Clicker Training

When I get back to New Ulm and volunteering again I will start to use clicker training on some of the dogs. Of course this will be after the time when the old ones get to know me again. Anyway the basic idea behind clicker training is that when the dog does what I want it to do I click my clicker and then proceed to give the dog a treat. The clicker is used as a bridge between the action and the reward. It cements the cause and effect relationship between the dog doing what I want it to do, whether it be sit, lay, or something else, and the reward. When the clicker sound is connected to the treat reward the dog will begin to react to the clicker just like it does to the treat.
One of the main benefits of the clicker is that it becomes much easier to pinpoint the behavior that is wanted and reward that specific behavior rather than cause confusion as to what is actually being rewarded.
Clicker training can be used to teach a variety of animals a variety of different behaviors. You can train anything from a dog, to a mouse, to a horse, to a bird, and a multitude of other animals. The behaviors you can teach are only limited by the limits of your imagination.
Next week when I begin to use clicker training with the humane society dogs I will also be able to shoot some short videos and then update you on what progress is being made.

Possession Guarding

Possession guarding in dogs is a serious issue. This is even more serious when the dog that practices it is exposed to strangers on a regular basis or to children. In both of these cases the dog exhibiting the behavior is most likely approached by people who do not know of this issue or how to behave around a dog with this issue.
Solving this problem takes time. You are not going to be able to make your dog give you any object you want whenever you want it in a single day or even two. Depending on the degree of the possessiveness it may take weeks or months to fix this problem. Don't give up. It can still be done. Before you reach the point when you can take anything from your dog you want it is a good idea to remove toys and other objects your dog guards from its access. Put toys away so that you have to give them to your dog for your dog to play with them. Then when you do decide to give your dog a toy keep treats at your disposal to toss to your dog in order to make him give up the toy, even if it is only long enough to pick up the treat and swallow it. This is the way it has to start. This begins the connection for you dog between you and all good things. The idea is that from this point you will be able to progress ever so slowly to the point when your dog will take the treat out of your hand and then to the point when you can trade a treat for the toy and then to the point when you will be able to tell your dog to drop the toy and he will allow you to take it.
Again, this is not something that is fixed over night, it takes time and patience. Other important factors can include other areas of your life with your dog and how your dog perceives your interactions with each other. In some instances this can be the result of allowing your dog, or making your dog take the position of leader. If this is the case you will need to establish yourself first as your dog's leader and then proceed to work on other issues after that. If your dog does not look at you in a leadership position he will not respect your wishes or your commands. If you have not already established yourself as your dog's leader a structured walk is the best way to do this in my opinion which Cesar Millan supports. This includes boundaries like where your dog must walk in relation to you, and making your dog become calm before you take him out and making him follow you out the door and possibly for the entire walk (I like to keep dogs with their heads parallel to my thigh with everything from their shoulders back behind me).

Vacation

Last night Abby went back home to my brother and his wife. This means that I no longer have a dog to work with for the next week until I go back to New Ulm, MN on the 15th. There are still a few things for me to write about before I go back to New Ulm so I encourage you to visit a few times before the 15th. At least one of those posts coming up will be about possession guarding/aggression. This is one of the issues Abby has which I started to work on with her and I am hoping my brother continues to work on it with her. Right now the basic idea is that whenever she is given a rawhide bone she will be given very small treats to encourage her to give up the rawhide bone. It starts with only getting her to drop the rawhide in order to pick up the treat and then go back to the rawhide but with time and patience the result should be that she will allow anyone to take anything away from her without any negative responses.

Dog Walking, Abby 2

Today I spent a full hour and a half working with Abby on walking. She already does well in a heal position as I stated in my last post but needs work on not pulling when she is allowed more freedom.
When I walk dogs I like to keep them in a heal position for most of the walk but I use the freedom of a longer leash to give rewards along the way by giving them more space and the opportunity to roam a little and sniff about more. Obviously if this is my general practice when walking dogs it is going to be the same when I walk Abby. Since I know that she does not always do so well with the limits of the reward time I started out by requiring her to stay in a heal position for a greater period of time. After establishing the rules of the heal position to a greater extent it was much easier to carry over the limits of the leash to the reward times. All I needed to do in the reward periods was give a small flick of my hand on my end of the leash and Abby would relax and release the tension on the leash. Another important part of this is that while I allow her the freedom of a longer leash the boundaries or clearly defined. As soon as the leash became taunt I flicked my hand because that was too far. I want a loose leash and that was as far away from me as Abby was allowed.
In addition to this the length of the reward period is important. As suggested by Cesar Millan, I only give five minutes of reward time roughly every fifteen minutes. This limits the chance that Abby will start to view the reward time as time when she is in charge and not me.
When I got done working with Abby today I gave her a rawhide bone as a reward for doing such a good job. This is when I discovered a problem in her behavior. Abby is very possessive of her rawhide bones. Since the bone I gave her was a large bone I took it away when she had eaten half of it. To my dismay she clenched it in her teeth, growled, and raised her hackles. I was able to take it when she settled down to start chewing on it again and set it down for a second but this is an issue that needs to be addressed differently from now on or it will most likely become worse.

Once again thank you too my readers and feel free to comment.

Dog Walking, Abby

Abby is my brother's dog. Since he is on vacation I get to take care of her for the week. This means that I become her leader. She has already become a model walker for me...when I keep the leash short and want her at my side. She takes corrections at my side very well and learns to walk with a loose leash in a heal position very well but as soon as I want to reward her by giving her the full length of the leash she is pulling once again. I am confident that this problem can be fixed by investing more time in the walk with Abby.
In addition to being a good walker in a heal position she does well while walking with more than one person at a time. She does not get confused as to who her leader is but I think part of this is due to the fact that my fiancee and I took turns holding the leash and making the corrections to make it clear to Abby that we both were her leaders.
After today it is clear to me that she needs work in two areas for sure. The first area is that of walking on a long leash. The second is running on a leash, or it might just be running with a person. I'm not sure at this point but tomorrow I should be able to determine the second area more specifically.

At this point I would like to thank all of my readers and invite you to leave comments whether they be positive or negative. That way I will be able to reach my readers more effectively. Thank you.

A couple notes about dogs

First off, I am now 6 hours removed from the humane society as I went home to my parent's house and will be here for two weeks. That means no updates on the humane society dogs. On the upside I will still be posting about different techniques and tools that I have found to be helpful but just haven't written about yet. This post is just a heads up for what is to come. I will also be working with my brother's dog so I will make some posts about her. That is all for now.

Dog walking, Chance

I have been told a number of times that Chance is the worst dog we have when it comes to walking on a leash. I disagree. Today was my first opportunity to walk Chance. He started out a little head strong and stiff necked but I was firm, consistent, and calm as his leader. First things first, I wait until every dog is calm before a let them go through the door, after I do. This means that I am the leader and I require a calm-submissive attitude before I let them do anything. Since there are three different doors that I need to take a dog through before we get outside the repetition does amazing things. Some dogs, like Chance, will still want to pull when I first get them outside but after about two blocks of timely and consistent corrections they tend to settle down and assume a follower role, even Chance.
Obviously one walk in which Chance was able to eventually assume a follower position is not enough to deem him a good walker. This does however give us a very good starting point from which we can improve.
My tool of choice is becoming more and more a chain. Most dogs are already used to having a collar around their necks so they usually accept a chain very easily. I find this the best for me to use with most dogs, although with dogs who put their heads down to sniff constantly I prefer a halti or gentle leader. With these dogs a chain will slide to the base of their necks and make it useless. The halti or gentle leader maintains control over the heads and necks of these dogs.

It is becoming more and more obvious to me that Cesar Millan is right when he says that 99.some% of all dogs are able to become balanced dogs. Every day I work with these dogs they become one step closer to better balanced and better behaved dogs.