Aidan

Just to clarify, Vickie, has this same bitch displayed examples of "intelligent disobedience" while herding?

Had you previously considered "functional fixedness" in relation to dog training and behaviour?

Just in case anyone in Tassie is reading this, there will also be a gundog beginner trial/training day at George Town early next month.

Cool! Now I know how to teach a lab to leave a steak, what I REALLY want to know is how do you teach a little girl to eat a steak???

Ahh, I get you now. Does my example above (intelligent disobedience example) seem like something done for the "greater good"? I think it does, hard to critically analyse something that is still (after 6 or 7 years) so close to my heart. I like it. I like it a lot. Keep it coming! That's a very refreshing comment! I have to say, since I got Erik I've realised that you certainly can teach a dog that is very aroused and build speed and enthusiasm into it from scratch. I generally train Erik in fast, high-powered training sessions where he's nice and excited and putting in heaps of effort. I find there are a lot of things that I just can't teach while the dog is highly aroused because the pathway to the end result is not clear in my mind, but the things I am good at I often prefer the dog to be aroused. A lot of it comes down to personal skill, how you work with a particular dog (e.g Kivi vs Erik), what the dog is good at etc I suspect Vickie has become very adept at working with dogs in this state, particularly with the sorts of things she teaches, through her experience. I am comfortable around highly aroused reactive dogs, teaching them to walk nicely on leash, come when called and that sort of thing. If I had to put a working BC through a set of weave poles I would struggle, it's just not what I am experienced with. It would be interesting to see Kivi working a fit-ball or soccer ball. A task that is a good match for his genetic heritage, that he might find intrinsically rewarding. I've seen some remarkable problem solving ability watching dogs that are allowed free-play with a large ball.

I guess you could call that "intelligent disobedience"? Similar to what guide dogs are expected to do (although a bit of behaviour analysis does tend to remove the mystery of "intelligent disobedience" in most cases). My retriever, Django, has shown several examples of this over his life. One stand-out was when my other dog, Sabella, was lost in the bush as a pup. It had been a couple of hours and it was only a small reserve on a hill so I decided to walk to the top of the hill to call her, thinking it would make me easier to find. We got a fair way up the hill and Django, completely out of character, just stopped and dropped. I tried to coax him along but he wouldn't budge. So I pulled. Then I tugged. Then I yanked. Then I dragged him. Then I yelled at him. Then I got down and grabbed his scruff to pull him to his feet. Then I stopped. Django was not the sort of dog to stop, and certainly not the sort of dog to stubbornly dig his heels in. So I started walking back DOWN the hill, and he followed me. I turned and started walking back UP the hill, and he dropped to the ground. I got the message. After about 5 minutes of walking back down the hill Sabella came barreling out of the scrub looking very pleased to see us. Certainly in that case there was significant pressure, "IF you don't come with me, THEN I will yank/yell/scruff you until you do" but he stuck to his guns despite the clear and present threat. ETA: and yes, I did feel like an a__hole after that and I learned to trust him, in 9.5 years he has not let me down since.

That's a good question and it's made me think about it a bit more. The owner told me she had asked the dog to get the fly-blown sheep a couple of times before, and after that whenever he saw that she had the stuff he would just go get the fly-blown sheep without being asked. OK, there are antecedents there (the treatment, the flyblown sheep in the mob) but to put all that together so quickly and get it right, you have to wonder about the level of cognition? You also have to wonder, had the dog not found the work reinforcing, would he have put this together? So there definitely needs to be some instinct. I'm pretty sure I could train a gundog to fetch a sheep but it would be hard going and the dog might die of old age before we got to this level, why is that? Working gundogs display similar levels of intelligence in their field of work, they have similar levels of drive, they even do a similar thing (bring another animal back to the handler). Very intriguing, I'll add some thoughts when I reply to Vickie's post next.

Hi Corvus, I'm not sure what you mean by this? Could you explain it for my benefit? Taking it at face value I can think of a few examples that would contradict this but I'm not sure that I understand what you are getting at. Most of what we train dogs to do is mechanical stuff - sit here, jump over that, bring this back here, stay over there. For those sorts of tasks you really should be "taking the thumbtacks out of the box" to use the candle problem analogy. Make it easy, then the bigger the reward the faster you get there (as a rule). But where I'd like to go is where the dog is being innovative or taking initiative. Beyond that boundary where operant conditioning fails. It's nothing new, we just don't know that much about it. Where we have working dogs who are bred to perform intelligent tasks that they perform better than a human could perform them we are reaching into that realm. If you look back into the origin of any dog you will find this. In some fields, and it might surprise some people to hear me say this, operant conditioning CAN hinder performance. But what do we do instead?

Not everything on the video is relevant to dogs. Dogs don't work for Google, for e.g, but they do herd sheep, use the ATM, and retrieve pheasant in thick cover. I suppose the fundamental relevance is that not everything that dogs do is what Dan Pink refers to as "mechanical", and that behavioural science has shown that "if/then" rewards are sometimes poor motivators for cognitive tasks that require you (or the dog) to think outside the box.

Off topic but can you please tell me how you taught him that? I would love for my dog to be able to do that! Well that's the very interesting thing about it - I didn't really teach him! I was digging (with my hands, for re-planting), he saw me doing it, he joined in, I got him started somewhere else and then all I had to do was point. It falls under the categories of "learning by observation" and "mimicry", which is normally a phenomenon you would associate with animals of the same species but there are countless examples of dogs, cats, marine mammals and birds learning this way across species. I believe it is strong evidence of cognitive thought process. I once had a cat observing me shape a dog to do something using clicker training. The dog did NOT figure out the thing I was trying to teach him, but the cat, after observing for a little while and seeing a chance to upstage the dog (presumably) just walked up and performed the completed behaviour! I should disclose that the cat had been previously clicker trained to perform a similar task, but still... But back to your question - if you want to experiment I suggest you take him down to the beach (being a Goldie the presence of water will most likely remove any inhibition he might have), then get down on your hands and knees right in front of your dog (right in close), then start digging like a dog would dig. I've seen a few dogs taught to dig this way, it is one of the most easily replicated experiments on mimicry you can perform with a dog.

That's an interesting point. So do you think there is a cognitive process going on when that happens? When I remember back to when my dogs were pups I can recall things like digging in the garden, and Django spontaneously coming up and digging beside me. I would point to where I wanted him to loosen the soil and he would dig there. Or when a salesman came around to measure up the house. I was helping him hold the tape measure in place. The next wall was short so the salesman didn't need help but Sabella jumped up and held the tape in place, standing against the wall. I have dozens of stories like that as I'm sure others do also, but generally they become fewer and further between as the dog ages. I would say that generally my dogs will "offer" operants but they take far fewer initiatives now even though I did always encourage them as pups when they did things like hold tape measures or pull weeds. I was speaking to a client who has spent most of her life, until recently, on sheep farms. She told me about some incredible things that her dogs have done on their own initiative, like fetching the fly-blown sheep when she went to get the stuff they put on fly-blown sheep, no command, no training, just watching and thinking. And don't even get me started on cats...

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html Not about dogs, but could be.

Aidan isn't this where I usually come in and give you a telling off? Sorry about the last time I really was having an off day Hahaha, right on cue!

For anyone who does not have access to his books and who would like a "preview", you can do a search through Google Books. There is actually a surprising amount of this material published on-line through Google Books.

It's known as "first order learning", the behaviour they learned first tends to be repeated if they don't know what else they should do. You've got a doozy! Don't worry, you can sort of take it as his sign that he doesn't know exactly what he is supposed to do, which is YOUR SIGN to make it a little easier for him and lower your criteria. Or you can move to a smaller space where he can't run around. It's a trap for new players, the learner gets something right very quickly and the trainer makes the assumption that the learner now understands it. The temptation is to stay at that criteria (touch the target) but the best thing you can do is to accept lesser approximations (e.g click when he gets close to the target). When he is really clear that he has to do "something" with the target (he will stop running circles), then you can stop reinforcing the weakest responses. A good rule of thumb - when you are in the early stages of shaping a new behaviour you should be clicking and treating every 2-3 seconds. If you can't do that your criterion is probably too high. Stop and figure out what a good lower criterion might be. In this case, "jabbing the nose towards the target, actual touch not necessary."

My 3 year old daughter plays tug with my working-line GSD. The dog always wins. So far no problems, and I don't anticipate any. It is a behaviour, not a war to determine who gets the keys to the universe. They are always supervised when together anyway, so rules about where to grip the tug and when it is OK to grip the tug are consistent. Rules about how my dog is supposed to behave around my child (and vice-versa) at other times are also consistent. For e.g she knows not to snatch toys, she knows not to take any other toy or object that my daughter is holding. There are clear antecedents that a game of tug is being invited. Sometimes teaching a dog to live in close quarters with a child is difficult to teach, this is one way that I have provided a point of reference for both dog and child. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone who was not confident that their dog was under control, safe around children (deliberate behaviours, can't account for accidental ones), and wasn't able to teach the dog where and when to grip. Some dogs just aren't good at that sort of thing, and just aren't good at figuring out when something is OK and when it isn't and therefore need more broad-ranging "black and white" boundaries. Some owners are very poor at teaching these sorts of boundaries and should be more "black and white" with the boundaries they set. But I have absolutely no concerns whatsoever about status seeking or control-related behaviours from letting a dog win a tug toy. It is simple a practical matter, the game is infinitely more useful and practical when your dog will "out" on cue.

Good work! Heeling is also good, I think anything that gets them thinking rather than just responding to their emotions is helpful. Fingers crossed it was just something in his environment and he'll get over it, that is the most likely explanation.

Anything from ear infections to poisoning to seizures. A vet is the best person to speak to. I don't mean to cause you any unnecessary alarm, just making you aware that it might not just be something in his environment.

Yes. Just be aware, you will need to send the sample to Dr Jean Dodds in the USA to test for hypothyroidism at this level. It cannot be done here and any result returned will probably show "normal" (otherwise you would be seeing the better known symptoms of hypothyroidism already). What's more, the results needs to be interpreted specifically for breed. There are other possible medical reasons for this sort of behaviour.

How do we know what dogs find reinforcing? If something increases or maintains the preceding response we know that it is a reinforcer. In Schutzhund some trainers will let their dog "win" the sleeve to reinforce some aspect of the bite, deep grip, good targeting, hard fighting etc We know that "winning" the sleeve (sleeve is stripped and dog leaves with it) is a reinforcer because it will reinforce whatever aspect of the bite you are working on. (N.B the same is true of games of tug in foundation training). It's likely that we have selectively bred dogs who enjoy winning, but I don't think it's unique amongst breeds intended for Schutzhund. If you look at what might be a natural function of the urge to tug, hunting and taking down prey would be the most likely origin (or preparation for that activity at least). This origin would suggest that the strongest drive satisfaction might come from winning, then killing and even disemboweling the toy (if possible). We also know that most dogs find the act of tugging reinforcing on it's own, because it is common to use that activity (in conjunction with an "out" so the dog doesn't win the toy) to reinforce other behaviours. Both of my dogs have different rituals that they display after winning a tug toy. If Sabella wins the bite sleeve she takes off and shakes it, then tears at the cover (I call her back before she destroys it). Django likes to lick or chew any toy that he has won, or if it's furry and limp he will shake and kill it first. Dogs will also learn how to behave with toys. If a dog is always coming off the toy then being rewarded with the opportunity to get back on the toy it wouldn't surprise me if they became mad about tugging (and even outing). Shaking, tearing, chewing etc need never enter the picture, which would be preferable for service dogs and gundogs.

Ahh, sorry, should have defined it. I mean the dog gets to take the toy from your hand and leave with it.

As far as getting him in the kitchen, teach him to target your hand or a target stick. It is 1000x better than food luring for this sort of problem. Condition it strongly first, although I have used this with a newly conditioned targeting behaviour and very frightened animals successfully before. As Jigsaw has mentioned, get him in, then let him leave. The exception would be if he has that look like "how silly of me, what was I worried about before?" His nervousness in the rest of the house and other little noises spooking him concerns me. Keep an eye on him. It may not be a simple case of generalised fear and heightened anxiety from whatever scared him before.

One of my dogs has never been taught to "out" and has always won games of tug. He is about as perfect a gentleman as someone who poops on your lawn can be regarded. Teaching "out" might be a practical matter but I don't think any one thing in isolation is going to lead to a misbehaving animal with no respect for rules or boundaries. If you have other rules and boundaries that you can effectively maintain then this is just going to be one little thing - a dog who doesn't "out" when asked. I must say I was surprised that CM didn't recommend teaching the "out" for those puppies who grew up. There was a study done in Canada, I believe it was University of Quebec but I don't have the reference. They discovered that dogs who played tug and were allowed to win were the most obedient in other trained tasks. I guess they had "learned to earn" and the reward was good.

This can make it tricky, a little excitement coupled with frustration usually does the trick. I taught one dog to bark by putting a chair in front of a door so that he couldn't get past then waited on the other side with some food, ready to click. Excitement + frustration = bark. An old trick used by Schutzhund trainers is to tether the dog, then wave a tug toy around just out of reach. These dogs are already trained to tug and are mad for it so they are excited and frustrated. So if there is something Pete is mad for, you can probably think up a frustration scenario which will cause him to bark. It doesn't need to be much, just be ready to capture it. A clicker makes this much easier.

Really? I guess they don't make them like they used to... They last about 6 months here. My only complaint is picking up all the little pieces before I mow.