Hi, We just adopted our 4-5 month husky two days ago. After much research, we decided to look into training/obedience classes. I've looked on some of the stickies and topics here, and am trying to get a good idea of the best way to train our puppy, but there's a lot of info and I'm kind of at a loss.

We had an appointment with someone from Bark Busters, (a local company who sends a trainer to your house) but after researching more about the company and reading some reviews, I don't want to use someone who uses fear tactics (shaking penny jars, "growl-shouting" etc). Review here

Does anyone have any advice? I would ideally like to do the training myself, but would appreciate any info you guys have on good books to pick up, or methods to follow.

She knows how to sit, and will do that (most of the time) on command, but she won't always come when called, and you can tell that she is laughing at us when we call to her. When we put her leash on, she acts really goofy and starts prancing around and trying to wiggle backwards out of the collar and laughing at us (twinkling eyes, mouth open and tongue hanging out). The main things I am looking for are to teach her to heel, come when called, and just in general see us as "in charge" and take us seriously. I know some of it is just puppy energy, but you can see the mischief in her eyes. The little stinker knows what we want from her, she just thinks it's all a game and doesn't want to do it!

Anyways, if someone could point me in the direction of some books/dvds or give me some pointers, that would be great!

She is testing you, and pushing her boundaries to see what she can get away with. Right now being consistent with what you want from her will get you your best results. You have to be husky stubborn to get through to your stubborn husky. I know, I have a 14 and a half week old puppy myself and it is a challenge most days.

A great book I have found is Before and After Getting your Puppy by Ian Dunbar. It repeats a lot, but the information is good and is very positive reinforcement based.

I am getting a new trainer myself, first session is tomorrow, fingers crossed for the both of us! Just don't give up!

Christina, welcome, i just saw you said you take her out for 2hrs a day, is that over the course of a day? at 4-5 months she should be getting about 30-45 min a day of walking and such and the rest of the time free play and mental work. any extra stress on the growing bones and joints will cause issues in the future, also taking her out that much now will create a habit and she will expect that + more as she grows, keep all heavy excising till over a yr old.
look into NILF training, and look over our training section here to. the best advice is DO NOT GIVE IN, stick with a plan and keep working on it no matter how sassy she gets!
for the backing up in the collar, look into a martingale stye collar.
please always keep her leashed, husky's will bolt at any given chance no matter how well you think you trained them, high prey drive. please get her chipped and register it.
look for a trainer that works WITH huskies, they are not like any-other breed and normal training will not work with them, you need to find someone that understands the breed in order to train them.
Routine is key, keep a set feeding/walking time every day and work on crate training.

I would go to Classes rather than an at home trainer. You can usually get a good deal on the classes at Petsmart/Petco. It is not just obedience training, it is also the socialization that is good about them... teaches manners around other dogs.

Good books that got me started in the beginning that I really enjoyed:

http://www.amazon.com/Siberian-Huskies-Dummies-Diane-Morgan-ebook/dp/B004T6L8VQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1413932323&sr=1-1&keywords=huskies+for+dummies

http://www.amazon.com/Siberian-Huskies-Barrons-Dog-Bibles/dp/1438070217/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1413932417&sr=1-1&keywords=Barron%27s+Dog+Bibles%3A+Siberian+Huskies

I personally did all of Okami's training myself, but that is because I am confident in my training methods that I didn't feel the need to pay for what I already knew how to do. At one point I had 6 dogs and I did all the training with them myself and I was only 13. My personal dog was a German Shepard, the other dogs were other family members' but I did most of the care myself because everyone was too lazy or something IDK lol. I would look into clicker training. I used a clicker for basically everything my dog knows and whenever I want to teach something new I go grab it. You can find a TON of videos on Clicker training on YouTube.... one of my favorite channels - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRyHBkIJ90SZNRyq1iVda5g This guys German Shepard is ridiculously smart and it is a good goal to try and teach some of the stuff that he teaches.

Hope this helps a little!

Thanks all for the advice! We will go 30-45 minutes as suggested, did not know there was such a thing as too much exercise lol! I've purchased a couple of books on Amazon (huskies for dummies and one of the skete monks books I saw recommended on here). We clicker trained our cats so i would imagine we could do the same with Gaia.

She will be getting chipped when we get her fixed the second week in November. Thanks so much for the advice! I'm learning a lot on this forum.