Hi guys, Bob is generally very good when we are at the pub or cafe... usually sniffs around for a bit but eventually he get the message and sits/lays down and chills out. I always give him treats when he's settled so that he knows he's being good. But it'd be nice to have a cue for SETTLE. Does anyone have any advice for getting this in motion? I don't want to confuse SETTLE with DOWN that's the only thing - he does DOWN very well. Thank you so much. Lou x
Re: Settle cue JulieT does something which I've started to do, too. It's a physical cue rather than a verbal on, and is simply putting your foot on their lead. It works well for our two - although Willow still has frustration issues to work through
Re: Settle cue [quote author=Loopyloo30 link=topic=9338.msg134071#msg134071 date=1420222113] I always give him treats when he's settled so that he knows he's being good. But it'd be nice to have a cue for SETTLE. Does anyone have any advice for getting this in motion? I don't want to confuse SETTLE with DOWN that's the only thing - he does DOWN very well. [/quote] You might be confusing settle with down, in a way, if you are using treats - probably, anyway. For a proper settle, you want your dog to think "oh, right, it's snooze time" when you give that cue. Not "what do I have to do to get that treat?". Before you can use treats you need your dog to be really settled and ideally you don't want to disturb the settle using treats. So, say the dog is nicely settled in the house, and you drop a treat as you pass - if he eats it and goes back to being settled, that's perfect. It is super hard to achieve this state of affairs in a pub or cafe though because first you've got to get your dog to settle. It's best not to use food at first. And the cue does not have to be a verbal cue, like Fiona says, I have a cue which is my foot on the lead. Once I do this, I ignore the dog - completely. You want the dog to think "absolutely nothing of interest is going to happen to me now, so I might as well snooze". Once you have a settle, reward by movement, take your foot off the lead, get up, walk around (and give treats if you want). Then, foot back on lead, and ignore. Repeat, repeat....
Re: Settle cue Thanks Julie we'll try that idea. We generally tie Bob to a chair or table when we are out so should I put my foot on the lead as well as the physical cue and then ignore him? We actually had an incident in a pub recently where Bob was literally tying himself in knots as the table leg was so wide it made the lead length tiny after I'd tied him up. So I threw my coat on the floor and untied the lead and he settled on that really well. We were at a friend's house for NYE and I put my coat down for him on top of his bed and he just went to sleep. In a room full of 20 people bless him, I was so proud of him
Re: Settle cue You can have whatever cue you want for the settle - being tied to something would work (although that won't be so good if you just stop to talk to someone in the street), a mat (your coat ) is very effective if you use it consistently - you do have to treat it like a cue if you want it to be a cue, so don't poison it by using it in different ways. Maybe you already have a settle cue in your coat or his bed? In which case, you can build on it by having a pub/cafe mat if that works for him? I use my foot on the lead because I can always use it, I don't need anything else - mats etc. But it can be anything that means "nothing is going to happen, so switch off". The key is that once you introduce "the thing" nothing happens. Good things only happen once you settle down.
