Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Be the Cookie!

or Ten Ways to Make Yourself More Valuable to Your Dog

Watching TV shows like Lassie and Rin-Tin-Tin as a kid, I was amazed at the rapt attention the dogs gave to their owners. Skip forward a few years when I got a Golden Retriever.  I assumed she would be loyal and give me all of her attention. She was easily distracted and I began to realize that you have to train TV dog attention. It does not just come with the dog.

Here are a few things you can do to increase the chances that your dog will think of you as their sun, moon and stars:


  1. Play with your dog. Play games they love. Tug, Find It, Chase (your dog chases you, not the other way around), Treasure Hunt, Hide and Seek, and Fetch are all wonderful games to play. Smiling, laughing and using your voice create an atmosphere of fun will help the dog think of you as the source of good times
  2. Install a Learn to Earn program. Feed your dog less from a bowl and more from your hand for doing tricks, showing impulse control and doing some obedience behaviors like sit at the door, sit for your bowl, sit for a leash, wait when I open the car or front door, etc.. Make yourself the gateway to many of the good things in life. 
  3. Train with a hungry dog (not starving, just hungry) and use high value, nutritious food for treats. Kibble and flour based treats are minimum wage. Don't be stingy, if your dog is easily distracted, then you might need to use executive wages to get and keep their attention. Even if you have a retriever (read "hungry all the time" and "will eat anything") then you may need to up the ante to develop the attention you need for training. You can use kibble in low distraction environments and something better like hot dogs, chicken or cheese in high distraction environments.
  4. Variety is the spice of life! Change to new treats regularly. Dogs get bored of eating the same treat all the time, even if it is high value.  Bring two or three types of treats to a training session and switch to higher value treats when there are bigger distractions.
  5. If they love it, use it. Use the things your dog loves to reward them. Just because it costs more or is a pretty color of red (dogs see blue and purple best of all the colors) doesn't mean your dog loves it. Use their enthusiasm as a gauge. Dogs do what works for them, learn how you can make good behavior work for them.
  6. Keep your reinforcement rate high. This means keeping the exercises simple enough that your dog can be successful and not taking the difficulty up too quickly. Splitting an exercise down into simple and achievable bits takes practice, and if lots of time (say ten seconds) goes by without having any success or if you find yourself putting your dog back in the stay several times, it means you have bitten off more than they can chew. Decrease the difficulty by decreasing distractions, distance, or duration. Among ourselves trainers call this being "greedy" and we often need to adjust our training plans too. One of our gurus, Bob Bailey, says "Be a splitter, not a lumper".
  7. Practice, practice, practice. Play, play, play. Or better yet, practice then play, repeat.
  8. Keep your practice sessions short enough that you do not loose your dog's attention. For most dogs, lots of short sessions with play breaks will get you to your goal much faster than long sessions. Lots of short sessions are often better to build desired behavior.
  9. Motivate your dog to behave well. All training is about motivation and manipulating consequences. Force free trainers use positive consequences to motivate their dogs. Keep your leash loose. If your dog is pulling however they are putting the pressure on the leash. It is your job to figure out how to motivate them to walk on a loose leash or at your side. 
  10. Minimize the use of corrections - either verbal or physical. My guideline is to use them only when life or limb are in danger. Using corrections, including collar corrections, can demotivate your dog, physically harm your dog's neck and throat, hurt your relationship with your dog and cause them to pay less attention to you. What kind of relationship do you want with your dog?


Have fun with your dog and keep training throughout your dog's life. As a very wise 5 year old child told me once "They don't stay trained, you know!"


Happy training!


Sandi