Mind & Scent Games For Puppy

[koalathebear]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjZzIckZsbo

^ There's a uh, highly stylised play dead I can't work out where I've stored the original video, but you get the gist. That was about a month ago - he doesn't need the hand movement so much now.

Niques - James is soooooooooooooo cute and clever. I particularly love how attentive he is with his little face focussed on you for instructions. His 'dead' is very impressive - particularly how long he is willing to lie there to 'sell' the authenticity of the death scene. We can get Elbie to drop his head down onto the ground but his eyes are open and extremely focussed

I watched your other vids - James looks so cuddly - Elbie's a bit of a wriggler.

wizzle: cool - can't wait to hear what Genevieve thinks of it. She will look so cute chasing around after it.

[Niques]

Thanks

Yeah, he is extremely cuddly (I type as he attempts to push his way onto my lap ). He occasionally pops his head up mid- "dead" to take a look around and needs to be told to keep it down, but I think we're getting there ;)

[toshman]

Thanks

Yeah, he is extremely cuddly (I type as he attempts to push his way onto my lap ). He occasionally pops his head up mid- "dead" to take a look around and needs to be told to keep it down, but I think we're getting there ;)

All your tricks are lovely, it's good reading about what you're all teaching your dogs! Here's one I saw on David Letterman's show last year - very funny! One day I'll teach my Border Terrier to do it.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DalB-CvO7Qc

[koalathebear]

All your tricks are lovely, it's good reading about what you're all teaching your dogs! Here's one I saw on David Letterman's show last year - very funny! One day I'll teach my Border Terrier to do it.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DalB-CvO7Qc

Toshman - thanks for sharing that link - that is so hilarious! We just watched it and were laughing our heads off at how cute Bailey was

Elbie loves learning new tricks so we're always looking for good ones . We bought a book but the last four chapters have really difficult ones that seem more appropriate for doggy dancing and would involve the handler doing somersaults and cartwheels No way!

[koalathebear]

Elbie's still enjoying the tuckerball and his technique has improved. In the beginning, he was a bit wild and all over the place but now he's pretty good at controlling the ball. He pushes it with his nose and then kind of brings it back using his paw. Video

. If you compare it to the video I uploaded of when he got the

, you'll see a difference in Tuckerball Technique

He has a soccer ball in the yard and when he first got that, he kept trying to bite it and would leap around it and bark and growl at it. I am pleased that he doesn't use his teeth on the treatball at all but just nose and paws. It can take him about 30 - 45 minutes to get his dinner kibble out of it and it really seems to tire him out! Last night he was conked out in his dog bed and barely lifted his head even though he's normally the nosiest little doggy in the world!

Edited August 14, 2010 by koalathebear

[dancinbcs]

I have been known to shave tennis balls

My dogs used to skin them, chewed the cover off and discarded it.

[Novjan]

Great thread, BUT it is costing me loads of money!! I have just ordered the squirrel and cube toy for my girls, will probably have to only let them have it when we are around because they are becoming very good at de stuffing! Suspisious chicken lasted a while, but once they made a hole and the stuffing was coming out I emptied it and they had it for another week before they were ripping bits of material - makes for interesting poo!!!

We do the muffin tin thing, I bought some tennis balls from the $2 shop and the smelled - sort of petrol smell. I was worried they would not know there was a treat under but they soon sorted it out. We use it when they are having time apart to stop them fretting. One will use her paws and the other her nose to remove the balls, occassionally they pick a ball up, they are no where near as fast as Elbie and my tin has double the amount of 'holes'

We have two Springers who are now 9 months old.

Thanks for all the ideas

Bundy's Mum: The muffin tray is excellent although with tennis balls, it's getting too easy for Elbie! Take a look at

. Although in the beginning he kind of just nudged things around with his nose and paw, he quickly learned to lift the balls with his mouth and eat the kibble beneath each ball He doesn't seem to be able to lift out a kong ball though when it's in the muffin tin - perhaps not enough grip or perhaps it's too small

it's a lot of fun though - he seems to enjoy it hopefully your doggy loves it, too.

fbaudry: that is an AWESOME array of toys. Now I don't feel so bad for all the toys we keep buying for Elbie that being said, I was really extravagant the other day and even though Elbie already has a perfectly good ID tag, I ordered one of these beautiful dog tags for him This one to be exact

[koalathebear]

Great thread, BUT it is costing me loads of money!! I have just ordered the squirrel and cube toy for my girls, will probably have to only let them have it when we are around because they are becoming very good at de stuffing! Suspisious chicken lasted a while, but once they made a hole and the stuffing was coming out I emptied it and they had it for another week before they were ripping bits of material - makes for interesting poo!!!

We do the muffin tin thing, I bought some tennis balls from the $2 shop and the smelled - sort of petrol smell. I was worried they would not know there was a treat under but they soon sorted it out. We use it when they are having time apart to stop them fretting. One will use her paws and the other her nose to remove the balls, occassionally they pick a ball up, they are no where near as fast as Elbie and my tin has double the amount of 'holes'

We have two Springers who are now 9 months old.

Thanks for all the ideas

So glad it's come in handy! We're constantly on the look out for things to keep Elbie entertained. The muffin tin thing was awesome for a while but six 'holes' just isn't enough because he just whizzes through it and gives us a: "Is that all?" look We're working on a few other things to tax his brain right now including packing up his toys - which will come in handy given how many toys he has!!!

Would love to see a video of your Springers and their muffin tin - I love the different techniques

[Novjan]

ooooo, ooooo, we keep saying we are going to teach them to tidy up.

do you guys just go for it or do you have a book or something that helps to get you started??

I feel like we have neglected our girls, we have not taught them any tricks.

Unless you count sitting pretty on a towel to dry thier feet when it is wet outside, LOL

oh and peeing on the dogloo - would love to know how to get them to poo on it too though, the go near it but not on it for some reason.

thanks again

Edited September 4, 2010 by Novjan

[koalathebear]

do you guys just go for it or do you have a book or something that helps to get you started?? I feel like we have neglected our girls, we have not taught them any tricks.

Unless you count sitting pretty on a towel to dry thier feet when it is wet outside, LOL

oh a peeing on the dogloo - would love to know how to get them to poo on it too though, the go near it but not on it for some reason.

About the pooping - Elbie has a toileting command which is "poop poop". It applies to wees and poops and whenever we say it, he knows he's supposed to go. Have you got a similar command for your pups? If not, if you developed a command then that could be a way to teach them to go on the dog loo. In the beginning, we took Elbie out on a leash to Poo Corner and didn't leave until he 'eliminated' (hilarious word) - saying "poop poop" when he did his thing. It's never too late to 'retrain' because sometimes after rain, we had to 'retrain' Elbie to go in the right spot so it was back on the leash again.

As to tricks, we have two books: (1) Dog Tricks by Mary Ray; and (2) 101 Dog Tricks by Kyra Sundance. To be honest, we learned most of our tricks here at DOL or over at youtube. I was writing a bit about it here. Elbie seems to really like learning tricks and doesn't get bored so we use tricks as a way of keeping him entertained because we're a bit slack about walking him :D

When we feel like teaching Elbie a trick, we look it up on the net. These days for new tricks (like tidying up), we use a clicker to get Elbie pointed in the right way and then after that we can just work with "good boy" to get him to do what we want. I like the clicker but I'm very unco so can't hold the clicker at the same time I'm juggling everything else.

The order Elbie learned his tricks was approximately as follows:

- sit

- wait for food

- drop

- shake hands, high five, wave

- spin and speak

- rollover (this one took us a while)

- backwards walk

- stand and bow (he still struggles with these

- are you shy?

- drop dead

Weirdly, "stay" took us a really, really long time to teach him because he always wanted to follow us. I can't remember when we taught him, but he has known "leave it" for a while, too.

Tricks he's working on now are:

- balancing treat on nose

- putting things in a box

- commando crawl

Let me know if you need any help with any of them. wizzle has been working really hard with her puppy as well and probably has some good tips for motivating an excitable puppy and will have a good memory of "before" and "after" with the puppy. wuffles is quite a bit more advanced than I am and has been teaching her puppy more intellectual recognition exercises like rear end awareness etc.

Good luck! Can't wait to see the vids.

Edited September 4, 2010 by koalathebear

[Genabee]

do you guys just go for it or do you have a book or something that helps to get you started?? I feel like we have neglected our girls, we have not taught them any tricks.

Unless you count sitting pretty on a towel to dry thier feet when it is wet outside, LOL

oh a peeing on the dogloo - would love to know how to get them to poo on it too though, the go near it but not on it for some reason.

About the pooping - Elbie has a toileting command which is "poop poop". It applies to wees and poops and whenever we say it, he knows he's supposed to go. Have you got a similar command for your pups? If not, if you developed a command then that could be a way to teach them to go on the dog loo. In the beginning, we took Elbie out on a leash to Poo Corner and didn't leave until he 'eliminated' (hilarious word) - saying "poop poop" when he did his thing. It's never too late to 'retrain' because sometimes after rain, we had to 'retrain' Elbie to go in the right spot so it was back on the leash again.

As to tricks, we have two books: (1) Dog Tricks by Mary Ray; and (2) 101 Dog Tricks by Kyra Sundance. To be honest, we learned most of our tricks here at DOL or over at youtube. I was writing a bit about it here. Elbie seems to really like learning tricks and doesn't get bored so we use tricks as a way of keeping him entertained because we're a bit slack about walking him

When we feel like teaching Elbie a trick, we look it up on the net. These days for new tricks (like tidying up), we use a clicker to get Elbie pointed in the right way and then after that we can just work with "good boy" to get him to do what we want. I like the clicker but I'm very unco so can't hold the clicker at the same time I'm juggling everything else.

The order Elbie learned his tricks was approximately as follows:

- sit

- wait for food

- drop

- shake hands, high five, wave

- spin and speak

- rollover (this one took us a while)

- backwards walk

- stand and bow (he still struggles with these :p

- are you shy?

- drop dead

Weirdly, "stay" took us a really, really long time to teach him because he always wanted to follow us. I can't remember when we taught him, but he has known "leave it" for a while, too.

Tricks he's working on now are:

- balancing treat on nose

- putting things in a box

- commando crawl

Let me know if you need any help with any of them. wizzle has been working really hard with her puppy as well and probably has some good tips for motivating an excitable puppy and will have a good memory of "before" and "after" with the puppy. wuffles is quite a bit more advanced than I am and has been teaching her puppy more intellectual recognition exercises like rear end awareness etc.

Good luck! Can't wait to see the vids.

Novjan - I think it is awesome that you can get the dogs to wipe their feet before coming in!!!! I always try to get Genevieve to stand on the door mat, so I can wipe her paws against it!! Not very productive though! She just tries to mouth my hands! I now scoop her up and bring her inside and towel dry her. Though I am not much sure how longer I will be able to do that for.

When she was little, she picked up sit, wait, down (as in to lie down), drop (as in dropping something out of her mouth), high five, shake and touch quite easily. Stay took us a bit of work and even then she would only do it if she could still see us! That being said, it only took her about three days before she knew that she had to sit and stay to get her meals. As she has got older, we have added more things that she has to do before she gets food. It is hilarious now - she just throws herself on the floor, rolls over and stays in the down position.

The last three weeks, we have really been working on down stays and and roll over because these were 'problem' areas. She now does both of these things pretty well. To get her to stay in the down position I basically had to pin her to the ground! Once she got that I wasn't letting her go, she started to relax. I went through a lot of treats! :p

I have found that she also had temporarily memory loss for a few weeks too. Which was a bit frustrating! I basically didn't try and teach her anything new in this time and worked on the existing tricks. I have also found that some tricks were better worked on before meals times (roll over, high five), while those that involved her staying, was better to do when she was a bit sleepy! Generally, now I only give her a treat when we are working on new things - she just gets a pat or a 'good girl' when she does an old trick. At dog school though she gets a few treats!!

My new thing now is getting her to do a down stay while I rest a piece of kibble on her front paw - she has to wait for me to say OK before she can have it! When she is in the mood, she just stares at it so intently... you see her following my hand (with the kibble). Much like Elbie, Genevieve likes working on new tricks (or is it spending quality time with me?) and when I am done and go to walk away, she gives me that look that say "Awwww Mum!!!". I find when I keep up the trick/obedience work, she is generally better behaved. If I have had a couple of days where I have slacked off, not only can she 'forget', she just becomes naughty and implements her selective hearing!

On the rare days when the weather is nice, we will go for a walk to the park and I try and work on with some of her things in the park. This can be hard because there are so many distractions! We will get there eventually!

My number one tip: is to have a glass of wine and be really really patient!!! If you feel yourself getting frustrated, walk away. When they do eventually get it, embrace it, because it makes the hard work seem worth it!!

Edited September 5, 2010 by Wizzle

[Genabee]

I have been slack on the filming front and am no where near as talented as KTB... I can't even get coordinated enough to video and give commands to the dog simultaneously!!

But, here are my measly attempts to do just that! Please excuse the poor lighting and cinematography!

(learning to roll over)

(working hard for her dinner!)

(an example of temporarily memory loss, testing Mummy's patience!)

[koalathebear]

wizzle: she's looking great. I really do love her rollovers - a big ball of fur rolling over. She's also very excited and wriggley which is also so funny to see - as the owner of a big wriggler, I identify with it.

I also sympathise with the whole ‘treat burner’ thing. Elbie does a lot of his training at dinner time but if I know that he’s going to be trained during the day, I try to put outside some of his kibble as treats because I don’t want to overfeed him and end up with a chunky monkey. While not as attractive to him, Elbie can be motivated to do tricks with his tug toy and his other toys – but we have to ‘charge their value’ up first. Basically my husband and I walk around carrying his toys and pretending to be fascinated by them – then Elbie will become re-interested them and do a series of tricks in exchange for a toy.

[Genabee]

wizzle: she's looking great. I really do love her rollovers - a big ball of fur rolling over. She's also very excited and wriggley which is also so funny to see - as the owner of a big wriggler, I identify with it.

I also sympathise with the whole ‘treat burner’ thing. Elbie does a lot of his training at dinner time but if I know that he’s going to be trained during the day, I try to put outside some of his kibble as treats because I don’t want to overfeed him and end up with a chunky monkey. While not as attractive to him, Elbie can be motivated to do tricks with his tug toy and his other toys – but we have to ‘charge their value’ up first. Basically my husband and I walk around carrying his toys and pretending to be fascinated by them – then Elbie will become re-interested them and do a series of tricks in exchange for a toy.

My bold.

I love it!!!!

[Novjan]

Thanks for the tips and info, I will try and get a video of them doing the muffin pan thing, then the challenge will be to post it !!

I think the drying their feet works because we had to do it from the 2nd day we had them when Melbourne had the big hail storm, so they don't know any different LOL it is the way they come in. Sit on the towel and wait to have their feet dried or just sit for a short time while the towel absorbs the water.

they know 'go potty' and even follow this command when they are very sleepy and do not want to leave their comfy Snooza bed in the lounge to ELIMINATE (I love that word too ) before going to 'bed' in their crates BUT they cannot seem to associate it with pooping even though I have spent ages saying potty, potty. potty while they poop. They always go near the dog loo but never on it. I am thinking maybe give them separate words for wee and poop Potty = wee and poop = poo.

We are working on 'enough' now to stop the play fighting when it gets a bit rowdy.

What do you use for treats? we feed our girls BARF and raw bones but they have Strasberg, cheese or cat treats as they love fish. Cheese gets under your finger nails and Strasberg is greasy. I used apple chopped up small once which seemed to go down well. Cooked chicken is good but I have them on a limited diet of beef and roo at the moment due to suspected allergies.

The problem is none of the treats work very well when we are out as they are more interested in what is going on around them, people, birds, traffic etc

love the vid's very inspirational

[Genabee]

Thanks for the tips and info, I will try and get a video of them doing the muffin pan thing, then the challenge will be to post it !!

I think the drying their feet works because we had to do it from the 2nd day we had them when Melbourne had the big hail storm, so they don't know any different LOL it is the way they come in. Sit on the towel and wait to have their feet dried or just sit for a short time while the towel absorbs the water.

they know 'go potty' and even follow this command when they are very sleepy and do not want to leave their comfy Snooza bed in the lounge to ELIMINATE (I love that word too ) before going to 'bed' in their crates BUT they cannot seem to associate it with pooping even though I have spent ages saying potty, potty. potty while they poop. They always go near the dog loo but never on it. I am thinking maybe give them separate words for wee and poop Potty = wee and poop = poo.

We are working on 'enough' now to stop the play fighting when it gets a bit rowdy.

What do you use for treats? we feed our girls BARF and raw bones but they have Strasberg, cheese or cat treats as they love fish. Cheese gets under your finger nails and Strasberg is greasy. I used apple chopped up small once which seemed to go down well. Cooked chicken is good but I have them on a limited diet of beef and roo at the moment due to suspected allergies.

The problem is none of the treats work very well when we are out as they are more interested in what is going on around them, people, birds, traffic etc

love the vid's very inspirational

Yay!!!

I have been using her kibble or beef liver as treats. But I find them small and gritty. From the local pet suppliers, I can buy beef liver biscuits. They are small (which is what I want), she loves them and then I don't get it under my nails (I hate that!!!!!!). I did try schmakos that I had cut down, but she didn't really like them (and they took too long for her to chew). I also prefer something packaged like this because I take them on walks and to school - and they smell strong enough to attract her attention. But she too likes apple, pear and other bits and pieces! When you are out and about, you really have to wave the treat in their face!!! Maybe try some beef liver. A little bit goes a very long way....

Where abouts in Melbourne are you? Maybe we could arrange a play date?

[koalathebear]

wizzle: I noticed in another post that you said Genevieve has a tucker ball now. How's it going? Does she like it? She must look so cute! With OH away, I give Elbie part of his dinner in the tucker ball so that I can have my evening shower uninterrupted

[Genabee]

wizzle: I noticed in another post that you said Genevieve has a tucker ball now. How's it going? Does she like it? She must look so cute! With OH away, I give Elbie part of his dinner in the tucker ball so that I can have my evening shower uninterrupted :D

She seems to prefer the ball to the rope bottle thing. It's not a real 'tucker ball'... it is a cheaper version I got at woolies for 1/4 of the price. It does the trick for the time being! Keeps her busy while I go back to bed for an hour and when I leave for work I give it to her. When she ruins it or takes less than 5 minutes to evacuate it, I will consider upgrading!

She is tearing around like a maniac now with it!

Hows Elbstar coping without his Dad? Moreover, how is Mum coping without Dad?

[koalathebear]

She seems to prefer the ball to the rope bottle thing. It's not a real 'tucker ball'... it is a cheaper version I got at woolies for 1/4 of the price. It does the trick for the time being! Keeps her busy while I go back to bed for an hour and when I leave for work I give it to her. When she ruins it or takes less than 5 minutes to evacuate it, I will consider upgrading!

She is tearing around like a maniac now with it!

Must have video! She must be soooooooooooo cute with it. Elbie's getting very polished at it - pushing with his nose and pulling the ball back with his paw. It's very funny.

Hows Elbstar coping without his Dad? Moreover, how is Mum coping without Dad?

He's ok - he was very unhappy yesterday because he was left at home by himself for almost 12 hours and it was cold, dark and rainy when I got back. He was barking dementedly and very jumpy. Today, the weather was a lot better so while he was excited when I got home, he wasn't jumpy. The tucker ball has been a great way to keep him occupied and in the morning when I leave, I divide up his breakfast - some of the kibble is scattered in the grass, other kibble is put into the tucker ball in the yard and some kibble was frozen into a peanut butter kong ball. I made him some frozen peanut butter kibble cubes in an ice cube tray just as a treat and threw those into the grass as well. We're both doing all right but work is busy and with looking family commitments, too I spend a lot of time driving around like a headless chicken Both Elborino and I will be very happy when OH returns!!! I feel very sorry for myself when he's not around. I must have separation anxiety - next step will be to gnaw on my feet or something.

Don't forget the video of Miss G and her treat ball :D

[koalathebear]

Boop