When Pigs Fly_ Training Success With Impossible Dogs - Jane Killion [70]
1. Stand with your dog near his crate.
2. Have a friend ring the doorbell—you may need to have your dog on leash to keep him from bolting, at first.
3. Toss something very high value into your dog’s crate—a favorite toy or food. Click him when he goes in and give him some more treats.
4. Alternatively, if you have shaped a “go to your crate” behavior, you can send your dog to his crate and then feed/give him a toy.
Please note that this behavior is not “doorbell rings and dog gets dragged forcibly to his crate.” This is the dog taking action in response to the doorbell ringing. The ringing doorbell has to predict something pleasant in exchange for a “good” behavior, and being dragged hither on a leash is not pleasant.
How many repetitions of pairing the doorbell with going to the crate will be necessary until the doorbell truly is a cue for your dog to go to his crate will depend entirely on your dog and how many times and how intensely he has practiced barking at the doorbell in the past. Eventually you will have:
A. Doorbell rings.
B. Dog runs to his crate.
C. Lots of great treats or toys (Yea!).
Love Hurts
Nipping
Nipping is a trickier than reacting to the doorbell ringing or jumping on people behaviors because the antecedents for nipping are not always clear until you start paying attention to them. First, you will need to note when your dog nips you and what was happening immediately before the nip, and that will vary somewhat from dog to dog. I am going to use a common example of a dog that nips because he is excited to see his owner.
1. Owner comes home.
2. Dog nips.
3. Owner shoves/pushes/yells at dog (how antagonizing!).
Piggy Pointer
The nipping I am talking about here is the kind of completely non-aggressive nudgey nipping that a rambunctious or excited dog might do. If your dog is freezing or growling before he nips, or if you are in any way in doubt and think he might be nipping out of aggression, that is a situation that requires professional help. Please find a qualified dog trainer to help you.
Now, remember your dog does not have opposable thumbs or arms that wrap around you. He can’t hold your hand or hug you. His main means of touching you is with his mouth. Although it hurts you, chances are he is just trying to communicate with you in a way that comes naturally to him. So, when you are thinking about selecting a substitute behavior for nipping from your list of foundation behaviors, which one do you think might keep your skin intact, but still give your dog a chance to interact with you the way he wants to? How about a touch behavior?
A. Walk in your door or into the room where your dog is.
B. Throw your hand down, say “touch” and click and treat.
C. If you find yourself in a situation where you don’t have a clicker or food on you, lavish attention on your dog after he touches your hand.
Now you will have:
A. Owner comes home and extends hand.
B. Dog touches nose to hand.
C. Owner greets and rewards dog.
(You may have to repeat the touch-cycle many times during each interaction.)
Soon your dog will be happily boinking your hand with his nose when he sees you. For dogs who are generally over the top with excitement, a hand touch can be used to center them again at anytime.
If your dog is nipping you at other times, you have to do your homework with the antecedents. Figure out how to predict when he might nip, and put your hand down and ask for a touch well before your dog actually does nip you. Usually, a dog that is about to get into an excited nipping sequence will have changes in his breathing and body posture that you can learn to read if you are observant. The whole key is to learn the earliest possible predictor for nipping and ask for a hand touch at that time, instead. If you can predict when your dog will nip before he himself has even fully formed the idea of nipping you, you can completely re-program his thought process and make hand touching his default behavior instead