tigger000 Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 Hey all, I have a 7 year old dalmation that i am currently training for a course i am doing. when i got him as a puppy i took him to obedience class and he did great. However he did get to a point in class where it didnt matter what kind of reward i had in my pocket (i tried a wide range of treats) he wouldnt listen to me. I am now starting to train him again and am running into the same problem. I call his name over and over, even tug on the check chain so it becomes annoying for him...yet he still wont focus on me. I need him to focus on me so i can give hand signals and to stop him getting distracted by other people/dogs around. He knows the command "look" as i get him to look at me every time he is fed dinner...yet when it comes to obedience training and i give him the "look" command he rarely does it. Im not sure whether he is too distracted by other thingsa or whether i am doing something wrong? Any advice on how to overcome this problem? thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
persephone Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 I call his name over and over, even tug on the check chain so it becomes annoying for him...yet he still wont focus on me. ;) he is probably 'tuning out' to give himself a bit of peace How is he at home? Does he come when you say his name? Does he know /obey commands without hand signals- just voice? Does he respond to a whistle,or a clicker? Does he respond to barking dogs? Have you done any regular training with him in the past 6 years? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigger000 Posted January 9, 2011 Author Share Posted January 9, 2011 I call his name over and over, even tug on the check chain so it becomes annoying for him...yet he still wont focus on me. ;) he is probably 'tuning out' to give himself a bit of peace How is he at home? Does he come when you say his name? Does he know /obey commands without hand signals- just voice? Does he respond to a whistle,or a clicker? Does he respond to barking dogs? Have you done any regular training with him in the past 6 years? haha, yeah at home he comes when his name is called. He knows commands just by voice. I am wanting to teach him to obey commands with just hand signals also. He hasnt been clicker trained, i used "good" as a bridge. He was crying at the park today as there were a couple of dogs off lead running around him and barking - so yes, he does respond. I have done very little training with him in the past 6 years (bad owner i know!). but he does still comply with the commands he was taught as a puppy - sit, drop, heel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs Rusty Bucket Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 (edited) I call his name over and over This is how you break the word and remove all usefullness for it. What you need is Lesley Nelson's "Really Reliable Recall". http://www.dogwise.com/ItemDetails.cfm?ID=DTB810P If she can get Afghans to come when called, you should be able to train a dalmatian but you're going to need to go back to scratch and start again where there are very few distractions eg your laundry. And if he's not interested in any treat you have - try skipping a meal and then training before the next meal is due. You may also want to investigate using methods from "Nothing in life is free" (aka NILIF) and "Triangle of Temptation" (aka TOT). Ie no dinner until he's doing what you want. Or he has to work for every piece of dinner. Ie if you get a successful sit-stay-come for every piece of kibble - that's a really high repetition rate... it should start to sink in. But you may need new command words if you have broken all your old ones. Edited January 9, 2011 by Mrs Rusty Bucket Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigger000 Posted January 9, 2011 Author Share Posted January 9, 2011 I call his name over and over This is how you break the word and remove all usefullness for it. What you need is Lesley Nelson's "Really Reliable Recall". http://www.dogwise.com/ItemDetails.cfm?ID=DTB810P If she can get Afghans to come when called, you should be able to train a dalmatian but you're going to need to go back to scratch and start again where there are very few distractions eg your laundry. And if he's not interested in any treat you have - try skipping a meal and then training before the next meal is due. You may also want to investigate using methods from "Nothing in life is free" (aka NILIF) and "Triangle of Temptation" (aka TOT). Ie no dinner until he's doing what you want. Or he has to work for every piece of dinner. Ie if you get a successful sit-stay-come for every piece of kibble - that's a really high repetition rate... it should start to sink in. But you may need new command words if you have broken all your old ones. I'm not even up to the recall stage of training. I am having the problem when he is just on the lead next to me and i am trying to get his focus on me. I took him out today just before his dinner...so he should have been pretty hungry. But i will try not feeding him for a morning and night and see how he goes. I might also try what you suggested about getting him to do something before given a piece of kibble etc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cosmolo Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 Classical conditioning- either his name or a look command or both. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
persephone Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 So- if you are at home- he sticks close and responds every time to his name? is he just not doing so when outside? Up until recently , how have you walked him each day ? Has he been like this for years? Or is it just since you started a new routine? I don't train using food- but would suggest associating his name with the TASTIEST things - tiny shreds of roast chicken... or little fragments of dried liver ...and make sure he smells it all -so he knows what is available Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigger000 Posted January 9, 2011 Author Share Posted January 9, 2011 So- if you are at home- he sticks close and responds every time to his name?is he just not doing so when outside? Up until recently , how have you walked him each day ? Has he been like this for years? Or is it just since you started a new routine? I don't train using food- but would suggest associating his name with the TASTIEST things - tiny shreds of roast chicken... or little fragments of dried liver ...and make sure he smells it all -so he knows what is available sometimes at home he wont respond to his name, but it is worse when we are outside. Yeah, he has been like that for a long time now. At the moment i am using frankfurts as his reward... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cosmolo Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 You need to spend some time inside conditioning first. And then gradually increase the distractions. Use his whole amount of food for the day to do the conditioning plus some yummy treats for 7 days WITHOUT using the word at times when you won't follow through with a reward and then go from there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs Rusty Bucket Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 Hi Tigger000 also mix up the treats - ie frankfurts will "wear off" after a while and you will need to swap to something else or have a mix of things to treat with. And cut them up into tiny pieces eg 1/2 cm cubes. So he doesn't get full too quickly. I use a mix of things, current treat is bread and promite - cos dog LURVES it. Mostly she loves it because I eat it but whatever works. I second what Persephone said. Use the tastiest treats for reward for responding to his name. Not just kibble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jigsaw Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 (edited) You could also change the dog's name for a few months and work on teaching the dog to respond to that name. He may be actually conditioned not to respond to his name given his lack of response to it. Training a response with his current name may take some time even if using high value treats. By using a different name or even just calling him "puppy" for a few months you may get a response much quicker than using his current name. When you have a surefire whiplash turn of the head to "puppy" and a reliable response even under distraction then you could reintroduce his name, new cue then old cue. I can't remember which trainer has used this method, Patricia McConnell comes to mind but I'm not definite on that. Edited January 9, 2011 by Jigsaw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pretty Miss Emma Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 I agree with others. Go back to basics. If it were my dog I think that I would probably take several steps backwards and pretend that it hadn't been trained at all and take it from there. When I goot my rescue dog I knew she had been trained but she needed to know how to work with me so we started at the start. The other thing that is probably important is more about you, try not to get frustrated as your dog will just pick up on it (hard I know!!!). Again it's going back to basics, if you feel yourself getting frustrated stop the training session and try again later. Something else that may be useful is to keep training sessions really short (ie. try to keep the dog wanting more). As for yummy treats, my pouch contains... devon meat, 4 paws, liver treats, roast chicken, natures gift treats, cheese, sausage and probably a few other things. I generally try to have a different type of treat every 2nd or 3rd training session, or a mixture of some of these, but definitely really yummy things (roast chook!) when I know we are going to be in a high distraction situation. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tigger000 Posted January 9, 2011 Author Share Posted January 9, 2011 Do you think I could get him responding to his name through shaping? When he looks at me reward him, and when he starts doing that really well then bring in the cue (his name)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cosmolo Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 I wouldn't shape it- it would take longer than classical conditioning and i'd want to get the attention happening ASAP if i needed to train the dog for other things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tralee Posted January 9, 2011 Share Posted January 9, 2011 I call my dogs "bickie" when they don't respond. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luvsablue Posted January 10, 2011 Share Posted January 10, 2011 I call my dogs "bickie" when they don't respond. That's funny so do I, and when she looks my way guess what she gets? "Bickies", but they are not biscuits, but whatever tasty cold chicken or beef etc I'm equipped with at the time. If you are training for focus using food you need to do this many many times. luvsablue and beckie the bluey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Casster17 Posted January 10, 2011 Share Posted January 10, 2011 what about changing the "look" command. I had to do that with my recall. COME had bad inplecation for my dog. So changed it. Works a treat now. Friend had the same problem with Stand. Stand made her rotty lean into her. But we changed it to Rock and he would stand next to her without leaning. What about using something like watch instead of look??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
poodlefan Posted January 10, 2011 Share Posted January 10, 2011 (edited) Hey all,I have a 7 year old dalmation that i am currently training for a course i am doing. when i got him as a puppy i took him to obedience class and he did great. However he did get to a point in class where it didnt matter what kind of reward i had in my pocket (i tried a wide range of treats) he wouldnt listen to me. I am now starting to train him again and am running into the same problem. I call his name over and over, even tug on the check chain so it becomes annoying for him...yet he still wont focus on me. I need him to focus on me so i can give hand signals and to stop him getting distracted by other people/dogs around. He knows the command "look" as i get him to look at me every time he is fed dinner...yet when it comes to obedience training and i give him the "look" command he rarely does it. Im not sure whether he is too distracted by other thingsa or whether i am doing something wrong? Any advice on how to overcome this problem? thanks! What do your course notes/instructors suggest? I assume you're doing a dog training course? Obtaining focus is an important first lesson. It teaches principles that will be applied in more advanced training. Principles to use are: * train it first with no distractions then increase the level of distraction OR duration of focus - not both at the same time. * It can be lured - put a treat near your face and most dogs will look at you. TOT is another method you can use * It cannot be "nagged". Incessant/repeated use of the same cue with no compliance taints the cue rendering it useless. If this is where you are at you need a new cue. * Applying aversives (eg. jerking the dog around) ineffectually will turn the dog right off. I think you need to go back to square one and start again. By the way, for most dogs, their name is not a cue. Use a fresh word. Sounds to me like hand signals are a long way off yet. You need to use a word and a visual cue and fade the voice cue ONLY when you've got reliable performance. Edited January 10, 2011 by poodlefan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaxx'sBuddy Posted January 10, 2011 Share Posted January 10, 2011 i never use my dogs name for anything much except to talk to her and pat her but nothing serious. i taught her to recall to "come" and a particular whistle and she rockets back. Jaxx knows her name but she also knows when it is used it is for cuddles and general not serious things like "come on Jaxx bed time" when really i don't care if she is slow to respond Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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