Dog Training Chicago

Creating Boundaries

Roxy learning "bed" command

It’s happened to all of us: we meet a new friend and we like them so much we tell them to call us anytime. When they do, we get flustered because we’re busy and have other things going on in our life. I see this all the time, people getting annoyed at one another for doing exactly what they’ve encouraged, tolerated and even rewarded (picking up a call in the middle of a meeting).

Goodness! No wonder we have such a hard time setting boundaries for our dogs! Dogs, just like humans, require clear and concise parameters to help them understand their relationship with us. These “guidelines” help our relationships continue down a positive and loving path where both individual’s needs are met.

Now, while I do not claim to be a psychologist nor an expert on the human mind, I can tell you that I have learned a few things to help me develop friendly boundaries with dogs that may just be applicable to humans as well:

Be present whenever you are with your friend. When you walk your dog, walk your dog. If you chat on your cell phone the entire time, you miss a great opportunity to reinforce good leash walking behavior and eye contact which goes a long way to prevent unwanted behavior. Plus, you miss important bonding time with your pooch; another great tool in preventing naughtiness.

Say goodbye to guilt! You have to go to work, run errands, and leave your dog alone for life’s necessities. If you give your dog appropriate mental, physical and social stimulation when you are home, you have no need to worry all day about whether or not your dog is happy.

Set and stick to expectations. It is super confusing to allow your dog to jump on you when you walk in the door from work but then get angry when your dog does the same to your guests. Again, don’t feel guilty. By teaching your dog a simple “sit” when you spot any human walking towards you, you will aid in the development of good social behaviors and further reinforce what is acceptable behavior. Over time and with consistency, you will eventually see a lovely doggie smile as a result of all that great attention he or she gets for “sitting pretty.”

All good behavior should be rewarded. The whole concept of training is to work with our dogs so they naturally and freely behave in a manner which is appropriate. Unfortunately, many people only look for the negative behavior and respond strictly to that, often finding their interactions with their dog peppered with “No’s” and ”Stop that’s.” Try changing your point of view: if your dog is good when you watch a movie, sits at a street corner without being asked, or goes to “bed” during meals, make sure to communicate that by providing praise. Your dog will learn that getting attention for good, calm behavior results in love and rewards instead of sock stealing, barking, and grabbing your shirt to get attention in a busy home.

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How to Motivate Your Dog

Cobweb working for toys Some dogs happily accept every toy their human brings home and will eat any treat with wild abandon; other dogs need a little more prodding to determine what makes them happy.

Watch your dog’s face when trying to decide if what you are offering is really a reward to your dog. If you see your dog’s eyes light up, their mouth open into that doggie smile’ or ears perk up; you know you are on the right track. On the other hand, if your dog turns their head or moves away, you may need to find a new way to reward your dog. It is not a reward nor is it motivating if your dog does not like it; no matter how much you think he or she should like it.

Praise In general, dogs like high pitched and happy verbal praise. However, if your dog is shy, loud voices can be scary. Play with the intonation in your voice, every dog is different. I have a client with a very fearful dog who LOVES low pitched praise. I have to purposely speak as low as possible to keep this sweet dog engaged in her training sessions and continue to build her confidence. Praise is an easy way to reinforce your dog’s good behavior, but it may not be enough in some situations. An energetic dog who likes to jump on guests may need a little more than a happy “good boy” to reinforce a calm “sit”.

Toys For some dogs, toys and play are the greatest joy in their tail wagging worlds. Save yourself time and money by taking your dog with you when you go toy shopping. Nearly all retail stores that cater to pets allow them to join you on shopping trips. Hold out a toy for your dog and watch his or her face. If you see excitement and delight, that is the toy for you. If not, continue shopping.

Once you get home, move the toy away from your dog to entice play. When you push a toy into your dog’s face to invite play, some dogs can find it obtrusive and withdraw. Dogs like to chase things so wiggle away and enjoy play time with your dog!

Treats There are so many treat options but soft and smelly tend to be the easiest to get dogs excited. Soft treats are MUCH easier to break up. It only takes a crumb to be enjoyable to dogs and the smellier treats tend to be more exciting. If you use small bits, you avoid adding too many calories to your dog’s diet and save money on treats! If your dog turns his or her nose up to even the premier treats like Salmon Paws or Dogswell, hot dogs or cheese are great to reward amazing behaviors. Use them in moderation and cut them up into tiny pieces to avoid an upset stomach. Vegetables or cheerios are also a great alternative if you are trying to maintain weight or help your dog shed a couple pounds. If your dog makes the happy face, you found the right treat!

Praise, toys and treats are wonderful rewards but your dog gets plenty of other great goodies every day. Cuddling on the couch, playing with other pets, walks and meals are amazing motivators of good behavior. Just be sure to give all of these when your dog is being good and you will keep your dog motivated for life!

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Home Independence

Have you been thinking about giving your dog more freedom in the house while you’re at work?

Many people learn the hard way that confining a dog in the crate one day then providing access to the entire home the next day (while alone), is a terrible idea.

It’s imperative to make this leap slowly and deliberately to prevent injury, housetraining regression, or significant destruction. If guilt is driving your decision, please reconsider. You’d be surprised how quickly your dog can destroy an entire room of furniture. In general, I recommend starting this process at about a year of age, or older. Young pups have insatiable chewing needs and could get hurt if you start this process too soon.

First, pick an area that your dog likes and will be his consistent haven when he’s alone—kitchens, long hallways, and bathrooms work nicely, just make sure you’re able to gate off the area. Your dog will do best if you give him less space as you teach him to like his new alone area.

Too much space too soon is too confusing.

As you determine the best new area for your dog, consider the amount of furniture (less is best) and proximity to busy doors and windows. Some dogs develop long-term barking issues if they spend the entire day near loud hallways, construction sounds, or busy sidewalks. However, some dogs enjoy watching pedestrians pass their house all day. You know your dog best, set him up for success. If you designate your kitchen as your dog’s new home alone place, remove food from your table, stove, and countertops. By placing snacks and leftovers in high, closed cabinets, you’ll prevent potentially dangerous counter surfing.

Once you’ve chosen the space, continue dog proofing the area for tempting items. You’ll save yourself a giant headache by clearing out trash cans, toilet paper, small rugs, blankets with tassels, wires, plants, and shoes rather than picking up bathroom garbage after a long day at work, ick! Not only do the above items create a huge mess, but they also pose serious health risks if your dog bites cords or ingests chicken bones. Additionally, you can help your dog relax in his new space by providing his favorite dog bed. If he’s still learning to like his bed (and not eat it), feed meals on his bed or blanket and spray it regularly with Bitter Apple. Please check his bed weekly to assure he hasn’t chewed a hole in it. I’d hate for him to eat his bed stuffing while you’re away.

Make a plan. Before you leave your dog alone in this new space, take a close look at your schedule and identify times that you’ll leave the house for five minutes, only. Before you leave your dog alone in his new space, take a hearty walk together, so he’s more relaxed. Then, when you leave him alone, give him a Kong filled with something amazing—cream cheese, liverwurst (without onions), baby food, Bark Pouch, or peanut butter. By giving your dog a job (clearing the Kong), you prevent stress and boredom which often cause bad behavior. Make sure you’re gone for five minutes, no more. If you get sidetracked and your dog potties in the new space or chews on your cabinet, he gets practice peeing in your house and eating wood. I don’t want him to do that, do you?

When you come home, pick up the Kong. Your dog will associate home alone time, in his new space, with the yummy Kong filling.

While your dog is learning to relax in his new area, you should continue guiding him to his crate when you’re at work or leave him alone for ten minutes or longer. Your dog will be less stressed and less likely to hurt himself and destroy your home if you transition him slowly and deliberately to freely napping the day away, alone.

Once you’ve practiced leaving your dog alone for five minutes, an entire week, and he’s completely chill when you return home, increase your training session time to ten minutes one week (or month), fifteen minutes the following week (or month), and so on. If your dog frantically greets you at the door, he’s not ready for more free-time alone. Slow increments will help him succeed and prevent a lot of stress, for you and him. Pushing too fast too soon may cause a raging doggie destruction party.

After you’ve spent several months acclimating your pup to his current space and have slowly eased him into being alone in that area for hours without incident or panic, you can introduce a second room. When you add more space, start over with five-minute increments to assure your dog is ready, safe, and happy with more space.

Giving your dog access to the entire house, when he’s alone, can take time. However, with a little planning and good follow through, you’ll come home to a calm house and dog.

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Five New Tricks

TricksStar

Tricks are a fun way to revive your training program and enhance your relationship with your dog. When introducing a new trick, it is amazing how we humans lighten our mood and body language. Tricks are a great way to recharge your dog’s brain and body.

Play dead To start this trick, you want to make sure your dog is fairly relaxed and has a reliable down. Once your dog is calmly lying down, wait for a shift in hips. If your dog lies on the left hip, place the treat at her nose and very slowly draw an imaginary line with a treat lure or your touch along the right jaw line. Keep your hand low so your dog follows and lays her head on the ground, cue play dead as soon as your dog is lying stationary on the left side. Repeat down, play dead and lure into the lying position a couple times, yes and treat for non-movement . Next, say down, play dead and point your finger to the ground before luring. If your dog responds, say yes and give a treat. With practice, you can add more duration so your dog will play dead until you release her. You can get creative with this trick by saying bang, down then bang, play dead then fading down and play dead so your dog drops into a down and lying position in response to bang, bang. Cute party trick!

Fetch Keep in mind you are asking your dog for multiple behaviors with this game: run away; pick up a toy; carry the toy to you and drop. Some dogs catch on to this very quickly while others need you to break it up into multiple steps. Start with a favorite toy and move it around a bit to get your dog excited but keep it low so you do not encourage jumping. Toss or roll the ball a couple feet away ONLY. Do not move from your original position, you want your dog walk or run to the toy all on his or her own. Say yes if your dog walks towards it. Continue to give verbal praise for every step your dog takes to the toy. If your dog touches the toy or picks it up, continue giving feedback. If your dog takes a step towards you with the toy in their mouth, increase the volume of your verbal praise so your dog knows she is on the right track. Some dogs will drop the toy a couple feet away from you. If that occurs, pick the toy up and put it away. You do not want to get in the habit of playing fetch for your dog. Try again until your dog understands the game continues when the toy is brought to you.

Some dogs get so excited with this game that they run right past you with their toy. Do not chase your dog. Next time you work on your fetch game, have a second toy handy to squeak or move about to get your dog to drop their first toy directly in front of you.

For dogs that do not catch onto this right away, repeat each step every day until your dog is reliably responding to that step. Then, only praise for response to the next step. For example, this week’s goal may be to praise for walking towards the toy; next week you say nothing for walking towards it but wait for your dog to touch it. Tons of praise when that occurs then only praise for picking up the toy. Remember, your dog may not understand all the steps in the process, so help her along by giving feedback for every behavior in this game.

Speak The easiest way to teach this trick is to anticipate what causes your dog to bark. Some dogs LOVE to hear themselves bark so please keep in mind that if you reinforce this behavior, your dog will enjoy barking even more. One of my favorite ways to cue this is by making a loud noise that does not often occur such as knocking on the refrigerator or making silly noise. This helps prevent unwanted barking with visitors, passersby or at meal times. Be ready with some treats, and say speak before you pound on the refrigerator. Once your dog barks say yes and treat. When your dog is responding nicely to the knock and verbal cue, simply say speak and give happy verbal praise for barking. You can then cue shush and heavily reinforce for ceasing of barking so your dog becomes silent when you are ready; great way to train your dog to quiet on command.

Beg Start with your dog in a sit position and either use a treat or your touch starting at the nose and draw it upwards so your dog’s front two paws lift into the air. Cue beg, say yes then treat. Do this a few times. Next, require your dog to maintain the position a little longer, only rewarding if she remains in the position for 2-3 seconds. Once your dog is holding the beg position for a few seconds, fade your hand cue by requesting beg and giving your dog a moment to consider what you are asking. If your dog raises her forequarters in air, say yes and treat. This trick is a little more difficult for large dogs, it is helpful to use a couch or wall to support your large dog’s back.

Wave You will need a basic shake to teach your dog to wave. Get your dog into a sit and simply hold a treat in a closed fist right at the nose. You want your dog to sniff at your hand to get the treat then resort to using the paw when sniffing is unsuccessful. When that occurs, cue shake, say yes and give the treat. This trick is best suited for dogs that have already been trained to take treats gently from human hands.

Once your dog reliably responds to shake when you present your hand, introduce your new cue wave then present your hand. Do this a few times, then say wave and only briefly show your hand. Be quick with the treat so your dog does not get frustrated with the new expectation. Do this a few times until your dog is pawing at the air with just a quick flash of your hand. Lastly, say wave and praise and treat your dog for pawing at the air without your hand to cue the behavior.

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