Got a good deal on dog treats

My dogs LOVE these treats, and I love them too because they're like healthy dog crackers.  I can break each one up easily into tiny pieces for individual rewards, and can keep them in my pockets without their making my pockets gross.  They're made from the same Natural Balance semi-moist food my dogs love (which I also use for treats, but can't keep as easily in my pocket since it's moist and perishable).

So I was a bit shocked the other day when I saw the price of these at a local big-box pet supply store go up to over $7.00.  At the rate we go through these, I had to do something. 

So I came home and checked to see how much they cost at that same store's online website.  They were cheaper there (annoying!!) but there would also be shipping.  I did some further online research and am happy to tell you about the deal I got at fido.com .  I bought 15 bags of these, plus 4 bags of high-quality Evo treats for a total of $100.11.  And guess what-- if your purchase is over $100 the shipping is free.  Oh, and I did I mention there was no tax?

So the bag which would cost me $7 plus tax at the big-box store cost me just $4.49 by buying it online.  When you have 3 dogs AND you train and reward as much as I do, that's a good deal.

Becoming a patient trainer

What training skill do you hope to develop in 2012?  I'm not talking about a new behavior in your dog, I'm talking about a skill for you, the trainer. 

May I suggest patience?

Most trainers (especially beginners, but even the advanced trainers) have a tendency to go too fast for their student (the animal), and to feel frustrated when the student is not learning as fast as the trainer wants him or her to learn.  That reaction, by the way, is very frustrating for the student as well.  The answer is to adjust to the speed of the student and learn to be patient.  Scrutinize your systematic training plan and make sure it is GREAT in terms of its adherence to rate of reinforcement (ie, treating frequently), and its clarity about the particular criteria you're shaping (ie, are you working right now on distance?  Duration? Distraction level?  Desensitization to a trigger?).  Lastly, check to make sure the timing of your click is fast enough-- it should happen at the exact moment of the desired behavior (and then follow quickly with a reward).

I enjoy following the work of animal behavior graduate student Mary Hunter, whose blog is engaging and does a beautiful job of illustrating the exact same concepts you are trying to learn as a person training a dog.  You can find it here:

http://stalecheerios.com/blog/training-videos/bathtub-mice-training-video/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+StaleCheerios+%28Stale+Cheerios%29 

So how do you develop patience?  I find the most effective way is to keep explicit records of your training.  More on that in the next post.

Happy 2012, and may you and your dog have a richly satisfying life together. 

Training your dog to ride in an elevator

I often encourage my training students to get their dogs out in public to train them in settings with a variety of distractions. Dogs should be well mannered out in public, and that means we have to train them in all kinds of different situations and environments. Tonight I went to my local outdoor mall (it was fairly quiet there) and worked with my Borzoi on a variety of skills. In this post I’m going to talk about etiquette and techniques for using an elevator when you have your dog with you.


In our mall, you can travel from one floor to another via stairs, escalator, or elevator. Never take your dog on an escalator. I know of one situation where a person had a young dog and he took him on an escalator. The pup became frightened, and crouched, and the escalator stairs caught the fur on his underside and (brace yourself) caught the dog’s penis. Never take your dog on an escalator. Use the elevator if you don’t want to use the stairs.

In fact, training your dog to use an elevator is smart because you may not always be able to use the stairs yourself. So here are the tips:

1. Keep your dog close to your side, in heel position, at all times. Don’t keep a tight leash unnecessarily—teach your dog to be at your side and have about 12” of leash, enough to allow the leash to be slightly slack if the dog stays in position.

2. You want to be very considerate of other people who may be in or around the elevator. Keep this in mind as we proceed….

3. Press the elevator button, and then turn and make a circle so you’re now about 3 feet BACK from the door and the dog is again on your left side in heel position. The purpose of this is to allow a person who may be IN the elevator to exit without being confronted (and startled!) by the presence of your dog right there at the elevator door. Be considerate—be a few feet back when the door opens.

4. Once it’s safe to enter, you need to determine if there is anyone in the elevator. If there is, if you are still in the beginning stages of training your dog, smile and say you’ll take the next one and let this one pass. You want to start out training without anyone else in the elevator.

5. OK, so assuming that no one is in the elevator, enter and turn left, guiding your dog along the wall until your dog is between you and the back wall. Pull out treats, hit your button, and start talking to your dog in a calm, slightly happy voice. Praise your dog and start feeding treats. Keep the dog close to you, but you don’t have to make him sit. The elevator jolts a bit when it starts and stops, and these sensations can scare a dog. So distract your dog with treats, especially as the elevator starts and stops moving.

6. As the door opens, pause a moment and then say “Let’s go” in a happy voice and proceed out slowly—there may be a person near the door waiting to enter, and they may be startled by seeing a dog come out. Again, and I can’t say this enough, keep your dog in heel position on your left side—don’t let your dog zoom out in front of you as you exit, for example. Imagine if a new mother had her baby in a stroller right outside the elevator and suddenly saw a dog rushing out. She’d be furious at such an unpredictable situation that would feel dangerous for her baby. Be considerate. Be considerate. Be considerate.

7. Once your dog is used to riding in the elevator with just the two of you, it is time to add the distraction of another person in the elevator. This is why we keep the dog in heel position, between us and the wall. It sort of contains our dog, and prevents him from having the full freedom of the elevator. Ideally, you want to practice this with a friend first, who will be forgiving if the dog makes a few mistakes. YOUR job is to ensure that your dog stays focused on YOU, and your treats, and doesn’t start socializing with everyone in the elevator. Riding in the elevator should be a low-key, still, sort of serious activity. It’s not the time to let your dog schmooze with other people. Why? Because you want your dog to be predictable and contained while in the elevator. It’s a very small space, and if your dog comes to assume it can visit with others in the elevator, you may create a very threatening and uncomfortable experience for someone in the elevator who isn’t entirely thrilled to have your dog there in the first place. In other words, your dog has to be extremely well mannered, and learn to stay still right next to you throughout the whole process.

8. The purpose of pausing and not moving until you say “Let’s go” is that you don’t want your dog to take the door’s opening as his signal that it’s OK to move. If there are others on the elevator, you should stay put while they exit, and your dog will have to stay still until you signal that it’s OK to move. Dogs are great at recognizing patterns and at anticipating, so you will want to vary the length of time you pause to ensure that your dog doesn’t associate the door opening as the cue to move. Also, there will be times where the door is opening to a floor different than your desired floor (another scenario to practice!)—again, you don’t want your dog suddenly springing into motion in these situations.

9. The more advanced version of this would (once your dog is very experienced) to practice elevator work with another friend and dog in the same elevator at the same time. Both dogs should be quite experienced before doing this.

10. Training for elevator work during quiet times is important, as a courtesy to the shoppers at the mall. Most people don’t even know where the elevators at the mall are anyway.

11. One last point—make sure your dog has pottied before starting any of this elevator work—you do NOT want your dog getting stressed and having an accident. Keep your sessions short, and give your dog a chance to potty again after working for a few minutes. Training something new can be sort of intense for a dog, and it can trigger a need to urinate sooner than you might expect. And don’t forget to click and treat generously.

Does your dog really need that vaccine?

I just took my 3 dogs in for a checkup, and it's been 3 years since their last DHLPP vaccination (disptemper/parvo).  Rather than go ahead and revaccinate, we ran a blood test for each dog to see if the antibodies for this were still adequately present from the LAST time I vaccinated them.  They were, for all three dogs.

The "titer test", as it's called, cost about $54 per dog, and resulted in a report I can use if I need to board the dogs at a kennel that requires DHLPP vaccination (ie, I can show them that the dogs are still protected). 

Running the titer test is more expensive than simply revaccinating, but over the years I've gotten more cautious about unnecessarily stressing the immune system by vaccinating again unless there's evidence that the dog is not protected.

My dogs don't typically hang out with other large groups of dogs (we rarely go to a dog park and they have not been boarded in years).  So their risk of infection is low.

I also politely declined the dog influenza shot.  If my dogs were traveling to dog shows with tons of other dogs I might choose differently, but mine are pretty protected.  Which isn't to say we don't go out in public-- we do, as often as possible- but they don't hang out with a lot of other dogs we don't know.

I'm not a vet, but I have learned a LOT from an excellent publication, The Whole Dog Journal (I encourage you to subscribe-- I do, and you get an online subscription too which gives you access to all of their wonderful archives, including this very helpful article about titer tests and vaccines: http://www.whole-dog-journal.com/issues/5_12/features/5502-1.html )

How to receive email notification of dog food recalls

Have you ever wished you could receive an email notification when dog foods are recalled due to quality and safety problems? What if your brand of dog food is being recalled and you're not aware of it?


I just found a site that will update you via email (for free) when new pet foods are added to the recall list, and wanted to share it with you. http://nationalpetfoundation.com/pet-food-recall.html

Even reputable manufacturers can have a problem now and then, so the important thing for us pet owners is quick notification.

I hope this info is helpful and that all your dogs are healthy and thriving!

What you need to know about classical conditioning

Classical conditioning is a basic concept in training so let's look at it for a few minutes.

Below is a rather humorous video showing a college psychology student demonstrating the use of classical conditioning on his roomate. He is using it DIFFERENTLY than we are, he is using it to establish that a sound means that the roomate is about to be shot with an air pellet. Warped, I know. But the demo is clear.
http://www.wimp.com/classicalconditioning/


Classical conditioning happens in our world (and our dog's world) whether we like it or not. It answers the question, "What is predictable in my world?". When we pick up the leash, it means we're going for a walk. When we open the container where we keep the dog food, it means its supper time. These are all associations the dog makes through repetition. We present a neutral or meaningless signal (the click) prior to the delivery of the treat, and after enough reps of this the dog comes to expect the treat as soon as he hears the click. See how the sequence is important? First the click and then the treat.

You know how your dog learns to anticipate things? You pick up your car keys and he runs to the front door? This is classical conditioning. He's come to associate your keys with the door opening.

With clicker training, we click, and then we deliver a reward.  The "conditioned response" on the part of the dog is the EXPECTATION of the reward arriving, and the happy feeling that goes with that.  The response we conditioned there was one of anticipation of the reward.  (In Pavlov's dogs, the anticipation of that reward also resulted in an automatic salivating response, so in their case the salivating also became part of the conditioned response).

This is useful in that we can click at the moment of good behavior, and instantly elicit that feeling of "reward coming!" in the dog.  THEN we give the reward.  This allows us to tie that happy feeling with the exact moment of good behavior, which then allows us to work at a distance from our dog.  In other words, it buys us a moment or two before we have to actually pay up!  But it still cemented that FEELING of the reward with the exact moment of good behavior.  This kind of laser-beam timing helps us shape behaviors very specifically.

Different behaviors or "conditioned responses" take different amounts of time (and repetitions) to condition.  Some happen quickly with just a few reps, and some take hundreds of reps.  It helps to create a nondistracting environment when you intentional create a classically conditioned response-- that way the signal and the event that happens next are easily identified and connected in the subject's mind. 

Imagine if you were at a noisy dance club, and suddenly you felt a drop of water on your forehead.  What happened right before that?  Was it a particular note of music?  A particular dance move nearby?  A flashing light in the club?  Who knows?  There's too much going on.  But if you were in a quiet empty dance club and a light flashed and then you felt the drop of water, and that happened 5 times in a row, you'd understand the connection much faster.  You have to be able to identify those two events in connection with each other.  If the environment is too distracting, it's hard to isolate the events in your mind enough to identify them as being connected.

Think of this when you're trying to give your dog a cue.  Pay close attention to your body language-- beginner trainers often have (unintentionally!) sloppy body language and they THINK they are giving a clear cue but their cue is inconsistent.  (This is where it really helps to have a trained eye watching you and giving you feedback-- or videotape yourself on your digital camera and play it back to see what you're REALLY doing). 

It can be a little stressful for an animal (or a human) when they suspect there is a pattern but they are having trouble identifying what it is.  It is a relief and a comfort when we make classical conditioning easy by making the first and the second event very clear and very easy to connect. 

One very cool application of classical conditioning happened with a young girl who was gravely ill.  The last resort for her was a very toxic drug, and they wanted to see if they could "train" her immune system to respond as though the drug were present, without having to actually keep GIVING the drug.  They paired the drug with a strong smell and strong taste each time they gave it.  The smell and the taste were very distinct,  and were not commonly found in the child's life up to that point.  After a few reps, they gave the smell and taste again, but secretly withheld the drug.  Her immune system responded again (favorably) as though they had administered the drug.  This showed that our immune systems can be conditioned to respond favorably (or unfavorably) to external stimuli.  VERY interesting implications. (I learned of this case on PBS). 

This week, pay attention to classical conditioning and where you see it in action in your life and the lives of those around you.

Training your dog to come, using a whistle

My students use my detailed 4-page "Come" training plan to train their dogs to come to them using the cue "come".  It's very helpful to ALSO train this same behavior using a whistle.  Why?  Because if you're like me, your dog goes with you to the beach, or to run in fields, or to a large dog park, where you would have to really yell your verbal cue in order for your dog to hear it.  So having 2 cues for the same "come"  behavior, one of which is handy to use in noisy, windy, surf environments, is very helpful.

Remember that it's OK to have two separate cues that mean the SAME thing.  That is not confusing to your dog if you train the cues to the behavior the same way.  In our own language, we understand "stop" and "halt" to mean the same thing.  What is confusing is when we accidentally let one cue mean two DIFFERENT things to the poor dog.  If "down" sometimes means "belly on the ground, please" and other times means "put your paws on the ground", that's confusing.  That's why in my house, "down" means "belly on the ground" and "off" means "put all 4 of your paws on the ground".   Each cue should only mean one thing, but it's OK to have multiple cues mean the SAME thing.  Make sense?

OK.  So get yourself a whistle.  If you are one of those fortunate people who know how to whistle really loud, and you can still do that in wind, you don't need a separate whistle.  I have a few whistles because I cannot whistle loudly on my own.

Get some HIGH VALUE treats, and play the backup recall game with your dog, where you hold a treat at their nose level, and backup quickly as you toot the whistle.  The dog follows you, and you release the treat.  If you can handle it, CLICK with a clicker and then release the treat.  So the whistle stays in your mouth the whole time.  You back up again, tooting the whistle, dog follows, you click and give the treat.  Do this about 25 times.  Quit.

Next time, pick a moment when your dog is about 10 feet away sniffing something, and (having the high value treat ready), toot the whistle, and click/treat when the dog comes to you.  Slowly build distance, and in other situations reduce distance and slowly build the dog's ability to do this is slightly distracting environments.  Raise the "bar" of distance and distraction separately.  And when out in public working on this, use a long line.

Never ever stop practicing your dog's recall.  Keep it happy, reward it generously, and keep it fluent.

I bought about 3 whistles on sale recently for $2 each.   The model I bought normally costs $9 at a major pet supply store (they were on sale).  I jumped at the chance to buy them when I saw their price.  I know I'll need them over time, and I'll keep one in my car, one in my dog-treat fanny pack, and one at home.  You don't have to spend a lot on these.   I have also used a little combo compass and whistle (for hiking and emergencies) that I got at REI one year.  It's got a great little whistle. 

Happy training!