When Pigs Fly_ Training Success With Impossible Dogs - Jane Killion [52]
Be very specific about what you are shaping. You want to select and reinforce a complete absence of motion. If you reinforce your dog, even though you left him in a down and he started doing the commando crawl towards you, the behavior of “stay” is going to be murky in his mind. If the commando crawl is OK, how about crouching? How about getting up? Stay means stay, and you should not reinforce any movement, even if it is in the same family as the original position. If your dog starts to crawl towards you, go back to him calmly and, without any comment, move him away from the spot where you had him in a stay. Then go back and re-set him up. If your dog is breaking position a lot, drop back to a length of time where he does not break position. However short an interval is needed to be certain that he will stay in position, go down to that level. Don’t be discouraged, you can build back up to a longer stay, but you have to get the behavior first. Again, please do not tell him he is wrong if he changes position—things will go much faster in the long run if you just don’t reinforce him and make him figure out why he is not getting his cookie.
Piggy Pointer
The only changes in position you should accept in a stay are “settling in” changes in position. For instance, if your dog lies down in a “Sphinx” position, with his back legs tucked directly underneath him, and after a little while he rolls over on his hip and stretches his back legs out, or lies down completely flat on his side, that is great. It means he is relaxing and committed to staying in position.
The bottom line is that it is better to have your dog remain completely immobile for five seconds than have him slowly crawl towards you over three minutes and wind up four feet from where he started. That is not a “stay,” that is a “slow crawl towards you.”
Add a cue. Once your dog is offering to stay in position for ten seconds, you can add a cue. I use a verbal “stay.” Although you have built up to your dog offering a ten second stay, when you first add the cue you should reinforce your dog immediately for remaining in position. You can build back up quickly to a ten second stay, with a cue “stay” at the beginning.
Frequent but short sessions. Whatever level of stay you are working on, practicing once a day is very helpful. Stay is a behavior that often gets neglected because it is kind of boring for the trainer. Put in regular effort for a minute or two each day, and you will be richly rewarded. Don’t be discouraged if it seems like your dog will never learn to stay, or if you thought he knew how to stay and then he seemed to forget. The first time I tried to teach a dog to stay I was sure I was doing something wrong, because it took so infernally long for him to get it. People sometimes assume that their training technique is wrong because their dog is not getting a particular behavior. Nine times out of ten, the trainer is doing the right thing, but it takes lots of repetitions in every conceivable situation over a period of time for a dog to truly “get” a behavior. Pigs Fly dogs may need more repetitions than other breeds—be patient!
Energize your dog’s behavior with hot reinforcers. When you are adding toys and games and other hot reinforcers, be careful that you do not always release your dog forward to the toy/game. Sometimes throw the toy/start the game behind him, sometimes to one side or the other, sometimes give him the toy/start the game right there before he breaks position. If your dog always is breaking forward out of his stay, he will begin to anticipate that and he might break before you want him to. As always, be unpredictable and your dog will wait to see what you will do next instead of taking matters into his own hands.
People who own biddable dogs often do