Re: Clicker Training: What's it all about? Hi Pippa, I have never used this in the past, but remain open minded. Have you or anyone you know used this? Or has any other members any experience of it (good or bad)? Paul.
Re: Clicker Training: What's it all about? Hi Paul Yes I have used and still do use clicker training for a number of purposes. This is some of the things I have found a clicker useful for Teaching 'free heelwork' in bouncy excitable spaniels Reducing excitable behaviour in dogs that fuss in the car on approaching exercise area Teaching a possessive dog to hand over a dummy/rabbit etc. Curing dogs that drop the dummy on return Teaching basic skills (sit etc) to pups Teaching older dogs to lie down etc. The clicker is great for establishing or fine tuning, precise behaviours in relatively distraction free environment. Where the technique loses its advantages are in areas where the dog is an environment where there are intense and unpredictable distractions (eg teaching a stop to flush in the rabbit pen!) Pippa
Re: Clicker Training: What's it all about? Hi Paul I've used a clicker to teach a busy spaniel pup to sit, and lie down, very quickly and easily - it was great fun. I tried to use it to teach heel, but didn't have enough finesse with the timing (or enough patience to persevere!), and haven't needed it so far for retrieves (just lucky with the dogs), but would be open to using it for anything. We once accidentally taught the spaniel pup to lie down in front of my husband, facing him, with his nose on the toe of my husband's right boot with about 3 misplaced clicks (we were clicking the lie down, but he happened to be touching my husband's foot a couple of times in a row, and became convinced that was what we were marking!). I am therefore very open to the idea of teaching a dog just about anything with it - provided there are no 'bigger' rewards around. My pup wouldn't have given a stuff about a 'click' when there was a bird in sight! As an aside I will say that the delivery Pippa gets from a clicker-trained-retrieve on her dogs is superb - to the point where it's tempting to do it even with a dog that does already retrieve nicely! Sam.
Re: Clicker Training: What's it all about? Pippa and Sam, Thanks for your replies. I am very impressed and are going to look into this in more depth. Paul.
