I miss videos from some participants... I hope you're still posting it, it really doesn't matter if you're not finished with the trick just yet, you can always do that later - but it might be easier with some directions, that's why I would like to see everybody's videos!
But well, it's time for a new to-do list, I'm again underlining the ones you want to focus on in case you run out of time for all of them:
1. see in what situations your dog gets really crazy and exited or runs as mad and name it - my "magic" word is "ajde, ajde" and you can really see how much speed they add when hearing it - in agility or when running in the fields. I got it by saying anytime they would be playing the BC games, chasing each other in full speed or go crazy and run in circles on a wet grass.
2. make the front feet target lower&lower and smaller&smaller and then fade it completely, still circling away from the dog and have him follow your leg. Then, add movements to the side, forward and backward and reward your dog for being glued to the leg.
3. side version of 2on2off: try to get side legs (the two left or the two right legs) on an object. The easiest is to choose an object that is angled (I put a pillow/plank/drawer under the angle against the sofa or a wall), so that the dog can't climb on it with all 4 feet. Because of 2on2off, they will probably try hind feet on, but position yourself next to an object so that the dog is parallel to it and will probably first try just one hind foot (it helps if you have a pee trick down already!): reward a couple of times so that he keeps it there as opposed to try to put the other hind leg on too and then see if you can get front foot on too. You can tell them to paw touch your hand that you keep close to an object and eventually fade the hand to have both feet on an object. Jackpot if the dog puts both feet on at the same time (vs. first hind, then front). Do it with both sides right from the start, you want to build muscle and balance on both sides.
4. one object into another: shape the dog to pick up an object, then to carry it around, then to carry it in the direction of another object, then to let it go close to it and eventually to actually put it in another object. I usually start directly with two bowls of the same size, but to make it easier, you can also use a toy and a box or something similar. Do try it with a bowl too, though, they require more precision.
5. hug the pole/umbrella trick, first clicking for any paw touch, then for sliding to the side and then for going more&more around the object, the final goal is a firm hug with one or both front feet around the object - see 
6. stays with distractions: tell the dog to sit or down and continue with proofing the stay until the release word as we were practicing in 2on2off position already in the last lesson: have them stay in a position with you running passed them, throwing toys and treats, making different hand gestures etc. - then say "go" (sometimes standing still, sometimes while moving) and reward, preferably with a toy as you want a fast start out of the position on "go"
Hi Silvia,
I have a question about session frequency. When you’re training a trick how frequently might you do a session for that trick? (I try to keep my sessions 1-2 mins max). For example, I started training the umbrella trick today. I rolled a big towel and put tape around it. Echo was afraid of it… 🙁 So I’ve done 4 x 1 minute sessions over the last 1-2 hours and now she’s confidently touching it with her paw.
About the fear thing. I hear from terv people that terv puppies are especially prone to ups and downs of fear periods. We go outside in a wind storm as Hurricane Irene flirts with us, and she’s saying “Party! Let’s chase leaves and things that go bump in the night!” But I offer her a rolled beach towel and she thinks it’s the boogey man, LOL! I’m mostly just working through this, but this is a very well socialized puppy who has fears about the oddest things. She’ll SLAM a door at work (I work at a vet hospital so can bring her with me at times), but tapping a closed cabinet door at home is terribly scary and I’ve had to go to having her make sounds and movements in other ways such as a wobble board. I’d love to know your approach to these types of unexpected fearful moments. I dream of my puppy having confidence in all situations, new or old.
Thank you so much.
Rachel
Well, you can do as many sessions as you can still find hers and yours motivation for 🙂 I have to admit that I’m somewhat lazy and do less and longer sessions, starting off with 4 to 5 per day for 5min or so and then making them fewer and longer. I don’t think it’s better in any way, it’s just easier for me, but 4x 1min in 1/2 hours is of course fine too and actually better when dealing with fear: you don’t want to overwhelm the dog when dealing with something s/he is not quite comfortable with! So I’ll keep it very short too when dealing with something like that and then spend the rest of the session on something else -- but you can as well just end it and try again later.
And well, the best way towards confident dog is providing them with lots of experience (interaction with different objects as we are doing here, interaction with different people and environments), giving them time to get used to things vs. pushing them into anything and, probably most importantly: never asking them more as they can offer to teach them they can trust you. My Bu is a very fearful dog and every try to make her see things aren’t scary actually only made things worse. So I learned to simply respect her fears, show her she can trust me that I won’t be pushing her in scary situations and will make sure everything is safe -- and it made a big difference for her.
Penny’s somewhat the same with new objects (well sometimes she doesn’t mind, there’s no system), so I’ve started leaving the new object on the floor for half a day before actually using them in training. That really seems to work for us 🙂 Except that my tiny apartment is really messy 😉 I simply just leave it there, not making any fuss about it and then she can investigate it at her own pace.
I really like Silvias approach to dealing with fear in dogs. I’ve had a really positive experience with this approach in real life as well. If Penny becomes scared of something I simply walk away from whatever scared her. I talk to her in a cheerful voice as we walk away and engage her in play. When we encounter what scared her again (sometimes the next day, sometimes a week later or even more) she doesn’t mind at all. I think she feels in control of the situation knowing she can just walk away 🙂
For the first month I had her I used the ‘old’ way of taking the dog to whatever scared it (or even staying in the scary environment until the puppy is calm) and trying to persuade her that it was ok, but she just seamed to be more and more scared with that method and I quickly understood that was not the way to go (at least not with her).
But I have one issue that makes me really sad as she is SO scared of the car as she gets really carsick almost every time we go for a ride (it started about a month ago, before that she could drive for hours without problems and loved the car). It breaks my heart that I have to break her trust for me every day, putting her in the car 🙁
But without car rides theres no trips to the woods, beaches or with me to work. So I really do not have an alternative (well, of course she could stay home alone all day and only have walks on leash, but that seems even worse).
Any suggestions are very welcome!! Or just comfort 😉
Oops that became very long, my ‘real life’ friends are not really into dogs, so it’s very nice to have a place to share and relieve what my mind and heart is full of.
Huh, I sure hope somebody can help with that problem! My dogs were sometimes car sick as puppies, but it always went away very quickly, usually already on their first ride home -- and most dogs I know also only had problem with this as puppies, so I have really no experience with that… I would probably try to make a car a nice place to be by playing and feeding her in the car and once she starts to like a static car, give her something to chew on and then even try to drive few meters as she is chewing it…
I had to work through this extensively with Grit, and I’d be happy to share what I did (even offline if you’d like). We did pretty much what Silvia suggests. I started a weekend that we didn’t HAVE to go anywhere, and we started by just going through the garage to go potty (she got where she didn’t even want to go out that door, since it meant we were getting in the car). Then we hopped in/out of her crate for a treat on the way to/from pottying. And I fed yummy raw meat meals in there (and sacrificed our training calories, since this was more important!). Very quickly, she was eager to jump in the van, and would run out offleash to do it (I had to keep her onleash at first).
Once she was this eager, I had her eat in the van with it turned on (but not moving), and then just driving to the end of the driveway and back. As I increased the time in the van, I also increased the “complexity” of what she was eating, so at it took a long time to chew up. Maybe a raw chicken quarter, or a smoked pig’s ear….something super delicious, but kinda distracting.
The last step was to gradually drive less and less cautiously….so stopping/starting more suddenly, swerving more, those types of things. I drove like this in my neighborhood for 20 min one time going through every inch of every bit of pavement we had!
Then, I found that she wasn’t so anxious about being in the car while moving, but more so when we stopped. Sort of like she had overheated in there once or something??? I’ll never know…I do know her father gets extremely carsick. So I then started taking her with me on short errands, and giving her something to chew on when we stopped, while I pumped gas, or ran in a store super fast (it’s still REALLY hot here, so these were only like 2 min trips in/out).
And finally, some general changes that seemed to help:
-a big open crate (this little puppy is in a 36″ crate)
-keeping the van as cool as possible
-not feeding within 2 hrs of a car ride
-i now keep a stash of fun things to chew on if I think she will need it
I hope some of that helps!!
Thank you so much!!! It’s so nice of you to write such a detailed reply, and it feels really soothing to know that I’m not alone. Many thanks 🙂
I guess it’ll be a lot of of training ( and I’d so rather train something fun as tricks) but it’ll be worthwile if it can cure her fear!
Sure, keep us posted! I know it’s a frustrating issue. I was especially concerned because Grit’s breeder was convinced I’d never be able to fix it, since her father gets so sick. But she’s totally fine now, so I’m thinking if this little bit of training that I did over a week or two took care of it, then I’m sure you can fix Penny’s issue too!
Oh, and Grit was more confident/comfortable in the van if she was with another dog that was super happy and relaxed, so maybe throw that into the mix as well! 🙂
And I’ve heard that a ginger snap cookie before riding also helps, but somehow, I seemed to be the one that ate all of those! 😉
You don’t know how much this means to me. THANK YOU! Did you really fix it in just a couple of weeks? I think I could manage to work from home for a week or two, so that we can progress in her own pace and then there will just not be any trips to the woods for a couple of weeks. But that would so be worth it if it means a lifetime of being ok with car rides.
How old is Grit? Pennys car sickness started when she was about 4 1/2 months old (as with the rest of her litter, they were all great travelers before that, might be something with the teething). I don’t think she’ll just outgrow it though as it seems that it has become a fear issue more than a balance/transport sickness thing 🙁
And I guess I have to start raw feeding 😉 Or just find something really interesting as I’m sure I’ll not be able to do this on kibble alone. Thank you again Melanie 🙂
Yep, I was afraid it would take a very, very long time, but it really didn’t. Of course, I was pretty intense about fixing this issue. I drive about 30k miles per year, so it’s REALLY important to me to have all my dogs LOVE my van!! I got Grit at 15 weeks, then was gone to Europe for almost 2 weeks, so yes, she was around 4 -- 4 1/2 months old. Occasionally, she will still get a bit drooly (maybe once per 15 rides?), but if I just tell her all is well, and give her something to chew on from our stash in the van, she seems just fine. Please keep me posted. I’m sure you can do this. And don’t let people tell you “it’s genetic and she will never get better”. NOT true!! If you can teach all these complicated tricks, you can surely make car rides fun again!!
Reminds me…is her crate strapped down so that it doesn’t move? I think that was part of my initial mistake with Grit. It seemed to help her when it was secured.
Haha I love the trick with the ginger cookies 🙂 It’s worth trying and I’m sure they’d comfort me as well 😉
I’m a bit early posting, and would have liked to make more progress before posting, but I’m going to be busy moving all next week, so I wanted to make a video to send before my video camera got packed up. We’ll still be training throughout the move.
We are having the most difficulty we the “pick up bowl” and same side two legs.
Chewy really wants to paw the bowl, or stick his feet in it. So, the only progress we’ve made is having him put his mouth on it for a brief second.
The two leg trick, I’m having a hard time keeping both hind legs on the ground. Boy, is it hard to keep track of all 4 legs and click at the right time! Suggestions on how I have him situated, and any other tips are greatly appreciated.
For the heeling, he is definitely better on my right side then my left, which is funny, because when we go for walks, he hates to be on my right!
Great job! Almost three with the hug! Too funny when he decides to do it in heeling position. His heeling position is really great, also without the target, time to add some side movement too. Side legs are actually going really good too. But it’s easier to get one hind leg only if you use something angled, almost vertical. You can use a plank, a drawer or a hard pillow against the wall, it makes things much easier. You’re getting there with picking up a bowl too, I think he only needs a session or two more anyway, but if you want to speed up the process you can also either use something else first that can’t be stepped in (a toy or maybe even a spoon, that’s what I used with Le as she was too small to pick up a bowl 🙂 ) OR, you can hold a bowl in your hand so that it’s too high to step in. But as you’ve got that far already, I would actually just keep shaping it as you do now.
Good evening. I made a video this afternoon of a single session with Finn. It was a great session, after not working together for 1 week. (Finn is with me only on some weekends.) The tricks in lesson 4 are mostly new to him and I’m so proud of him. His enthusiasm was such a joy.
This is especially poignant for me because Finn is my “cross over” dog. I trained him initially with old style compulsion methods. It just about destroyed our relationship, and his joy and spirit. It’s taken more than a year to get it back. In this video I see the Finn that I had before corrections, micro pinch collars (*gasp*, I know), and miles and miles and miles of heeling in circles (BORING). He has his joy back. Thank you Silvia. Thank you all of you who are inspiring positive reinforcement trainers. I’m a true believer. And I’m never going back.
Very cool! Finn sure looks to have lots of fun and that’s always fun to watch! And he is really doing GREAT for the first session on those tricks!!! For side legs, that’s a very good plank to use, that’s what I had in mind with “angled plank/drawer/pillow” for those who are just starting with this trick. It’s even easier to get front foot if you reward even closer to the object. GREAT heeling position on left side, getting there with the other side! For left side, I would already start fading the object. Quite a challenge to reward him with a vertical head, though 🙂 Getting there with bowl to bowl and a hug, that was too cute!
I remember times of miles of heeling in circles with corrections too, BORING for me too, I was sure I’ll never taught another dog to heel back then! -- Well, I was wrong 🙂 🙂 🙂
Thank you Silvia. We’ll work on all of these things. How do we get from here to hug with both fronts — do I let him choose what he wants (1 or 2 legs) or ask him for sit pretty position? With the bowl in bowl, I feel like he’s moving the second bowl toward the first, but I’m not positive; would this be clearer for him if I toss a treat to get him up and doing this standing?
The plank on the side legs is a stiff dog bed over a piece of plywood. Worked well for Finn. I’ll try it with Echo tomorrow.
Thank you so much for this class. I can’t believe how much I’m learning.
I first teach a hug with one leg, so that I can really completely shape it. Once they have a good, firm grip with one leg and also have good balance and duration in a sit up, it’s very easy to put the two together: ask for a sit up and offer an object, they always get it right away. And yes, bowl to bowl trick might be easier from standing position. Happy training!
Hi Silvia and everyone,
I just say go-go-go! for getting Cosi to run like crazy -- not very original , but oh well…
Here is ta videoof the start of our Lesson 4 tricks. They are still pretty sloppy (the heeling and bowl into bowl and hugging especially), but of course we are still a work in progress 🙂
Looks pretty good to me! 🙂 But hey, you need to be more generous with your rewards and reward after every click! You can’t click faster as she can eat! For jackpot, click once and reward more. When clicking for duration, click several times, but give a treat after each and every click! Also, reward more frequently for stays, try to go to her and drop a treat after every distraction she successfully passes. Side legs are going really well, just try to reward somewhat higher, would help with weight distribution and duration. Almost there with handstand, you can try with even steeper plank now. Very nice heeling! Loved the hug, she sure has a great firm grip and seems to like it a lot too! Getting there with bowl into bowl trick too, she definitely understands her job really well already, keep working on precision. If anybody wants to take it even further, one of the students from the first class taught her dog “coins into the bottle” as a continuation of this trick, it looked really impressive, I will try to find her video.
Thank you Silvia! I thought on the heeling and side that Cosi was moving a little too much forward from last exercise, so its good to know that the position is OK… yeah, I will try not to click several times in a row when she does well -- it is probably confusing to her… Thanks for the reminder… You are right that I should reward more for such a long stay and down on the mat, its just that in an Obedience Class I we have worked on Karen Overall’s relaxation protocols with a mat, and the dog is required to stay a LONG time with distractions and no reward when you work through those sheets, so that’s what I was thinking of while doing this exercise. Cosi is very willing, wants to do a good job and tries hard, so I will be happy to reward more 🙂 Thanks for the feedback, we will keep working and I look forward if you can find the coins into the bottle video -- what a challenge that would be 😉
We will keep working and having fun!
Cindy & Cosi
I definitely agree that Cosi is a great dog, she tries really hard and is always so focused and happy to work. She sometimes goes somewhat too much forward, but then corrects the position really well. You can challenge her some more with it, but it looks really pretty already now. I don’t know this relaxation protocols, but yes, I can imagine that when relaxing, you don’t want to bring in rewards as that adds excitement, so maybe for really long stays, you’re right! -- You can see I only teach agility stay 🙂
Here comes Gracie and her coins trick, at 4.38 -- she is really awesome!
Wow, Gracie IS awesome! I’m impressed with the whole darned video…but yes, the coin trick is especially impressive!
What an amazing video!! Gracie is truly amazing, I am going to work more on the Hug trick, so Cosi will actually catch the toy and hug like that! And so INCREDIBLE where she figures out how to pick up the toy to hug! The whole video is so great -- and the coins trick -- wow, I want to try that one! Her owner is doing a wonderful job of enthusiasm, encouragement and frequent rewards too, but not so much clicking -- I’m going to try this way, I think my dog will do well without all the clicking that I do 🙂 Thanks so much for finding and resharing this video with us -- is there a way I can save it and keep it in my video file with my others? (not sure about copyright issue or…) Thank you so much for the inspiration :))
She has a youtube channel with lots of great/inspiring videos:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=user/cowgirlsdrivetrux
Dondi, Thanks!
I am pretty new to YouTube and would never have found this link otherwise… lots of inspiration to look at 🙂
Cindy & Cosi
Clicking is perfectly o.k.! -- As long as you reward after every click 🙂 If you don’t, then it looses its effect.
Yep -- I understand what you are saying now -- Thanks Silvia! 🙂
I want abdominal strength like Gracie! What an amazing dog -- balance, core strength, enthusiasm. Such a great video. Thanks for finding it for us, Silvia.
Hello everyone!
Here is our 1st submission for Lesson 4. I’m looking forward to advice on each of the Lesson 4 exercises. I think we are making progress, but wow, these are getting harder, and I’m not sure I have a clear vision of all the steps needed. I put in a little clip of crossing paws, just because I think it’s adorable. 🙂
Wow, you two sure were fast catching up! Those paw crosses are too cute! With heel and side, she is wrapping too much behind you…. -- What is good for figure 8 backwards 🙂 -- but not perfect for heel and side position. Make sure you don’t reward with head out, maybe head in would actually be better at this point. Only click when she is parallel and move away if she isn’t so that she can try again. She seems to do best with side and forward steps, so maybe only do those for now so that she can practise the right position more. Very enthusiastic about side legs I see 🙂 What you want now are simultaneous lifts -- jackpot those. Those will give her better balance and allow you to go to completely vertical object. Getting there with the bowls, keep working like that for a couple of sessions more and then stop helping and start challenging her by moving the other bowl to make sure she really knows it’s about finding the other bowl. Getting there with hugging a pole too, time to stop clicking when she is just pawing it and jackpot when she goes the deepest around the pole (even if she misses it) to get more&more of a hug.
Hi Silvia,
Here’s some progress after a couple of days. I thought I’d see if you could help us along. I keep trying to edit the footage down, so that we can submit more clips, but it seems hard to do for shaping sessions!
1)Heel/Side -- I think I need to wean off the food so close to her head. Any other thoughts? Is this looking better? She’s still really leaning on me.
2) Same Side Legs -- Any tips to get her to “stand up” more? I experimented with different placements of cookie feeding, but what I did earlier in the day wasn’t working in this clip
3) Hug-a-pole -- I think she’s getting it! Thoughts on next steps?
4) Stacking Bowls -- Just need the accuracy to actually get the bowl in. Any tips?
Stacking bowls sure looks really good already! You can get more selective now and only click for most accurate ones -- and jackpot the best ones! For hugs, you can go for duration now and once you have some duration, select for the most firm grip. With side legs, try to go to another object now, a less comfortable one to lean on 🙂 -- you can maybe try going directly to a wall. Heeling sure looks much better! But yes, getting rid of food on her nose is a good idea, might actually help getting rid of some of the leaning. Also, try to reward so high that she needs to leave the ground with front feet some. That will require she shifts the weight and if you reward like that every time and a lot, I think she will choose to stay on her own feet vs. lean on yours and then need to shift back every time.
Hi Silvia!
Grit got demotivated very quickly when I got more selective with the bowls, so I got a slightly bigger, same style bowl for her to stack into. Instant success!!! So we’ll do this a couple of times to make sure she has the idea (tonight sure did look like it!) and then go back to same sized bowls. I’ve never succeeded in teaching any of my dogs this trick, so this is a big deal for me too! 🙂
For the “hug-a-pole”, when are they ready to move to another object? She was gripping pretty firmly with one paw tonight.
Great suggestion for “same side paws”. I got a hard board, and magically, she is standing!! 🙂 It’s also a prop I can take on the road, so double bonus!
The heeling seems very frustrating to her, maybe because it’s not as black and white anymore? I tried rewarding high, and she did NOT like that…left me, in fact! I will try to make the changes more gradual and see if that helps.
I know I shouldn’t be watching week 4 when I am at week 2….. but I am just so in awe of how clever these puppies are ! Well done everyone.
Very interesting she has such a strong opinion on how you should reward… What if you try with a toy, maybe a toy will make her happier to jump up? Of course, you can’t reward with lots of frequency then, but maybe once she gets the idea and realizes it’s fun to jump up, she will do it for food too? Another option would be to do less work on circling and side stepping and start with real walking, it will make harder for her to lean on then and you can then pick moments she is not leaning too much to click&reward.
And yes, you can try a hug with another object too at this stage. Great to hear about side legs and bowl stacking going so well! She sure is a fast learner to catch up on everything that fast!
Hello Silvia and everybody !
You are so right with telling about having fun together. It is difficult to master this tricks in two weeks, especially when you have no experience with the clicker before, as me. Luckily, Revi is very talented and she helps me a lot.
But for now, I think we got stuck with the picking up of something. She plays with these toys, but when clickering, she makes a difference and doesn’t pick them up. So I am curious for your advice !
There comes an other video with the variation on two on two off. There also, she has the good side that is ok without problems, but the other side is quite difficult…. 🙂
But for now, first the other tricks….
bye,
Rebekka
For heeling, make sure you vary position of your hand so that she doesn’t get dependant on it. I prefer to keep them behind the back, to make sure the dog is not cueing from the hand. For side legs, try to be closer and sideways to the object, it will be easier to get simultaneous lifts that way and you can then reward in a position better.
For picking up toy, you’re doing the right thing, just continue like that. I think this is very important lesson for her, to learn to interact with toys to get to food, so I would really focus on that one a lot. Once she learns to pick it up, I would actually also take it further and shape her to hold it as you reach in and grab it and then to put some pressure on it etc. -- all the way to tugging. This would be even more important as stacking bowls, so maybe we can change your homework somewhat 🙂
A stay looks really good, good enough that you can reduce the number of rewards in a position and slowly switch to rewarding her with a release, meaning that if she passes the distraction (a thrown toy or food), you reward her by releasing her to that same toy/food. Of course, things get more difficult that way, but as that’s how real stays look like in agility (no other reward as a release to do agility that is right in front of your nose all the time), we can progress in that direction now.
And don’t worry, no need to master everything in 2 weeks! 🙂 You still have at least 15 years together, so there is still plenty of time 🙂 Those tricks are here just to give you some ideas on how to spend some quality time with the puppy -- and you sure seem to be doing a wonderful job with that!!!
hello !
here is the rest of the video with the side version of the two on two off…there is still a difference between her “favourite” side and the other one. She is more “leaning” with her body then touching with the paws…but..we are working on it !
Rebekka
Ah, o.k., wrote the first answer before seeing this video, here your position is very good! 🙂 All you need now is to make that object completely vertical (and then maybe find a more slippery one), so that she can’t lean on it so much. Great job!
Hello Silvia,
due to some computer problems, we were a few days out of internet. So thanks for your comment, I am training already the “changed homework” and it goes better and better ! Very nice ! Thanks !
Rebekka
I don’t think your parents would let me but you two are so cute I could adopt you both! Stacey, Rocket & Heidi
Hihi, here is the mother of Rebekka…this two girls are indeed very cute, but you could also “mistake” yourself 🙂 they LOOK very cute, but they both have a lot of character so…not always easy 🙂 But yes, I feel blessed with such couple !! Thanks !
Lesson 4, second week:
Go Dondi!! I’m so impressed…you guys are just amazing!! 🙂
You are funny.. your video looks very similar to ours! with lots more puppy enthusiasm. I wish we had taken this class when he was younger..
Thanks for the compliment!
What? Oh, you are the one that’s funny. 🙂 Just keep those videos coming…I can refer to them when I need more inspiration!! Will you be in Foundation next session?
planning on it!
Amazing! You sure mastered all the tricks! Have to try those coins with my dogs too, I just hope they don’t swallow! 🙂 Very nice heeling! I would sure try to shape for high legs with him, would look great with his long legs! Great job with side legs too! And thanks for the kiss Dondi 🙂
Hi Silvia! This is our first week really getting to this lesson as my work interfered. I plan to post a video this weekend but had a question. With 2o2o is there a way to help get rear paws (Rocket is offering only front paws on both sides -- he is the one that took me weeks to get him to pivot for side but we did it and lowering perch now) (Heidi is offering left rear paw and front left paw but not at the same time yet but not offering her right rear paw just right front). Any suggestions or just persevere! Thank you, Stacey
Oh yeah, a funny thing with Heidi! I tried a pole for the hug and she only barely taps it. Tried a bottle and she would only barely tap it! Bought a long stuffed dog -- thinking it was long like a pole and she only wanted to grab it with her teeth! In desperation grabbed a stuffed cow I had bought at a thrift store but hadn’t given to them yet and she is offering paw hugs! Guess she likes cows! I am concerned it may be too heavy for her to easily hold but will deal with that later.
To get side legs, it’s important the dog already knows to back up an object with hind legs. Once they know that well, position the dog sideways next to the object so that it would be hard for him to go on with both hind legs, so you’ll probably get just one -- immediately click&reward that and then click&reward again for duration. Once they’re offering that one hind leg (as in a pee trick), it should be easy to get front foot, by paw targeting (lesson 1) if necessary. The important part is to get hind foot first, if you click front foot first then they offer too many things with front feet to get that hind foot.
Looking forward to see the cow hug! 🙂
Thank you Sivia! I meant to tell you here in the States frozen juice can lids are bigger than coins and do not have sharp edges. I used to make banks out of coffee cans and the frozen juice can lids as coins when I taught preschoolers so they wouldn’t choke on coins! Think if I get to the coin trick I will be less afraid to use the lids. Not sure how they sell frozen juice concentrate in Slovenia though! Stacey
Ah, thanks for an idea! I don’t think we have what you describe, but it reminded me of another thing that I can use, should work well too!