Clicker Training, A Good Idea?

[Kavik]

I find it interesting Santo that you keep wanting to blame the dog. The dog is what it is. Our job is to get us working well as a team and work towards whatever our goal is.

All of your training problems will not be fixed by having a high drive dog lol.

Edited October 3, 2013 by Kavik

[fbaudry]

I find it interesting Santo that you keep wanting to blame the dog. The dog is what it is. Our job is to get us working well as a team and work towards whatever our goal is.

All of your training problems will not be fixed by having a high drive dog lol.

I would answer with a resounding YES to the OP's original question, and thank Aidan, Kavik and others for putting the argument so eloquently (and staying level headed and cool when I couldn't have replied so politely to some posts :-) )

Kavik, what resources would you recommend regarding engagement and building value for the handler? (Sorry for going OT)

[Kavik]

Some trainers that I have found inspirational in regards to engagement and building value for the handler are Susan Garrett and Michael Ellis.

Susan Garrett often has online courses (Puppy Peaks has just closed, this time it includes Recallers as well, which is the best of her courses for engagement/relationship building stuff) and she also has DVDs, books, and useful videos on her YouTube channel.

Michael Ellis has some free videos on YouTube which are really great as well as DVDs through Leerburg.

[fbaudry]

Thank you!

[Diva]

I find it interesting Santo that you keep wanting to blame the dog. The dog is what it is. Our job is to get us working well as a team and work towards whatever our goal is.

Very well put

[OSoSwift]

I have two dogs, one has good drive, the other reasonable. They both work very well. One was harder work than the other but it is my job to as Kavik said, to get the best out of the dog I have I front of me.

Of course if I choose a dog I will choose the one with the naturally higher drive as I don't have to work so hard to build it. That is just basic common sense really.

[huski]

My beagle is moderately driven and I put a lot of work into harnessing her drive and channeling it into working for me. It was hard work but enjoyable and we got pretty awesome results. I have a before and after video somewhere if anyone would be interested in me posting it I will dig it up :)

We find we have great results with our training in drive program with a range of dogs, not just dogs with high drive though obviously they do really well with that style of training.

I think as much as people look at really high drive dogs and see how awesome they can work, it's not as easy as you might assume and handling dogs like that comes with its own challenges.

When I went from my beagle to our working line Malinois I thought awesome, this is going to be so much easier. It's not easier overall. It's just different and you face challenges with both types of dogs.

Edited October 4, 2013 by huski

[Santo66]

I find it interesting Santo that you keep wanting to blame the dog. The dog is what it is. Our job is to get us working well as a team and work towards whatever our goal is.

All of your training problems will not be fixed by having a high drive dog lol.

Ok let me explain:

My youngest GSD (working line)has food drive, will leave food for a ball, will leave a ball for a tug toy, will leave a tug toy for a bite sleeve in that order. The dog has learned the game in foundation training from a puppy, but the drive intensity to earn those rewards is in the dog......training merely extracts it.

My older GSD in comparison although he didn't have the foundation training the younger one had, he has food drive to a point, will chase a ball twice then tires of it, will bite a tug toy once or twice then tires of it, would rather sniff and mark territory than engage with a handler where the younger dog is almost painful attention seeking in drive to engage with the handler, all he wants to do is play and indoors most of his training is teaching to remain in a relaxed state......I understand fully why dogs like this are often kennelled, bought out for training then put away as the drive intensity and handler focus is off the wall and is hard to control and maintain composure.

Because of the drive, the intensity for handler engagement and to earn reward which is in the dogs genetics, using that genetic structure in training and primarily the drive training was from the Ivan Balabanov tapes and some of Mike Ellis, the genetic drive is channelled into use to gain a behaviour which will not work to this degree with a low drive dog, not even close in fact. These professional people are NOT using low drive dogs including Susan Garrett......they are using the drive in the dog to get the performance

This misconception is this:

I mentioned earlier in this discussion about a working line GSD desexed female pet out of control and relegated to the back yard.....she was of similar bloodlines to my younger male and she had no foundation training whatsoever. Within seconds of waving a tug toy in her face, she bit it instantly and tugged like an old pro.....she had never seen a tug toy previously in her life.....within 30 minutes we were getting a behaviour and release for reward.......my older GSD will still not produce over 6 years what this girl did in 30 minutes.......that's in the dog, not the training :)

[Kavik]

Your foundation work in engagement has helped your newer dog to seek to engage in the handler. While having good drive makes this easier, having high drive is not what has done this, the training is. A high drive dog without such training would not automatically seek engagement with the handler. You still have to put in the work.

While Susan Garrett has Border Collies, she also has JRT, and has a journal of how she transformed a rescue JRT that showed no interest in a ball or toy of any kind and no interest in engaging with the handler into a flyball champion. Not all of her students have super high drive Border Collies either. She is committed to helping students bring out the best in their dogs.

I think everybody understands that high drive dogs, and dogs with certain temperaments are easier to train up to higher levels. Why else would we choose certain breeds and research breeders and bloodlines and look carefully at individual pups? Nobody is disputing that.

But understanding how to build value for working with you, how to get the dog to engage with you, and play with you for whatever reward, is also very beneficial to dogs without high drive. You may have to work harder for it and experiment more and have some lateral thinking, which you may not have to do with a dog that has high drive and biddable temperament. But that does not mean it can't be done.

[Santo66]

My beagle is moderately driven and I put a lot of work into harnessing her drive and channeling it into working for me. It was hard work but enjoyable and we got pretty awesome results. I have a before and after video somewhere if anyone would be interested in me posting it I will dig it up :)

We find we have great results with our training in drive program with a range of dogs, not just dogs with high drive though obviously they do really well with that style of training.

I think as much as people look at really high drive dogs and see how awesome they can work, it's not as easy as you might assume and handling dogs like that comes with its own challenges.

When I went from my beagle to our working line Malinois I thought awesome, this is going to be so much easier. It's not easier overall. It's just different and you face challenges with both types of dogs.

There are some pretty awesome Beagle's out there in scent detection roles trained in food drive, but like all working roles, the dogs are individually selected based on the drives best suited in these roles and adaptability to the training that achieves it :)

[Kavik]

I have just enrolled in Puppy Peaks. This is following Susan's progress with her young dog Swagger from a young pup of 3 weeks to about 2 years when he is competing in agility. Videos of everyday training sessions and how she deals with challenges. She stresses and the videos show that Swagger was not an automatically perfect puppy, she had challenges with him. You get to see good sessions and sessions where things went wrong, and how she dealt with that.

That is what I like about her, she stresses that even professional trainers have challenges with their dogs, the same challenges that everybody else faces. They do not automatically have perfect tugging dogs which give them focus in the face of high distractions.

[Santo66]

Your foundation work in engagement has helped your newer dog to seek to engage in the handler. While having good drive makes this easier, having high drive is not what has done this, the training is. A high drive dog without such training would not automatically seek engagement with the handler. You still have to put in the work.

While Susan Garrett has Border Collies, she also has JRT, and has a journal of how she transformed a rescue JRT that showed no interest in a ball or toy of any kind and no interest in engaging with the handler into a flyball champion. Not all of her students have super high drive Border Collies either. She is committed to helping students bring out the best in their dogs.

I think everybody understands that high drive dogs, and dogs with certain temperaments are easier to train up to higher levels. Why else would we choose certain breeds and research breeders and bloodlines and look carefully at individual pups? Nobody is disputing that.

But understanding how to build value for working with you, how to get the dog to engage with you, and play with you for whatever reward, is also very beneficial to dogs without high drive. You may have to work harder for it and experiment more and have some lateral thinking, which you may not have to do with a dog that has high drive and biddable temperament. But that does not mean it can't be done.

A JRT is an extremely high drive breed, in fact if they were bigger, they would be almost in Malinois country.....I have trained some JRT's and they are a super little dog and very intelligent. It could be an environmental effect or previous issues with Susan's JRT why it didn't have drive response initially, but it still amounts to the genetic drive within the dog to extract it.......you cannot make a ball crazy dog out of a dog low in prey drive.....if a training regime extracted drive, the drive was there in the first place :)

High drive dogs are more work as a general pet I have found where higher level training becomes a necessity as they can easily become a pain in the arse to live with :laugh: My younger GSD is laying on the floor snoozing.....when I move from this chair, he will be up ready for action bouncing around in my face "what are we doing, are we going to play"......we will probably do a focused heel into the kitchen to stop him ramping up too high and smashing into the furniture High drive DOES present other challenges I can attest to that!!

[Kavik]

My beagle is moderately driven and I put a lot of work into harnessing her drive and channeling it into working for me. It was hard work but enjoyable and we got pretty awesome results. I have a before and after video somewhere if anyone would be interested in me posting it I will dig it up :)

We find we have great results with our training in drive program with a range of dogs, not just dogs with high drive though obviously they do really well with that style of training.

I think as much as people look at really high drive dogs and see how awesome they can work, it's not as easy as you might assume and handling dogs like that comes with its own challenges.

When I went from my beagle to our working line Malinois I thought awesome, this is going to be so much easier. It's not easier overall. It's just different and you face challenges with both types of dogs.

There are some pretty awesome Beagle's out there in scent detection roles trained in food drive, but like all working roles, the dogs are individually selected based on the drives best suited in these roles and adaptability to the training that achieves it :)

She is not talking about Beagles in scent detection roles She has had great success with her own pet Beagle in obedience, great job!

[huski]

Thanks Kavik :)

We have a LOT of owners with dogs of various backgrounds and breeds from low drive dogs to super high drive dogs, coming to see us to learn more about training in drive. One thing with our system is that we have adapted it so it can be applied to dogs of different drive levels, it's about maximizing what the individual dog can give.

Dogs of all breeds and drive levels can enjoy this style of work and benefit from it.

[aussielover]

I agree that drive level doesn't affect clicker training, at least at the level of what the average person wants to achieve.

I have a low drive/energy dog, yet she responds very well to clicker/marker training and has been taught lots of tricks this way. Using positive reinforcement, she even enjoys agility and retrieving training now. I could get more out of her but I'm happy with the way we are going at the moment.

I've seen others with even lower drive dogs than mine also achieve success with clicker training.

It's lots of fun for the owner and dog and can only help to build the relationship, so I can't see any downsides to giving it a go :)

Edited October 4, 2013 by aussielover

[Santo66]

She is not talking about Beagles in scent detection roles She has had great success with her own pet Beagle in obedience, great job!

Beagles adapt extremely well to food reward and are generally high in food drive being the method used in the detector dogs......so I could imagine a Beagle well trainable in obedience using the drives they have?

That is what I like about her, she stresses that even professional trainers have challenges with their dogs, the same challenges that everybody else faces. They do not automatically have perfect tugging dogs which give them focus in the face of high distractions.

That's a very simple thing to determine how much focus a dog has in the face of high distraction and many professional trainers wash dogs out that don't measure up.....they even sell their washouts to Australians who don't know the real reason they are for sale. Commercial trainers always make out their champion dog was crap by nature and their training program made a silk purse out of sows ear...it's how they sell training programs, didn't you know that When the training program purchased doesn't work because the dog doesn't have the right drives to support it, they tell the owner they are not applying the program properly :laugh:

Can positive training ever really work for everyday amateurs like myself in terms of giving as high an obedience level as possible or will i always be worrying that something is more interesting to him then me?

Back to the OP's original question above........IMHO success depends on the dog's genetic aptitude to adapt to handler induced reward above all else :D

Edited October 4, 2013 by Santo66

[raineth]

I really think it's a bit rich to say that Beagles would be well trainable in Obedience.

If they were well trainable in obedience why aren't they there? Why do they have a reputation for being difficult to train?

Huski, please post up a vid of you working with Daisy, I watched a vid you put up once before and it was so awesome

[Kavik]

She is not talking about Beagles in scent detection roles She has had great success with her own pet Beagle in obedience, great job!

Beagles adapt extremely well to food reward and are generally high in food drive being the method used in the detector dogs......so I could imagine a Beagle well trainable in obedience using the drives they have?

That is what I like about her, she stresses that even professional trainers have challenges with their dogs, the same challenges that everybody else faces. They do not automatically have perfect tugging dogs which give them focus in the face of high distractions.

That's a very simple thing to determine how much focus a dog has in the face of high distraction and many professional trainers wash dogs out that don't measure up.....they even sell their washouts to Australians who don't know the real reason they are for sale. Commercial trainers always make out their champion dog was crap by nature and their training program made a silk purse out of sows ear...it's how they sell training programs, didn't you know that When the training program purchased doesn't work because the dog doesn't have the right drives to support it, they tell the owner they are not applying the program properly :laugh:

Can positive training ever really work for everyday amateurs like myself in terms of giving as high an obedience level as possible or will i always be worrying that something is more interesting to him then me?

Back to the OP's original question above........IMHO success depends on the dog's genetic aptitude to adapt to handler induced reward above all else :D

Swagger (SG's dog) is a singleton BC pup whelped in her home. I don't think she would have gotten rid of him! She doesn't make out that he was 'crap by nature', rather that he is a pup which provided challenges, just like everybody's puppy, an average BC puppy, not a special, superstar perfect puppy from the time he was born. And you get to see video proof of the challenges and how she deals with them.

As the majority of us are not professionals nor do our dogs 'work' for a living, we don't 'wash out' or rehome dogs which prove more challenging, or don't have as much drive, or are independent, or more easily distracted, or motion sensitive etc. Sure I try to do my research on breeders, bloodlines etc but in the end you work with the dog you have, they all provide challenges.

Edited October 4, 2013 by Kavik

[Vickie]

Ok let me explain:

My youngest GSD (working line)has food drive, will leave food for a ball, will leave a ball for a tug toy, will leave a tug toy for a bite sleeve in that order. The dog has learned the game in foundation training from a puppy, but the drive intensity to earn those rewards is in the dog......training merely extracts it.

Out of interest, what type of work and/or competition do you train for? Do you have any videos of each of your dogs? Would be interesting to see the differences you are talking about.

Edited October 4, 2013 by Vickie

[huski]

I really think it's a bit rich to say that Beagles would be well trainable in Obedience.

If they were well trainable in obedience why aren't they there? Why do they have a reputation for being difficult to train?

I think it takes a lot of commitment and you need an approach that can harness their drive appropriately. They still aren't high drive dogs.

Huski, please post up a vid of you working with Daisy, I watched a vid you put up once before and it was so awesome

Thanks Raineth :)

Ok this is a before video. Pretty cringe worthy! This is when we just started at obedience club. I very clearly had no idea what I was doing :laugh: this is the best work Daisy was capable of giving. Outside of the house her scent drive took over and she wouldn't take food. Most of the instructors and trialling members at the club told me not to bother trying to train Daisy. I think most people would see this video and say she isn't showing any actual drive for the food.

This is an after video, once we met Steve and started doing training in drive. In both videos Daisy's primary reward is food. The difference is she works IN food drive now and we developed and channeled her drive into working with me.

Same dog, same reward, very different results IMO!