As I've said I've watched lots of the kikopup YouTube videos, does anyone know of any other clicker training videos that could be recommended ? Thank you
Are you interested in learning specific skills/behaviours? I don't have my links to hand, but there are some books that are worthwhile reading. Clicker training:the perfect foundation comes with a dvd. In the same series is Learning Games for Dogs, which is a good reference for loads of activities, but is rather brief on descriptions for people just getting to grips with their clicker. It's worth reading the online articles by Karen Pryor, too - just do a search and they'll come up. Hopefully others will be along with more ideas for you.
Thanks again @snowbunny, you've been a great help since I joined here. My main concerns at the moment are that the clicker is making Enzo a bit hyper, for example, I've read in another thread to get your pup to lie on his bed while you eat and start this by clicking if he approaches the bed, but, as soon as I click as Enzo is on or approaching is bed he just goes a bit hyper because he knows treats are coming and then totally defeats him going to his bed, he will also sit at my side then waiting for more clicks/treats. I just want to stop this while he is still young and doesn't fall into too bad a habits. My main use for the clicker at the moment is for behaviour while he is young, once I have behaviour 'conquered' I can move onto skills a lot further down the line. Things such as going to his bed, sitting until a release cue so no need for a stay cue. Not crossing certain lines/carpet dividers in the house with out a cue, not charging past me and out of the front door when someone is arriving to visit (ties in with carpet dividers) Jumping! I watched the kikopup video of treating while all four paws are on the floor and it worked great while I had treats, as soon as the treats run out he was jumping up at me for more. I know these seem fussy and demanding but I would like to start off on the right foot, I've come across so many horror stories on here I don't want to go down a similar route by creating bad habits plus I'm very eager to learn. I have read so so much but it's hard to practice with out actually seeing it in practice. I enjoyed the kikopup videos and would like some behaviour ones to follow or compare tactics, I will most definitely Google Karen Pryor after writing this and see what she is about. Again, thank you very much
OK, so you're right, the clicker can induce excitement, but that's OK. In fact, it's great! If you approach training as a series of games, rather than as something serious and a chore, both of you will have a lot of fun learning the behaviours you're after, which means they'll come faster and will stick better. I know it seems a bit counter-intuitive right now, though, when what you're after is calm behaviour. Think of the click as being something that ends the behaviour, so what happens afterwards is irrelevant. In fact, if it's excitement, because of the treat, it means that the clicker is doing its job as being a really strong marker, meaning he'll continue to want to work to get it. Let's take the sit. I also train the "sit mean sit until I tell you otherwise" method. It's not the only way, and plenty of people are more than happy with using a "stay" cue, but the way I chose makes sense for me. So, at first, you'll be clicking as soon as that bum touches the floor. Then, you'll be clicking a half second after. Then a second. Then five seconds etc etc. Then, you'll be introducing movement, starting with you shifting your weight back away from him, and ending up, some way down the line, with being able to walk out of the room, do your washing and come back to him still being sat in the same place. But, for now, every time you click, it means "it's over, you can move". For the "go to bed" behaviour, it's the same. At first, you click a look at the bed. He does his happy dance because that means a treat. Then, after a few goes, you stop clicking the look. So, he has to work out how to get the click. He knows it's something to do with the bed, so he takes a step towards it - a click, yay! Great game! But, soon, that step isn't enough. He has to take two, then three. At each stage, you'll be clicking and his behaviour will "break" as soon as you do so. That's OK. He's done what was asked, and now it's time for his reward. But, as you progress, you'll up the requirements to all four feet needing to be on his bed. Then, you'll add duration. Meanwhile, whilst you're still in the training stages of "go to bed", you can still capture calmness outside of training sessions. But, for this, you shouldn't use the clicker. As you said, clicker generates excitement, which isn't what you want when your dog is calm. So, just keep an eye on him and, when he's quietly settled in his bed for a snooze, walk past and quietly put a treat by his nose. You can softly say "good boy" or something if you wish, but the idea is to maintain calmness. He probably will jump up and start trying to work out how to get another one, but you're just going to ignore him; this isn't a training game, this is capturing a behaviour that you like. So, he mustn't be rewarded for jumping out of his bed. If you continue to do this, he'll just accept that the treat is a little reward for being calm, but there's no point trying to work for another, because it's not coming, so he may as well just continue to chill. Here's a Kikopup video on capturing calmness. It's an old one, so pretty poor quality, but you'll get the idea. You can't expect a young puppy to stay on his bed for the duration of a meal, it's just not realistic. So, you have a few options. - One is to pop him in a crate/pen so you can enjoy your meal in peace. - Another is to be aware that your meal may not be the most relaxing thing in the world, but you constantly get up and give him treats for staying on his bed while you eat. This is likely to be every few seconds at first. - You could invest in a Treat & Train, which is a remote device for giving treats (at set intervals, or on the click of a button), which would be incredibly useful in this scenario. - You could give him a kong on his bed while you eat. Sorry, this made me chuckle. You're not planning on training any skills until he's in his dotage, then? Hehe. Sorry, I don't mean to make fun, but there will always be behaviours to work on, some that don't become apparent until he's older. But, joking aside, I do agree with your approach wholeheartedly; it's more important to get the basics of what makes a good pet in place right from the start. You don't sound fussy at all. It's important to get these things right, and lots of people skip the step while the puppies are young and cute, then end up with big dogs which are more of a problem when they don't have impulse control. As @Boogie says, you shouldn't teach or let a small puppy do things that you don't want your full-grown dog to do.
@snowbunny I can't thank you enough for that well written reply and help, once again. It's nice to have reassurance that what I have done so far and continue to do is along the right path, I do place a tear near him while he's resting and also randomly give out treats if he's following me around the house, out the garden etc to encourage him to stay close by and always follow me, I've read that along the line somewhere, hopefully it's a good practice. Re the excitement after clicking for going to his bed, what you you're saying makes perfect sense to me. A little question I have to go with that, unless he's lying on my feet, he naturally goes to lie on his bed so he does enjoy it, it's just associating his bed with the bed cue, I've been saying bed enthusiastically once he's reached his bed so he knows what it means, would you think it's already time to say bed straight after the click once he reaches his bed to start the association? Glad I made you chuckle, I have to be honest, I had a little laugh reading your reply, I did make it sound a little simple haha, what I was trying to mean is I'd prefer him to sit and stay before he started jumping through hoops haha. Going to watch the video now, not sure if I came across that when watching the other kiko vids, I've also found the Karen Pryor website and starts to navigate my way around that
When you put a behaviour on cue, it's normally done before the movement, so before the click, not after. So, if you can get him offering to go to his bed, that's great, but you need to set up some training scenarios that mean it can be repeated - repetition is the key to associating a cue with a behaviour. So, you could click him for going to his bed, then throw the treat away from his bed, so he has to move off to go and get it. Because you've clicked, it doesn't matter where the treat is fed to him, just that the click happened on the bed. Then wait for him to go back to his bed again, click, toss the treat away. He should soon make the association with moving towards the bed (and eventually being all four paws on the bed) being the thing that gets his click, so he'll be running towards it. Once you see this confidence, and you know that, once he's had his treat, he's going to turn and head for the bed again, that's the time to add the cue. When you would bet £100 on him doing the behaviour, you start to add the cue before he makes the movement. Does that make sense?
I totally missed your reply yesterday @snowbunny , yes it makes absolute sense. When Enzo gets on his bed I have been clicking but then also throwing the treat on the bed, that is about to change In other news, Enzo had his first walk on the lead yesterday. Initially he was like a wild banshee jumping around and pulling with excitement, but I didn't give in and when ever he calmed and got near my side I c&t, then we set off, it may have helped that I had cubes of chicken mixed in with his usual kibble and treats which he's never had before, but he was wonderfully behaved, stayed at my side nice slack lead as I rapid fired c&t while we walked, this worked brilliantly so I hope it's the right thing to do. Then we hit the empty field so I let him off his lead, he didn't leave my side while we walked and I kept up the treats just to encourage him to stay near me. His second walk of the day Isaac was with me so I had a distraction while I could get about 10 metres away and then get enzos attention, while he was darting towards me I gave the whistle a pip pip pip, only had about 3 occasions to do this and each walk was only about 3-400 metres and 5 mins but I think we all enjoyed it
You're doing exceptionally well if he behaved on his first lead outing! And isn't it just fabulous letting them off the lead for the first time! Xena's doing pretty well on lead in a very low distraction environment (empty schools) but the second you insert a distraction then it's all over. We're a long way off being able to walk on a footpath!
Thanks Although It was a peaceful walk and we didn't encounter any distractions. On his walks today we met a spaniel that he had a little sniff of and pulled on the lead to get to, but once he'd had a sniff it was more or less job done to him, he's wary of other dogs at the moment but still not afraid to get in their face for a little nosey all tail wagging, he's only met a few so far though and always on the lead doing so. He also pulled towards a little girl but she made a little fuss of him, I was just happy he didn't jump on her, I've been working hard on stopping his jumping by jumping and running around the house myself on occasions and c&t him for staying on his feet around me, I do feel slightly mad while doing so He does seem very good so far and everyone we've encountered is quick to say how well natured he is and such a lovely temperament. Hopefully he can keep it up but I'm not keeping my hopes up haha. It's great that people on here are at a similar stage and can share tips and stories Here's a customary pic of him taken today, he's grown quite a bit in just 2 weeks. And love his innocent expression in this one
Hi Sim. Just thought I'd add some of my own experience with clicker training for Ted. We're a bit behind you. Ted is 11 weeks today and has so far responded pretty well. I bought four clickers; one for each family member. My son Matt has always been less enthusiastic about having a puppy, and has been less than pleased when Ted nips at his shorts and trainers when they encounter each other. When trying to get him to praise Ted for obedience he would say "well done" or "excellent" in his usual monotone (he's 23). I'll probably have to click and treat Matt with bottled craft ales! Son aside, it's been good to see my wife and daughter get on board with clicker training. The house and garden echo to "click"s - "good boy!"s. A few niggles where we get the timing wrong, but the clicker has been a real help in getting Ted used to walking on a leash, up and down the garden (not allowed out yet - last vaccination tomorrow). Funnily enough my wife and I both, in our very different careers, did family therapy training, and we apply the same prinicple of "catch your kid doing good instead of catching them out doing bad" to our relationship with Ted. Ted is now often surprised and delighted to find himself clicked and treated for minding his own business and not interrupting the cook or the vacuum cleaner! It's been a big help in getting him to "go to bed" in his crate, or to "settle" on his big cushion in our sitting room. It helps with "leave", "come", and "off", and every time he pees outside he waits for the click - which only comes after he's really finished peeing. He has NOT worked out yet that there is neither click nor treat for peeing on the kitchen floor. Who was it who said "Two paces forward, one backwards!"? You could always look at Zac George on clicker Training on Youtube. He's a positive enthusiast and clearly loves dogs, although you have to get past his endorsements of pet foods, etc. He's great on other methods too. There's another guy called "Training Positive" who's very good once you get over his alarmingly close to the camera preambles. Once he's working with a dog he's fine. Hope to keep hearing how Enzo's getting on with his training. How old is he now?
Hi @Deejay50, great to here your experiences too, and raised a few smiles at the stories re your son haha. Enzo is going to be 12 weeks on Sunday, I'm not sure if he's doing anything yet for a click reward to be honest, I'd say you sounded a lot further ahead with regards to clicker training, he doesn't go to his bed for a click or wee etc, but he does bomb into his crate when we go out or for bed just because he knows it means his Kong is going in there with him. I think he's responding well to C&T while in the lead and walking but ta hard to tell to be honest. He's fairly well behaved and I've kinda taught him to look at me when I do a short sharp whistle, that's good for distracting trainer chewing, I found that advice on kikopups, she trained it to a sort of 'tch tch' noise. He does seem very well behaved, my biggest concern/gripe at the moment is his jumping up and short snapping at our little un who's 6, as I said previously I'm hoping/trying to C&T him out of this. Thanks for the names you mentioned, I'll be sure to check those out and hopefully hear more from you in the future. @Samantha Jones thank you, ahh the innocent look, yea haha
Got a couple of videos here of Enzo off the lead trying to start training him to the whistle. I'm waiting untill he's darting towards me before the whistle so he starts to associate the two together and also got a nice reward of minced beef or chicken when he gets to me, he seems to enjoy it as pippa suggests in here training advice have read. Could somebody look at these and just check we're on the right lines before we continue this way, I know it's not a huge distance but it's hard to get away from him at the moment. Also, when to start using it as a cue.
Your videos are marked as private. You have to make them public or unlisted to share. I keep mine unlisted, so I can share where I want, but people can't just "come across" them.
Aw, lovely!!! He is such a cute little guy and running towards you with loads of enthusiasm I don't know if it's the video (my GoPro doesn't pick up sound very well) but I'd be giving him lots of excited, high pitched verbal praise as well as the treats when he gets to you. But absolutely gorgeous!
He has got lots of enthusiasm running towards me, I love that I do praise him but I haven't been going over the top with it, I'll up the vocal praise thank you
