My Dog Obedience Teacher, My Killer

Never mind those thin-lipped, controlling dog ladies with their utterly bizarre fashion sense. Alexander Vyatkin is the most serious trainer you are likely to come across in this overfed, underworked nation. He has no time or tolerance for people who let their dogs in the driver’s seat. Today for example, up at Red Star Kennel in Hudson, Wisconsin, he’s doing “bite work” with one of his Presa Canarios, and his corrections leave no doubt about who’s the big dog. When the eager, hundred-pound animal is released, she goes flying at the “agitator” like a rocket made of muscle. The agitator is also large; he is a well-muscled volunteer wearing a padded suit, who is yelling and slicing the air with what looks like a large wooden riding crop. Eighteen-month-old Jedda leaps on the agitator and clamps her teeth onto his arm. Dog and man go reeling around and around, the dog airborne, jaws locked, a ballet of will and aggression. The guy yells. He hits the dog with the stick; she couldn’t care less. This is thrilling but not amazing. How hard can it be to get a dog full of drive to bite? The surprise comes when, at a single word from Vyatkin, the dog drops the sleeve, turns around, and walks calmly back to his side. It’s like watching a freight train instantly reverse.

My saucer-eyed bulldog looks up at me, his body tense with desire to get in on the action. Someday, maybe. We’re still in basic obedience. In fact, it’s me who’s getting trained; I keep walking left instead of right, stumbling into my dog. I just want our heel-sit-stay to be a little more, uh, precise, and for him to stop chasing after mountain bikes.

Back in the Ukraine, Vyatkin won medals in the Russian Army’s canine unit. Here, he continues to exude a military mystique. Breeders, firemen, and animal control officers speak about him in glowing, almost worshipful tones. More to the point, they make up a big chunk of Red Star’s clients.

In America, trainers often come in two breeds that we’ll call Strange Lady and Soldier Guy. Vyatkin and his spouse, both Soldier Guys (though Irina is not a guy, and was never in the military), came here in 1993, partly to escape Kiev, a city only forty-five miles from Chernobyl. Once here, they began breeding Presa Canarios—large, sleek-coated, Mastiff-type dogs from the Canary Islands originally used as guardians and fighters. They now own one of America’s best-known kennels.

The Vyatkins are passionate about ethical breeding. If you sound thuggy on the phone, Alexander will quote you a puppy price of fifteen thousand dollars. He operates as if he were in Europe, where the business is regulated, and he favors tighter controls. Here—where a kind of mind-your-own-business libertarianism rules, especially at the more rustic end of the dog-breeding spectrum—Vyatkin has been told more than once to take his Commie ass back to Russia. This is ridiculous on several levels, not the least of which is that Vyatkin is a big believer in private property.

“When people come up and ask can they pet my dog, I say no.” He smiles devilishly. “If you want to pet a dog, buy your own dog and pet him.” This, oddly, is part of his sales talk. “People are always amazed at how my dogs come right to me in the dog park with all the other dogs and distractions… When I walk by my dogs, they follow me with their eyes, asking, ‘What can I do now, what do I do next, how can I please you?’ I am like a god to them.”

In the kennel, the worshippers of this god eagerly await his arrival. The door opens and a gamey canine smell saturates the air. The dogs do follow him, anticipating orders from their general. They’re the cream of the crop; while mastiffs like them are often slow, these dogs are fast, agile, and “drivey.” Red Star animals frequently win the Iron Dog Triathlon, an insane contest involving the same kind of endurance trials in the human version of Iron Man, with the added bite-work required of protection dogs. Imagine running two miles, jumping over barrels and through hoops, then having some monster in mutant hockey equipment jump out of the bushes to pick a fight with you.

Today Vyatkin is returning to its quarters a German Shepherd puppy he’s holding for a client. The puppy does not want to go; it stiffens its fluffy little body, splaying out its oversized paws in a show of passive resistance. Little puppy, you are about to incur the wrath of God. But Vyatkin just tugs a little bit on the leash, laughs at how the dog wants to stay outside with all the people, and picks him up. Even a deity can display tenderness toward his subjects, as long as everyone knows who is who.—Emily Carter


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