Pinch Collars

[bedazzledx2]

Agree Rommi. Bob Bailey said to use your clicker like a scalpel...I try

I don't see how a clicker is an interrupter?

When I think interrupter, I think something you do to stop or interrupt a behaviour. Like if you have a dog that is about to start lunging at another dog, and you make a big loud stupid noise and turn around to walk the other way. That noise and spin interrupts the lunging behaviour.

I dont get it either corvus. In the scenario above how would a dog know its an interupter not a marker.

Agro dog looking at the other dog just about to lunge and you click? That could be very dangerous marking the totally wrong behavious!

That is my thinking as well. Click means mark, means treat. I am only going to mark what I want to reinforce and reward. I think to use it as an interruptor is a bit dangerous as to the dog, you could be marking and reinforcing something that could come back to bite you on the bum later. I wonder also if it will, over time, reduce the "power" of the clicker when rewarding what you do want? Probably not, but got me thinking.

[OSoSwift]

I don't see how a clicker is an interrupter?

When I think interrupter, I think something you do to stop or interrupt a behaviour. Like if you have a dog that is about to start lunging at another dog, and you make a big loud stupid noise and turn around to walk the other way. That noise and spin interrupts the lunging behaviour.

I dont get it either corvus. In the scenario above how would a dog know its an interupter not a marker.

Agro dog looking at the other dog just about to lunge and you click? That could be very dangerous marking the totally wrong behavious!

That is my thinking as well. Click means mark, means treat. I am only going to mark what I want to reinforce and reward. I think to use it as an interruptor is a bit dangerous as to the dog, you could be marking and reinforcing something that could come back to bite you on the bum later. I wonder also if it will, over time, reduce the "power" of the clicker when rewarding what you do want? Probably not, but got me thinking.

I think it would be better to read Leslie McDevitt's description of it, seeing as it's her method. The idea is you use it under threshold to mark a behaviour you're going to ask for again in a moment anyway, and then the dog automatically turns away from the object of interest to get the treat from you. You wouldn't click when the dog was lunging or carrying on. The only thing you are marking is looking, but it simultaneously interrupts that looking because the dog turns back to you for a treat. You're then rewarding them for attending to you, so the only behaviours you're likely to increase are looking at a trigger and then looking back to you.

I am thoroughly confused by this thread. What actually are prong collars being used for? What does it do to teach impulse control?

I will have to have a read.

Although - I am am merely attempting to understand - If I click while a dog is looking at another dog to get it to look at me/come to me so I could treat it. I do not want to mark it looking at another dog I want to mark it looking at me. In my way of thinking I would be better off to use something else to get the dog's attention away from the dog and when it did look at me click/treat then.

The otherway seems to be teaching them to look at the dog for a C/T. Which is what I don't want??????

Sorry but that seems to be taking the state highway around Australia when I could get home by driving just down the road.

I remember being told many moons ago by someone I admire (and is on DOL), reward what you want.

If you want to trial you want a perfect straight sit in a certain position. So don't ever treat what is not that sit. Treat the perfect sit then you are highly likely to get it, treat the half backed sits and then you are highly likely to get half baked sits.

So that is why the other idea doesn't compute for me.

[OSoSwift]

Agree Rommi. Bob Bailey said to use your clicker like a scalpel...I try

I don't see how a clicker is an interrupter?

When I think interrupter, I think something you do to stop or interrupt a behaviour. Like if you have a dog that is about to start lunging at another dog, and you make a big loud stupid noise and turn around to walk the other way. That noise and spin interrupts the lunging behaviour.

I dont get it either corvus. In the scenario above how would a dog know its an interupter not a marker.

Agro dog looking at the other dog just about to lunge and you click? That could be very dangerous marking the totally wrong behavious!

That is my thinking as well. Click means mark, means treat. I am only going to mark what I want to reinforce and reward. I think to use it as an interruptor is a bit dangerous as to the dog, you could be marking and reinforcing something that could come back to bite you on the bum later. I wonder also if it will, over time, reduce the "power" of the clicker when rewarding what you do want? Probably not, but got me thinking.

I agree Bedazzledx2 and although I try I know I have a long way to go and many more things to learn.

[Kavik]

I don't see how a clicker is an interrupter?

When I think interrupter, I think something you do to stop or interrupt a behaviour. Like if you have a dog that is about to start lunging at another dog, and you make a big loud stupid noise and turn around to walk the other way. That noise and spin interrupts the lunging behaviour.

I dont get it either corvus. In the scenario above how would a dog know its an interupter not a marker.

Agro dog looking at the other dog just about to lunge and you click? That could be very dangerous marking the totally wrong behavious!

That is my thinking as well. Click means mark, means treat. I am only going to mark what I want to reinforce and reward. I think to use it as an interruptor is a bit dangerous as to the dog, you could be marking and reinforcing something that could come back to bite you on the bum later. I wonder also if it will, over time, reduce the "power" of the clicker when rewarding what you do want? Probably not, but got me thinking.

I think it would be better to read Leslie McDevitt's description of it, seeing as it's her method. The idea is you use it under threshold to mark a behaviour you're going to ask for again in a moment anyway, and then the dog automatically turns away from the object of interest to get the treat from you. You wouldn't click when the dog was lunging or carrying on. The only thing you are marking is looking, but it simultaneously interrupts that looking because the dog turns back to you for a treat. You're then rewarding them for attending to you, so the only behaviours you're likely to increase are looking at a trigger and then looking back to you.

I am thoroughly confused by this thread. What actually are prong collars being used for? What does it do to teach impulse control?

I will have to have a read.

Although - I am am merely attempting to understand - If I click while a dog is looking at another dog to get it to look at me/come to me so I could treat it. I do not want to mark it looking at another dog I want to mark it looking at me. In my way of thinking I would be better off to use something else to get the dog's attention away from the dog and when it did look at me click/treat then.

The otherway seems to be teaching them to look at the dog for a C/T. Which is what I don't want??????

Sorry but that seems to be taking the state highway around Australia when I could get home by driving just down the road.

I remember being told many moons ago by someone I admire (and is on DOL), reward what you want.

If you want to trial you want a perfect straight sit in a certain position. So don't ever treat what is not that sit. Treat the perfect sit then you are highly likely to get it, treat the half backed sits and then you are highly likely to get half baked sits.

So that is why the other idea doesn't compute for me.

I wait the dog out. Dog looks at other dog, dog look at me = click/treat. I don't use an interruptor to get the dog to look away from the other dog to me. The dog chooses to look at me after looking at the other dog, knowing that looking at me will get the reward. Quite different to trying to distract the dog by shoving a treat under its nose. I stay still and quiet and don't say anything to the dog (no cue word).

[bedazzledx2]

Same here. Although I know the premise of the Look at That! game is to treat the dog for noticing the distraction, my training is a bit simpler than that and I prefer my dog look at me from the get go.

I wait the dog out. Dog looks at other dog, dog look at me = click/treat. I don't use an interruptor to get the dog to look away from the other dog to me. The dog chooses to look at me after looking at the other dog, knowing that looking at me will get the reward. Quite different to trying to distract the dog by shoving a treat under its nose. I stay still and quiet and don't say anything to the dog (no cue word).

[Erny]

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Edited September 15, 2010 by Erny

[aussielover]

I wonder how people train their dogs to totally ignore other dogs on lead ie. keep looking forward whilst walking by another dog

I have not been able to master that consistently yet, but when it does occur, I have noticed its when I just keeping walking forward in a no fuss manner and expect her to do the right thing, completely ignoring the other dog and completely ignoring HER so in other words, my own confidence, not hers. I also found this with recalls, if I thought "oh shes not gonna come", she wouldn't come but since I have started to expect her to come everytime, she actually does. weird.

Perhaps the Prong Collar is a tool where the owner can feel more confident and therefore need to use it less??

Personally I think things like check chains and prong collars, even haltis should only be used by those who know what they are doing (I wouldn't know what to do with it) or under guidance from an experienced trainer.

[Steve K9Pro]

Kavik: I have certainly found teaching the dog to deal with the fact that there is another dog there, and that that is alright, has made a HUGE difference to my dog aggressive dog. I have used a different method to K9Pro (I used the method from Click to Calm: Healing the Aggressive Dog).

K9: Yep some of the techniques in there are ok, it is just not where I "start"with an out of control lunging dog, or one that has little food motivation nor one that has rank issues.

When Zoe was younger I boarded her with my GSDs breeder who I trusted to help me to fix her aggression issues. They used correction/praise method. It worked well for them, they were able to have her around other dogs and even sniff another dog, but I was not able to keep that up,

K9: I think though that your not supposed to keep it up, if the training was successful you would not need to keep correcting. I think that after they had reduced the aggression to a controlled level, some counter conditioning through the clicker is a good idea, I dont think just one or the other is a total solution.

MR: Hi K9pro,

I don't quite understand your meaning of impulse control, but wasn't corrected for lunging on the prong. When the dog had the impulse to lunge wearing a prong, unless you dropped the leash, the prong would have applied an aversive and consequently a correction as such on the basis of learning that pulling or lunging towards another dog doesn't feel nice around the neck, so the dog re-think's it's choices, otherwise you could have achieved the same result on a flat collar if the aversive action of the prong wasn't a relevent factor in rehabilitiation.

K9: Sure that would be the case if I introduced the prong collar in the presence of another dog and let the lunging dog figure out it could hurt itself, but I dont do that.

[Steve K9Pro]

Perhaps the Prong Collar is a tool where the owner can feel more confident and therefore need to use it less??

Personally I think things like check chains and prong collars, even haltis should only be used by those who know what they are doing (I wouldn't know what to do with it) or under guidance from an experienced trainer.

K9: There is also a great difference when training a dog for obedience or rehabilitating a family dog that is aggressive, and the use of tools sometimes is determined by the end goal and the starting point.

All aversive tools should at some point be faded out if the training is being done correctly in theory.

[Aidan]

I've not read McDevitt's book so I can't give an opinion on that directly, but what I was originally trying to achieve and what I believe LAT tries to achieve is a short-cut to a "normal" dog, even if at first it appears to be the long way around

The clicker is a scalpel so you can get in first and reinforce something reasonably calm while the dog is looking at another dog. He sees the dog, click, treat. He looks again, perhaps a little curious, click, treat; and so on. No cues are used, we're just capturing something a "normal" dog would do - look at another dog without having a hissy fit. Learning has a direction, and outward behaviours influence internal behaviours, so we're heading remarkably quickly towards a calm dog while we do this. If you can understand that last sentence it will make more sense.

The idea is not to teach the dog to look at you. I must state that with emphasis. It is easy to teach a dog to look at you with distractions. It is easy to correct or shape or capture or interrupt or distract or whatever a dog into looking at your face while the dog is still freaking out (internally) about the other dog. You might even do a pretty good job of maintaining it, and you might even change the dog's emotional state (eventually) but unless you're vigilant or go to extraordinary lengths to control the environment things will probably come unstuck eventually.

[Kelpie-i]

I believe you can use whatever technique or tool you fancy with dog aggressive dogs, but you can never rush the natural process of desensitisation which occurs slowly and over time with regular exposure to other dogs. Everything else, whether it be clicker, prong or whatever are just tools and techniques to help us handlers handle our dogs whilst the process of desensitisation is taking place naturally and on it's own time.

Edited September 15, 2010 by Kelpie-i

[malsrock]

'bedazzledx2' date='15th Sep 2010 - 03:58 PM' post='4814431']

How about teaching an alternative behaviour? ie..see a distraction, focus on me. Lots of ways to teach this before the need for a correction should ever come into the picture.

I don't see the purpose in saving a dog the experience of learning there are consequences to an action good and bad. Behaviour reinforced with positives is good, but behavior reinforced with positives and negatives IMHO is better and amounts to increased reliability.

Fiona

[corvus]

Hehe, I will stop confusing everyone with my unique way of looking at the world and just say, what Aidan said. I was using LAT as a shortcut. Before that I didn't have much in the way of an alternative response that was strong enough, so I was left with waiting for them to do some sort of default behaviour and then asking for a heel, which I had to strengthen as well. It was working fine as the dogs weren't wildly worked up. LAT was just faster.

[corvus]

'bedazzledx2' date='15th Sep 2010 - 03:58 PM' post='4814431']

How about teaching an alternative behaviour? ie..see a distraction, focus on me. Lots of ways to teach this before the need for a correction should ever come into the picture.

I don't see the purpose in saving a dog the experience of learning there are consequences to an action good and bad. Behaviour reinforced with positives is good, but behavior reinforced with positives and negatives IMHO is better and amounts to increased reliability.

Fiona

I assume we're talking about behaviour that is rewarded when performed on cue and punished when not performed on cue rather than a single behaviour that is reinforced with positives and negatives? What's the difference in reliability between rewarding a behaviour when it is cued and rewarding a behaviour when it is cued... and then punishing whatever behaviour the dog chooses instead of the original one when it is cued?

[malsrock]

How about teaching an alternative behaviour? ie..see a distraction, focus on me. Lots of ways to teach this before the need for a correction should ever come into the picture.

it's not always feasable to do it this way, particularly when some dogs are so habitually explosive in their reactions. The owners still need a way to get the dog to settle before they implement the redirection of attention back to them. Also some owners give you time limits and ultimatums.

Yes, I do agree Nekhbet. Teaching the dog focus skills and conditioning them well enough for an explosive dog not to react can be very long drawn out process. Sometimes with an explosive dog, a couple of air blocks is all it takes for the dog to settle in order for focus exercises to take place......other wise, good luck

Fiona

[malsrock]

Perhaps the Prong Collar is a tool where the owner can feel more confident and therefore need to use it less??

Personally I think things like check chains and prong collars, even haltis should only be used by those who know what they are doing (I wouldn't know what to do with it) or under guidance from an experienced trainer.

K9: There is also a great difference when training a dog for obedience or rehabilitating a family dog that is aggressive, and the use of tools sometimes is determined by the end goal and the starting point.

All aversive tools should at some point be faded out if the training is being done correctly in theory.

YES.......I think K9's post provides the perspective that many of us are missing. There is a massive difference IMHO between the two scenarios of obedience training and the rehabilitation of behavioural issues which most importantly I think needs to be determined before a method of training and/or tools are decided upon.

Fiona

[Steve K9Pro]

MR: YES.......I think K9's post provides the perspective that many of us are missing. There is a massive difference IMHO between the two scenarios of obedience training and the rehabilitation of behavioural issues which most importantly I think needs to be determined before a method of training and/or tools are decided upon.

Thanks Malsrock, I do quite a lot of training for competition, working dogs and Government Departments etc, and because I am trying to muster every bit of motivation I can find, I dont use any corrective measures as far as physical corrections go, its absurd to think pumping out leash corrections is all I know, but when a dog has learned how to use its drive for evil, well some of them need to be redirected and slowed down and taught that there are limits, and sometimes, the prong is the right tool.

There are very few tools I dont use, we have everything from Prong collars, stabilisation collars (AKA dominant dog collars) to clickers in stock, I use them all, I will use bread and butter if it works!!!

There is such a focus on methods and tools, it is almost disrespectful of a trainer or behaviourist to group them because they use one tool or another.

I say find someone who can help, who cares how they help as long as they do...

Edited September 15, 2010 by K9Pro

[malsrock]

'bedazzledx2' date='15th Sep 2010 - 03:58 PM' post='4814431']

How about teaching an alternative behaviour? ie..see a distraction, focus on me. Lots of ways to teach this before the need for a correction should ever come into the picture.

I don't see the purpose in saving a dog the experience of learning there are consequences to an action good and bad. Behaviour reinforced with positives is good, but behavior reinforced with positives and negatives IMHO is better and amounts to increased reliability.

Fiona

I assume we're talking about behaviour that is rewarded when performed on cue and punished when not performed on cue rather than a single behaviour that is reinforced with positives and negatives? What's the difference in reliability between rewarding a behaviour when it is cued and rewarding a behaviour when it is cued... and then punishing whatever behaviour the dog chooses instead of the original one when it is cued?

Ok, I will give an example:

I teach my dogs a "stop" command. We walk along on leash and the dog is out front for instance and I say "stop", the dog stops I catch up in a footstep and reward which is working well in low distraction atmospheres and the dog knows the stop command well. We up the distractions where the dog moves forward on the leash focusing on another dog. We say "stop" and the dog ignors the command, I will then correct him and the dog stops, catch up and no reward. The dog from my experience learns that unless he obey's the stop command a correction follows and has the choice of which action he wants to take. Stop and be rewarded, don't stop, get a correction and no reward. Im my way of thinking, there is a "double" reinforcer in place, a correction and no reward for disobeying, no correction and reward for obeying.

Does it work??? ABSOLUTELY, my 8 year old boy's "stops" are bullet proof off leash even with my OH calling him at the other end although it was 7 odd years ago I trained him to do this

Fiona

[malsrock]

MR: YES.......I think K9's post provides the perspective that many of us are missing. There is a massive difference IMHO between the two scenarios of obedience training and the rehabilitation of behavioural issues which most importantly I think needs to be determined before a method of training and/or tools are decided upon.

Thanks Malsrock, I do quite a lot of training for competition, working dogs and Government Departments etc, and because I am trying to muster every bit of motivation I can find, I dont use any corrective measures as far as physical corrections go, its absurd to think pumping out leash corrections is all I know, but when a dog has learned how to use its drive for evil, well some of them need to be redirected and slowed down and taught that there are limits, and sometimes, the prong is the right tool.

There are very few tools I dont use, we have everything from Prong collars, stabilisation collars (AKA dominant dog collars) to clickers in stock, I use them all, I will use bread and butter if it works!!!

There is such a focus on methods and tools, it is almost disrespectful of a trainer or behaviourist to group them because they use one tool or another.

I say find someone who can help, who cares how they help as long as they do...

Well said K9, your approach is IMHO a balanced approach with a large box of tricks.....EXCELLENT :D

Fiona

[Kavik]

'bedazzledx2' date='15th Sep 2010 - 03:58 PM' post='4814431']

How about teaching an alternative behaviour? ie..see a distraction, focus on me. Lots of ways to teach this before the need for a correction should ever come into the picture.

I don't see the purpose in saving a dog the experience of learning there are consequences to an action good and bad. Behaviour reinforced with positives is good, but behavior reinforced with positives and negatives IMHO is better and amounts to increased reliability.

Fiona

I assume we're talking about behaviour that is rewarded when performed on cue and punished when not performed on cue rather than a single behaviour that is reinforced with positives and negatives? What's the difference in reliability between rewarding a behaviour when it is cued and rewarding a behaviour when it is cued... and then punishing whatever behaviour the dog chooses instead of the original one when it is cued?

Ok, I will give an example:

I teach my dogs a "stop" command. We walk along on leash and the dog is out front for instance and I say "stop", the dog stops I catch up in a footstep and reward which is working well in low distraction atmospheres and the dog knows the stop command well. We up the distractions where the dog moves forward on the leash focusing on another dog. We say "stop" and the dog ignors the command, I will then correct him and the dog stops, catch up and no reward. The dog from my experience learns that unless he obey's the stop command a correction follows and has the choice of which action he wants to take. Stop and be rewarded, don't stop, get a correction and no reward. Im my way of thinking, there is a "double" reinforcer in place, a correction and no reward for disobeying, no correction and reward for obeying.

Does it work??? ABSOLUTELY, my 8 year old boy's "stops" are bullet proof off leash even with my OH calling him at the other end although it was 7 odd years ago I trained him to do this

Fiona

Ok an interesting alternative to the situation you just described . . .

walk on leash and dog is out in front, I stop, give dog no command, the dog stops and looks at me, I click/treat, I stop and the dog comes back to me and looks at me, click/treat. Up the distractions to where the dog is focused on another dog. I stop, the dog stops and looks at me, click/treat, I stop and the dog comes back to me and looks at me, click/treat. The dog has the choice of which action to take. :D Same result

Edited September 15, 2010 by Kavik