to keep in mind when doing some of this stuff. What do you think, buddy? Should we talk about how our dog did with the search and rescue training first,

or do you want to get into some basics? We can get into some basics and talk about that afterward. Okay. So first things first, obviously, training your dog to do certain tasks like intensive tactical training, search training, things like that, you'll want to keep in mind that you'll want to have, let's see, you want to be mindful of the time that you spend doing this. And you might think that, you know, the search and rescue dogs wind up, you know, in training for eight hours a day or whatever, 10 hours a day or two hours a day.

but what Amber Higgins recommends is actually a 30-minute max, but in that time, you highly concentrate desired training. And you can switch up the training so that if you want them to focus on one aspect of tracking, then you can do that. But the big thing is to maintain their focus in that 30-minute intervals while you're training. and the importance of doing that that sometimes is lost on new dog owners is that when you try to train a dog to do something over and over and over again and don't give them time to break and be a dog, they wind up getting burned out. And that doesn't matter whether it's a new puppy or, you know, an old hound. if they're not actively engaged and they're not actively learning the risk or not the risk the reward behavior that's ingrained with

training, they'll wind up getting distracted and they'll have a hard time paying attention. Especially the puppies because they are so distracted all the time. Yeah, especially puppies. So a couple of things that new owners should know is that, sorry for the noises folks, some of the things that new owners should know and keep in mind is that you'll definitely want to keep specific leashes on hand for specific tasks.

So, for example, if you're going to be doing a tracking event, you might have a 20-foot leash or a 30-foot leash, something like that. And you would only bring that leash out when you're doing tracking training. and if you are doing, you know, scent training to where you're trying to have them pick up a scent that's farther away, you might use a shorter leash. And one of the things about having different leashes is the dogs will recognize one leash from a different leash, as long as you focus on having one activity associated with. a certain leash and a separate activity associated with a different leash. Now you might think to

yourself, well, you know, if I want them to do four or five or ten different things, that means they have to have ten different leashes. Granted, while you're training, you might have to keep that in mind, but it may not be just the leashes that you have to work with. You could also use training tools. And experienced dog trainers will wind up using more often than not a training tool. And these are specific toys or reward items that are only provided to the animal once they've succeeded at the task. I had an opportunity to work with a few Air Force canines, and see, how do I put this tactfully? I was in the kennels with the handlers, and it was interesting to see how, how well behaved they were and whenever they would wind up getting distracted or if the handler ever

needed to maintain their attention they would have a very specific token whatever that token item was and if they brought it out the attention was instantly drawn to that token and so the handler knew what things to to guide the dog's behavior and steer their attention which is something that comes into play when it comes to some of these training things. So you can use leashes or you can use specialized tools. But the big thing is to make sure you always use the same ones for the same skills. For example, I mentioned that our dog, the deaf dog that's partially blind, is actually good at finding frisbees.

And she has chewed frisbees to the point where they're pretty much rags. and if you, even if you have a toy that has been destroyed, if you know that that dog likes the toy, even though it's ruined, consider hanging on to that toy and using it as a training tool. You can actually put that toy in a different location and use it to, like, drop it off in different locations and have them find it.

And they'll be able to track, that item very well because they know the sense so well. And then beyond that, once you start getting into this, you know, this object tracking and object, oh, how do you call it, preference, then you can really gain traction when it comes to training. A couple of the things that a lot of new dog handlers have problems with, and myself included, is yelling at a dog or, you know, those people who wind up beating a dog when they're not behaving. Something that I learned early on was that being aggressive toward a dog winds up being far more detrimental to their training abilities than ignoring bad behavior and rewarding good behavior.

And now it's hard to say to just ignore back behavior because if you've got a dog that's in there ripping out trash and causing a big mess, you know, a lot of that comes down to, you know, the owner and owning up to their own responsibilities because a dog is going to consider anything at their eye level to be essentially their property or they can do with it what they want because it's at that level. So by eliminating access as an owner, you were helping yourself and you'll be helping the dog. A big eye opener to me was this deaf dog was that when she would do something bad, like run out into the street or something, it did absolutely no good to use.

yell at her because she couldn't hear me. So as a result, we've had to train her to be very careful about paying attention to where we are and watching for hand signals. And even just today when I was heading out to take on the show, I wound up, you know, she was following us alongside the road while we were in the car. And I had to stop, open the door, and give her the signal for back. which is like a karate chop in the hand. And she knows that that's not good.

Whatever she was doing was not a good thing. So she counterword and tucked her tail on her. Go ahead, buddy. They feed off your energy. They do. And that's actually a very important thing because the dog will recognize when something isn't right, when they're not being treated fairly. Well, she knows not to do that.

She got the command, and she realized that she was wrong and went back to her the house. Now, that didn't involve me yelling. It didn't involve me beating her. It didn't involve me chasing her. But it did involve me getting her attention and making her realize that she needed to do what I was telling her. And this is probably one of the biggest lessons that I've learned because our other dogs and any other dog I've ever had has been able to listen. they've been able to respond to a command. But what I realized is that, you know, by yelling for a dog,

and Amber Higgins mentions this later on in her book, that, you know, sometimes yelling or shouting at a dog to try and retrieve it is counterproductive because they wind up not wanting to approach you. They feel like they're in trouble. So some of the best things that you can do are to maintain that relationship and hold off on correction

until you've been able to calm yourself as a handler. And by calming yourself and drawing attention and focus to yourself without shouting or screaming, you can greatly increase the response that you have with your dogs.

Another way to do this especially at night because obviously a deaf dog can't hear at night or can't see at night, I can't hear it day or night really, but they can't see hand signals at night as well, is laser pointer training. And you can actually do that to get their attention by pointing a laser at your own hand. And this is probably one of the most effective ways of silently calling your dog at night because your hand becomes a beacon.

And if they're trained properly, they'll come to that very quickly, especially if you reward them soon after they come. So we'll get into some of the other aspects of how you can reward and train here in a few minutes. But I think first, why don't we take a brief break to give some airtime to our sponsors. And when we come back, we will get into some of our real-life search and rescue training and the lessons learned from that. So just a few minutes, and we'll be right back. Have you visited Survivalgearsystems.com?

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We've got great shows every night this week, so don't miss out. And if you'd like to get updates on show topics and what's going on here at Prepper Broadcasting, go ahead and sign up for our newsletter. Just go to Prepper Broadcasting.com and you can sign up right there. Just provide your email and that's it. You can get it every time it comes out. So today we've been talking about tactical canine training and we got into some of the basics of training. And some of the experiences that we've had we're going to get into next are related to search and rescue training.

Now, a lot of this is based on a book that we wound up focusing our efforts on for this show, which is called Family Disaster Dogs, which is a prepper-focused tactical dog training book. Well, it's more for search and rescue training. And it's by author Amber Higgins. And one of the things, she mentions a couple of great nuggets, I guess, when it comes to training. And a lot of her training expertise was built around, what do you call it, search and rescue dogs. So she worked with a lot of bloodhound for about 40 years, did a lot of work with them with search and rescue and had a lot of dogs professionally trained and sent off to canine units around the country. And one of the neat things that she brings out continually throughout the book is this thread that,

A scenting dog is not trained by you. They do this naturally, so do not expect them to do so just because you tell them to. That's not how sending dogs work. And it was, for me, that was kind of an eye-opening sentiment because she's talking about how, you know, as a handler, you might think, yes, I've trained my dog to do this. And, you know, when we get into some of our experiences, I really have to pull back on that, Because, you know, you come to realize that, no, you know, you really didn't train them to do anything. All you did was direct them to focus what they already know how to do naturally. So, Colin, do you want to maybe tell the folks what we wound up doing with our dog and how it worked out?

Sure. So our, what is it, collie Aussie, that's deaf and partially blind, turns out she has, you know, a great snout. She can send and track very well. So what we did was we took a few of my dirty socks and made a trail, and every other sock we would put a treat. obviously she liked it, but in between each sock was about 15 of my paces. So there would be six socks, and at the end of the trail, I would hide somewhere where I could see how she's acting throughout the scenting of each sock, and she would have to finally try to find me. And I don't think there was ever a time where she couldn't find me, but there were times

when she lost scent, and then she just either sat or went back to the previous source. Yeah, and that's, it was pretty cool to watch this all take place. So what we wound up doing is I would hold her back on a leash inside. And from the doorstep, Colin would place his items, his tracking items. And wherever there was a sock that had his smell on it, she would go to that sock. And it was just like connecting the dots. So what was neat was that in some cases, like it seemed like she wasn't tracking it.

She wasn't finding the right trail. And I asked Colin after the exercise, because we did this, what, three or four times, something like that? Yeah, I think. Yeah, every time she was able to find him. And, you know, this was, you know, in an area, you know, maybe an acre or two span. And it's windy. And it was windy. Well, come to find out, two of the 10 or 12 socks that we used were clean, and the other ones weren't.

And we knew that those two were, you know, a different type of sock. And wherever she got lost was whenever one of those... Just happened to be. Yeah, it happened to be where one of those clean socks were. So what we did is we wound up picking up the first sock once we realized that, okay, she went out to find Colin. We picked up that sock and I let her smell it. And then I just kind of had her on the leash and we kind of walked a little bit. And I guided maybe a little bit on the first or second sock.

And then beyond that, she was on it. She had her nose to the ground and she was tracking you. and there's a difference that Higgins puts between tracking and scenting. So when the dog tracks, they actually follow footprints or they follow a ground scent or a ground trail or ground track. Senting is where they pick up a scent on the air. And this can go both ways. So if, for example, like you're hunting, your scent will travel on the wind and a dog will be able to pick that up. And most hunters are aware of that and they'll be mindful or upwind depending on the situation.

And humans are not as tuned to that as dogs are. So when she lost the track, she tried to pick up the scent. that was still on the air. Since it was windy out, we wound up, her scenting was actually pulling, you know, 8, 10, 12 feet off the actual track at times. And it was doing that because the actual scent had wafted over at least that far, just in, you know, a matter of, really a matter of seconds, because I think I gave you two or three seconds to hide,

and then we came and found you. So one thing to keep in mind, and especially as Amber Higgins talks about in this book, is that you need to be able to trust the dog's instincts. And the thing is, is that the lessons that she spells out are not made to fool the dog or to make finding a person any harder to do.

After all, they already know how to use their nose. It's the hands. handler learning how to find people, not your dog. So you're learning essentially to trust your dog. And this is something that I really had to be careful with because there was instances where I could see the sock and I wanted to lead her over in that direction or pull, but I really had to hold back. And that's as a handler, when you're doing search and rescue, you really want to be mindful of giving a dog that kind of space so that they can do their job because at the end, they're going to want to find, you know, whatever it is at the end, whether it's their treat, their magic toy, the person at the end, the goal, whatever that goal is,

or the treat after they have achieved that goal, you know, whatever it may be, they're going to want that. And the more you train and reward them, the faster they'll be able to do it. But you have to be able to allow your dog to take on that skill set and run with it. And in most cases, when you're training a dog for the basics, you're usually handling the dog. Like, if you're walking down the sidewalk, you've got them on a tight leash so that they don't lunge other people or, you know, so they don't go into traffic. When you're actually tracking, it's almost completely opposite because the dog is handling you. And you need to keep that in mind. So, and I mean, it was actually relatively easy to do this.

I was really kind of surprised. One of the tactical advantages of being able to train a dog with, well, I guess to be able to listen to a dog's ability to do this on their own, I guess is a better way to put that, is by allowing the dog to train on different scents. So, and that's, you know, a sense like a type of scent, like whether the scent is gasoline or food or, or a piece of clothing, or, you know, an empty gun shell casing, or even fish. I mean, if you're on a boat. Because a lot of search and rescue dogs, depending on what their specialty is, they've been trained extensively on being able to smell either live human sense,

individual human sense, dead human sense, and sometimes dead human sense underwater. A lot of cadaver dogs wind up finding bodies that have been decaying underwater for, you know, sometimes several weeks or months or even years at a time by simply being able to recognize that smell. So search and rescue approved. handlers can get their hands on these sense, but if you're not, like if you're just an average person like me or Colin, you're not going to have much luck. So what you can do is let's say you have a dog and you want it to track a shed, like from, you know, some sort of animal and you want to retrieve it so you can build your massive collection of deer or elk or moose antlers or

whatever may be. Piece of cake. All you do is you take one of the them and you use that as the main scent and then you reward them as they find it and i've actually had buddies who will take their dogs out and they train them to find sheds and then once they go out and find the sheds they can track where the animals are and to that you know to that point you can actually use it to or use that skill to whether you're building a business or collecting things or something like that, or tracking animals that you can hunt. Some of the other things you might be able to do are track other things like I mentioned earlier, you know, food.

If you have a dog that's skilled at finding even canned food or, you know, certain types of edible plants, they can have a better, you know, a better sense of finding that if you provide them with the scent of the plant or, you know, subject that you're looking for. You know, ammunition. Let's say you want to find your box of 50 caliber shells or something like that or all your black powder gear. Whatever it might be, you can train a dog to find that material for you. Well, what if the tables are turned, you know?

You're lost and your dog is safe somewhere else. Well, there's an old hunter's trick where if you leave a coat in the area that you last saw or released your dog, if you have to leave that last location, they will actually return to that point, and in most cases they'll lay down on or around that coat. And if you keep that in mind, like, for example, if you were lost, you can actually use that trick to be able to have your own dog find you if you've been lost basically or if you've separated from a group by leaving an article of clothing even if it's something as simple as a sock that dog can find it and if trained properly they can lead others to help you you know another

trick that you can do to help, like if your dog runs off, you can actually drop food kibbles into a bowl. This kind of goes back to what I was saying earlier about calling a dog back. And you can do that, so the sounds that you normally make at dinner time, drop a couple food kibbles in the bowl, and they will respond to that much faster than if you're yelling their name because they might think that you're in trouble, especially by just on the tone of your voice. most dogs will come quickly when it comes to food. Another thing to keep in mind that she mentioned in this book is she provided a scenario where

they were tracking a dog, they were using their dogs to track an Alzheimer's patient who had gotten out. So if you have someone in your family or in your group who has Alzheimer's and has a tendency to get out, it would be extremely useful to make sure that your dog. can find them because you may not have access to public services as readily as you need to especially if you know there's a major event like an earthquake, a wildfire, hurricane, something like that. But you will need to keep in mind the way that you train your dog when they find the object. In the example that she used the patient

kept thinking that she was being tracked by German hounds during World War II. And so the patient kept running away and they would wind up going around in circles trying to find this person until they finally realized that, you know, the dogs, the dogs were able to get close, but they had to use another tactic to actually locate this woman because those dogs triggered an emotional response and made her run away from the search parties. So it's definitely something to keep in mind on how you train your dog to respond when they find whatever they're looking for. Sometimes it makes sense.

For a bloodhound, that's what they're bred to do is, you know, be able to track something, tree it, and bark until their owner shows up. With an Alzheimer's patient, that's probably not going to happen very often. So you might want to keep in mind that maybe it's better to have a dog with some sort of, you know, appropriate vest. that is able to approach calmly and tell the difference and, you know, be friendly when they see whatever it is they're looking for. In our example, Colin was the subject, so she already knew to be friendly with him. So it'll be a lot easier for her to continue her training on this path with others silently. So, and if you ever, if you ever curious that, you know, if you think a dog can't track something or can't, you know, be focused on certain things. Keep in mind that

there are dogs that are trained specifically to detect cancer cells. They can predict seizures and identify PTSD episodes. So there's something about a dog's innate ability to sense things with their sense of smell that is far above and beyond what we as humans can fully understand. So make sure to give them a little bit more credit than you normally would. Well, with that, Colin, what do you say let's get into the pint-sized prepper project of the week? We've got a few minutes left. and with the idea of getting lost or being found, we thought it would be a good idea to do a pocket-sized noise maker.

And you can put these in your altruids tin or your backpack and whatever suits you. So, Colin, do you want to kind of explain what we did with this? and then I'll maybe add a little bit of context toward the end? Yeah, so this prepper project was like a soda can whistle or aluminum can whistle. And it's like a coach whistle. So basically what you do is you take your aluminum can and you start a hole with a knife for your scissors. And you're going to cut along the top and just cut off the top and bottom part of the, part of the aluminum can.

And then you're going to have a rectangle when you're done, taking the top and bottom off. You're going to want to clean up the edges and cut a strip off the short side of the can. Okay. That's probably about half an inch to three-quarter or a seven-inch. Then you're going to make another strip that's a little bit shorter. and narrower, then lay it on top of the larger one.

Then you're going to fold the edges of the little pieces on the sides than the large edge of the edge of the large one. It's really kind of hard to explain, but on the Instagram and Facebook photos, you can see. And then you just take the larger piece and fold it downward than fold it downward than. rake it out so you have this round coach whistle like thing and

what you should have now is like there's a mouthpiece for air to go through and then when you hold it in between your fingers the air will go through and then just like a whistle it'll get split on the edge of the longer part of the aluminum can make a

you know a really high pitch noise. Yeah. And that's, you know, one of the other, so that one's a little bit more complex, but it's super lightweight and thin and easy to stash away. One of the things that we wound up using in high school was a clicker. And clickers can be used very well for dog training by encouraging certain activities based on the number of clicks or the type of clicks. And We actually used this during high school to share test answers with one another. And it got really popular to the point where they had to ban these lids from school because they figured out what we were doing. But what you can do is if you take a Snapple lid or a Snapple style lid, it's usually on a glass bottle,

and you press it on the corner of a table through the portion where it, not through, but on the portion where it sticks up, where it would normally pop, right on one of the curves or the bends in the metal, if you do it just right, when you click on that, it will actually increase the volume of that click. So instead of being a real muted sound,

it's an extremely loud sound. And you might be wondering why this would, even be something that you could use as a prepper. Well, as a kid, I remember I was hiking with my family in the Uintas. And at the time, we didn't have a dog with us. And I went up ahead and took a high road where my parents had taken a lower road with the family. And I didn't realize it. When I did realize it, I stopped. And I realized that no one was around. And I come to the realization, obviously, again, that I was lost. I was definitely scared, but I calmed down and realized that I had what's called a cricket with me.

And it's just a simple thumb-sized noise maker, and it makes a loud clicking noise when you press a flat piece of steel. And it was just a toy, and I don't remember, I think we got them just as toys, but it turned out to be a real lifesaver for me. It could have been way worse. as a result I stopped and this is a heavily traffic trail so there was a lot of people that would go up and down it but I wound up clicking that because it didn't make sense to shout out mom or dad because there were dozens of other moms and dads walking along that path and I knew that me being out there wouldn't have queued any of them to come and find me or it would have been too confusing. And when we left, we had these crickets, and one of the things my mom and dad told me was that if we ever get separated,

you just push this button, and they knew that that loud, thumb-sized noise maker was something that only me or my brothers had. And they were quickly able to find me and avoid what could have been a much more dire situation. and it was something that really kind of stood out to me is something that we can very easily be packed around with your kids or on your own camping pack.

And by being able, you may not have the perfect snapple lid, but if you find something in your travels like an aluminum can, you could essentially make your own whistle out of it. So there's always a good way to draw attention to yourself in times of need if you do wind up in a situation where you need to be rescued. So that could happen

a lot easier than you think. So just kind of keep some of these on mind or on hand. If you run into times when you might get separated from a group, you know, it's also a great way to...

So this particular project is a kid-friendly way to demonstrate the importance of pets and practical prepping skills and is a great way for tactical echolocation or even calms like in high school when we're using it as you know test dancers it's also a great use of everyday garbage quote unquote as survival tools and by doing this it'll actually save your voice and it'll set you apart in a crowd so if you're alone in the woods or if you're in a lot of, if you're in a crowd full of people, you can stand above the voices by taking on a specific sound that other folks are tuned to. It's also a great way to train your dog. So pocket size training tools like clickers can also be used by parents and kids alike.

So if you get separated from your child, if you get like in a store, you can teach them to go toward the sound or know that they need to click something like that to be found or follow that click to safety. So a lot of these ideas of Pavlovian conditioning and training that you can use to train your dog in a tactical fashion can also be used to train your own kids. So with that, as a final takeaway, I think if I've learned anything over the past few years of owning dogs, it's that patients rules supreme when training. This came to a head when my deaf dog wouldn't respond to a shout or a clap or any other noise, allow any other noise as a deterrent.

I learned quickly that engaging bad behaviors didn't work, but encouraging good behaviors through reinforcing those positive actions and skills was leaps and bounds better. And after reading this disaster, the family disaster dog's book by Amber Higgins, I'm confident that I can handle my own training, continue that training, and hone those skills at home. I continue to work with this family dog in a way that may come to be a life-saving skill, whether it be my family or someone else. So whether your dog is young or old, you can enhance and engage their skill sets by taking on some of these training skills. You can add their keen senses to your toolkit in a survival scenario and build a lasting relationship in the process. Whether you're training your dog to hunt,

to track game, to search out supplies, or to defend a home, you can benefit by taking these steps of research, readings, and training practices just a little bit every day. It doesn't take very much. And your kids can learn alongside you as you prepare yourselves by providing training and lessons of responsibility for the entire family. Lastly, in case you missed it, on the last show, we had a canine tribute where we devoted an entire episode to the K9 units who have served our country at home or abroad. Remember that if you missed out on any of the shows of mine or on anyone else here on Prepper Broadcasting, you can always check out the previous episodes on their show page or on your favorite streaming service by downloading

as you go. And while you're there, be sure to leave us a five-star review. Next week, we're going to be wrapping up this series on tactical dogs by taking you through some of the best finds when it comes to tactical dog gear. That's right, how to equip your dog and the best resources to have on hand. So your dogs can be armed and ready when you are. You won't want to miss out, so be sure to join us next time. Well, that's it for us today, everyone. Thank you for joining us on the Next Generation Show. And don't forget to tune in next Sunday

where we explore another aspect of the little things in life that make all the difference in the world. This is your host, Ryan Buford, and your co-host. Colin Buford. Reminding you to stay informed, get involved, and be prepared. Have a great night, everybody, and make it a great week. Bye-bye. Today's broadcast has come to you through the courtesy of the Prepper Broadcasting Network.

See our hosts, show schedules, archive programs, and more at Prepper Broadcasting.com. Thanks for listening.