KouVang

Hi, When I introduced the targeting my dog was on point and picked it up easily with her nose. Somehow she has transitioned to sometimes using her mouth and touches my hand with her teeth instead almost to a biting point. Any idea what may have caused that or should I do something else to get her to use her nose again or is the mouth ok? I know if I do it really low she uses her nose but once I raise my hand a little she uses her mouth/teeth instead.

Coco the dog has learned drop it! It feels great. I first play with a toy (usually her tug-rope) and get her excited, then I toss it and tell her to take. She then brings it back now and I say drop it and she does it. Then we walk over to get treats. Somehow that walking over to get treats really stands out to her. We do that whenever she finishes pottying too and she's doing super at that now on the pad. I think the key was to really just look for opportunities for saying drop-it that worked for me. Although these opportunities were usually when she was playing with her toys. Nothing would get through if she was taking something that she was not suppose to. On to the next one we go. Now we can do some brain training games. Now it is just a matter of doing those commands at a more distracted situation.

oh....a lightbulb just hit. You just made me realized something. My dog does now know "take". hahaha.. for some reason in my mind, my thinking of "take" was to take and hold...so that then I can introduce the next one of teaching her "drop". That was why the "hold" part was in ingrained in my definition of take so that in the future I can teach her to "drop" it. But it makes sense now that she does know take. By the way, that click signal tip does help. I usually do it too soon or when I see it happening. Good thing to note that it signifies the end of behavior instead of in the middle of doing one or the beginning. Ok so yes, then my goal would be to get her to hold it in her mouth long enough so that I can say "drop it" and teach her that? What are some suggestions to help her hold it in her mouth so that I can tell her to drop it? Another question that i'm been wondering about.... the term "drop it" and "leave it" almost could be used interchangeable at certain situations...such as if they are eating something you don't want them to. In this moment, which one do you use?

Adrienne, I've made progress as to pointing at a toy and say "take". What she would do is she would go bite the toy, shake it for a second or so and then make eye contact again. (I think she's expecting a treat). I'm trying to train without a treat now but just verbal cue. So I made progress that far but now any suggestions to move to the next step and have her hold it in her mouth for a longer period of time? I've tried to wait it out and keep saying take but that will only make her frustrated because then she gives a blank stare as like "what do you want me to do?" The only time I observe her taking something and holding it around her mouth is when she is bored and needs to release some energy so she picks up the toys and run around the room with the toy in her mouth. I should try to catch her in the act and then say "take" and reward? but rewarding will cause her to drop it...so i'm not sure if that's a good idea too.

Hi Daniel, I'm no pro but I've learned a lot from Adrienne so I can share some of the things from experience. I've learned that training and raising a dog so far boils down to two things: fostering and redirection. Fostering as in creating a safe environment and encouraging wanted behaviors. I find that if I don't want my dog to do certain things, sometimes it is me as the owner who needed to make the environment better. Examples are if I don't want them chewing on things, I need to remove them from the dog's area. I didn't like it that my dog was running around in the backyard all over and eating my garden totally ignoring me. Later, I thought about it and it was on me because I let her loose....now she has a leash on and we are training her first. My dog does bite the clothing of my kids sometimes too. At times I can see that it is the behavior or actions of the kids that causes the dog to do so. They either hug or do such actions that are uncomfortable to the dog, another one is that my son likes to run so him being so little the dog thinks it's play and goes after him. I usually wouldn't let the kids be near the puppy when she is really energetic because she can be really wild. Do you see your daughter doing any sort of actions that may trigger a reaction from the dog? The other suggestion I learned is redirection which I see you are trying to do as well in trying to teach her the right toys to chew on instead of the clothes. Have you looked into the bite inhibition article? Training the dog to bite softely definitely helps as well.

Thank You for your wonderful time and help Adrienne. I've learned a whole lot. You really give great value. I'm just going to keep a note as I'm progressing here to remind myself. I noticed that my dog only "takes" it if I'm holding it so holding the toy for her to take seems to be better. Next is that she will just like take a bite of the toy and then leave it alone and expect treats lol. To resolve that issue, I'm going to now just train with toys only and treats seprately so she's not always expecting treat. To help her hold the toy in her mouth too I hold the toy for her to come take and I help her hold it there.

Hi, So while I'm working my ways towards the obedience module there are some behaviors that comes up that I need help with. This is regarding my 12 weeks old black lab. 1. Chewing/Biting - There are times where she has a tendency to chew on our shirts/pants or even bite. What do you suggest we do in these situations? I do like the positive re-enforcement approach so what i do is I usually make a loud "ow" sound and I walk away and over the gate and turn my back to her. I see her reaction so if she pays attention to that she will look sad or go into a sit/down position then I come back in and that seems to work most of the times. There are times where that doesn't work because once I walk over the gate she is distracted and goes to play on to other stuff. Should we do more things like send her to her crate? Is that bad? 2. Potty training - So we got one of those plastic holders where we got the pads clipped on top. The dog keeps tearing those pads up so we invested in one of those where you put the pad on and then there is a cover with holes so that it will prevent that. That's been great. She knows how to use that but there are times where she will still do it else where. I'm curious if it is because once she has peed in the pad, does she thinks she needs to pee elsewhere? Should she be pooping on that pad to or no? 3. Outside- going outside she is soooo distracted and it seems like I don't even exist anymore. This time we are starting out small now by putting her on a leash and I'm trying the training where everytime she makes eye contact I give her a treat. She barely does it. I also call her name but she doesn't respond much. Any other suggestion? 4. Resistance - What do you do when you want her to come inside or come back inside the closed gate but she is resistance to you pulling the leash? 5. Gentle Feeding - I thought I read somewhere but I have a problem sometimes where she is too excited during training that when I give her a treat off of my hand she takes it too aggressive and it hurts some of the fingers. Did you have a suggestion to do that better? Any help would be appreciated! Thanks.

Hi, Some questions. 1. Any additional tricks on how to transition from treats to toys for "take"? Although she can leave the treat and then take on command in the other hand, now when I try to do it with toys, she just stares at it or sniffs it. Most of the time she just stand still. I'm trying the shaping where if she starts to interact with the toy I click the clicker or cue with a yes and treat. But then I try again right after and point at the toy and say "take" and still blank stare. I'm thinking she relates the "take" to only treats therefore no movement for now. 2. You mentioned in one of your articles to not train the "drop" the same time you are training "take" or else it will confuse the dog. Is that correct? If so, I'm just going to train to make sure she gets this concept of take first and then move on to the drop after she fully understands it.

Thank you Adrienne. I'm using verbal cue now and she's got "down" now with ease now. It's awesome! I think it just required some time and repetition. We are on now to take/leave! Making good progress too. Right now she requires me saying "leave it" first before I show her my hand of the treat..but I feel like she gets it because at times she starts to go get the treat but controlled herself and wait for my verbal cue of "take". This is really exciting. First time dog owner and I'm loving it.

Hi, I am going through the course. My 10 weeks old black lab already knew how to sit so that was easy for me as it is the first thing to learn. I was able to teach her "Down" to get down to the floor like how you showed with the L shape treat method. However, sometimes now she seems to mix the two sit and down. I use a clicker and say "YES" when she does it.... could it be that she just needs repetition and time? Do you also recommend for her to master that one first before moving on to other things? I don't want to overwhelm her with too many all at once.