NaturallyWild

I'm waiting on my copy to arrive - i've heard good things from a few people though.

With all this socialisation have you introduced any level of self control or is it just automatic play-time. Does he have self control with other things that he really likes?

I attended her evening talk in Melbourne - thought her communication skills had something to be desired and a little limited in her thoughts on how problems can be fixed. In saying that she is good that encourages to take control of leadership/situations/resources through passive means. Don't think that the $800 she was trying to charge for her training package would have been worth the money though. Will tell you more when we catch up.

My preference would be to try bowen therapy &/or cranio-sacral both of which are extremely gentle and therefore can be applied in more situations that might be contraindicated for other therapies. As mentioned by others getting a scan/xray would be the best start to get a more definite diagnosis so the problem can be dealt with properly.

Rescue remedy (bach flower essence) from your chemist or health food store can be helpful sometimes, but as mentioned any drug or remedy needs to be combined with training to change the behaviour. Might be worthwhile getting someone in to assess the situation and give you a detailed training plan. They don't do things like going to the toilet in their bed because of spite, but it could be that emotionally and biochemically she is all over the place and contributed to the situation. Was this when she was confined to the crate? If so how long for? How long before she goes nuts when you put her outside (immediately/5sec/30sec/when you leaving house/etc)? If you leave her inside and you go outside and shut the door does the same thing happen?

Colloidal silver does wonders for infections/reactions. Can get from most health food stores. This type of reaction is very common at this time of year - allergies to pollens/grasses etc is usually the culprit. I usually find improving/changing diet can help a lot with this. If your ever unsure and the problem persists or gets worse then always of to the vet. Like you said - better safe than sorry.

Interesting that you use this sequence because if you are giving the command after the behaviour then technically there is no way that the dog can make an association - this has been scientifically tested and they could not create an association if the cue followed the behaviour. I would assume that at some point you bring the command just before the behaviour occurs.

I think it is wise to only use a portion of the dogs daily food for a couple of reasons - first is i'm a fanatic about keeping dogs from getting overweight and secondly if it is food added on top of the normal ration, some dogs can loose food motivation very quickly, particularly when puppies. I suggest for a new dog/puppy feeding as much of the daily food ration from their hand and not feeding the immediate meal prior to training (ie the night before meal if training in the morning or the morning meal if training in the afternoon) because if they are working hard enough in class they will probably endup feeding a full meal or more.

I do utilise luring to give the dog a helping hand to begin with and when i do i am looking to remove the food lure asap - this could mean 3 repetitions then i remove the food and then the dog will follow the hand signal and then i quickly come in with food from the other hand when the behaviour is acheived. I find novice dog and trainer teams will need a few more food luring repetitions because their timing and hand movements don't tend to be as good. I like to teach hand targeting and find that this helps as the dog is eager to follow the hand without food in it. This will then mean i am then luring with the hand for new behaviours and do not need food lures and do not have this problem of "will only do it with food". I will then add a cue once the behaviour is happening the way i want it and predictably. Doing this will also help stop people becoming dependant on bribing with food because they are not using it at the point that they adding the word. The thing some people have argued for shaping opposed to luring, successive approximations or placing, etc is that the dog has had to make that "self choice" to create the behaviour and creates stronger learning (for a number of reasons) opposed to following food or being pushed into place. I agree with this which is why i will get rid off food as early as possible and then also remove the hand signal fairly soon after adding the voice cue. This is to give the dog an oppertunity to use their "self choice" understanding of the behaviour to respond to the voice cue rather than the temptation of hand or food (some people really struggle with this as they expect a response from the dog within a second when it may take 10secs or so). It is also a learning process for the dog though with each technique but once they have experienced enough of one type they get much more efficient at it and learning new behaviours is much quicker. Changing over to a new type of training then becomes a bit harder for them if they have only been used to one type. Like kelpie-i said, there is a need to used placing techniques so they are comfortable with this when needed, i like to use as many techniques as possible early on so the dog (and owner) are comfortable with working different ways.

I absolutely do - i want to see a consitent pattern of behaviour (the way i want it) happening that i can almost 100% predict before i add the cue. This process isn't going to stop the comfusion though if you need to then make changes/corrections to the behaviour after (ie crooked sits that then need to be straightened).

I absolutely think dogs will/can create their own associations for words even though we may not be deliberately training it in. We humans are creatures of habit and probably do a heck of a lot of stuff that we don't realise - dogs are also rediculously keen observers and can make learned associations in only a single event - why wouldn't this happen. Pax - yes i've done the "release" without any body cues and he will break - if he wants to - it depends on if there is reinforcement coming and from where. Just because a dog hasn't moved from that position when released doesn't mean that they don't understand it - it may be that they are waiting for a reward or think it is better to stay in that position because that is where they are likely to get a reward. Next thing for you to test is lying down or facing away or hidden and giving the release cue. I've also recently thought about the use of release cue only vs using stay and release cues. I can now actually see a potential benefit to using the stay and release cue. For someone who is not persistent enough with providing the release cue everytime after asking for sit/down/stand/etc the dog can begin to break position before being released because the owner forgets about it. If they were to have the specific stay cue they are more likely to be persistent with the release cue because they are more concious of what they have asked and becomes more solid because it doesn't loose value when not used/wasted in other situations. Does this make sense to anyone . Saying all this though I prefer the sit means sit rule until asked to do something else or released because i know i am reliable, but my GF doesn't follow this so much and forgets a lot of the time - when i came back from 3months overseas our dog was horrible with sit means sit.

Yes, some joint supplements have these mixed already. The green lipped muscle has a wide range of substances that naturally occur in it including omega 3s, glucosamines, chondroitin sulphates. Some dogs (or people) find that they need extras of some of these and do better. Biggest tip for you to be able to do is to keep the weight off your dog (i prefer slightly under weight) and as fit and strong as possible - lots of exercise/swimming. This helps reduce excess stress to the joints. Joint guard is probably one of the better ones out there, but i would definitely combine with a green lipped muscle extract - have seen some great and rapid results with this.

I personally think the yakult and yoghurt tend to be of little benefit when there is a problem that needs to be dealt with. Yoghurt and yakult tend to only have several million of a single type of beneficial bacterial. When dealing with an imbalance that has effected the health you want to use the ones that have several billion bacteria and of a few different bacteria strains (check the label to compare). Our body is meant to normally have several trillion and these can be reduced when under stress (physical and emotional), illness, on antibiotics, etc. I always suggest adding a little extra when any of this comes along just as a safe gaurd. I usually get mine from a health food store but i am looking into the various canine one that are available at the moment. The yoghurt and yakult can be useful to help maintain a good level if given regularly, but are less useful when larger specific issues occur and can sometimes have issues from the dairy.

Yes but you can short cut the amount of "figuring out" the dog has to do by manipulating the environment and how the reward is given. This can also help prevent some erroneous behaviours that the dog believes is part of the complete behaviour. Not that it is always necessary but how the reinforcement is given and also what rules you create about how having it will have some influence on behaviour. Cosmolo you are very right that the criteria (and all the other factors) needs to be very clear, but you also want it to be moderately easy to achieve (in general).

Are you using the clicker primarily as a release cue eg "free"??? If so then yes your use is true, but do you reinforce after every click? How much time does there tend to be between click and reinforcement? In this case the clicker is possibly not being used purely as a bridge or marker, but it does probably have some secondary reinforcement value. I still think that there are behaviours that get linked between when you click and when you reinforce, in your case you get orientation to you after the click and will possibly effect how they orientate when giving the first behaviour. Hard to know without seeing. The jumping i was thinking about was more agility where they need to continue running straight (often away from you) unless signaled otherwise. If you were to try and build the same behaviour without throwing the food it would take a lot longer and would be hard pressed creating as much drive over the jump.

According to who does it not count - thats the thing you need to be aware of. Like i mentioned with the example of the jump and throwing food forward what happens after the click can, and does effect there behaviour. If the food was given from you at the side of the jump you will get a dog that jumps a bit slower and at angles to turn once over to get to the reward. The primary reinforcer (eg food) should be much more important than the secondary (marker), so there are going to be effects from how the primary is given.

Rewarding for position doesn't need to be a stationary thing. For example going over a jump you would reward by throwing out away from the jump because you want them to drive over the jump, ie that distance position is part of the behaviour that you want. I think that if you were to think about where you reward for each thing you are teaching it would speed up the learning and remove parts of the behaviour that are unwanted and need to be removed later. Yes there are many times where it doesn't matter so much with the position but it will always have some effect. With the quoit set going in and back from the pole is part of the behaviour so throwing the food can be useful. I would possibly throw towards where the other quoits are - but this would be further along the teaching phase

Ok, this makes things clearer for me. For you the throwing of food tends to be used after the behaviour has been learnt (and a cue/command added?), it is more to "fine tune" parts of the behaviour as well as practising and maybe challenging or proofing that behaviour - is this right? I will definitely utilise throwing food after i have it on cue, but it is not so much for "fine tuning" a behaviour. I think that maybe (and i need to do this more myself) the "fine tuning" should be done before adding the cue. Once the cue is added the clicker is far less important as you have already worked on the precision of the behaviour, its more about cementing that cue response through challenges.

I didn't mean that you "have to" reward for position, but that it is an extremely big part of creating the behaviour. Can you not reward for position first, then throw a treat to get that break that you want. Do you find that when you are throwing food away from your dog that after the click there is then an immediate shift in behaviour to "wheres that food gonna be thrown". If you continually throw the food to one position in the room will your dog gravitate towards that area more, even pausing there to wait for more treats? Is this taking some focus away from the specific behaviour you are trying to teach? Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't.

I use the clicker when i have planned a new behaviour i am trying to teach. I provides much more clarity and precision to what i am asking - and in turn requires me to focus much more on what i am asking because i will reward every click, even the bad or accidental ones (like Laffi said ). The clicker is more effective (as long as it is not an aversive noise to the dog) in marking because of a few things. The sound that you get from a clicker (the 2 sharp clicks) is a sound that universally gets animals attentions as short repeated sounds are used as "be alert and pay attention" warning signals in the wild where as longer continuous sounds serve as freeze or be inconspicuous signals (i should double check the research done on this to see if there was anyhting else involved). The other reason is purely just because there is less variation compared to our voice that gets used all the time and probably often use the marker word without consequence. Some people believe that a voice marker is better because you can create different meanings with the one marker word - i think that although there can be benefit in providing a socially rewarding aspect to using your voice, it can also create another level of complexity for the dog to deal with, and reduces the effectiveness of providing a simple marker of the behaviour you want. The more complex you make it for yourself and the dog, the harder it will be to teach the behaviour. My explination of clicker training is that the click simply marks the behaviour, it does not end the behaviour. What tends to "end" the behaviour is a prompt by you to do something else or a history of behaviour after the click to do something to get the reward. The click marks the action, the reward marks for position. So if you click and then take several seconds to give the reward and they are doing different things you are rewarding those behaviours. If you were continually reward in one position, then that position will become a part of the behaviour. I think they are excellent for new handlers particularly if they are taught how to use them first, but not at the same time as trying to achieve a specific behaviour (these are 2 seperate things). It teaches the handlers how important timing, criterior and rates of reinforcement are. In saying that i will not use a clicker or marker in many occasions because the reward itself can be given with enough precision and timing or also when i have no need for an exact behaviour, just a rough one. I utilise the clicker in different training techniques - luring/targeting and/or shaping, etc, which ever provides the best clarity and quickest option for the behaviour i am after. Some people also poo-poo clicker training because it can create a dog that is "frustrated", shuts down, or constantly offers behaviours. It has nothing to do with the clicker and everything to do with how you reinforce (eg only using poorly performed free shaping - bad timing, criteria and reinforcement).

What sort of allergic reactions are you refering too? I'm assuming you are meaning a food sensitivity rather than allergy which is more of a immediated and often more severe reaction. Yes there are items within that food that your dog could be sensitive to. Commonly the dried beet pulp, grain component (rice or oats) or even the meat protein type (fish in this case), but any one of the ingredients could be responsible. How long has it been since you started the new food and the reactions occuring?

I personally thing that there are too much grain used in the VAN, much of it doesn't get digested and comes straight out the other end (dogs struggle to process the cellulose). In saying that many dogs do very well on it, just like many dogs do well on dry dog food. I would suggest you try and see/contact someone with knowledge (vet/natural therapist) regarding your dogs diet and health. He may need some pre and por biotics to boost his digestive plus other nutrients (oils, vitamins, minerals). Eating his droppings could be a sign that he is missing nutrients or it may be a behavioural thing. Like Myszka said you may need to feed more, every dog is different in their metabolic needs, the feeding amounts are the suggested levels, these need to be adjusted based on what your dog needs.

You need to build up an assocation with your hand claps to something really fantastic like food or toy (just like trying to prime the clicker). Do this in a situation where there is little or no other distractions initially. You want to be getting her to give attention eagerly when she is not intensely focused on anything in particularly (including yourself). Repeat it a lot so there is a history of great things happening when you clap your hands, then try and apply it to this situation The reason i suggest hand claps instead of clicker is as BF said, what if you want to utilise clicker training later. You can use a marker for PP just as you can for PR (or NP and NR). What i described is not using PP as it sounds like you were not using it in the first place (or effectively anyway). I forgot to add that with this technique you need to be aware of not using it for "attention" barking as it will continue the barking occuring - but it definitely doesn't sound like attention barking here.

Using the clicker can be used as an interuptor (i prefer to use quick hand claps that have been conditioned to a reward as you generally won't have a clicker with you all the time - i assume you have hands ) to break off the attention from the barking. You can then reward away from the fence when she has stopped barking and giving you some attention. If you are persistant enough with this you can get your dog to come running to you for a reward before the barking starts - in response to what normally triggers her to start barking has now become a reward marker. You can then start fading how often you reward (or with what you reward).

:rolleyes: Bout bloddy time there was some recognition of the skills available in Aus by this group. You might be busy with summer and fire season coming up. Congrats guys