When Pigs Fly_ Training Success With Impossible Dogs - Jane Killion [32]
Where things get more complicated is when your dog’s hot reinforcers are things like sniffing or running around. These are things that you cannot easily control, so you need to take the time to put them on cue. Sniffing in particular is an activity that brings dog trainers much grief, but is invaluable as a reinforcer when put on cue. All dogs enjoy sniffing to a greater or lesser degree, and it is very good to have sniffing available as a life reward—a reward you can have with you and use any time, anywhere. If you have a scent hound, putting sniffing on cue should be your first order of business.
Here is one way to put sniffing on cue. Take your dog somewhere where you know he will be likely to want to sniff. Shorten up on your leash so he does not have a lot of freedom, but do not use the leash to pull him or prompt him in any way. The leash is only a barrier to manage control your dog’s access to sniffing, not a training tool. Wait until he looks at you, and then say “Go sniff ” and release the leash so he can put his head down and sniff. If your dog really likes to sniff, it should not take long for him to catch on to this fun game. Eventually, any time you say, “Go sniff ” your dog will happily oblige. Let’s call this the “release” method of teaching a cue to sniff. The nice thing about teaching it this way is that not only are you getting an important behavior on cue, but you are exchanging something you want (attention) for something he wants (sniffing) and that will strengthen the behavior of paying attention to you. However, teaching the sniff cue this way has its drawbacks, as I will describe in the next paragraph.
Here is the reward for that great healing—go sniff!
Alternatively, you could just capture the sniffing behavior and use a clicker to mark it. Wait until your dog is sniffing, then click and treat. As soon as he puts his head down to sniff again, click and treat. If you have been playing your free shaping games, your dog will quickly figure out that he can offer the behavior of sniffing for a treat. Once he is obviously offering the behavior, add a cue like “Go sniff ” just as his head is lowering to the ground to sniff. This method will isolate the behavior more quickly and make it much clearer to the dog exactly what the cue means than does the “release” method. If you just generally release the dog and allow him to sniff as in the previous paragraph, the dog might think that “go sniff ” means “do whatever you want to do.” It so happens that, for the heavy sniffers, “whatever you want to do” generally means sniffing. However, it might also mean walk away, eat some dirt, bark at another dog, or jump on you. You may not know for a long time that you have not actually trained a “sniff ” command because “sniff ” is the default behavior of many dogs. However, that day may come when you say “Go sniff ” and your dog simply walks away from you because he thinks he can do whatever he wants, which happens not to be sniffing on that particular day. If you have a dog that finds sniffing very reinforcing, you want to have precise control over that behavior, so I would always use some capturing of the behavior to be sure that the dog really understands the cue. Both the “release” and “capture” methods are handy in different contexts and both can, if correctly used, strengthen the “sniff ’ cue.
Be creative about your reinforcers and, if your dog gets really excited about something, try to find a way to incorporate it into your training sessions. I keep a kiddie pool just outside my training yard. I have a couple of students whose dogs just live to go swimming and, after a particularly good sequence, the dog is released to “go swimming!” The entire training session is now infused with the delicious possibility that swimming may just be around the corner.
The opportunity to get in the water is an overwhelmingly powerful draw for a Newfoundland. Because he knows he can earn the opportunity to swim