Little cooperative care session with our mucosal intranasal rapid atomisation device! This is to build up to an intranasal kennel cough vaccine.
We had been doing it with him holding the ‘bite bar’ (otherwise known as a kids play gym frame from eBay!)
I picked up the syringe and went to move the bar into position for him and he was like ‘I don’t need that anymore’ and targeted it with his nose!!
So, on Leo’s suggestion we did it this way and it actually worked really well! I was very cautious to make sure he was moving his head forward to meet me with the syringe and I wasn’t moving it towards him if he was backing away or feeling pressure and becoming frozen.
I use our location specific reward marker cue ‘bucket’ which to Leo means collect your reward from the bowl/plate/bucket - I started using it when we were training in a big field and needed something he could see easily, hence we used a bucket and therefore used ‘bucket’ as the cue which he actually responds really well too - it’s hard to find cues that sound unique!
It’s so useful in scenarios like this where I need both of my hands free!
Leo’s niece Laena came for a cooperative care lesson this morning!
Leo’s niece Laena came for a cooperative care lesson this morning!
One of the things we worked on was chin targeting and then transferring it onto an object to free up her owners hands - she picked it up really quickly!!
Using a keep going signal, ‘nice’, worked really well for her - without it her brain was still thinking about what else she could offer to earn reinforcement like give a paw etc.
Giving her instant feedback that she was doing the correct thing and to keep doing it made such a big difference!
We also used a location specific reward marker, ‘snack’, to communicate to her that we would deliver the food straight to her mouth and she didn’t need to move which meant we could do lots of repetitions in quick succession as we didn’t need to keep getting her back into position. It also meant she wasn’t even thinking about being ready to move to collect her reward which helped her offer lots of stillness, which is never easy for a spaniel!
Work in progress….. ear targeting!!
I love how you can see him thinking, particularly on the second attempt where he initially offers a chin target, pauses for a second and then goes ‘I know what you want, it’s this!’
Using a Keep Going Signal means I can give him feedback and tell him he’s doing the right thing which allows me to grow duration in the position before giving my terminal marker which is the click - If I don’t use a Keep Going Signal I can almost guarantee he will start offering other things in the early stages of learning something new!
Happy 3rd Birthday Eric! 🥳
Happy 3rd Birthday Eric! 🥳
He enjoyed a scentwork session this morning 😊
I’m fast running out of things to challenge him with so have been looking through my recycling to see what we can safely use - I thought asking him to put something long in the bottle was a step too far but apparently not!!!
Leo is always set up for success and I never allow him to be unsuccessful more than twice before making it significantly easier for him, which actually means he progresses a lot quicker than try to push through him being stuck and getting frustrated and losing confidence!
If he has had 1 or 2 unsuccessful attempts I will set it up so he is pretty much guaranteed success for the subsequent 5 or 6 tries before even thinking about making it harder again!
For this trick it would have been dropped back to either me handing him the stick pointing downwards so he didn’t need to turn it and/or putting it into a much wider object.
Work in progress….. playing around with positions facing away from me!
We are using his Location Specific Reinforcement Marker Cue ‘Bucket’ - when he hears it he knows to go and collect his reward from the bucket instead of looking at me to give it to him which puts lots of value in him facing away from me!
Chewy is the most incredible little dog - he hadn’t done either of these tricks before his session today!!! 🤯
Eric enjoyed his scentwork session this morning!
We’ve been experimenting with different ways we can help dogs keep their mouths open comfortably to allow their teeth to be brushed or checked by a vet etc.
Leo holds a piece of pipe while I brush his teeth every night, which allows me good access to his teeth but it does totally block the view of the inside of his back molars - I can see so much better using this!
Something happened last week that got me thinking about how often we must miss pain in dogs - I had a sore tooth which started when I suddenly bit down on something hard unexpectedly while I was eating and it caused a sharp pain in one of my upper molars. It wasn’t excruciating by any means, but annoyingly uncomfortable!
A couple of days later it hadn’t improved so I phoned the dentist. They checked my teeth and did an x-ray which showed that there was nothing visibly wrong, and it was put down to an irritated nerve caused by uneven pressure distribution when I had bitten down on the hard piece of food.
Thankfully, I was able to speak and explain to the dentist what had happened, what the pain was like etc and he totally believed me, even though my teeth looked fine!
However, it really got me thinking how often things like that must happen to our dogs, and how readily owners rule out pain as a cause of behaviour changes as the vet ‘says they are fine’, when in-fact the vet means that they just haven’t found an obvious source of pain and the owner has assumed all is well! How often do people say that their dog ‘has been a nightmare recently’ etc when in fact their dog could well be experiencing pain or discomfort?
Something else that has become very obvious in experimenting with looking in Leo’s mouth is how he reacts to concern/negativity in someone’s voice while they are examining him, you can see him instantly change and look worried and go ‘WHAT! WHATS WRONG WITH ME?!’ - so from now on I will always ask the vet etc to talk to him positively while they are examining him!
Sam really enjoyed playing the drum this morning!!
I love how quickly Leo figures things out!
In one of my Zoom groups yesterday we were working on undoing zips which we normally use a suitcase or bag for, and someone suggested using a fabric crate! Of course Leo had to try doing it today - figuring out new things makes him so happy!
I’m usually pretty quiet when I train, and everything I do say is deliberate and I expect my dogs to respond to it. There is no random shouting.
Clarity is kindness and I can see how quickly frustration creeps in if I start to muddy the waters and say things that aren’t relevant or helpful - Leo is particularly sensitive to even me sighing if things haven’t gone quite right, he’s certainly massively increased my awareness of things I used to do subconsciously!
Training for us is first and foremost fun, and I’m very conscious to never put pressure on him. I’m always generous with my rewards and always reward effort - we can’t ask any more of our dogs than that they try their best!
Trick training has massively increased Leo’s confidence and he is always so happy after a training session ❤️
Eric had fun learning to unzip a suitcase this week!
Chewy came for his first session today! He’s such a clever little dog!
Eric really enjoyed his scentwork as usual this morning, he is just the happiest little dog! 🥰
In his last session we struggled to introduce the bags hanging up as he didn’t understand what we wanted him to do with them - he was thinking he either had to grab them and pull them off (he has recently learned how to take off socks and gloves so that was fresh in his mind!) or push them strongly with his nose and they would swing away from him and then he wasn’t sure what to do.
It’s completely different from any other indication he’d learnt!
He had already worked really hard last time so we didn’t push him when it clearly wasn’t working and it gave me time to think of a plan of how to explain to him what to do!
We needed to teach him a sustained nose touch with lighter pressure so we did this using a wooden spoon as a target stick, got what we were looking for and then put the bag with a small piece of kong (he’s trained to indicate on red kong odour) over the spoon and he instantly went ‘oh, I see what you want me to do now!’ and it transitioned beautifully to the bag hanging up! Well done Eric! 🌟
One of the best things I’ve ever taught Leo is his ‘wait’ cue! It saves a lot of time and potential frustration with him trying to figure out what on earth I want!
I use it to communicate to him ‘you are in the correct position, freeze there until I give you further instruction’
You can almost feel Leo’s brain pause when I use it - he goes from thinking about what I’m asking and working out what he needs to do to ‘freeze’ instantly.
I use ‘wait’ - you must use a unique cue so you can’t use ‘wait’ if you use it as a ‘stay’ type cue, that would mean ‘stay where you are, don’t change position’ but they are free to move their head etc
It’s something that must be grown slowly, ensuring that the dog understands what you are asking each step of the way. Shouting ‘WAIT!!!’ won’t suddenly develop their understanding of the cue, much like if you were to shout German at me I would still have absolutely no clue what you were saying!
All too often I see people asking too much too soon from there dogs, which leads to a lack of success and a partnership that don’t thrive and enjoy every minute they get to spend working together.
My dogs are successful 90-95% of the time, if they are finding it difficult I make it easier. The result? Dogs that love working, are motivated, happy and confident and always try their absolute best, because they know they have a high chance of success!
We had a play around today with him waiting facing away from me, guided into position with his target stick, then a little distraction added by moving it around before I gave him his terminal marker ‘yes’ and he got his reward 😊
Eric had lots of fun doing scentwork yesterday
During his last 2 sessions we’ve worked on him not touching the pot with his paws, look at what he can do now! ⭐️
This week Leo’s enjoyed training sessions with an electric toothbrush!
He was a little unsure of it at first but getting him to target it with his nose definitely helped him get used to the noise and sensation of it before we progressed further with it!
You can see how confidently he pushes into it- that is because I let him come towards it so he was totally in control and he knew he could move away from it if he needed to. I would have never got him to this stage of enjoying interacting with it if I’d started by moving it towards him.
For our final session today, having him hold the pipe in his mouth gives him another way to indicate he is happy for me to touch his teeth with the brush (start button).
I would immediately stop if he moved his head down away from targeting my hand, dropped the pipe or stepped of the block he was standing on.
A lot of valuable information is gained when you go to repeat the procedure - if there was any latency and he was slightly reluctant to take the pipe then I would know he’s not totally comfortable and we need to go back a step or two.
My goal is that he can just whisper ‘I’m not comfortable with this’ to me and not have to shout ‘I CAN’T COPE!!!’ for me to stop and think about how we can make things easier for him ❤️
Congratulations to Terri and Zero for coming 5th in the Novice class of the International Trick Dog Competition! 🎉
Congratulations to Stacey and Louie for coming 3rd in the Intermediate class of the International Trick Dog Competition! 🎉
When you suddenly realise that your dog has fallen asleep during a nail maintenance session 🙈
For a long time my dogs have used a scratch board for their front nails and I’ve cut their back ones - they don’t need done nearly as often as the front ones do!
The scratch board allowed us to get their nails shorter than I’d be confident cutting them incase I caught the quick!
Recently we’ve been experimenting with using a grinder - particularly to help my old poodle Katie and my other spaniel Phoebe, who has recently been diagnosed with arthritis in her front toes she and was beginning to be less enthusiastic about using the board.
After a few of weeks getting them used to the grinder they are all totally relaxed while having their nails done, and yesterday Leo even fell asleep!
It’s a big deal considering 3 years ago he wouldn’t have wanted to be in the same room if it was switched on, let alone let me use it on his nails!
