-
Sheltie Chasing Cars – Part 3 | Training DETAILS | David Video Message
????With the sharing of so many great ideas this week, we already have an impressive list of training exercises for the Sheltie Chasing Cars case. Now it’s time to get into some of the details for the ideas you shared! ????
Here’s what we’re looking for next, don’t hesitate to jump in with your thoughts. What are some of the BASIC STEPS you would use to teach these exercises? BONUS points if you share a video example. ????
- A Scent Game that can be used to redirect the dog’s attention and change the response to the trigger
- An “Engage/Disengage” or “Look at That” exercise (these are similar)
- Any behavior you can teach to quickly redirect the dog’s attention and create distance (ex., Emergency U-Turn or Recall)
- Teaching a dog owner handling skills including how to be more calm (breathing) or confident and effective (body positioning)
- Any other exercises we’ve covered that you would like to share a little bit more detail on how you teach it? We would love to hear your steps!
Here’s is a summary of the real case details again:
“A sheltie is exhibiting chasing behavior, especially cars. I know chasing is hard wired in herding breeds. This is a 4 month old Sheltie who has lots of energy. The owner got him from a breeder in WVA and had him for about 2 month now. Owner has had Shelties before but not nearly as high energy as this one. They are concerned because he already escaped when they opened the door and started chasing after cars. When they walk him, he barks and wants to chase after everything that moves.”What are the BASIC STEPS you would use to teach any one of the helpful exercises we’ve proposed for this case? BONUS points if you share a video example!
These exercises, plus your management ideas from last week, are being edited into a Training Plan and everyone who shares an idea will be listed as a contributor on the finished write up. Fantastic work so far by: @Jeri @Wanze @Abbie @BeagleMania @HollyJMartinez @VinnyMickey @bmacwatt @CountryGirl @Chris @RADS @KathyS @MaddiAlflen @Jenz @Jenny @JoyBaker1611 @BelleSeren @ilana @denny
We can’t wait to hear more from you all:
@Bernerlabreclectus @PawsUp @KTinaN @Vincent @Lis @Lis @WalksWithAlex @Anna @ZaneB @stomper16 @Gin @Marcybel @Melissa @Carolyn @Brigid @HHPS @Levi @Achtung @PawstoConsider @Laurie @Reddog @amywurst @DoggoneSpecial @Pkoh @Levi @Achtung @PawstoConsider @Laurie @Reddog @amywurst @DoggoneSpecial @Pkoh @Erika
-
26 Replies
-
Puzzle and I, and the good folks at KARE (www.nwkare.org), made this Look at That video a few years back – https://youtu.be/F-he2vbR1Yc. When I play the Engage/Disengage game, I use the cue “Who’s That?” because it seems more like initiating a conversation rather than making a demand of my dog by saying “Look at That”.
A super simple, but quite effective, physically relaxing reminder I give my clients (and use myself) is just to shrug up tight, briefly hold, and then drop down your shoulders. When I get really tense, my shoulders seem to get pinned to my earlobes, and this motion releases that tension.
-
This video is an amazing resource, @jenwalker and perfect for this plan.
Also, what a great, simple way to teach relaxation for better handling. Anyone can do this and appreciate the immediate effects.
-
Great video! My husband and I have been working with our reactive dog and this video has made us see that maybe we are getting a bit ahead of ourselves and what Timtam is ready to encounter! Thank you!
-
Firstly, thank you for working with your dog through the challenges they face @Brigid; it is not an easy path but a very rewarding one for sure!
When you say that you are getting ahead of yourself in what Timtam is ready for, where are you in their training? To me it feels like is a balancing act of sorts, to continually be assessing what a dog is ready for without pushing them beyond what their current limits are.
-
We did a lot of distraction training inside the house and she did great. We then moved it outside to our yard and still did great. We then opened our gate so she could see out front and has continued to do well. Our distractions have been piles of food that we walked her by, a kong, a ball but nothing moving. We did not do any type of distraction where one of us were a distance away and causing the distraction and were just relying on things that naturally were happening around us. We also were not doing this together. Usually my husband would work with Timtam while I took our other dog for a walk to decrease that distraction. Since watching your video we have done 2 sessions with both of us where he is working with Timtam and I am creating the distraction (bouncing a ball) and discovered she is not ready for things that are happening on the other side of the gate. We definitely do not have an 80% consistent “watch me” from her and realize we were hitting threshold quickly. Your video also helped me realize that we were pushing above threshold and missing some of her stress cues as well.
-
-
-
-
For the emergency recall I would teach the touch. I think someone mentioned it
Training Steps for teaching “touch”:
– Start in a calm, quit place and hold a few small treats in one hand and rub the scent of the treat onto the fingers of my other hand, then put your hand with the treats behind your back and hold the empty, scented hand with 2 fingers extended two inches from the dogs nose.
– when the dog touches your hand with his nose then immediately mark and quickly reward the behavior with a treat from your other hand that is hidden behind your back
-each time you repeat the exercise, You will bring my target hand up from your side or from behind your back
-Once you get reliable five for five start moving your hand to about 4 inches away from the nose, then 6 inches and so on
-Now start switching hands if the dogs does do well, start to present your target hand from different positions as well, for example different sides of the dogs face. It’s important to stay close for this at the beginning and start to gradually move further away when your dogs really understands the behaviour.
- When the dogs show consistent understanding of the behaviour start to at the cue “touch”
- Start to teach in different places, Add distractions and try to increase the distance. If your dog won’t come after you said “touch” then you need to decrease your distance and try it from a closer distance again. If he comes back and touches your hand 5 for 5 then you can increase the distance again.
Sorry I don’t a video or a fancy looking training plan ????. I’m mostly reading here because I still need to learn a lot and unfortunately I don’t have any experience training dogs other than mine.
-
Good idea to use the target for a recall and attention diverter, and way to lay out the steps, @KTinaN !
-
Your training outline for Touch is very clear and laid out in an easy-to-understand and follow manner. @KTinaN! All the details are there for someone who had never taught the cue before.
With teaching outlines as good as this one, I wouldn’t worry at all about not having videos to share! The only reason I have these snazzy videos to share is that the nonprofits I was working with at the time had professional videographers as volunteers.
-
This is my first time posting! Thank you for your ears!
At our nonprofit we only work with rescued dogs, 90% of which have missed critical socialization periods and have reactivity to, well, sadly just about everything. Their backgrounds tend to stir our creative juices around coaching.
For those that need coaching with car chasing type activities, as with the Sheltie Story, I can add a technique we have had some success with in the past. This is far from the great technically savvy advice others have offered up (so please forgive the somewhat kooky slant of what I will share) but sometimes one has to just get creative when traditional methods are not pushing progress forward.
With a few of our canine clients (and I suspect not everyone has access to this type of equipment) we have employed the use of those kiddie type cars to begin desensitization techniques in areas of low distraction (i.e. a home, basement, backyard, etc.). Many even come with a remote control component (as believe me I couldn’t fit into one of them). We are big believers in baby-stepping just about everything with the rescued dogs we see and we have had some success with this type of rather “kooky” approach. For families too, having an appropriate aged child who can follow directions and drive the car, can lay the foundation to incorporate children to take interest in, and become an active part of a dogs training plan.
As an aside: We always start with many of the management practices others have mentioned. We also advise that once we move from indoors to outdoor training that a tracking device or micro-chipping would add an additional layer of safe return should the dog, once in flight, continue movement away from the home.
-
Awesome first post, @PamM You added good tips to both management and training, thank you!
-
Welcome @PamM and thank you so much for sharing your use of the remote-controlled toy cars! That is brilliant! I can see how it would allow for those baby steps and for much greater control of the environmental stimulus than I have had in other set-ups I have used, such as watching at a traffic circle/roundabout or using a parking lot from a safe distance.
You mention the large percentage of under-socialized dogs your nonprofit is seeing. Is that pandemic related or was it also the case before the last couple of years?
-
Thanks so much Jenn for asking about our experiences! The majority of our rescued cases have always come up as as transports from the southern states. We have seen a bit of an uptick related to issues with socialization but I think that is because of the increased numbers of adoptions during the pandemic versus just an increase in socialization issues. Also, during the pandemic when rescue organizations were flooded with adopters and not enough dogs to go around (which is a great problem to have) we had a huge increase (we doubled the numbers we saw in the past) in international adoptions (mostly Russia/Turkey/India and the Caribbean Islands) and those all came with similar type issues related to socialization.
-
I feel so sorry for both the under-socialized dogs and for the folks who adopt them. Those people are joining that growing club of “I’ve never had a dog like this before”! Do you feel your organization has the tools to support them? Thank you for the work you do!
-
Jen, thanks for asking about our support levels. Most days I feel like we are well positioned to support a big chunk of our clients. But that is only because we have such devoted clients to rescued dogs who come with realistic goals based on a rescued dogs backstory. And for those who are first time rescuers we offer up a pre-adoption/pre-foster 1.5-hour educational session (without their dog) to lay the foundation for why we will make certain suggestions. The clients also have access to our lending library (all materials have been donated to us for which we are so grateful). I also find that now, as a CATCH student, I can better explain the “how’s and why’s” things happen (or conversely do not happen) for clients.
We are small compared to many nonprofits, but I like to think our reach is mighty. We have access to a holistic and mobile vet for referrals. Most of our dog clients are not yet candidates (and may never be) for a traditional vet visit. We also have one trainer and a CBCC-KA that we can call upon for advisement. And we are further supported by our volunteers who are top notch-they have long term exposure and specialty areas like deaf dog, blind dogs, service dogs, tripawds, and even a “little dog” specialist. We just recently added a psychologist (Ph.D.) who volunteers as needed for our clients when those heartbreaking, teary eyed times come (we’ve all been there).
And now I also have access to, and support from, a variety of educational offerings because of my CATCH student status! Although I don’t post often, please know that I am looking and learning on this platform and am so very appreciative for those who do take the time to offer up their experiences in this Digging Dogs Community. Nonprofits like ours are only sustainable because of the sharing support of others.
-
And we appreciate you, @PamM ! That is awesome that you are using your educational resources in such helpful ways. Your community is lucky to have you and so is DD.????
-
-
-
-
-
-
Not sure if I’m to late but I’ll jump in with a scent game/nose work for known triggers that elicit reactivity.
Step one: grab the dogs favorite high value food/treat and toss it on the floor and cue “Find it” Your dog should search for the food. This works awesome for food motivated dogs. Do this a few times a day with short sessions and after a few days your cue should be a go signal for dog to use its nose to find food/treats. (Nose to the ground)
Step two: take this outside and practice under threshold of known triggers. Nose work is known to help dogs be more confident and desensitize to its surrounding environment.
Step three: find your dogs threshold and keep him/her under threshold and when you see/hear a car coming toss your food/treats and cue find it. Your dog should put its nose to the ground and start searching for food as the car passes. In theory this can be desensitization and counter conditioning because it’s raining good things but if we get technical we are kind of working on an operant level. I think it can benefit both ways. That’s another whole topic 🙂
Step four: I use this technique especially with dogs that are food motivated and I’m observing that it is working. What I look for after many trials is the dog offering the behavior with out me cueing the behavior. With some dogs I find it becomes a coping mechanism for the dog etc scary trigger dog sniffs the ground until tiggers are gone.
Summary: I use this for many fearful dogs and it has become a what I label a coping mechanism instead of reactivity. If it doesn’t become a coping skill I use it in what I label survival skills in the real world when I can’t keep or get the dog under threshold in time. The last thing is it might work as ds/cc and it changes the CER conditioned emotional response.
Note: the editors can do better justice with this 🙂
Bonus: I also use this similar technique in the shelters with dogs that have known Argo (fear anxiety related). The ones that come barreling out after you leash them and open the kennel. I load up a near by grass area with grated cheese and small pieces of high value food. When dog gets there I have them on a long lead and let them sniff the whole area therefore dog learns I am no threat and I can start building my relationship and trust.
Hope this helps…love the idea and can use some detailed training/behavior modification files 🙂
Is it ok if we use them in the future?
-
This is a great addition and you are not too late @VinnyMickey
Yes, you can definitely download the training plans and use them at any time in the future. They will always be here. So far, just the management section has been posted but there is more to come, thanks to the contributions everyone has made.
-
-
I am probably also late with my contribution. But one of training skills to teach the client was leash walking by starting inside the home. Here are my steps of teaching it. I have not had another session with the client yet because of cancellations but will hopefully see her this Saturday.
LEASH MANNERS
Your dog will walk on a loose leash despite minor distractions
1. Start inside your home
2. Put your dog on a leash
3. Keep treats in the hand nearest to your dogs (example: if your dog walks on your left, you will have treats in your left hand and hold the leash in the right hand)
4. With your dog by your side, take a step forward
5. If your dog steps with you, click, and feed your dog by your side. Be sure to feed your dog close to your body (you may use plastic or wooden spatula coated with something delicious in the beginning)
6. Take another step and repeat step 5
7. Slowly increase the number of steps so that you reinforce the correct body position (being next to you)
8. Start reinforcing (feeding a treat) your dog for every two steps, three steps, and so on
9. As the behavior becomes more reliable, practice walking with your dog at different speeds and, separately introduce distractions by walking on the back porch or back yard
10. If your dog pulls away from you, stop all forward motion and start walking backward slowly. As the leash becomes looser, click, and feed your dog for remaining close to your body. Repeat several times until you can start moving forward again successfully
11. When you practice loose leash walking in your back yard, alternate between teaching your dog to be near you and releasing him to explore and sniff or toss some treats for him to find in the grass
-
The very first thing I did with the client was working on attention with Forest. Below is the script I gave to the client.
Pattern Games for building Attention
Trainer and author, Leslie McDevitt developed attention building games called “Pattern Games”. Play these games with your dog’s leash in hand or stepping on the end of the leash to free both hands. If you are in a safe off-leash situation like inside your home, you don’t need a leash at all.
You’ll need your dog and 10 treats.
Up-Down
1. Wait for your dog to look up at you.
2. Click.
3. Follow the click with a treat placed on the floor in front of your feet.
4. Your dog will look DOWN to eat the treat.
5. When your dog looks UP to you again, repeat steps 2-4
Once your dog is reliably looking up at you, move on to Ping-Pong
Ping-Pong
1. Your dog looks up at you
2. Click
3. Follow the click with a treat tossed a few inches to the right
4. Your dog will run to eat the treat
5. When your dog looks up at you again
6. Click
7. Follow the click with a treat tossed a few inches to the left
8. Your dog looks up at you again, follow steps 2-7
After your dog is successful playing the Up-Down and Ping Pong games move on to the Positive Interrupt
Positive Interrupt
1. Toss a low value treat away a few inches
2. Give or dog time to chase and eat the treat
3. Say your dog’s name
4. When your dog turns his or her head back toward you, CLICK
5. Feed a high value treat from your hand
6. Repeat
-
The third session with the client was about establishing threshold which also included the look at that game as was already mentioned.
WEEK 3 “Look At That Game” – Finding the threshold
This exercise is an excellent way to practice adjusting Forests’ threshold distance to the triggers. You will learn the signs when he is over threshold, at his threshold, or under threshold. To begin, take an object (a trigger) that Forest is very interested in and determine how far away you need to be from it to be able to click and feed Forest for looking at the object calmly, and then, eventually, for looking away from the object toward you.
Goal:
When Forest hears you click, he can turn toward you to receive reinforcement (or later, turn away from the trigger toward you for a click and reinforcement)
How to teach it:
· Decide which room you are going to practice in and put your trigger on the floor. Turn it on if it is battery-operated
· Put Forest on his leash and walk into the room
· Be ready for Forest’s quick pull toward the object. Try to click before he starts dragging you toward the object. (If he is pulling you, you are too close to the trigger)
· Back up to where Forest can watch the object calmly.
· Start clicking when forest is looking at the trigger, move away, and then give him a treat. Remember each time to move away, and then treat. Now your dog is under threshold (he is focused on you and no longer pulling). You are practicing stage one.
· Once Forest does the behavior reliably, withhold your click and see if he turns his face toward you. If so, click, move away, and give him 5 treats individually. Give him the treats slowly, counting out loud as you give each one. Take a breath in between. You are practicing stage two.
· If Forest does not swivel his head back to you, chances are that he is right at threshold and his head is “frozen.” Take a step back and see how quickly he re-orients to you. When he does, click and feed five treats as described above.
Key Points:
· If your dog is pulling you toward the trigger, often barking as well, he is over threshold
· If your dog is silent but cannot turn his head away from the trigger,(appears “frozen”) he is still over threshold because he is at the precise point where he is barley relaxed enough to watch the trigger but too worried or mesmerized to do anything but stare at it. Moving him a little farther away from the trigger will help loosen his head.
· If you dog can look at the trigger and then look at you, he is below threshold. This is always the goal behavior. Your dog is absorbing information at this point. BRAVO!
Secret to Success:
· Do you best to find your dog’s optimal threshold and work from there. Avoid any temptation to close the gap to the trigger quickly regardless of how well your dog is doing.
· Be sure that you back up or move away after each click. Backing away from the trigger will give your dog time to take a breath and eat before venturing toward the trigger again. This also gives you a chance to reassess your next exposure level.
-
Along with the attention pattern games we also worked to build engagement in the very first in home session.
WEEK 1 – Practicing Engagement at Home
Working dogs such as Shelties tend to be overly sensitive toward any kind of motion. They are mesmerized by it, and it can be difficult for them to disengage from staring and or barking at moving things.
Before we can even start to think about our dogs to do anything at all for us, we need to make sure our dog will engage just for the treat’s sake.
HUNTING FOOD ON THE FLOOR
1. Have several treats in your hand
2. Toss them left and right for your dog to chase
3. Play on a surface where your dog can easily see the treats
4. This should be pure fun, we are not asking for eye contact, sit, down etc. this will come later
5. Play this game in different rooms of your home
HUNTING FOOD IN YOUR HAND
1. Show your dog that you have treats in your hand
2. Let him chase you a little bit for these treats
3. You can face toward your dog, face away, go in a straight line, a circle, zigzag etc.
4. Vary the chase to make it fun but do not run away too fast or too far
5. Be generous with your treats
FOOT TARGET – PAWS UP
1. Teach your dog to step onto objects with his front feet; pick objects that are low, stable, and wide enough such as an old phone book, low stepping stool etc.
2. Stand facing your dog with the object between you
3. Lure you dog onto the object with his front feet
4. Feed him treats for being in position
5. Toss a treat to the side to reset your dog and start over
6. Move the object around and to other rooms of your home
7. Add your cue word “paws up”, “target” etc. once your dog very consistently
offers the behavior
MAT WORK 1
1. Have several treats ready
2. Lure your dog onto the mat and feed for position 5 treats one at a time
3. Reset your dog by tossing a treat about 2 feet away from the mat
4. Repeat 5x
5. Your dog should be coming onto the without lure now
6. Once your dog easily goes back and forth between mat and floor ask him to lie down on the mat
7. Feed 5 treats between the front paws on the mat for lying down
8. Reset your dog by tossing a treat about 2 feet away from the mat
9. Repeat steps
10. Vary your position (kneeling, standing) to help your dog build a more comprehensive understanding of the exercise
11. Practice this in different room of your house (use a mat that you can easily carry)
12. Once your dog gets good about returning to the mat and lying down, you can add your cue word such as “go to mat”, “bed”, “relax” etc.
-
@Wanze WOW! These are great – and I’m sure your clients are on the path to success with these easy to follow steps. Fantastic job!
-
-
Outstanding work, Heidi! Both with your clients and with the plans you’ve posted. ????????????
-
Mightly indeed! Reading your reply @PamM I would say that your nonprofit is head, neck, and shoulders above 90% of the rescues and shelters out there; and I say this from nearly twenty years of experience in animal welfare. Honestly, you might even consider mentoring others.
The varity of support and resouces that are offered seems like it would create a truly wholistic adoption experience. Thank you for adding your CATCH knowledge to the mix!
-
Hey everyone. Sorry I am late to the game. It’s been a whirlwind of a few weeks. I have been playing catch up and reading this very enlightening thread! Lots of great ideas here. I think for a dog that chases cars, I agree with @wanze , especially about the positive interrupt and look back. Actually, I think everyone had really good ideas here!
One thing I just thought of really quickly would be something I learned in a R+ bird dog workshop a few years back. It was called “whoa” and it’s basically the dog learns to stop dead in their tracks. The sequence could “whoa” (stop), then a quick look back, then emergency recall.
-
Love this idea.
-
Log in to reply.