Top Five Things Your Dog Can Do to Earn Dinner

In my first class with clients, I always tell them that they need to take the dog food out of the bowl and make their dogs’ work for dinner. You paid for the dinner and now your dog should have to earn it with good behavior. What kind of fun tricks and activities can you come up with for your dog’s job for the week? Here are just a few suggestions:

1.    Look At Me Game

Take a piece of kibble and throw it on the floor close to your body. After he eats it and looks up at you, reward him with a YES and throw another piece on the floor. Play this for a few minutes each day and this simple game will teach your dog that looking at you earns him the next piece of dinner. You can start to add a Watch command just before he lifts his head to look at you.

2.    Name Game

Take a piece of kibble and toss it on the floor about 5 feet in front of you. Use the command “GO” and once he eats kibble, call his name. When he returns to you, reward with a piece of kibble from your hand. The game now starts over again with a kibble toss to the floor.  As he becomes better at responding to you, increase the distance of the throw.

3.    Puppy Ping-Pong

This is a simple way to improve your dog’s recall but you will need a helper. Each person will take a handful of kibble and put it in a pocket. Start out in a place with low distractions and stand at a distance of less than ten feet from each other. Practice calling your dog’s name and having him run to you. When he makes it to you, reward with a piece of kibble and then the other person calls the dog. As your dog’s speed increases, you can move to other parts of the house and increase your distance. We slowly increase the distractions and distance as the dog is finding success in responding to his name. The goal is to call the name only once each time and get a quick head turn and dash off to the next person. This game can easily create a tired puppy.

4.    Kong Wobbler

One great product that I highly recommend to clients is called a Kong Wobbler. You can fill this toy with kibble and your dog can to bat it around with a foot or nose to get the food out. This will keep your dog busy as you are trying to cook dinner, watch TV or engage in any non-dog focused activity.

5.    Sit for Attention

What it your dog had to earn his dinner by sitting for any attention? If you have friends over and your dog wants to jump to greet them with a slobbery kiss, it might be better to have them reward with a bit of dinner for a polite sit. If your dog wants to go out the back door then maybe a sit would open the door.  Think of how many pieces of kibble you could give your dog for offering the correct behavior. If we reward a sit, we will get more of them. The reward is simply something that was once free out of a bowl.

Please be sure keep training sessions short- five to ten minutes is plenty and be sure to stop before your dog becomes too tired and is no longer in the game. If your dog is not into his food, even if fed out of your hand, you might want to switch to a food that he enjoys a little more. Get creative and think of fun games that you can play with your dog so that dinners become a little more interesting than just kibble in a bowl.  It should all be about creating a relationship and also a well behaved, polite dog that never assumes that everything in life is free.

Variety Class Field Trip

This week the Variety Class took a field trip to Tuscan Lakes to test our skills walking around the lake with the distractions of birds, bikes, cars, barking dogs and other real life distractions. The dogs were amazing as we successfully did recalls and sit and down stays around the trail. Another great example of having fun with your dog and training good life and social skills.

So you think that you are ready for a puppy?

When do you start training a puppy?

I start puppies in training from the time they enter a home. Canine Connection Training offers clients a free 30 minute consultation so that we can get owners off to the best possible start. Puppies are learning from time they come home so I like to create good behavior and try to redirect the bad behavior so it does not develop into bad habits.  I like to think that my training philosophy is best summed up as: your puppy should not assume that anything good in their life is free. If your puppy wants a toy, he needs to sit and be polite and the toy will be tossed for a fun game of fetch. If your puppy wants to eat, he needs to be calm and quiet and the bowl will be placed on the floor. If she wants to come out of the crate, maybe a sit will open the door. Puppies are capable of learning a great deal at a very young age so start having some fun and build that strong relationship of trust and cooperation. Puppies need to work to get the good things in life.

What kind of learners are dogs?

Dogs are more visual learners rather than verbal. If you are teaching a sit, better to be completely silent, and give a hand signal for a sit (example: treat in hand raised over puppy’s nose and butt goes down on ground). Once your puppy is learning to sit with your visual cue after a few days, you can transition to using a verbal cue such as the word SIT. You would say SIT, just prior to giving hand signal. If you are saying sit multiple times to your puppy, you are just cluttering up the learning process.  Dogs are much better reading our body language than we are at reading theirs. How long does it take for your dog to realize that you are leaving the house?

How do you stop a puppy or dog from jumping?

Dogs learn that jumping up is rewarding from the time that they are little. Many owners tolerate a cute puppy jumping up to say hello. I always start puppies off with a polite sit for any attention. If they have to earn attention with a sit instead of jumping, it becomes an automatic learned behavior and not a bad jumping habit. All your family members and guests need to know the rules prior to entering the house so that they are not reinforcing jumping with attention… positive attention or negative is all the same. If your puppy can’t control her behavior, then she must be on a leash or in the crate until guests come in the door and settle. It is wonderful if we can create situations in which puppies can be successful in learning good behavior.  Invite some friends over to your house to help your puppy learn a polite sit for attention. Always better to be proactive in training your dogs, rather than being reactive. 

Refrigerator Lists?

Think of all the commands that your puppy should know and write them down as a list posted on the refrigerator. If you want your puppy to keep the paws OFF the counter, than the whole family should train that the paws are OFF the counter. If you want to use the word COME, all the family should use the same verbal or visual cue. If your dog knows that ALL doors mean that she needs to look at you to be released to go out, your dog will be happy to oblige.  Dogs love clear and consistent rules that don’t change each day with each person in their lives. If the family decides that the dog is not allowed on beds, then the entire family has to enforce the rule.  You will get an amazing dog if you create rules and boundaries and your dog will feel confident and secure.