Training Matters

09/10/2025

Our friend Ryan Talbot in cooperative care video from Wolf Park.

09/03/2025

I recently read of a horse someone’s been working with for five years. The horse has needed to move on to another trainer. I’ve also read of someone who was surprised when the horse they were working with had fear-based reactions at a training competition. The trainer had not witnessed those behaviors previously. When we know better about how behavior and training work, we can do better. It’s not just about the species you are working with. There are overarching principles we know from behavior science.

Behavior is in the environment. When you understand that on a deep level and see it everywhere and can talk about it clearly (repeating and extending your own understanding of this repeatedly demonstrated truth about behavior and how it works), being surprised at how behavior changes in new environments or taking five years with a challenging individual to not get very far becomes way less likely. Is there any 100 percent? No. Do we do things differently with different individuals? Yes. Within the framework of our understanding of how behavior works supplied by applied behavior analysis. Are we always learning? Certainly.

Link to related post in the comments.

08/30/2025

It's less than a month until our Animal Trainers' Retreat: Training With Love + Science in Brattleboro, Vermont. Not only do we have amazing talks lined up from distinguished speakers who work with dogs and also people and horses, we have experiential opportunities to practice the human behaviors involved in shaping learner behavior. We also have an option for listening to and receiving recordings of the presentations only. These are the topics that will be delved into:

* Applied behavior analysis as providing an overarching, holistic framework for teaching and training.
* Reinforcement systems and how they work. Reinforcement isn't an event. It is a series of events that, when understood and strengthened, improve communication with learners.
* Loose leash walking: These days we want to allow our dogs more freedom to explore while on leash walks. This means we need to strengthen a variety of behaviors to allow exploration and keep the dog with us when needed. It's not the 'walk next to me at all times' behavior that it used to be.
* A science-based approach to talking about the concept of anxiety. The word 'anxiety' or 'anxious' is often used to describe a learner. But, what, really, does it mean behaviorally? How can getting a better handle on the behaviors involved in 'anxiety' can improve assessments and learning needed skills.
* An exploration of the efficacy and efficiency of owner-implemented protocols. Who needs what additional supports to implement them well? And what would those supports be?
* There's a lot of talk of 'consent' (beginning to be discussed more as 'assent' now) in the training industry. What are the contingencies at play in 'assent'?
* Some behaviors animals engage in are labeled as 'instinct' and thought not trainable using positive reinforcement. We will look at sheepherding as an example of an 'instinctive' behavior and how it responds to social reinforcers and apply this understanding to other, more common situations in which instinct is assumed to be involved.

For more information on presenters and their talks, see the link in the comments.

This program has been put together from talks given at a variety of other, more expensive and less accessible events. This is part of our commitment to making high quality information available to a wide range of trainers, animal care professionals, and dedicated owners.

08/29/2025

Chewy boxes: the savior of dogs and puppy raisers everywhere.

This was a blast. The boxes and their contents occupied the puppies for about an hour with a novel experience: fishing out treats from the paper packaging and boxes. Then they started to tear the boxes and packaging up. Is it a mess now? Yes. Was it worth it? Also, yes.

08/18/2025

In defense of feeder toys.

I know, I know. It’s fashionable now to poo-poo feeder toys. They aren’t really enrichment or all of what enrichment is. Fair enough on the latter point: they aren’t the one thing that is enrichment. The point about enrichment that there isn’t one thing. There are many things that prompt behavioral variety in keeping with a species’ behavioral needs.

Here’s one. As many know by now, I am raising a litter of puppies. This is my first and probably my only endeavor at puppy raising. I had a nice dog. I bred her with a nice dog. We have EIGHT fractious and active 7-week-old puppies right now.

Feeder toys help me to divert them from their fractiousness with each other when it gets too intense. They give me a way to get them all in from outside: yell “puppies, puppies, puppies” and provide feeder toys. They give the pups things to interact with that are sometimes unpredictable, take some figuring out, and offer different textures and smells to explore. They add chew items to their collection of such. Etc.

So, they help me, one part of the two-individual equation that is dog stewardship. And they provide opportunities for lots of natural puppy behaviors: foraging, chewing, licking, learning how objects behave and some of their physical properties, using one’s body in relation to the toys, acquiring reinforcement both for behaviors and just because.

Don’t ditch the feeder toys because it’s a fad to do so. Use them with behavioral purpose. Remember that you, as the dog’s person, count, too. And make sure you are meeting and even exceeding your dogs’ behavioral needs in all their variety.

Picture below of the feeder toys and a paper roll that will be distributed after the heathens wake up from their post-breakfast nap and go out to potty.

08/12/2025

Featuring trainers, researchers, and behavior analysts using real-world strategies grounded in ABA.

08/11/2025

08/10/2025

Another, even more beautiful piece by Francesca Degli Espinosa. Behavior is the root of all learning. Behavior in itself is something to be valued and understood by teachers of all species. Our workshops explore how behavior works and shaping for all learners. Link to the next one in the comments.

How Lilly learned to offer movement, rather than wait to be moved

08/10/2025

I may have shared this previously here, but this author's writing is so very important, illustrating how the field of applied behavior analysis is evolving when best practices are followed. Shaping without touching the learner is something we practice here at our workshops, the next coming up in September. Link in the comments.

How a labrador puppy taught me behaviour analysis