corvus

I've only got thoughts as I'm not a trainer. * Chill out games to teach self control with arousal, but it's kinda hard work and maybe beyond what these folks can do. Maybe they can do some good with massaging, though. * Perhaps the underlying problem is the youngest dog has this one person as a big part of their maintenance stimuli set, so that there's all this excitement when she comes home. There are a bunch of things you can do to reduce the salience of someone's presence in a dog's maintenance stimuli set and expand the MS set to incoporate other things. * Derailing the anticipation of the favourite person's arrival. She doesn't go out to them until all the dogs are calm. If just standing up sets the young one off, sit back down again.

Firstly, great to hear the OP is meanwhile having success with the front-attach harness. Woot! Secondly, I think we are getting confused between training approaches and training tools. IMO, if you are applying a training method based in operant conditioning and it's not working, that's a problem with you, not the method not being suited to the dog. When you apply a training method through the use of a training tool, you are constrained by what that tool can do. So if the tool doesn't work, it doesn't mean the method doesn't work for this dog, just that there are other variables not being taken into account. If you're serious about trying to train your dog in the least invasive and minimally aversive way, then the only thing holding you back is your own skill. Operant conditioning works equally well on any dog. Well, some dogs are a bit quicker than others... Anyway, the point I was making before was about trainer downfall. It's not by any means that I think some dogs won't respond to rewards in certain situations. They always will. My concern is how quickly I can figure out what to reward when, how high the reward rate needs to be, the best way to deliver the rewards, what reward I should use, and what interruptor I should use. I would try a positive approach first every time, but in some rare cases with some dogs, I would not mess around trying to perfect the positive approach if it isn't very effective right away. But I'd happily spend weeks tweaking it in most cases. The more time I spend tweaking now the less tweaking I find I need the next time. I think where tweaking is not going to be a big deal it's a very valuable exercise.

Well, I think that "what works best" is more dependent on the skill of the trainer than the dog. There are lots of ways to train something and I don't think there necessarily is a "best" way in any one situation with any one dog. What "works" best, though, will be what the trainer is most skilled and consistent in applying. That might seem to be contradictory to what I just said about how differently I would approach something depending on the personality of the dog. Personality of the dog should certainly be considered, but even more so the arousal level associated with the problem behaviour, and the way it is being reinforced, and what kind of reinforcement. If Kivi was engaging in some sort of highly aroused problem behaviour that was endangering him (or my rabbits, for example) I would definitely consider P+. If he was engaging in a problem behaviour in a moderately aroused state, I wouldn't. Considering he is almost never in a highly aroused state, I can safely say I can't imagine ever using P+ on him. That's not to say, though, that you can't get a dog typically in low arousal that can't also be a bit on the obsessive side.

So you're saying that people with driven dogs shouldn't bother "messing" around with positives? Not quite. I'm saying if you have a driven dog engaging in a self-rewarding behaviour, it's not always better to run through a few positive methods first. IME, you're running against the clock in these cases. It's a gamble to try ANYTHING that might not work because it's not as easy as just trying something else if it doesn't. Now you've got a dog that is more driven to practise the behaviour and not only are you on a slippery slope down to punishments, but the behaviour is getting more and more habitual with every occurrence and you're looking at a tougher time of installing the behaviour you want instead, and maybe even a higher probability of spontaneous recovery (although that one depends on a lot of factors). I'd far rather use a mild punishment well at the outset than find I have an obsessive behaviour on my hands down the track. That's all I'm saying. But like I said, if you were in the fortunate position of seeing this process begin, and you realise what you might be up against if you let it continue, there's no reason why you can't take care of it with positive methods the first time. Positive methods if applied well tend to work, even with dogs that are very aroused and driven. If they don't I assume the problem is with me or my identification of what I should be treating. And if you have a different sort of dog that's not the type to get wound up and obsessive, I'd just stick with the positives indefinitely and not even consider aversives. What I should have said but didn't is that I think there are very few situations suited to punishments anyway. For example, I wouldn't punish anything I think is a symptom of an underlying problem unless the behaviour was an ingrained habit feeding the underlying problem. I'd be mad to introduce punishments in everyday training with Erik, and I can't say I would ever do it if he was in any state other than a drivey, persistant, exceedingly optimistic one. And even then I still expect fallout. What it comes down to, is if Erik started doing something I badly didn't want him to do, I'd break out the treats and tell him what I want him to do instead. If instead of seeing him engaging more and more in what I want him to do and am rewarding, he just starts doing what I don't want him to be doing even more and becomes harder to distract from it, and I'd decided this wasn't a symptom of some underlying problem, then I would be considering whether this is something I want inhibited and how I might be able to pull that off with the least amount of fallout.

I had a Kivi on my neck this morning. He's been in a smoochie mood for some unknown reason lately and when I woke up he thought he should give me a kiss on the cheek and then lay on me. He was secretly just trying to get closer to the used tissue on the bedside table, though. ;) When I blew that one out of the water he figured he may as well just snuggle up and enjoy the cuddles. I think that Lappies are a good size for a living teddy bear. :D

I had a "Dogs are incredible!" moment.

Name: Kivi Tarro Nickname: KT, Sweetie Pie Breed: Finnish Lapphund Gender: Male Age: 2 Picture: Where did you get them from? Registered breeder How often do you exercise your dog? Every day. Do they know any commands? Sit, down, hang about, hold up, target, paw, other paw, hip, plays dead and rolls over. Compete in any dog sports? No Favourite treat: He gets pretty excited about dried cow ears. Favourite toy: The big monkey puppet he found on the side of the road one roadside cleanup. I let him keep it. Funny habits or quirks: When he's excited he has to put something in his mouth and then walk around with it. What's their personality like? He's a crybaby, a mama's boy, and a cuddly teddy bear. He is extremely social, very easy-going, and smooches everyone. We joke that he's disabled. He is so placid and tolerant you kind of wonder if something is wrong with him. Do they get along well with other dogs? Oh yes. He's the dog park diplomat. Are they scared of anything? Not that I can think of. What training methods do you use? Positive reinforcement? Corrections? Strictly positive reinforcement. Name: Erik the Tall Nickname: E, E-squidge, Squidge puppy, Erikson Breed: Swedish Vallhund Gender: Male Age: Nearly 1 Picture: Where did you get them from? Registered breeder How often do you exercise your dog? Every day Do they know any commands? Heel, walks backwards, walks sideways, gives ten, target with nose, paw, pivot, down, sit, speak, shh, spins, rolls, paws objects Compete in any dog sports? No, but we're just starting agility for fun Favourite treat: He doesn't have a favourite. Favourite toy: His custum bungee tug with sheepskin Funny habits or quirks: He gives extreme cuddles. You can be fooled into thinking you have a child cuddling you. What's their personality like? He is a firecracker! Way too smart, quite driven and persistent and he throws himself into everything he does. He's also outspoken and pushy. I call him an obnoxious twat and I reckon he swears like a sailor. Do they get along well with other dogs? Yep, as long as they are up for a game of chase. Are they scared of anything? Not scared, but he's a good watch dog and gets worked up by a lot of things. He doesn't like one of our cleaners for some reason. Won't go near him. What training methods do you use? Positive reinforcement? Corrections? He is extremely responsive to rewards! Lots of clicker training and shaping with him. Also lots of distracting and redirecting. He's very busy.

Readers really should see that study as well. I think it gives a nice, rounded view of e-collars in training. I have to admit I'm not very trusting of people that think they have good timing. If they can clicker train proficiently I'll believe they have good timing.

Psst, luvsablue, no one who's laughing at themselves looking like an idiot ever really looks like an idiot. I'm with you. I love seeing happy dogs performing beautifully, but I always end up laughing in spite of myself when I get a dose of Spitzy independence. It's always when you least expect it. Erik has this way of looking at me when I'm telling him off for getting into something that just cracks me up every time. Completely unworried by me grumping and telling him he's wicked. He just looks like he wouldn't know how to look submissive. I call it partnership when you can laugh when things don't go exactly as planned.

Haha, I'm going to slightly disagree with that suggestion despite being very much a positive trainer and using as few aversives in training as I can... The reason why is if you have a dog that is persistent by nature and quite driven (Erik, I'm looking at you) and you mess around trying positive methods for a while and they don't work, then all this time that you're messing about this persistent dog of yours is developing a real taste for what he's doing, and what was a rewarding activity is now a near obsession. Chances are it's going to be harder to fix now than it would have been a while ago when it first cropped up, and you have pretty much painted yourself into a corner so that you have to use aversives and will likely have to use them several times to create the inhibition you need. Having said that, IMO if you were a good trainer you would have realised more quickly that there was a fault in your positive approach, identified it, and taken care of it and got back on track right away with a different positive approach. The only time I ever want to create inhibitions is when I've left myself no other option. I'd far prefer to train incompatible behaviours, and if I put my butt in gear as soon as a potential problem rears it's head, I can do just that before it becomes an obsession. Other people are a lot more relaxed about inhibitions, and that's fine. Of course, sometimes we don't realise there's a problem until it's already an obsession, and sometimes we underestimate a dog's drive to do something, and sometimes our management measures fail us before we can get the problem in hand. There are lots of ways things can go wrong. I'd always assess what to use based on the personality of the dog. I'd be quite happy to plod along trying different positive methods with Kivi where I'd move very swiftly indeed for Erik. If someone brought me a dog like Kivi and wanted to fix a problem that was already there, I'd try positives first all the way. If it was a dog like Erik, though... well, it would depend on the behaviour.

Isn't that funny? Erik loves this trick as well. He learnt it absurdly quickly for some reason (because he's Erik?) and then I didn't know what to do next! So I just kinda kept practising it for a while until I had something to do with it and then I discovered I should have moved him off the box long ago, because he found it hard to transition to just doing it on the flat. He does some pretty cute pivots while heeling, now. I think it's clever, but this is me who still thinks reliable recalls and dogs that love training are something to cheer about.

As many as you like? But I found it became necessary to keep a training diary. The dog knows where we're up to, but I don't. Erik likes variety and gets bored if I don't do several different things with him in the space of 10 minutes. Kivi doesn't get bored and I usually only work on a couple of things at a time with him.

Ooooh, exciting, Dr Patricia McConnell is doing a 2 day seminar out of Aukland in November. http://www.learningaboutdogs.co.nz/html/pa..._mcconnell.html Topics covered will include advanced canine behaviour, dog-dog aggression, and play. Apparently she's not coming to Australia. :rolleyes: Early bird prices until the end of August.

I looked into them for a while. They seem like really fun dogs. :rolleyes: I think the Grande Basset Griffon Vendeen is now in Australia as well...

I'm so sorry to hear. I didn't know. I remember seeing pics of him when you first got him. I don't have any advice. The thought of losing one of my boys who are both young is enough to take my breath away. It's painful to even think about. I do know a breeder that was breeding from a dog with a persistent cough. She insisted it wasn't genetic, although how she could know I wasn't sure. Not knowing half of what we do now, we got a puppy sired by him, who developed the same cough. He was x-rayed and the vet said the cough was caused by an elongate soft palate. I think there are serious welfare issues in breeding from dogs with what may be genetic conditions.

A lot of primitive breeds can be tetchy about other dogs of the same sex. Like Basenjis, Akitas, Canaan Dogs and so forth. Also guardian breeds. I have heard livestock guardian breeds in particular. Perhaps in some cases it is breeds that are just quite game. Same sex animals are far more likely to create sparks when they come together than opposite sexes, so it may appear that they are not good with the same sex.

Isn't Koehler all about markers these days?

It is true, but equally, the C-BARQ questionnaire doesn't just address whether your dog is reliable with obedience commands, but also whether your dog learns new things quickly and that kind of thing. You can fill out the questionnaire online if you're interested. I did one time. It was a good exercise. Made me think about some aspects of behaviour that I don't normally think about. It spits out a little report where you get red flags for potential problem behaviour. It's pretty general, but it's an excellent place to start for any enquiry into dog behaviour. Especially because it has been validated and covers the basics of pretty much every aspect of dog behaviour.

I think that maybe boy Lapphunds are a bit more clingy. Kivi is usually in whatever room has the most people in it. He will usually set up camp in my study on the days I'm home studying before I actually get there. He sleeps at my feet most of the day. When I come home he is quite excited, but waits for me to crouch down to greet him so he can give me smooches. He is extremely kissy. He will do that to anyone at all. Someone at the dog park copped a Kivi kiss on the face on Friday when they were bending down to pick up dog poo. The guy didn't even know he was being stalked by a serial smoocher. Kivi would very much like to sleep on the bed, but he isn't allowed. He sleeps on the floor at the foot of the bed and sometimes comes up for cuddles in the morning. Most of the time he plays with Erik rather than me, but he gets very excited about training. Lots of barking and when I bring him in to train he bounces. He gets into clingy moods sometimes and he'll come over to stare at you periodically in the hopes that you will give him a chest rub. Otherwise, he's very placid and unobtrusive. At least until you need him to get up and move. Then he's all like "Can't. Carry me." He's a 25kg dog, so obviously it's not that easy! He'll move eventually, but until he's had his fill of cuddles he's a limp, dead weight. I always end up giving him the cuddles he wants, sneaky devil.

The problem is it's hard (read impossible) to control for all the variables when the dogs are being raised and trained by other people. The C-BARQ questionnaire has been inter-rater tested, which means they got two different people to rate the same dog and then tested how similar the two ratings were. They found that on most aspects the agreement was quite high. Trainability comes up in a lot of different personality and performance studies, and as much as I feel uneasy about it I have to admit that it appears to be a valid measurement. Some dogs are easier to train than others no matter what method you use or how good or bad a trainer you are. That's what they are rating. It kinda smooths out with a lot of participants, because what they are rating is from the perspective of an average pet owner. There was a similar study done testing the personality factors that make good performance dogs. They used the Swedish Association of Working Dogs test, which is different to the C-BARQ approach because it measures actual behaviour, not human perceptions. Their findings were very similar across many personality aspects by my interpretation (and that of later studies). They found that in general, male dogs were better performers than female dogs (possibly because they are in general bolder), but that good performance dogs are spread evenly between the sexes. It sounds contradictory, but what it means is that an average male dog will be a better performer than an average female dog (in some breeds, mind you, not all), but a good performance dog has qualities that override these effects.

Well, the argument goes you can build plenty of anticipation for a drive reward in an adult dog. Considering drive building in a puppy also incorporates a lot of building of anticipation, it does look the same for the most part. The difference is that the effects of anticipation are arousal, whereas the effects of building drive is.... more drive. Jury's still out in all the discussions I've had, though.

I think it depends on how naturally drivey your dog is. There are arguments that you can't build drive in an adult dog and that you can only build it a finite amount in a puppy, which is pre-determined by their genetics.

I can appreciate wanting to work it out for yourself. If you get someone to help you it will all be filtered through their experiences and views. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but there is usually more than one way to do something in training. I like to brainstorm a bunch of different ideas and run them past a bunch of different people with different experiences. It usually throws up some things I hadn't thought of or considered. There's nothing like having a good discussion about it with other people and getting a feel for the different approaches that have been used and what kinds of dogs and situations they have been effective on. I would hire a trainer tomorrow if I could find one that could advise me on how to get a wild hare out of a behaviour rut of avoiding his trainer. Unfortunately, I can't even find someone online over a myriad of training boards and lists that has any ideas. I've got several ideas, but I always balk before applying anything with this animal because if I mess up it's a big deal and I may never be able to fix it. And the stakes are higher than usual this time because we're talking about his relationship with me! I think dog folk have got it easy. But everytime I go through this process of brainstorming and consulting I learn a lot. When it comes to practical skills, though, it's great to have someone to show you.

But conversely, the advantage of using drugs early is that you can prevent the dog practising the aggressive behaviour while you get a handle on it. That wasn't expressed very well. What I mean is, if the dog comes to expect or anticipate that he will be frightened and need to be aggressive, it may become a feedback loop. There's a good argument for intervening early with drugs to prevent that feedback loop being established, because once it is it's harder to treat. Of course, that is assuming there's a high chance of the feedback loop becoming established in the first place. This is why you need a good behaviourist. :D They'll be able to assess the risks and best advise you of your options.

To supplement that further, it appears from the literature on measuring positive and negative emotional state in animals that it can be quite a transcient thing. One has to ask at what point negative emotional state should be considered a welfare issue. As someone who has had to recently wrap my empathetic mind around the fact that animals can get used to and be comfortable with a lot of things I think should make them unhappy, I have become cautious about drawing conclusions. I think that we should use these things as a guide rather than a definitive answer.