"All-Positive Monday 16" - Canine Creativity?

This was something different. Today, I took Wally out to an open field and just waited for him to do something. When he did, I tried to go with it and see if I couldn't get him to extend it.

He started with his usual, the typical sitting and such that usually gets him rewarded, and I did reward it here as well. After a while, he was like, "hmm....what's up here?"

I pretended to ignore him and he sat next to me. I kept acting like I was looking at something and then he stood up on his back paws. I kept looking in the distance and he waved his paws up and down like "hey, I'm over here!". Turned and clicked and gave him a treat. He kept standing up. I held out for a little while and he started with the paws again. Another reward.

Next, the tail started going. Usually, this is a precursor to his barking (he always "winds up" his tail before he starts barking). It wasn't quite a bark, but he did make some vocalization. That got him another reward.

Then, I went back to "ignoring" him. He sat down for a moment just looking at me. He sort of "gruffed" and started looking around. I suppose he was looking for an object to grab or poke. He went over to the monkey bars (we were near a playground) and pawed the base. I rewarded that. I was hoping he'd act as though he'd climb them, but he didn't.

He came back. He sat, but I had gone back to the pretending again. He lied down. Still nothing. He tapped my foot with his paw. I looked at him and rewarded him. He did it again. Another reward. Again, but this time - nothing. Next, he put both his paws on my foot and barked. That got rewarded.

After that, we had some fun just running around before going back in because we were both getting quite hot.

Next time, I will have to do this near a light pole to see if he incorporates that into the things he offers!

Object Discrimination 5: First Attempt At Three Objects

Tonight, I upped it to three objects. All three objects where down, including a new one, "perro" a little stuff dog. This was different in lots of areas and would present a challenge to Wally.

At first, I introduced him to "perro". I pointed to "perro" and when he touched the little stuffed dog, I clicked and rewarded him. I repeated this multiple times and then put out two other objects, his first new ball (still using "pelota") and the same bone as before, the soft, big one.

Once done, I called for "perro" again. He did go to the dog toy again, but then again, it was in the same spot and the same object he was rewarded for, so it follows that it would be his first choice. I called for "hueso" next, his bone. Now that confused him. In fact, the bone was a hard object for him to find! I don't understand why that was, but he just was at a loss to find it.

He did eventually find the bone somewhat consistently, and then I threw in "pelota". Another bit of confusion and he went back to the bone a lot. The ball was just sitting there, in plain view and he wouldn't turn around to find it. I think what happened was that his usual search pattern kicked in. Too bad for him, the ball was in the opposite direction!

Wally did get the ball, and now it was time to have him looking for an object at random. He was challenged, at times he seemed to want to give up, but I wouldn't let that happen. I don't know if I was pushing his limits, but with encouragement, my constant calling out the object, and the rewards I used (the new treats I got at the last trip to Petco) kept him going and he did find the object I called out for.

After that, I gave him a two minute break. I stroked him slowly and gently while he sat in front of me and just let him have a little time to recover and unwind.

Then I tried to add 'dónde está?' so I would say 'dónde está perro?', for example, and he had to at least go to the proper object, the dog toy in this case. Once I did this, he got the object a couple times and brought it to me, but I think it was too much. Also 'dónde está?' is the "find it" cue so that might have entered his mind. A positive (at least in my view it's positive!) sign is that when I said 'dónde está?', he was ready to look, but waited for me to stay the object name. He may have been waiting for the object name to know what to go looking for - something for me to watch going forward.

I switched to "go get _____ " and that helped him. For now, I think I'll stick with that, at least for these exercises.

We had been working for about 30 minutes, so I ended the session, let him jump up on me and let him unwind and process things (he's currently sleeping next to me).

Sorta Light Day For Wally

I thought he deserved another break and since I needed to go to Petco anyway, I brought him along. No surprise that he enjoyed the outing, sniffing everything like he's just come to his most favorite place ever in the whole world.

No dogs in the store, though, and I was hoping there would be so I could do a little socialization work. But I did get to do a lot of work with trying to control his excitement and having him stay under control. He did a pretty good job overall, considering the situation. We mostly worked on simple stuff like positions and stopping when I stopped.

He did show interest in people going by, sniffing them as they passed and not shying away or shrinking back. I rewarded him for that and it is a part of socialization so we got a little of it in.

At one point, I think I overstimulated him. I found another cute little ball with some interesting colors while also being "floss" for his teeth (not that he'll likely chew on it, but I figure if I play with it with him and making him bite and pull on it to get it from me...) and I was telling him to get it and getting him excited, and he was slipping around on the floor trying to change directions and get the ball and looking around! He was just super excited and wound up - eyes all big and just didn't know what to do with himself.

Of course, he loved being around the food aisle and sniffing the bags of treats. I don't know if this counts as object discrimination, but he got to pick out which treats he liked best. He kept showing interest in one pack first and most often, so that's the one I bought for him. When I gave him some, he certainly liked them.

So it was a kind of a light day. No "formal" training, but threw some in and he got out of the house and to explore a fun place. He was pretty tired from all the excitement.

"All-Positive Monday 15" - Dealing With Fireworks

*sigh* It's that time of year again. While I love a good fireworks show as much as anyone, especially on the Fourth like today, it drives Wally mad. This is one of the few real major fears he's got left and every year, it just brings back too many memories.

Fortunately, he's still more stable but today I focused on making him as happy as possible during everything going on.

Basically, what we did is described as the "Look At That" game mentioned in the book Control Unleashed.


Since we where working with fireworks sounds, every time he looked in the direction of the sounds, I clicked and treated him. I definitely made sure to use a very high value treats, in this case some cornbread chunks.


I made sure to use the clicker since he's going to be key on sounds so it would likely "break through" the noise and capture his attention.


One thing this accomplished was get him more focused on me. He started looking at me as we walked, though he was still skittish and had a hard time staying in position because of all the nervous energy inside him.


I started branching out what I would click for, this time clicking for looking at me. I didn't care about position, just if he was focusing on me as that's effort in itself if he's scared/anxious.


Even then, there were still signs that he was too anxious. He didn't want to do much in the way of relieving himself. He did only what he couldn't hold and that was it. That's a clear sign since he usually loves to mark and sniff on walks. His tail stayed low and he was lower to the ground as he moved.


He was also doing behaviors I usually like. This is something he often does when he's anxious, and sometimes I wonder is it because it makes him feel safe ("I'm sitting at his side so I know nothing will happen to me.") or if he is trying to get me to help him feel better ("If I do this, he'll be happy and then something good can happen for me.") It's one of those times I wish I knew what he was thinking.


I also wonder if there's something I can do to further desensitize him to fireworks. Perhaps I can turn to youtube again like I did with dogs. Hmm...

Day of Shaping Puzzles

Today, we tried a little something different with shaping. Well, it's not shaping, per se, but more a test of how much he remembers from tasks we've gone through via shaping - and maybe a little shaping type responses from me (i.e. no direct commands)

First, I put the scale out to him. I didn't do anything else. He had to get on the scale and sit-stay on it. After that, I would act as though I'm checking his weight and he had to stay until I told him it was okay to get off.

When I put the scale out, he kinda looked at it strange, but then must have remembered something because he stood on it with his front paws and the back paws were on the floor.

I didn't say anything of course, just stood there looking at him. He saw no reward forthcoming, and tried something else. After a few tries, he got it and sat on the scale. I then did the rest and had him stay on for a little longer. Once finished, I rewarded him and let him off.

Next was his soccer ball. Since this is probably easy for him, I made him do a couple different behaviors. He could paw it, pick it up, poke it, or push it. Any of those, but he had to do at least two.

He did the poke almost immediately. Not surprising since that's one we've worked on quite a bit. I rewarded the poke and waited for something else. He kept wanting to give me pokes, but I wasn't paying any attention to those any longer. He tried some other stuff like sitting near me, but the picked up the ball. That was good enough.

Lastly, I had a towel laid out. This was for him to lie down on as if doing the "mat" training. This one he got pretty quick. At first he sat on it, but then he lied down and solved it quickly.

Not to bad, considering it's the first time I had him switch like this and had him basically to remember the whole thing from scratch and on his own.