Vito’s here to tell you to stay hydrated this weekend….or just get water splashed in your face…whatever works 🤪
For food to be part of providing enriching activities for our dogs, there probably needs to be more feeding behaviour than actual eating.
Food can be a great way of providing some enriching outlets for dogs, and can form parts of other interventions too. Dogs have to eat and they come in-built with many consummatory behaviours, some of which we have exaggerated or inhibited via domestication.
But food can just be food too. And knowing which and when is best for each individual dog is a key to providing them with enriched lives & worlds.
Just using food in toys or other imaginative ways doesn't mean that the dog can be declared "enriched". That depends on the outcomes.
Providing different options, collecting data about their preferences, and watching how their behaviour is affected, or not, on the back of these interventions helps to determine if we are providing enriching activities.
One of the best ways to better understand behaviour, and to teach, is look at the actions of cues.
Cues happen before behaviours and tell the learner that doing a specific behaviour makes reinforcement happen. The simplest example is, you say "sit" and your dog learns that lowering their bum after they hear that sound makes you produce a treat.
I want to be really easily trainable and for my dog to be able to 'train' me to make the goods things available. And to make so many good things available for them.
So, what does make you do? What does another dog, a loud noise, wildlife...anything..happening make the dogs' human do?
Does something happening cause you to tighten the leash, yell at your dog, get frustrated? What can your dog expect when those things happen?
What does the appearance of prey animals like deer or squirrels cue your dog to do? What does that happening cue you to do?
Identify the behaviours these things cue.
Identify what your dog gets out of doing those behaviours.
And, instead you provide those outlets cued by the .
What if the appearance of ANYTHING cues you to make some fun happen, that cues you to make the function of their behaviour become available?
Start with things that don't cause BIG responses. The appearance of a person, jogger, bike, dog, bird, leaf cues you to play the games.
This clip shows Decker's response when he sees deer appearing and running. Decker is pretty deaf now, due to old age, so any noise I'm making isn't going to be terribly useful. But deer appearing, moving, or whatever, cues Decker to engage.
We do this naturally and he returns, or we do it formally by playing a Look At That game (cued by "Who dat?" but I point at the thing to prompt cos he can't hear me!).
This comes from thousands of practices starting with me making BIG EXCITEMENT happen cued by deer - don't get your jollies chasing deer, get them with me! Works for all the other things too!
Our awesome Community K9s/Adventurers out and about again for a fun filled outing altogether.
Compliments about how "well-behaved" our dogs are had the humans beaming, and righly so. Our Teams devote inordinate time and energy to their dogs' care.
But this is so hard for dogs. We humans have all sorts of societal rules that are arbitrary to dogs...why can't I chew that wooden table leg? why can't I toilet on this carpet? why can't I eat that delicious sandwich that you left on the counter?
While we might have many good reasons for these and similar rules, this is simply ridiculous to dogs!
As our world becomes less and less 'dog-friendly', it becomes more and more challenging for guardians to provide for their dogs' needs. And that's what this class is all about...
We must develop skills and knowledge to provide for our dogs' needs, without causing nuisance to others, and to do that, we must teach our dogs skills (behaviours) to better cope with the human world in which they have no choice but to try to survive.
The trick for guardians is choosing a dog for whom they can provide outlets for their behavioural needs without their dogs' behaviour ever presenting nuisnace or risk to others...other people, other animals, other dogs, our entire communities.
That means we must understand what's normal, natural, necessary for dogs and provide those outlets without impacting others' comfort.
We must recognise not just those needs but the ways in which dog behaviour can impact others.
It's on you, the human, to provide for your dogs' needs without futher deteriorating the limited tolerance and negative acceptance for dog behaviour in our communities. We wouldn't expect to be able to 'just slot in' to a foreign or even alient culture and nor can our dogs. It's on us.
Our Adventurers-turned-Community K9-ers have completed their coursework so we are going on some outings together over the summer to really apply our skills. Plus we love to hang out with this special group of guardians and dogs, who have been on such a journey together.
Our theme today, on our first outing, was redirection-skills - behaviours we teach our dogs to redirect their focus or body from something else to maintain safety.
And not only are we emphasising skill building for both ends of the leash, but the application to these skills to maintain one another's and others' comfort.
Being part of a community means that we are looking out for others and being a community-focused guardian means that we are meeting our dogs' needs without causing harm or nuisance to other people, dogs, animals, wildlife and the environment.
And most importantly, by leading with community focused guardianship we maintain dogs as safe, beneficial and healthy members of our society, as they have been for tens of thousands of years.
That's what this course is all about, and what our participants so elequently demonstrate in every interaction with their wonderful canine companions.
Congratulations to our Community K9 group who finished up this weekend 🥳
Some of my favourite Teams who are a pleasure to work with ❤
This is an engagement based course. We ask, what does (your dog's) engagement cue you to do? If your response is reinforcing, engagement builds.
And once we have those foundations, we ask, what do other things in the environment cue you to do?
When a dog, a jogger, a scooter, a horse, appears what's your predictable response?
What does your dog's response cue you to do? What might you do that cues reinforcement behaviour from your dog?
And soon, those dogs, joggers, scooters, and horses, will cue you and your dog to do engagement behaviours!
Sounds simple, right?! Ha! 😆 This requires work, practice, and so much fun but is doable and a key to living with a community canine 🙂
"Meet & Greets" are not terribly predictive of how dogs will develop a relationship together. Altough commonly recommended, a reliance on information from relatively short and usually intense interactions, doesn't provide great insight.
Whether the dogs appear to get on famously, or if the dogs appear to dislike one another, in that moment, doesn't really tell us how their relationship will blossom particularly under different and varying conditions.
You will understand the complexities of moving into a house or sharing space with other humans...
One of the most common risk factors I see in IDA (interdog aggression) cases is inappropriate introductions early on during what should have been space and time for relationship development.
Think instead about relationship building over time. A new dog moving in already has to navigate new human relationships along with all the environmental changes, without having to try to keep the peace with established dogs too.
Starting out by building toward neutral responses toward one another under conditions where that can happen. It's a long road before those dogs are able to form cooperative relationships and many may never do so at all or across contexts.
Taking that time at the start and spending the first several months of your new dog's life supporting them in developing healthy and safe relationships with the humans and canines is an investment. And it doesn't happen over night or based on one or even a few "meet & greeets".
Here ADL Vito has some hanging-out walks with another dog who largely ignores him. Hanging out with other dogs is no big deal and we set up conditions so that's possible.
If these dogs were to live together, this is rehearsed under all the conditions where that's necessary, setting up their world so that can happen. Rushing this is not recommended!
Community K9s Class 5 and more of the same fun and engagement on a somewhat sunny morning!
More engagement, more space, more comfort, more fun and this week we really looked at just how many food rewards we use. We gotta know how many we start with before we can adjust while maintaining behaviour.
We don't fade out reinforcers, we add more and a greater variety. Food is fast and great for establishing behaviours and managing behaviours, but we can add more engagement, movement and fun so food becomes less important.
Improving the humans' skills leads to improved dog skills - the dogs just need to turn up and do reinforcement behaviours. We have to present reinforcers in the right way so they can learn. Simple, not easy!
All dogs should be muzzle trained so that, at the very least, wearing a muzzle isn't a further stressor in painful situations. You can start muzzle training any time, even if just a fun training project for you both; you don't even need a muzzle to start!
This is a great learning-to-learn project for both ends of the leash too.
While every plan is personalised for each Team, generally, I don't start with luring the dog into the muzzle & really don't do much luring at all.
Muzzle Prep
- line different containers (e.g., cups, pots, tubs etc.) with yummies so your dog learns to stick their nose in there.
Move to the next stage when your dog is enthusiastically sticking their nose in.
Stage 1: muzzle bowl
Line the container & prop your muzzle in it. Your dog sticks their nose into the muzzle in the container to get the good stuff.
Or, line the inside of the muzzle and prop it up in the muzzle box.
Stage 2: nose in - treat out
Hold the muzzle or balance it between your knees. Your dog sticks their nose into all sorts now so will offer this behaviour. Mark with an enthusiastic YES! and toss a treat for them to chase or catch.
Stage 3a: nose in - treat in
Your dog enthusiastically jams their nose in to the muzzle & you feed, through the muzzle once they've done that. Their behaviour first, then your reward delivery. Practice the mechanics without your dog first.
Stage 3b: loop on
In separate sessions, but concurrent with 3a, open the muzzle loop wide. Lure your dog's head through the loop & let it rest on their neck. Play sniffing games to encourage them to move about & get used to the weight of the muzzle on their neck.
Stage 4: muzzle on loosely
Once your dog is happy with that, combine 3a and 3b!
If you get this far, you're doing great & you can progress by building the gap between rewards delivered into the muzzle so that the dog's nose stays there longer incrementally.
Practice in 30-60 second sessions twice a day and make it fun. The most import
Class 4 for our Community K9s group and we are no fair weather Teams...nor do we do "training classes" as traditionally envisioned. It's all about engagement, fun and participation as Team members.
Not to mention our busy Whatsapp group where our awesome humans make the most wonderful observations about what they're learning with their canine companions!
We love to learn in the wild, having fun and giving our canine learners scope to be dogs, with their humans' support.
Kelly from A Dogs Life is just so unassuming and a joy to live with that she is often overlooked. But she's ready, with her bags packed, to go home!
Check out just how joyful outings are with this wee pet ❤
Kelly specs:
- about 6-8 years old
- female, neutered, healthy & happy
- quiet, unassuming and clean in the house
- adult, grown-up home
- secure garden for hanging out & pottering
- rural, semi-rural, mature suburban areas
- no cats
- quiet, mature dog or no other dog
- patience and support to help her settle in and build confidence
- once better settled, a couple of pottering walks a day
- some space beside you on the sofa for plenty of sofa time
Kelly is such a sweet and gentle lady who has been enjoying some luxury in her life in foster and is now more than ready for her new life with her very own humans.
Please share Kelly to spread the word about this awesome dog who will make the best pal and companion 🙂
Ask your dog!
When our dog appears "distracted" or not wanting to do the things, we often attempt to increase the value of food reinforcers or the intensity of social pressure or other averesives.
But your dog's behaviour is information. If we expect engagement, we need to ask them if they're able.
Here's an example of some questions to ask:
- can you eat?
- can you re-engage, after moving away?
- can you do simple behaviours?
Rather than just sticking the yummiest yummy in front of their noses, possibly reducing their "choice" and coercing supposed cooperation, we might ask them if and when they're ready and willing.
This is a key focus of our engagement work. The dog chooses to engage. We don't intimidate, lure, nag or otherwise induce it. They get to seek their jollies, we make sure they're safe and their behaviour is appropriate, but most of all, we ask them if they can participate.
Of course, engagement isn't always possible or safe and we do need to have skills in place to cue safe and more appropriate behaviour, but when we can, engagement is the focus.
We make that happen by taking care with the situations to which we expose them. Their behaviour is information telling us if they are comfortable and if they're able to do our things...we just have to listen and respond appropriately.
We got even more sunshine for our Community K9s Class 3 🌞
This week we worked on keeping engagement and getting some engagement behaviours onto verbal cues, plus so much more fun and learning. Closer proximities and improved comfort while passing one another, plus in engaging with their humans despite the activity surrounding us in the park.
It is truly an honour and pleasure working with this awesome group whose ability to apply our coursework to meeting their individual dog's needs is astounding and inspiring. Hopefully the sunshine continues for our next class too #IrishSummer
Vito from A Dogs Life is ready for home so get your applications in fast!
He is looking for a lap and sofa of his own to do this with...all day every day... ❤
A home for Vito:
- adult home, sturdy family members - Vito loves hard and with his entire body
- quiet-ish home without a lot of comings and goings and with someone available to help him settle in initially
- prefers to be an only dog but we can guide you through integration with another appropriate dog
- no cats or other pets as that might be too much fun for Vito
- a nice secure garden
- person who works from home or part-time but who can take some time initially to settle a new dog into a new routine
- a vehicle to drive this fella about town - after lying on your lap, his FAVOURITE thing to do is to go for car-rides
- an appreciation for bully love and silliness - Vito has this in spades
- much time for snuggling and sofa-time together
- Vito doesn't require a lot of physical exercise so a couple of short potters about a quiet park and then some play, puzzles and chews at home is plenty
Vito will steal your heart and that spot beside/on you for all the lovin' ❤
Rollercoasters are an integral part of living with dogs and supporting their behavioural health. Sometimes they happen naturally but for adolescent dogs, particularly, consideration for Rollercoasters is probably best if structured and guided.
Here's one simple way to add some Rollercoasters! Play duration-down/300Peck games during every outing. And everywhere else!
Stop, scatter some treats for your dog to snuffle.
Ask them to lie down and reward by delivering a treat to the ground between their front legs.
Count one, reward
Count one, two, reward
Count one, two, three, reward
Count one, two, three, four, reward
Count one, two, three, four, five, reward
Then toss a treat for your dog to find and go on your way.
By adding in a round of this game here and there on every outing you are creating Rollercoasters and helping your dog learn about coming down. With practice and practice, you might be able to extend duration and your dog might start to seek out ways to come down when they feel themselves become overwhelmed.
Taking a break and checking in with your dog during outings is an excellent way to boost engagement too.