Most of my "vet school revelations" end up over on the endurance blog, but today I learned a most amazing fact.
Parvo wasn't found in dogs until 1978.
WHAT???!!!???
The disease that was THE puppy disease at the clinic at worked at - what we warned our clients about, the reason we recommended that puppies be carried into the clinic and not go anywhere until they were finished with their puppy boosters (not good advice BTW - it IS possible and NECESSARY to socialize puppies before their boosters are done) - yes, the disease I lived in fear of when I had to let Tess out of the car on the way home from Oregon so that she could pee. THAT disease wasn't even in dogs until I was almost born.
There's a very similar disease in cats that causes panleukopenia. Apparently, cats having lived with this disease for a very long time, have learned to cope and do pretty well. Dogs on the other hand....well.....apparently having the disease only 30-odd years makes it pretty awful.
I knew about it coming out from both ends in the puppies, and how super infectious it is, but today I got to see the pathopysiology and let me tell you - it is not pretty.
Sure, there are other awful puppy diseases like Distemper, but to imagine a world where I don't have to worry about parvo is really hard for me. To imagine what it was like to be a practicing vet in the 70's when this disease starting hitting dogs must have been amazing (from a disease/epidemiology port of view) and awful all at the same time. It's amazing that we have such an effective vaccine against this disease that hasn't been around for very long.
It makes sense to me why there are so many vets that still recommend that puppies are completely kept out of public places until after all boosters are done - the recent memory of a parvo epidemic is still fresh. Better safe than sorry. I also understand why the "older" generation (sorry....so cliche) sometimes seems a bit oblivious to the dangers of parvo.
Veterinary Science is so cool!!!!!!!!
Friday, April 13, 2012
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Dog play
Recommended post
When I got Tess, I didn't really know how to just play with a dog. I had read all sorts of books and I knew I wanted to do agility, but I really didn't know what it looked like to train an agility dog, and I had all sorts of "have-to's" and "nevers" floating around in my head. Things like:
-never play tug with your dog and never let them win if you do.
-let them blow off steam and make sure they are tired when you start your training sessions
-make sure you are the dominant animal in the relationship.
-don't rely on treats because your commands will be "tricks"
-Using a head collar or other training "device" to teach leash walking means you failed.
Of course I got good advice too:
-get a puppy when you can spend a lot of time with in in the first couple of months (I quit my job early, and spent the first FOUR months with Tess at home without a job or school).
-crate training is essential
-puppy is in the crate when it isn't being directly watched or interacted with
-use the gastro-reflex, crate training, control of food and water etc. to house-train. House training must be 100% positive.
-Make sure the puppy has a wide variety of toys that fit different needs.
I knew I would be getting a puppy from Tess's litter before they were born - so I had LOTS of time to plan and think and read. I decided early on that no matter what I was reading, I would train my recall using treats. I had seen some research that said that behaviors trained with treats tend to "stick" better, especially if you randomly treat. Recall is so important to me, I decided I would do whatever was necessary to make it 100%, and it looked like positive training with treats was the answer.
After the first 3 days, realized I had a bigger problem.
My puppy didn't like me. Didn't see any value in checking in with me, being around me, or hanging out with me. She didn't see any value in me other than when I said "come", and then it was a quick dash away. She didn't like being petted, didn't care about verbal praise. Alternatively, she saw LOTS of value in Reed, the golden retriever.
I decided that step one wasn't getting her to sit, down, or even come. The first step was building a relationship.
The good thing was that she was very very VERY food motivated. (And toy motivated until she discovered I wouldn't play tug with her. )
I made my decision then that I would use treats. Lots of treats (actually, mostly her kibble, deducted from her meal). Every time she looked at me I threw her kibble. Every time she came up to me, I threw her kibble. Every time she acknowledged me, I threw her kibble.
Looking back, I'm not sure what prompted me to depart radically from what I had preached to family members and friends and jump "off the deep end" in regards to food, treats, and what the human-dog relationship should look like. I'm eternally grateful for whatever little trigger occurred because I firmly believe that if I hadn't made that change when I did, I wouldn't have the companion I have now.
So now I had a puppy that actual had some value for me. But she still wasn't interacting me like I had dreamed she would. My model of course was Reed (Golden Retriever) who had spent his entire puppy hood (and adult hood, if you must know), GLUED to someone's side and seemed to derive his entire satisfaction from life from "his people". Can you believe I actually thought I would get a dog like this by choosing whatever breed from the AKC sporting group? *shakes head*. Of course, I wouldn't have had nearly as much fun, or learned as much if I had!
Anyway - I digress.....I spent my afternoons in the back yard sipping wine and watching the puppies play (ah the delights of a summer off....). I had no concept of how to play with a dog or puppy beyond fetch - a delightful activity that none of my childhood dogs - but I knew that it was an important piece of the relationship puzzle. Tess LOVES Reed and so I started to observe HOW they played. How the engaged each other, their body language, the actual play, how they communicated intentions.
And then I tried to mimic it.
We left toys out of the picture - I still didn't know that tug was OK - but I started to get on the floor and just play.
Oh sure - we worked on sit, come, down, stay etc. - but we spent far more time on the floor wrestling and running and rolling and being silly. And guess what? My puppy started to like me, to choose to be with me, and see me as a source of good and fun things. And that's when we could start to work on those other behaviors like come, sit, and down. Relationship comes first.
After starting school and meeting agility people and other dog trainers, I realized the benefits of positive training, tug, treats etc. and I was ever so grateful I had decided to through my conventions out the window and listen to my dog.
BTW - Relationship STILL comes first. If I'm having a problem, especially as it relates to recall or leash work, it's time for a relationship check. Will she tug with me? Chose to play with me? On Sunday afternoon I got frustrated during a training session and among other things, put her in a forcible down stay. It was unfair of me, and Tess knew it. I spent the next 24 hours doing damage control on our relationship. Oh sure, she still listened and responded when I said "sit", "down", "come", "weave", "bow", "pout",.....but the she was not thrilled to please and play with me. Whereas before she would do ANYTHING to get me to notice her and initiate play, now she suddenly found anything more interesting to me - including grass, mud, and the cat. Only after 24 hours of relationship games was the relationship repaired to the point where Tess once again chose me over the environment, and was a willing, engaged partner. The more I pay attention to and evaluate relationship, the more successful I am in training tasks, tricks, responsiveness, drive, and motivation.
Susan's blog (linked above) talks about watching 2 dogs in play in order to gain insights have how they play. I often use this trick. Last fall, after realizing that I needed to teach Tess how to tug (since I had all but extinguished that behavior) I watched her tug with Reed to discover how she liked to play with the toy and then tried to mimic that.
Tess considers off-leash play with Reed the highest form of reward. And yes, since they are both toy motivated, it sometimes includes a rope or other toy. Their play is always supervised more because I can learn an enormous amount about behavior and motivation than because of any real danger to either dog (not to mention it's a training opportunity for recalls and a reminder to Tess that this high value reward came from me).
My advice if you are having problems with your dog is to watch them. What do they like? When do they take their naps? what is their favorite toy? What is their favorite way of playing with it? How do they prefer to initiate play? Training isn't necessarily bowing to every wish and whim of your dog - but understanding their needs, wants, and motivations is the first step towards shaping a relationship of your choice.
When I got Tess, I didn't really know how to just play with a dog. I had read all sorts of books and I knew I wanted to do agility, but I really didn't know what it looked like to train an agility dog, and I had all sorts of "have-to's" and "nevers" floating around in my head. Things like:
-never play tug with your dog and never let them win if you do.
-let them blow off steam and make sure they are tired when you start your training sessions
-make sure you are the dominant animal in the relationship.
-don't rely on treats because your commands will be "tricks"
-Using a head collar or other training "device" to teach leash walking means you failed.
Of course I got good advice too:
-get a puppy when you can spend a lot of time with in in the first couple of months (I quit my job early, and spent the first FOUR months with Tess at home without a job or school).
-crate training is essential
-puppy is in the crate when it isn't being directly watched or interacted with
-use the gastro-reflex, crate training, control of food and water etc. to house-train. House training must be 100% positive.
-Make sure the puppy has a wide variety of toys that fit different needs.
I knew I would be getting a puppy from Tess's litter before they were born - so I had LOTS of time to plan and think and read. I decided early on that no matter what I was reading, I would train my recall using treats. I had seen some research that said that behaviors trained with treats tend to "stick" better, especially if you randomly treat. Recall is so important to me, I decided I would do whatever was necessary to make it 100%, and it looked like positive training with treats was the answer.
After the first 3 days, realized I had a bigger problem.
My puppy didn't like me. Didn't see any value in checking in with me, being around me, or hanging out with me. She didn't see any value in me other than when I said "come", and then it was a quick dash away. She didn't like being petted, didn't care about verbal praise. Alternatively, she saw LOTS of value in Reed, the golden retriever.
I decided that step one wasn't getting her to sit, down, or even come. The first step was building a relationship.
The good thing was that she was very very VERY food motivated. (And toy motivated until she discovered I wouldn't play tug with her. )
I made my decision then that I would use treats. Lots of treats (actually, mostly her kibble, deducted from her meal). Every time she looked at me I threw her kibble. Every time she came up to me, I threw her kibble. Every time she acknowledged me, I threw her kibble.
Looking back, I'm not sure what prompted me to depart radically from what I had preached to family members and friends and jump "off the deep end" in regards to food, treats, and what the human-dog relationship should look like. I'm eternally grateful for whatever little trigger occurred because I firmly believe that if I hadn't made that change when I did, I wouldn't have the companion I have now.
So now I had a puppy that actual had some value for me. But she still wasn't interacting me like I had dreamed she would. My model of course was Reed (Golden Retriever) who had spent his entire puppy hood (and adult hood, if you must know), GLUED to someone's side and seemed to derive his entire satisfaction from life from "his people". Can you believe I actually thought I would get a dog like this by choosing whatever breed from the AKC sporting group? *shakes head*. Of course, I wouldn't have had nearly as much fun, or learned as much if I had!
Anyway - I digress.....I spent my afternoons in the back yard sipping wine and watching the puppies play (ah the delights of a summer off....). I had no concept of how to play with a dog or puppy beyond fetch - a delightful activity that none of my childhood dogs - but I knew that it was an important piece of the relationship puzzle. Tess LOVES Reed and so I started to observe HOW they played. How the engaged each other, their body language, the actual play, how they communicated intentions.
And then I tried to mimic it.
We left toys out of the picture - I still didn't know that tug was OK - but I started to get on the floor and just play.
Oh sure - we worked on sit, come, down, stay etc. - but we spent far more time on the floor wrestling and running and rolling and being silly. And guess what? My puppy started to like me, to choose to be with me, and see me as a source of good and fun things. And that's when we could start to work on those other behaviors like come, sit, and down. Relationship comes first.
After starting school and meeting agility people and other dog trainers, I realized the benefits of positive training, tug, treats etc. and I was ever so grateful I had decided to through my conventions out the window and listen to my dog.
BTW - Relationship STILL comes first. If I'm having a problem, especially as it relates to recall or leash work, it's time for a relationship check. Will she tug with me? Chose to play with me? On Sunday afternoon I got frustrated during a training session and among other things, put her in a forcible down stay. It was unfair of me, and Tess knew it. I spent the next 24 hours doing damage control on our relationship. Oh sure, she still listened and responded when I said "sit", "down", "come", "weave", "bow", "pout",.....but the she was not thrilled to please and play with me. Whereas before she would do ANYTHING to get me to notice her and initiate play, now she suddenly found anything more interesting to me - including grass, mud, and the cat. Only after 24 hours of relationship games was the relationship repaired to the point where Tess once again chose me over the environment, and was a willing, engaged partner. The more I pay attention to and evaluate relationship, the more successful I am in training tasks, tricks, responsiveness, drive, and motivation.
Susan's blog (linked above) talks about watching 2 dogs in play in order to gain insights have how they play. I often use this trick. Last fall, after realizing that I needed to teach Tess how to tug (since I had all but extinguished that behavior) I watched her tug with Reed to discover how she liked to play with the toy and then tried to mimic that.
Tess considers off-leash play with Reed the highest form of reward. And yes, since they are both toy motivated, it sometimes includes a rope or other toy. Their play is always supervised more because I can learn an enormous amount about behavior and motivation than because of any real danger to either dog (not to mention it's a training opportunity for recalls and a reminder to Tess that this high value reward came from me).
My advice if you are having problems with your dog is to watch them. What do they like? When do they take their naps? what is their favorite toy? What is their favorite way of playing with it? How do they prefer to initiate play? Training isn't necessarily bowing to every wish and whim of your dog - but understanding their needs, wants, and motivations is the first step towards shaping a relationship of your choice.
Monday, April 9, 2012
4-8-12 Training Session
Part of my weekly goals is to record one training session. It's really helpful for me to evaluate myself, and it's good experience to "be in the spotlight" since eventually my plan is to compete with Tess. There's something about having someone watch you, even if it's a video camera, that makes everything go screwy.....
Today's session is uploaded to youtube and includes notes. (it's hard to see the notes unless you blow it up to full screen - sorry about that).
For some reason recording sessions makes me REALLY distracted and Tess can sense that my attention is divided.....as a result she isn't as focused or motivated.
This was the first part/skill of the session - I went on to let her play with the ball, and do some other toy related stuff, and a session of Yer choice since she was SO distracted by the treat bowel (had cooked sausage in it for recalls among other tasty things) but this was the best part of the session and so just chose to share this. Letting her play with obstacles (like the ball) really revs her up, so I probably should have "sandwiched" the shaping session (although this was more of a luring session), between 2 high drive obstacle exercises instead of putting the shaping first.
Why did I chose to lure her into going under my legs instead of pure shaping? We've been doing a lot of shaping and I didn't want her to get confused that I was asking for something new. I did fade the lure as fast as I could - if you notice, there was not luring after the initial introduction to the activity.
I forgot to set my timer for the session - as a result, as you can see by the length of the video, the session ran 6 minutes instead of my planned 3-4 minutes. It's VERY difficult to judge the length of time without a beep every minute or so.
As a side note, some of you may be wondering why I'm bother to teach something like this? A couple of reasons:
1. Yet another fun thing we can do together that engages Tess and teaches her that I'm the "best cookie" in the world.
2. Yet another thing that engages her brain and causes her to think about something
3. Stretches and uses her body in a different way. I ask her to do many physically challenging things and I try to balance those skills with tricks and activities that stretch her muscles. Jumping and running the A-frame requires strength - but it's not the best way to build strength because you can injure the dog - so I do alternative strength activies (and related stretching) to gain a level of fitness so that Tess can learn the technique of jumping. I use the peanut ball for ab strength training, this crawling behavior to stretch afterwards, handstands to strengthen the back, yoga for stretching etc.
Things I really like about this video:
-even though I was distracted, Tess stayed fairly engaged throughout. She had one moment of running into the kitchen instead of retrieving - but she didn't do any sniffing stuff. She was sorta in "slow-mo" mode, but now that I realized that I should have put a higher drive game on either side of the new shaping session, that makes sense. And I can see how distracted I was - it's obvious I'm splitting my attention between Tess, the camera, and where to put the feed bowl. Tess can definitely tell.....
-I was pretty consistent about not treating for behavior that was "close" but not criteria.
-I realized after watching the video that Tess is all grown up!
What needs to be improved:
-early in the behavior I'm clicking too late
-More Yer choice in the beginning of the session if realize the treat bowl is going to be a problem.
-Figure out where I'm going to put the treats BEFORE I start the session. Even though I was good about getting everything staged before the session, that was the one thing I hadn't thought out.
-Should have used the crate games, or some other relationship game other than just toy play between the shaping. I didn't have enough room to really throw or play and I was trying to manage the treat bowl, the ball, and the camera at the same time.
-I need to stop worrying about whether the camera angle etc. is good. In this case I did 3 things and 1 of them came out good enough to share. Chances are, if I just act normal and go about my training "normally" I'll get one or two things good enough to share.
-Use a timer EVERY time.
Overall I give this session a "C".
The best thing about doing a video analysis of the session......
it was really really really helpful to see and it's going to make it easier for me to do it better at the next session. I do an indepth analysis of each session that I write in a training journal....BUT there's nothing like seeing a video of yourself and making a commitment to post in a public place to make the lessons sink in. I think taping myself on a regular basis and sharing it here is probably one of the best things I can do to improve as a trainer.
Today's session is uploaded to youtube and includes notes. (it's hard to see the notes unless you blow it up to full screen - sorry about that).
For some reason recording sessions makes me REALLY distracted and Tess can sense that my attention is divided.....as a result she isn't as focused or motivated.
This was the first part/skill of the session - I went on to let her play with the ball, and do some other toy related stuff, and a session of Yer choice since she was SO distracted by the treat bowel (had cooked sausage in it for recalls among other tasty things) but this was the best part of the session and so just chose to share this. Letting her play with obstacles (like the ball) really revs her up, so I probably should have "sandwiched" the shaping session (although this was more of a luring session), between 2 high drive obstacle exercises instead of putting the shaping first.
Why did I chose to lure her into going under my legs instead of pure shaping? We've been doing a lot of shaping and I didn't want her to get confused that I was asking for something new. I did fade the lure as fast as I could - if you notice, there was not luring after the initial introduction to the activity.
I forgot to set my timer for the session - as a result, as you can see by the length of the video, the session ran 6 minutes instead of my planned 3-4 minutes. It's VERY difficult to judge the length of time without a beep every minute or so.
As a side note, some of you may be wondering why I'm bother to teach something like this? A couple of reasons:
1. Yet another fun thing we can do together that engages Tess and teaches her that I'm the "best cookie" in the world.
2. Yet another thing that engages her brain and causes her to think about something
3. Stretches and uses her body in a different way. I ask her to do many physically challenging things and I try to balance those skills with tricks and activities that stretch her muscles. Jumping and running the A-frame requires strength - but it's not the best way to build strength because you can injure the dog - so I do alternative strength activies (and related stretching) to gain a level of fitness so that Tess can learn the technique of jumping. I use the peanut ball for ab strength training, this crawling behavior to stretch afterwards, handstands to strengthen the back, yoga for stretching etc.
Things I really like about this video:
-even though I was distracted, Tess stayed fairly engaged throughout. She had one moment of running into the kitchen instead of retrieving - but she didn't do any sniffing stuff. She was sorta in "slow-mo" mode, but now that I realized that I should have put a higher drive game on either side of the new shaping session, that makes sense. And I can see how distracted I was - it's obvious I'm splitting my attention between Tess, the camera, and where to put the feed bowl. Tess can definitely tell.....
-I was pretty consistent about not treating for behavior that was "close" but not criteria.
-I realized after watching the video that Tess is all grown up!
What needs to be improved:
-early in the behavior I'm clicking too late
-More Yer choice in the beginning of the session if realize the treat bowl is going to be a problem.
-Figure out where I'm going to put the treats BEFORE I start the session. Even though I was good about getting everything staged before the session, that was the one thing I hadn't thought out.
-Should have used the crate games, or some other relationship game other than just toy play between the shaping. I didn't have enough room to really throw or play and I was trying to manage the treat bowl, the ball, and the camera at the same time.
-I need to stop worrying about whether the camera angle etc. is good. In this case I did 3 things and 1 of them came out good enough to share. Chances are, if I just act normal and go about my training "normally" I'll get one or two things good enough to share.
-Use a timer EVERY time.
Overall I give this session a "C".
The best thing about doing a video analysis of the session......
it was really really really helpful to see and it's going to make it easier for me to do it better at the next session. I do an indepth analysis of each session that I write in a training journal....BUT there's nothing like seeing a video of yourself and making a commitment to post in a public place to make the lessons sink in. I think taping myself on a regular basis and sharing it here is probably one of the best things I can do to improve as a trainer.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Things I learned from the Spay
Tess is (almost) fully recovered from the spay, since a behavior that she used to do constantly came back for the first time last night - standing on her hind legs with her front paws crossed in front of her on the top x-pen, just hanging out. Until she started doing that again, I knew that her incision site probably still was a bit uncomfortable when stretched.
I want to share some things you can do PRE spay to make the recovery period afterwards go as smoothly as possible. Based on my experience in the vet clinic and observing friends and family’s dogs at home after a spay what typically happens is this. A young puppy is brought in. The puppy doesn’t walk on a leash, slips on the slick floor (made worse because it’s pulling on the leash), and is stressed in the environment of the vet clinic. Post-spay the clinic gives the pup back to the owners with instructions to not let the dog lick at the incision, and to restrict movement for 7-10 days, keep on a leash, don’t let jump or run. The first day/night goes well and the pup is quiet. However, trouble starts in a couple of days. The owner does their best, but hasn’t really taught their pup to kennel well so it whines and paws and is generally annoying, it’s never eliminated on a leash, is so full of energy it pulls and jumps and bounds around. The ecollar is driving everyone mad and the owner is tired of yelling at the dog to stop licking. In less than a week the dog is tearing around the yard for better or worse.
It doesn’t have to happen like this. Although many dogs do just fine, there’s a real possibility of injury to the incision site and infection if you don’t follow a proper recovery protocol, thus incurring additional vet bills and expense - not to mention risk to your dog. A little pre-thought before taking your dog in for a spay can reduce the stress you and your dog experience afterwards.
A note about the age of the pup at spaying…..although there are some perfectly valid reasons to spay/neuter early, there are also some REALLY good reasons to wait until your pup reaches puberty. One of those reasons is to be able to put some time into training so that you DON’T have a crazy puppy jumping around, risking injury.
Things I learned from Tess’s spay (both from an owner and vet perspective):
1. Do the CBC. Not only will it catch any problems that might cause issues during the surgery, if you do have to give additional NSAIDs or other drugs to control pain after surgery, you won’t worry about whether their liver can handle it. Plus it gives you a base line in the future. It was ~ an extra 100 bucks for Tess. Well worth it - especially considering that she has a ton of recessive genes floating around - including a rather rate white recessive (less common in Brittany’s than other breeds).
2. The owner knows the patient best. This was a take home lesson for me as a future vet. If the owner says they are in pain, give it careful consideration. Someone who didn’t know Tess may think she’s fine. I know what’s normal for her. I wasn’t comfortable with the level of discomfort she was exhibiting. While the clinic gives an injectable NSAID post-surgery that should last most of the day, in Tess’s case I felt it wasn’t enough, so I called and got directions for administering additional drugs. I can remember doing multiple spays a day in the clinic I worked at and we NEVER sent pain meds home. We assured owners that their pets behavior was “normal”. I was likely to brush off owner’s concerns unless they really pushed……I will never again take a clinic’s opinion so lightly. They know the animal best. The take-home lesson for the owner is this: If you feel like the NSAID injectable isn’t controlling the pain and you weren’t given additional meds, call the clinic. It is important not to give aspirin or other drugs that you may have self-administered in the past to your dog after the spay, because a recent surgery AND the meds that are given for the surgery can have all sorts of interactions. Call the clinic.
3. Surgery is surgery is surgery. Routine doesn’t make it any less scary or less risky.
4. Knowing what is “normal” is a huge reassurance. A good handout with detailed information (and a concise summary) is worth a lot to the client. Google is priceless if you as the owner don’t get that handout.
5. A follow up call would have be nice. Especially since I had called the night of the surgery and asked for help managing what I saw as excessive pain. This is a reminder for me as a future vet: if the owner had called in to the clinic telling you that their animal seemed to be in a lot of pain, follow up the next day - the client will probably appreciate it.
6. Teach your dog to potty on a leash
7. Teach your dog not to jump now, before the spay.
8. Have a plan for wound licking management. When you yell at your dog to get out of the trash do they listen? Do you have to tell them multiple times in a day? How about in a week? If you can’t keep your dog out of the trash by yelling, do you think you will be successful if you just yell at your dog every time they like their incision? Ecollars are a pain. It was my goal NOT to use one. A standard “game” that Tess and I play with food, toys, going out side, dropped food etc. She knows that if she wants something and she waits, or stops, or does a desirable behavior like practice self control when she really wants to do something naughty, she will be rewarded with something even better. I turned the wound licking into the same game. My back up plan was an old T-shirt. My point is: HAVE A PLAN.
9. Kennel train your dog. This will help keep your dog calm in the hospital, and will maintain your sanity for the 1-2 week recovery period.
10. Train your dog to walk on slick surfaces - keep the nails short, teach to walk on a leash. Yes, slick floors can be the bane of a dogs existence - but their stress level and their behavior on a leash has a LOT to do with it. For ease of cleaning and disinfecting, vet hospitals have slick(er) floors. Keep your dogs stress level low at the vets clinic is much better for your dogs health in the long term (which is why you should kennel train your dog, even if you don’t kennel at home).
I want to share some things you can do PRE spay to make the recovery period afterwards go as smoothly as possible. Based on my experience in the vet clinic and observing friends and family’s dogs at home after a spay what typically happens is this. A young puppy is brought in. The puppy doesn’t walk on a leash, slips on the slick floor (made worse because it’s pulling on the leash), and is stressed in the environment of the vet clinic. Post-spay the clinic gives the pup back to the owners with instructions to not let the dog lick at the incision, and to restrict movement for 7-10 days, keep on a leash, don’t let jump or run. The first day/night goes well and the pup is quiet. However, trouble starts in a couple of days. The owner does their best, but hasn’t really taught their pup to kennel well so it whines and paws and is generally annoying, it’s never eliminated on a leash, is so full of energy it pulls and jumps and bounds around. The ecollar is driving everyone mad and the owner is tired of yelling at the dog to stop licking. In less than a week the dog is tearing around the yard for better or worse.
It doesn’t have to happen like this. Although many dogs do just fine, there’s a real possibility of injury to the incision site and infection if you don’t follow a proper recovery protocol, thus incurring additional vet bills and expense - not to mention risk to your dog. A little pre-thought before taking your dog in for a spay can reduce the stress you and your dog experience afterwards.
A note about the age of the pup at spaying…..although there are some perfectly valid reasons to spay/neuter early, there are also some REALLY good reasons to wait until your pup reaches puberty. One of those reasons is to be able to put some time into training so that you DON’T have a crazy puppy jumping around, risking injury.
Things I learned from Tess’s spay (both from an owner and vet perspective):
1. Do the CBC. Not only will it catch any problems that might cause issues during the surgery, if you do have to give additional NSAIDs or other drugs to control pain after surgery, you won’t worry about whether their liver can handle it. Plus it gives you a base line in the future. It was ~ an extra 100 bucks for Tess. Well worth it - especially considering that she has a ton of recessive genes floating around - including a rather rate white recessive (less common in Brittany’s than other breeds).
2. The owner knows the patient best. This was a take home lesson for me as a future vet. If the owner says they are in pain, give it careful consideration. Someone who didn’t know Tess may think she’s fine. I know what’s normal for her. I wasn’t comfortable with the level of discomfort she was exhibiting. While the clinic gives an injectable NSAID post-surgery that should last most of the day, in Tess’s case I felt it wasn’t enough, so I called and got directions for administering additional drugs. I can remember doing multiple spays a day in the clinic I worked at and we NEVER sent pain meds home. We assured owners that their pets behavior was “normal”. I was likely to brush off owner’s concerns unless they really pushed……I will never again take a clinic’s opinion so lightly. They know the animal best. The take-home lesson for the owner is this: If you feel like the NSAID injectable isn’t controlling the pain and you weren’t given additional meds, call the clinic. It is important not to give aspirin or other drugs that you may have self-administered in the past to your dog after the spay, because a recent surgery AND the meds that are given for the surgery can have all sorts of interactions. Call the clinic.
3. Surgery is surgery is surgery. Routine doesn’t make it any less scary or less risky.
4. Knowing what is “normal” is a huge reassurance. A good handout with detailed information (and a concise summary) is worth a lot to the client. Google is priceless if you as the owner don’t get that handout.
5. A follow up call would have be nice. Especially since I had called the night of the surgery and asked for help managing what I saw as excessive pain. This is a reminder for me as a future vet: if the owner had called in to the clinic telling you that their animal seemed to be in a lot of pain, follow up the next day - the client will probably appreciate it.
6. Teach your dog to potty on a leash
7. Teach your dog not to jump now, before the spay.
8. Have a plan for wound licking management. When you yell at your dog to get out of the trash do they listen? Do you have to tell them multiple times in a day? How about in a week? If you can’t keep your dog out of the trash by yelling, do you think you will be successful if you just yell at your dog every time they like their incision? Ecollars are a pain. It was my goal NOT to use one. A standard “game” that Tess and I play with food, toys, going out side, dropped food etc. She knows that if she wants something and she waits, or stops, or does a desirable behavior like practice self control when she really wants to do something naughty, she will be rewarded with something even better. I turned the wound licking into the same game. My back up plan was an old T-shirt. My point is: HAVE A PLAN.
9. Kennel train your dog. This will help keep your dog calm in the hospital, and will maintain your sanity for the 1-2 week recovery period.
10. Train your dog to walk on slick surfaces - keep the nails short, teach to walk on a leash. Yes, slick floors can be the bane of a dogs existence - but their stress level and their behavior on a leash has a LOT to do with it. For ease of cleaning and disinfecting, vet hospitals have slick(er) floors. Keep your dogs stress level low at the vets clinic is much better for your dogs health in the long term (which is why you should kennel train your dog, even if you don’t kennel at home).
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
New commitments
Susan Garrett has a great website, blog, and newsletter. You have to subscribe to read the newsletter, but it's well worth it the trouble it takes to input your email and then click on the confirm link.
I don't get spam from her - just really well thought out articles that are always timely for something that me and Tess are going through.
The last newsletter talked about "triggers" - an unspoken language/behavior/body language between you and your dog that is fun, motivating, and relationship building. I was doing them unconciously because it was fun (raising my eyebrows at her for example, when she stared at me, because I knew she found it stimulating and she would instantly come over and check me out) but now that I recognized the value of installing "triggers" I use them all the time throughout the day. It's a way of making myself really run and unpredictable to Tess, and as a result she's super focused on me, even in potentially distracting situations. For example, I might inhale sharply and dash down the hall, inviting a game of chase. Or I might throw my hands up in the air inviting her to jump with me. It's a way of focusing attention without toys or treats and reminds both of us that it's the strength of our bond and relationship - not which particular toy or treat I happen to have in my pocket that matters.
Today I had a dismal training session, probably one of the worst ones I've had in the past month. It wasn't because she was naughty or zoomie - but her motivation was low, she was distractable, and left the area several times. She just seemed bored with the whole thing. Even though she was super excited about tug and the toy, she was kinda faking it.
I salvaged it as best I could and evaluated what went wrong. My hypothesis was: We had been working poles every day prespay, and once she was able to do them again post-spay, have continued to do them every day. I'm drilling her too much. We do the same thing every day - poles: because they are sexy and I find them fun. My solution was: give her 2 days off and just play, making sure she has off leash play time with other dogs. Have fun, no obstacles.
After reading the newsletter that was in my inbox this evening, I immediately realized that I need to make several changes to my program. None of the concepts are new....rather they are concepts that I follow for a while, and then gradually move back to my "M.O." - boring, predictable, drilling etc. Practices that do NOT make Tess happy. So here's a new commitment to working with Tess that I know works!
1. Avoid unnecessary timeouts (have all the equipment and treats in place before bringing her out for a session), but use them when I need to (like when she decides to leave the area - don't stand there like a date that's been stood up plantively calling her name....)
2. Don’t reward grey areas - make criteria black and white and don't reward "close". (When teaching something of course, shaping etc, criteria "moves" as the dog progresses). The dog shutting down, zoomies, leaving work area etc. can be because of stress/confusion of rewarding inconsistent criteria.
3. Plan training sessions to include skills that are brand new, developing, and well known. I'm bad about only focusing on one skill.
4. For dogs that you are building drive - sessions last for less than a minute. SET A TIMER. In all cases, keep sessions shorter than 5 minutes. How many times do I have to remind myself of this???????
5. Do a balance break/joy break/relationship building (with the 5 games) every 3-5 treats. I'm good about taking breaks - but based on this recommendation I'm not doing them nearly as often enough.
I suppose I should be grateful that Tess focuses as well as she does, considering the amount of time I require her to focus on a task! Hopefully by breaking it up more often and setting a timer, we'll both find a lot more joy in our sessions and drive/motivation will go back up.
I don't get spam from her - just really well thought out articles that are always timely for something that me and Tess are going through.
The last newsletter talked about "triggers" - an unspoken language/behavior/body language between you and your dog that is fun, motivating, and relationship building. I was doing them unconciously because it was fun (raising my eyebrows at her for example, when she stared at me, because I knew she found it stimulating and she would instantly come over and check me out) but now that I recognized the value of installing "triggers" I use them all the time throughout the day. It's a way of making myself really run and unpredictable to Tess, and as a result she's super focused on me, even in potentially distracting situations. For example, I might inhale sharply and dash down the hall, inviting a game of chase. Or I might throw my hands up in the air inviting her to jump with me. It's a way of focusing attention without toys or treats and reminds both of us that it's the strength of our bond and relationship - not which particular toy or treat I happen to have in my pocket that matters.
Today I had a dismal training session, probably one of the worst ones I've had in the past month. It wasn't because she was naughty or zoomie - but her motivation was low, she was distractable, and left the area several times. She just seemed bored with the whole thing. Even though she was super excited about tug and the toy, she was kinda faking it.
I salvaged it as best I could and evaluated what went wrong. My hypothesis was: We had been working poles every day prespay, and once she was able to do them again post-spay, have continued to do them every day. I'm drilling her too much. We do the same thing every day - poles: because they are sexy and I find them fun. My solution was: give her 2 days off and just play, making sure she has off leash play time with other dogs. Have fun, no obstacles.
After reading the newsletter that was in my inbox this evening, I immediately realized that I need to make several changes to my program. None of the concepts are new....rather they are concepts that I follow for a while, and then gradually move back to my "M.O." - boring, predictable, drilling etc. Practices that do NOT make Tess happy. So here's a new commitment to working with Tess that I know works!
1. Avoid unnecessary timeouts (have all the equipment and treats in place before bringing her out for a session), but use them when I need to (like when she decides to leave the area - don't stand there like a date that's been stood up plantively calling her name....)
2. Don’t reward grey areas - make criteria black and white and don't reward "close". (When teaching something of course, shaping etc, criteria "moves" as the dog progresses). The dog shutting down, zoomies, leaving work area etc. can be because of stress/confusion of rewarding inconsistent criteria.
3. Plan training sessions to include skills that are brand new, developing, and well known. I'm bad about only focusing on one skill.
4. For dogs that you are building drive - sessions last for less than a minute. SET A TIMER. In all cases, keep sessions shorter than 5 minutes. How many times do I have to remind myself of this???????
5. Do a balance break/joy break/relationship building (with the 5 games) every 3-5 treats. I'm good about taking breaks - but based on this recommendation I'm not doing them nearly as often enough.
I suppose I should be grateful that Tess focuses as well as she does, considering the amount of time I require her to focus on a task! Hopefully by breaking it up more often and setting a timer, we'll both find a lot more joy in our sessions and drive/motivation will go back up.
Friday, March 30, 2012
Fun stuff
Wanted to share one of the best nail trimming diagrams that I've seen! I grabbed this off the internet somewhere - if anyone has a credit for it, let me know. I think the most interesting thing to note is that clipping or filing off a little off of a long nail every FEW DAYS is necessary to get the blood supply to recede. I guess I had always assumed that every few weeks was adequate - but then again, I've never personally dealt with a dog with this problem, besides the dogs that came to the clinic for nail trims, that were always bad/long no matter what because we only saw them every few months or so.
And now for something a little more lighthearted.....
One of the funniest thing I've heard in vet school is "brachycephalic breeds are predisposed to everything except living". Seems like the onion proclaiming a recall of the 07 model isn't THAT far off reality. :)
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Pet food link
Still can't get enough on the raw versus kibble debate? Here's an interesting article here.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Tess pics!
FYI - these are all pre-spay, a least a couple weeks old!
Tess trying to get my attention while studying
Tess trying to get my attention while studying
Tess at the hotel room in Reno at the AERC convention - off duty!
Friday, March 23, 2012
Literature update (and a Tess update)
In preparation for an upcoming post on purebreds, I've added some papers to the Mendeley Journal Club group (see side bar) on mortality in dogs based on size and breed.
As a follow up from the "spay" post, I've added a couple papers on pain in animals. Update on Tess - she's doing well. Still uncomfortable this morning so I popped her a tab of Deramaxx (spelling?) which is basically a NSAID (works similarly to ibuprofen in humans) and it seemed to help a LOT. The plan is to give her Deramaxx daily until she doesn't show any sign of pain, I don't think she needs any more Tramadol. Pain is a HUGE quality of life issue for me when it comes to animals and is one reason I get the CBC blood work done pre surgery. Yes, it will reassure me that she is fit for surgery - but it also gives me the peace of mind that her organs such as kidneys and liver are functioning and can handle pain medication like NSAIDs post surgery if they are needed.
As a follow up from the "spay" post, I've added a couple papers on pain in animals. Update on Tess - she's doing well. Still uncomfortable this morning so I popped her a tab of Deramaxx (spelling?) which is basically a NSAID (works similarly to ibuprofen in humans) and it seemed to help a LOT. The plan is to give her Deramaxx daily until she doesn't show any sign of pain, I don't think she needs any more Tramadol. Pain is a HUGE quality of life issue for me when it comes to animals and is one reason I get the CBC blood work done pre surgery. Yes, it will reassure me that she is fit for surgery - but it also gives me the peace of mind that her organs such as kidneys and liver are functioning and can handle pain medication like NSAIDs post surgery if they are needed.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
A spay, of compliments, and a tooth
I just returned from picking up Tess - she is officially “Spayed”.
It was part of the agreement with her breeder that she would be spayed. It was the right thing to do. No matter how good of a performance record, or temperament she has, she will never be the color she needs to be to excel in the show world. And you know what? That’s OK. One thing I REALLY like about the Brittany breed is the focus on “Dual Champions”. While so many breeds have split into “show lines” and “working lines”, Brittany’s have continued to focus on a breed that can excel at both. And while that wonderful dogs like Tess don’t get to contribute to the breed genetically, there’s plenty that she’s doing for the breed’s reputation locally - even spayed. And now, when someone approaches me and asks if I’ve ever considered breeding my dog, I can say, a bit regretfully, that she is spayed, but that I know of a breeder that does breed incredible Brittany’s that excel both in the field and as companions in the home. (There’s a whole debate about purebreds, and breeding - a debate that I’ve actually switched sides on recently - but that’s for another post. ). And apparently, most Brittany’s that people see in public and in vet clinics aren’t nearly as “companionable” as Tess is.
I’ve had many people tell me over the last couple weeks when they see Tess out in public how “calm” she is. I kind of brushed the comments off since I’m fully aware of her athletic capabilities and attributed it to her wearing her vest, or that we had done nose work or agility earlier in the day. She has certain mental and physical needs that I understand need to be fulfilled before she is capable of being obedient and fit to be in public. I think it finally clicked that maybe Tess IS unusual for a Brittany when the vet’s office told me in the morning how calm she was, and then when I picked her up in the afternoon remarked how utterly “un-stressed” she was about being in the clinic. They told me the joke is when they get a Brittany in that they never-ever stop moving and spinning.
It’s more than just the “fulfillment of physical and mental” needs. A large part of it is good breeding - the breeder I got her from breeds field trial dogs that are foremost companions in the home. I may have programmed the “off” button, but the button had to be there in the first place! It’s also the fact that she gets to be my almost constant companion every day. Going to school is a lot like being in a vet clinic - there’s a ton of other people, dogs, smells, and CONFUSION. In the home room where she’s kenneled there’s dog barking and playing and being crazy right outside her kennel. Thus, going into a strange place, being put into a kennel, and asked to hang out for a day wasn’t any big deal. I’m very lucky in my situation that allowed me to socialize and habituate her to a wide range of situations, but I’m also very lucky that I chose the breeder I did!
So, I’m going to start accepting those compliments! Tess is a special girl - I just didn’t know how special - and being my first dog, we really can’t chalk it up to any kind of superior training or some sort of perfect socialization program. Nope, I just got lucky and ended up with EXACTLY the dog I was suppose to!! Looking at her, I can’t believe I was “suppose” to end up with one of her brothers, or that when I looked at the puppy pictures I was so glad the white one was a girl so I didn’t have to worry about ending up with the ugly one.
Or that after cautiously agreeing to take her once we knew she wasn’t deaf, shortly before I was going to pick her up breeder was afraid that personality-wise this maybe wasn’t going to work with what I wanted to do after all - that she was too independent. But then she started to be sweet and a little more people-focused so I got her after all.
Back to the Spay. I admit that I’ve been a bit worried about the whole spay thing. I do consider it major surgery, even it it’s routine. I paid an extra $100 to have a blood panel done before hand - the orange/white color and the excessive white are both recessive, and there’s a whole host of nasty organ diseases and platelet disorders that would be a not-so-wonderful-surprise to find out about during spay (everything was just fine). I couldn’t remember my phone number when I dropped her off in the morning (fortunately they had it in the computer). It went just fine and when I picked her up she was dopey but alert enough to walk out to the car, recognize me etc. Once I got home I felt that she was really uncomfortable. Kept getting up, couldn’t find a position laying down, would refuse to lay down until she was swaying with grogginess, and making little grunting, whining sounds when she moved when she was laying down. Finally I couldn’t stand it and I gave her Tramadol I had left over from her whole tooth thing earlier in the year. She much more drugged now and I’m much happier. :)
Ah yes - the tooth thing. I was suspicious of the permanent tooth that come in after the baby tooth had been knocked out - but wasn’t’ sure if the discoloration I could see was because of the antibiotic use during that time frame or something more sinister. While Tess was out, I asked the vet to recheck it. The discoloration on the inside of the molar is a slab fracture that doesn’t go into the pulp or the gum. The vet said that most dogs have no problems with it - the most common cause for slab fractures is chewing on something really hard. Apparently, when Harley knocked out Tess’s baby tooth, she also applied enough force to crack the adult tooth coming in. It’s also possible that Tess did crack it chewing something since she’s a HUGE chewer, but if so it’s a huge coincidence that she cracked the same tooth, as it was coming in, as had been injured…..
My friends in the classes above me assure that animals bounce back from surgery amazingly fast and I will be very happy tomorrow - but for right now it’s hard to see Tess miserable (less so since I drugged her to the gills!). It’s the first time I’ve left the room and she hasn’t gotten up to follow me.
You’ll have to excuse me if this post is a little sickly-sweet. My girl has turned one year of age, had a major surgery, and proved herself yesterday during her first ever execution of her service dog duties in a “real” situation. Seriously - 10 months of puppyhood was TOTALLY worth the dog I got out of it!!!!!!!
It was part of the agreement with her breeder that she would be spayed. It was the right thing to do. No matter how good of a performance record, or temperament she has, she will never be the color she needs to be to excel in the show world. And you know what? That’s OK. One thing I REALLY like about the Brittany breed is the focus on “Dual Champions”. While so many breeds have split into “show lines” and “working lines”, Brittany’s have continued to focus on a breed that can excel at both. And while that wonderful dogs like Tess don’t get to contribute to the breed genetically, there’s plenty that she’s doing for the breed’s reputation locally - even spayed. And now, when someone approaches me and asks if I’ve ever considered breeding my dog, I can say, a bit regretfully, that she is spayed, but that I know of a breeder that does breed incredible Brittany’s that excel both in the field and as companions in the home. (There’s a whole debate about purebreds, and breeding - a debate that I’ve actually switched sides on recently - but that’s for another post. ). And apparently, most Brittany’s that people see in public and in vet clinics aren’t nearly as “companionable” as Tess is.
I’ve had many people tell me over the last couple weeks when they see Tess out in public how “calm” she is. I kind of brushed the comments off since I’m fully aware of her athletic capabilities and attributed it to her wearing her vest, or that we had done nose work or agility earlier in the day. She has certain mental and physical needs that I understand need to be fulfilled before she is capable of being obedient and fit to be in public. I think it finally clicked that maybe Tess IS unusual for a Brittany when the vet’s office told me in the morning how calm she was, and then when I picked her up in the afternoon remarked how utterly “un-stressed” she was about being in the clinic. They told me the joke is when they get a Brittany in that they never-ever stop moving and spinning.
It’s more than just the “fulfillment of physical and mental” needs. A large part of it is good breeding - the breeder I got her from breeds field trial dogs that are foremost companions in the home. I may have programmed the “off” button, but the button had to be there in the first place! It’s also the fact that she gets to be my almost constant companion every day. Going to school is a lot like being in a vet clinic - there’s a ton of other people, dogs, smells, and CONFUSION. In the home room where she’s kenneled there’s dog barking and playing and being crazy right outside her kennel. Thus, going into a strange place, being put into a kennel, and asked to hang out for a day wasn’t any big deal. I’m very lucky in my situation that allowed me to socialize and habituate her to a wide range of situations, but I’m also very lucky that I chose the breeder I did!
So, I’m going to start accepting those compliments! Tess is a special girl - I just didn’t know how special - and being my first dog, we really can’t chalk it up to any kind of superior training or some sort of perfect socialization program. Nope, I just got lucky and ended up with EXACTLY the dog I was suppose to!! Looking at her, I can’t believe I was “suppose” to end up with one of her brothers, or that when I looked at the puppy pictures I was so glad the white one was a girl so I didn’t have to worry about ending up with the ugly one.
Or that after cautiously agreeing to take her once we knew she wasn’t deaf, shortly before I was going to pick her up breeder was afraid that personality-wise this maybe wasn’t going to work with what I wanted to do after all - that she was too independent. But then she started to be sweet and a little more people-focused so I got her after all.
Back to the Spay. I admit that I’ve been a bit worried about the whole spay thing. I do consider it major surgery, even it it’s routine. I paid an extra $100 to have a blood panel done before hand - the orange/white color and the excessive white are both recessive, and there’s a whole host of nasty organ diseases and platelet disorders that would be a not-so-wonderful-surprise to find out about during spay (everything was just fine). I couldn’t remember my phone number when I dropped her off in the morning (fortunately they had it in the computer). It went just fine and when I picked her up she was dopey but alert enough to walk out to the car, recognize me etc. Once I got home I felt that she was really uncomfortable. Kept getting up, couldn’t find a position laying down, would refuse to lay down until she was swaying with grogginess, and making little grunting, whining sounds when she moved when she was laying down. Finally I couldn’t stand it and I gave her Tramadol I had left over from her whole tooth thing earlier in the year. She much more drugged now and I’m much happier. :)
Ah yes - the tooth thing. I was suspicious of the permanent tooth that come in after the baby tooth had been knocked out - but wasn’t’ sure if the discoloration I could see was because of the antibiotic use during that time frame or something more sinister. While Tess was out, I asked the vet to recheck it. The discoloration on the inside of the molar is a slab fracture that doesn’t go into the pulp or the gum. The vet said that most dogs have no problems with it - the most common cause for slab fractures is chewing on something really hard. Apparently, when Harley knocked out Tess’s baby tooth, she also applied enough force to crack the adult tooth coming in. It’s also possible that Tess did crack it chewing something since she’s a HUGE chewer, but if so it’s a huge coincidence that she cracked the same tooth, as it was coming in, as had been injured…..
My friends in the classes above me assure that animals bounce back from surgery amazingly fast and I will be very happy tomorrow - but for right now it’s hard to see Tess miserable (less so since I drugged her to the gills!). It’s the first time I’ve left the room and she hasn’t gotten up to follow me.
You’ll have to excuse me if this post is a little sickly-sweet. My girl has turned one year of age, had a major surgery, and proved herself yesterday during her first ever execution of her service dog duties in a “real” situation. Seriously - 10 months of puppyhood was TOTALLY worth the dog I got out of it!!!!!!!
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Mendeley
I've created a Mendeley group for this blog. I will periodically post papers on dog behavior and training that I find interesting or thought provoking. Many of the articles are available for free by searching on google scholar, others your library will have, and the remaining ones will usually have a free abstract on online somewhere. For more information on Mendeley, check out today's post on Boots and Saddles!
Friday, March 2, 2012
A day in the life of Tess
Tess turns 1 year old in about a week, and while she's definitely calming down, there are afternoons (like this one) where she has been ignored for most of several days (I had an exam this morning and had to put in some heavy duty studying). To get my attention she runs through all her tricks and then starts offering new ones. Most of the time the lack of attention is the lack of a reward, but every once in a while she discovers something so self rewarding that I have to take action....
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Showoff - Yoga
I taught this in order to stretch her back out after doing a handstand. Which yoga position is it? Down-ward facing dog of course!
Showoff moment - roll over
Sorry for the “clicking” noise - I’ll take my camera strap off next time.
I love how she brings me the toy. We have really been working hard on making the association between toy and high value treats. The messing around she’s doing in the beginning up close is her trying to get at the toy - which is GREAT.
I trained this in 3 stages with a clicker -
1. lay on your side with your head on the ground.
2. go completely on your back
3. flip over.
I didn’t intend on this to be a roll over trick. I was teaching #1 as a “relax” cue when I was using her in public and she was in a down stay. A couple of days ago she was really excited and she started offering her “relax” trick, and then rolled over - which is adorable and I could totally use for a “bang” trick (play dead: fall on to side and roll over with feet in air). Yesterday I decided to see if she would actually roll over.
A couple of notes
This is the second session I've had on this trick, so it's fairly recent.
In the beginning if you want closely, you can see she offers me at least 2 other behaviors that she has been previously rewarded for, before going into the roll over sequence. BEcause this trick is not yet named (see later notes) and I’m waiting for her to offer it, she’s trying a few other things first that she has been strongly rewarded for in the past - when no treat or verbal praise comes, she moves onto another behavior, which I immediately reward her for because she’s on the “right track”. The behaviors she offers in the beginning are: nose tap and freeze with her head at the ground, and she thought about doing a trick called “yoga”, which I’m also working on (more on that later).
I’m rewarding each stage right now because I’m going to be getting 3 separate tricks out of this: relax, Bang, and roll over.
You will notice that there isn’t any verbal cue for any of these - I name tricks only AFTER they are learned. I wait until she’s offering the behavior ~80% of the time, then I’ll start saying the word, right before she does it, to associate the word cue.
Although I trained this behavior with a clicker, you will notice that once she offers the behavior consistently, I don’t necessarily need a clicker to reinforce it. When I start using a word cue, I’ll go back to a clicker for a session or two so I can help her understand the exact moment she completes the behavior.
I managed to get this behavior with luring - which is nice because I don’t have a physical cue to fade out, and it will be easier to get her to do it just on the verbal cue later.
I’m rewarding with random kibble. She just had breakfast (a raw patty), but since she’s VERY food motivated it isn’t problem :)
After the camera was turned off, I had a good fetch/tug session with the giant rope toy - shaping and training a behavior is a lot of mental work and it’s good to give the pup a release from the stress in a physical way (Tess tends to EXPLODE with energy and delight after a training session and be very bouncy because she’s so proud of herself).
A good way to visualize how hard the dog must work mentally doing a shaping session is to imagine you standing in front of someone with a handful of m&m’s. You really want the candy. The person waits. You have to do something. But they aren’t giving you any kind of lure. You sit down. “good” - and you get a treat. So you stay sitting. No more treats. It has something to do with sitting……..you put your hands on the ground - no treat. You put your knees to your chest - no treat. you lay down - “good!” - and you get a treat.
You get the idea.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Nosework Intro
Tess has been learning a new sport - nosework.
Today we had an EXCELLENT session with just odor, and blind hinds (meaning a friend hid the odor and I didn't know where it was).
As nosework is a fairly young sport, I'm assuming that you are as unfamiliar with it as I was a few months ago.
(sorry - you have to copy and paste the addresses - it's late, it's a Friday, and it was a long day at school - THREE Pharm/tox autonomic lectures in a ROW)
Here's a few websites and resources:
http://www.dogstardaily.com/blogs/getting-started-nose-work
http://www.clickertraining.com/node/3276
and of course....the organization website: http://funnosework.com/
Youtube videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAH4FD6xKoI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkXtAup14Sg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2WvN5dijt0&feature=related
I find it difficult to find good online instructions on how to get started, but fortunately a classmate is willing to teach me. (I'm finding out that in vet school, if you want to do something animal related, SOMEONE in your class has probably done it and is willing to share knowledge).
A quick introduction
It was a couple of weeks until my friend and I were able to meet for the first time, so I decided to play a modified nosework game with her with a toy. I starting hiding a hunting bumper (one of the canvas) after playing a game of fetch with it. I hid it in all sorts of places - high, low, buried under objects, behind the cat box and in the dryer. On top of objects that she had to climb on other objects to get to. Outside, inside, in a vehicle.....You get the idea. She didn't get the treat until she had found the toy and brought it to me. In summary, I taught her several bad habits according to the rules of competition. I think I'm lucky that Tess has a good nose on her and seems to instinctively understand the game, even though I changed the rules once I learned the more formal nosework training. Retrieving the toy is NOT good, and you are suppose to keep the hides easy and off of grassy areas in the beginning......oops. Apparently you aren't suppose to constantly challenge your dog - you are suppose to train them using consistent hides that aren't too hard. It's hard to not see whether the puppy can find the toy inside of the spare tire of the 5th wheel when she just managed to dig the toy out of the recliner hidden under 2 blankets.......And apparently handing the toy off to the boyfriend and telling him to hide it somewhere in the house and not to tell me where it is, also isn't the "approved" method or progression for this sort of thing. :) But - it was a LOT of fun and I begin to suspect that Tess was going to be really REALLY good at this.....
The start of formal training
*FYI - I'm not intending this as a full "how to" summary so I haven't gone into some of the detail of how we fully trained each step. However, if this sounds like fun and you want to give it a try, check out the websites and feel free to comment!
First Tess was introduced to boxes - lots and lots of cardboard boxes - one of which had food in it.
Once Tess had the idea of "see box, look in box because something yummy might be there", we started hiding the boxes out of sight.
It's very important to get your dog out of "obedience mode" when playing this game. The dog is the star and she should NOT be getting direction from you. Tess, being the independent little puppy she is had NO problem with this.
After Tess was actively looking for boxes and was excited about food in boxes, we put a little metal tin (~1" in diameter) that contained cotton swabs soaked in the first official scent, "birch". The metal tin had holes in the top of it so the odor could get out. This is called "pairing". When she smelled the food, she was also smelling the odor, and the food was where the odor was the strongest. Because I knew that Tess would search on odor more efficiently than food (because of my experience with the toy prior to doing the formal nosework) I asked my friend if we could go to odor sooner rather than later. Because "food" is such a general search criteria, in my opinion, Tess was less focused than if she had a specific object/odor that she was searching for. My hunch was correct and Tess's focus for the search increased after being exposed to the odor (she makes a "whuffing" noise with her nose when she's searching for something, and because extremely focused and almost impossible to distract from searching).
At first I paired odor and food in boxes and objects, and then I started mixing in some hides that weren't in boxes - I would put the odor on the floor with a pile of food next to it, so that when she ate the treat, her nose would be on the odor.
It's very important to reward AT the odor. Meaning, their nose should be pushed against the odor container (metal tin) as they get the reward!!!!
The next step was to remove the food. The odor is still put into a box (mostly) and the box/hide is kept at nose level or lower. At this point, I would always do ~1 hide out of the box during a session, just to mix it up and remind Tess that while searching inside of objects is important, she needed to look at the entire picture. Finally, the odor tin is hidden out of a box for the majority of the hides during the session.
Finally, some blind (meaning the handler does not know where the odor is) hides were done by someone who understands how odor travels and understands where the dog is in the training process (ie - my friend).
For the last 2 weeks or so, I've been working with Tess to "stick" to the odor - meaning when she thinks she's found the source (the spot where the odor is strongest) she stays next to the odor and signals me in some way. The formal "signal" comes later, but for now I want her feet to stay still and for her to look at me and stay next to the odor until I come to her. I have to be careful because Tess's inclination when she thinks I don't understand that she's found it is to paw at it or grab it with her mouth to show me. VERY NAUGHTY!!!!! There's a limit to how long I can have her stick to the odor before I find that she's turned into a retriever. Today, after 3 blind hides and Tess giving me fairly clear signalling behavior, my friend decided that it was time to really work on her "stickiness". It's practically impossible to put the tin in such a way that she can't retrieve it (our hides are still nose level or lower) when I make her frustrated by waiting for her to clearly signal. But with a cotton swab I can wedge it somewhere... I get to take the cotton swabs (soaked with the odor) out of the tin!!!!!!
Thoughts
I'm not sure how much of my "pre" nose work has influenced Tess, but here's my thoughts so far.
- She has a really good search pattern, probably because she doesn't look for the obvious first based on the difficulty of hides in the beginning. I was probably lucky in that it was difficult to make it "too hard" for her and she has a streak of persistence that I may curse for some of our other activities.....but is good for this.
- She's really adament about getting to the source of the odor - probably because of the retrieves that I required in the beginning. If she didn't get to the toy and bring it to me, she didn't get the treat. While that's causing me issues with her wanting to mouth the odor if I delay the reward, I think that's fixable, since I've never allowed her to retrieve odor - only the toy. Once she learns a formal alert once she finds the odor, she won't be frustrated and tempted to try a retrieve.
- It's possible that it wouldn't have mattered WHAT or HOW I did this. Tess, is a Brittany with strong hunting lines in both her sire and dam. She is bred to work a field, and find bird scent. The difference of working an urban setting with birch scent is negligible.
- She has an incredible work ethic and focus when doing this job - something I'm working on harnessing for our agility activities - my guess is it's a function of using her for what she was bred to do. :)
Training:
I typically do nosework 1-2x a week on my own. Every 1-2 weeks I work with 2 friends - one of which is experienced and one that has a dog starting out just like Tess and we have a instruction session. I find that doing a training session on any one thing more than 1-2 times a week is too often for Tess and she loses motivation so as a rule I limit the number of sessions of any particular activity, even for something that she loves. I take boxes and odor with me and we have sessions in novel places, going back to an earlier stage or making the hides really easy if the location is really distracting. If the location is not safe to work off leash, she works on a long line.
Why I like Nosework
1. This is Tess's favorite game. It's a hands off game where she's the star and taking very little direction from me. She's good at it, and she knows it. I do nosework at least once a week as her reward for being a very special puppy.
2. It caters to her strengths - her nose, persistence, independance, and focus. It's nice to see those traits as "strengths" in their natural element, instead of "training opportunities". (During fall migration, I had to discontinue all outside training sessions because she was so "birdy" and focused on flying birds we couldn't get ANYTHING done - she's better now, but WHEW! Definitely tried my patience when I wanted to get a jump bump obstacle session done and she wanted to be out in the field pointing birds....)
3. It puts her in "work mode". Things that would normally be VERY distracting such as other dogs, mittens and socks on the floor, stuffed animals etc. are completely IGNORED because she's using her nose. It's fascinating to watch because she completely transforms from a rather boisterous puppy to a 100% focused adult dog on a mission.
4. It's a fun activity she can do off leash that is completely positive.
5. It's an excellent activity to balance out agility training.
I'll post some videos of Tess doing nosework soon - as well as some of her new tricks. Some of her tricks - such as the handstand - have to be appreciated in movement, not just as a picture!
Today we had an EXCELLENT session with just odor, and blind hinds (meaning a friend hid the odor and I didn't know where it was).
As nosework is a fairly young sport, I'm assuming that you are as unfamiliar with it as I was a few months ago.
(sorry - you have to copy and paste the addresses - it's late, it's a Friday, and it was a long day at school - THREE Pharm/tox autonomic lectures in a ROW)
Here's a few websites and resources:
http://www.dogstardaily.com/blogs/getting-started-nose-work
http://www.clickertraining.com/node/3276
and of course....the organization website: http://funnosework.com/
Youtube videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAH4FD6xKoI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkXtAup14Sg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2WvN5dijt0&feature=related
I find it difficult to find good online instructions on how to get started, but fortunately a classmate is willing to teach me. (I'm finding out that in vet school, if you want to do something animal related, SOMEONE in your class has probably done it and is willing to share knowledge).
A quick introduction
It was a couple of weeks until my friend and I were able to meet for the first time, so I decided to play a modified nosework game with her with a toy. I starting hiding a hunting bumper (one of the canvas) after playing a game of fetch with it. I hid it in all sorts of places - high, low, buried under objects, behind the cat box and in the dryer. On top of objects that she had to climb on other objects to get to. Outside, inside, in a vehicle.....You get the idea. She didn't get the treat until she had found the toy and brought it to me. In summary, I taught her several bad habits according to the rules of competition. I think I'm lucky that Tess has a good nose on her and seems to instinctively understand the game, even though I changed the rules once I learned the more formal nosework training. Retrieving the toy is NOT good, and you are suppose to keep the hides easy and off of grassy areas in the beginning......oops. Apparently you aren't suppose to constantly challenge your dog - you are suppose to train them using consistent hides that aren't too hard. It's hard to not see whether the puppy can find the toy inside of the spare tire of the 5th wheel when she just managed to dig the toy out of the recliner hidden under 2 blankets.......And apparently handing the toy off to the boyfriend and telling him to hide it somewhere in the house and not to tell me where it is, also isn't the "approved" method or progression for this sort of thing. :) But - it was a LOT of fun and I begin to suspect that Tess was going to be really REALLY good at this.....
The start of formal training
*FYI - I'm not intending this as a full "how to" summary so I haven't gone into some of the detail of how we fully trained each step. However, if this sounds like fun and you want to give it a try, check out the websites and feel free to comment!
First Tess was introduced to boxes - lots and lots of cardboard boxes - one of which had food in it.
Once Tess had the idea of "see box, look in box because something yummy might be there", we started hiding the boxes out of sight.
It's very important to get your dog out of "obedience mode" when playing this game. The dog is the star and she should NOT be getting direction from you. Tess, being the independent little puppy she is had NO problem with this.
After Tess was actively looking for boxes and was excited about food in boxes, we put a little metal tin (~1" in diameter) that contained cotton swabs soaked in the first official scent, "birch". The metal tin had holes in the top of it so the odor could get out. This is called "pairing". When she smelled the food, she was also smelling the odor, and the food was where the odor was the strongest. Because I knew that Tess would search on odor more efficiently than food (because of my experience with the toy prior to doing the formal nosework) I asked my friend if we could go to odor sooner rather than later. Because "food" is such a general search criteria, in my opinion, Tess was less focused than if she had a specific object/odor that she was searching for. My hunch was correct and Tess's focus for the search increased after being exposed to the odor (she makes a "whuffing" noise with her nose when she's searching for something, and because extremely focused and almost impossible to distract from searching).
At first I paired odor and food in boxes and objects, and then I started mixing in some hides that weren't in boxes - I would put the odor on the floor with a pile of food next to it, so that when she ate the treat, her nose would be on the odor.
It's very important to reward AT the odor. Meaning, their nose should be pushed against the odor container (metal tin) as they get the reward!!!!
The next step was to remove the food. The odor is still put into a box (mostly) and the box/hide is kept at nose level or lower. At this point, I would always do ~1 hide out of the box during a session, just to mix it up and remind Tess that while searching inside of objects is important, she needed to look at the entire picture. Finally, the odor tin is hidden out of a box for the majority of the hides during the session.
Finally, some blind (meaning the handler does not know where the odor is) hides were done by someone who understands how odor travels and understands where the dog is in the training process (ie - my friend).
For the last 2 weeks or so, I've been working with Tess to "stick" to the odor - meaning when she thinks she's found the source (the spot where the odor is strongest) she stays next to the odor and signals me in some way. The formal "signal" comes later, but for now I want her feet to stay still and for her to look at me and stay next to the odor until I come to her. I have to be careful because Tess's inclination when she thinks I don't understand that she's found it is to paw at it or grab it with her mouth to show me. VERY NAUGHTY!!!!! There's a limit to how long I can have her stick to the odor before I find that she's turned into a retriever. Today, after 3 blind hides and Tess giving me fairly clear signalling behavior, my friend decided that it was time to really work on her "stickiness". It's practically impossible to put the tin in such a way that she can't retrieve it (our hides are still nose level or lower) when I make her frustrated by waiting for her to clearly signal. But with a cotton swab I can wedge it somewhere... I get to take the cotton swabs (soaked with the odor) out of the tin!!!!!!
Thoughts
I'm not sure how much of my "pre" nose work has influenced Tess, but here's my thoughts so far.
- She has a really good search pattern, probably because she doesn't look for the obvious first based on the difficulty of hides in the beginning. I was probably lucky in that it was difficult to make it "too hard" for her and she has a streak of persistence that I may curse for some of our other activities.....but is good for this.
- She's really adament about getting to the source of the odor - probably because of the retrieves that I required in the beginning. If she didn't get to the toy and bring it to me, she didn't get the treat. While that's causing me issues with her wanting to mouth the odor if I delay the reward, I think that's fixable, since I've never allowed her to retrieve odor - only the toy. Once she learns a formal alert once she finds the odor, she won't be frustrated and tempted to try a retrieve.
- It's possible that it wouldn't have mattered WHAT or HOW I did this. Tess, is a Brittany with strong hunting lines in both her sire and dam. She is bred to work a field, and find bird scent. The difference of working an urban setting with birch scent is negligible.
- She has an incredible work ethic and focus when doing this job - something I'm working on harnessing for our agility activities - my guess is it's a function of using her for what she was bred to do. :)
Training:
I typically do nosework 1-2x a week on my own. Every 1-2 weeks I work with 2 friends - one of which is experienced and one that has a dog starting out just like Tess and we have a instruction session. I find that doing a training session on any one thing more than 1-2 times a week is too often for Tess and she loses motivation so as a rule I limit the number of sessions of any particular activity, even for something that she loves. I take boxes and odor with me and we have sessions in novel places, going back to an earlier stage or making the hides really easy if the location is really distracting. If the location is not safe to work off leash, she works on a long line.
Why I like Nosework
1. This is Tess's favorite game. It's a hands off game where she's the star and taking very little direction from me. She's good at it, and she knows it. I do nosework at least once a week as her reward for being a very special puppy.
2. It caters to her strengths - her nose, persistence, independance, and focus. It's nice to see those traits as "strengths" in their natural element, instead of "training opportunities". (During fall migration, I had to discontinue all outside training sessions because she was so "birdy" and focused on flying birds we couldn't get ANYTHING done - she's better now, but WHEW! Definitely tried my patience when I wanted to get a jump bump obstacle session done and she wanted to be out in the field pointing birds....)
3. It puts her in "work mode". Things that would normally be VERY distracting such as other dogs, mittens and socks on the floor, stuffed animals etc. are completely IGNORED because she's using her nose. It's fascinating to watch because she completely transforms from a rather boisterous puppy to a 100% focused adult dog on a mission.
4. It's a fun activity she can do off leash that is completely positive.
5. It's an excellent activity to balance out agility training.
I'll post some videos of Tess doing nosework soon - as well as some of her new tricks. Some of her tricks - such as the handstand - have to be appreciated in movement, not just as a picture!
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Valentine's Day
Matt greeted me with a big red See's candy heart and a box of truffles.
Tess greeted me with the remains of the red velvet cupcake she snagged off the counter.
Guess which present I liked more?
So, at 5:30a I'm trying to decide whether 1/24 of a box of red velvet chocolate cake mix contains enough chocolate to poison a 35 pound dog, instead of curled up with coffee and a See's chocolate, planning my 40 minute run.
Here's some Tuesday morning math.
Box of cake mix = 18.25 oz
Tess ate 18.25/24=.76 oz
If we assume worst case scenario - the entire .76 oz was solid dark chocolate (and you and I both know that a prepackaged red velvet cake mix is a far cry from solid dark chocolate).
0.76 oz = 21.55 mg
35 pounds = 15.88 kg
Tess ate 1.36 mg/kg of cake mix, that we are calling "dark chocolate".
According to a paper I found on the internet (quality sources you know...) mild clinical signs are seen when an animal ingests 20 mg/kg of the chemical in chocolate (plus caffeine).
According to the same paper, dark chocolate contains 150 mg/oz of the "bad stuff". (I am staying away from big words at 5am).
That means that in 0.76 oz Tess got 114 mg.
That means that Tess ate 3.26 mg/kg of bad stuff.
As that is a far cry from 20 mg/kg, I think she'll be OK.
Although, she's pretty sure she's going to die locked her in kennel in the dark bedroom. And I don't particularly care right now.
What a failure at the "Yer Choice" game! I'm pretty sure the synapse went "see cupcake, want cupcake", instead of the preferred - "see cupcake, want cupcake but if I wait and don't take it, she will give me something better".
Tess greeted me with the remains of the red velvet cupcake she snagged off the counter.
Guess which present I liked more?
So, at 5:30a I'm trying to decide whether 1/24 of a box of red velvet chocolate cake mix contains enough chocolate to poison a 35 pound dog, instead of curled up with coffee and a See's chocolate, planning my 40 minute run.
Here's some Tuesday morning math.
Box of cake mix = 18.25 oz
Tess ate 18.25/24=.76 oz
If we assume worst case scenario - the entire .76 oz was solid dark chocolate (and you and I both know that a prepackaged red velvet cake mix is a far cry from solid dark chocolate).
0.76 oz = 21.55 mg
35 pounds = 15.88 kg
Tess ate 1.36 mg/kg of cake mix, that we are calling "dark chocolate".
According to a paper I found on the internet (quality sources you know...) mild clinical signs are seen when an animal ingests 20 mg/kg of the chemical in chocolate (plus caffeine).
According to the same paper, dark chocolate contains 150 mg/oz of the "bad stuff". (I am staying away from big words at 5am).
That means that in 0.76 oz Tess got 114 mg.
That means that Tess ate 3.26 mg/kg of bad stuff.
As that is a far cry from 20 mg/kg, I think she'll be OK.
Although, she's pretty sure she's going to die locked her in kennel in the dark bedroom. And I don't particularly care right now.
What a failure at the "Yer Choice" game! I'm pretty sure the synapse went "see cupcake, want cupcake", instead of the preferred - "see cupcake, want cupcake but if I wait and don't take it, she will give me something better".
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
7 tricks in 7 days
For some reason when it's been a couple of days since I've blogged, I find it easier to post here than on boots and saddles. Perhaps because boots and saddles has so much history and I feel an obligation to produce quality, entertaining pieces for that audience. I feel less pressure here - and freer to just write.
At the end of last week it became apparent that Tess was showing signs of over-training - lack of motivation, lack of relationship, and just generally "checked out". I have a tendency to focus on a list of 5-6 things every day and when I get "focused" on something, to do it every day until we have it down. I'm just a little OCD (just a little I swear!) and feel the most comfortable when I work through something in a very methodical, systematic way. However, I have a dog that enjoys spontaneity and new things!
Tess is very good for me.
So....I set a challenge for myself. In the next 7 days I would teach Tess 7 new things. No repeats, no practicing what we learned the previous day, and no drilling what we already know. Just 7 brand new tricks and skills in one week.
At the end of the day, even if that particular "trick" isn't finished - IT'S OK!!!!!! We can go back to it at a later date (days or weeks later) and finish the behavior. This works for Tess much better than drilling. I have to keep reminding myself how damn good she was after the 3 week winter break. Not only did I take a break from school, I took a break from any serious training.
Sometimes giving Tess time to think about a task is better than any drills I could devise. The handstand trick is a perfect illustration. I introduced the handstand by having Tess back up onto text books, and after 2 days quit before going to the next step: transitioning her to placing her back feet on the wall (higher than her head). Ten days later I was at school with a friend picking up some supplies and on a whim I asked her to back onto some books against a wall......and BAM! she totally avoided the books and hit the wall with both back feet! She had transitioned to the next step. For the last couple of weeks Tess has consistently performed a handstand with a wall for support every where and anywhere - against trees in the park, lightstands in the parking lot, walls at school, the xpen in the house. It's been about a week since we've worked on the handstand trick (I'm senstive to the fact that doing a handstand if a fairly strenous trick and I don't want her to over do it physically). Yesterday I was shaping a different behavior and she started offering a handstand without any support of an object!
I think much like our muscles get stronger after exercise during the rest and repair phase, Tess's mind makes new connections when she is allowed some time to connect the dots. So many of the behaviors I want for agility and our other activities require her to figure out how to synthesize information and training for the task at hand. I can't do it for her, I can only make sure she has the foundation training for task, support her while she tries to figure it out, and let her know when she's close, and then go wild when she nails it.
We are on day 4 of "7 new things in 7 days".
-Day 1 she learned how to go through a cavelleti grid of irregularly placed poles. (Agility foundation behavior, paw awareness. She was so excited by the site of poles on the ground she was bouncing 5 feet in the air trying to get to the poles while I was setting up. It reminded me how much she LOVES new things and figuring stuff out for herself).
-Day 2 she learned how to go around an upright pole (agility foundation behavior)
-Day 3 I shaped her putting her head between her front legs and her forehead on the ground. (Trick, stretching, flexibility behavior. The start of a yoga position trick....downward facing dog of course!)
-Today I'll be teaching her to bounce in and out of a PVC square (foundation behavior for running an A-frame in agility)
-Day 5 plan is to shape her to put 2 paws (hind and fore on the same side) against the wall. This will eventually turn into a waltzing behavior of us dancing together.
-Day 6 plan is to shape her to jump over my leg
-Day 7 plan is to teach her to shake (she knows how to high 5, but everyone who says hello wants a shake)
I've been so impressed with Tess over the last 3 or 4 days. I had forgotten how smart and engaging she is. Her focus is incredible when suitably motivated. It doesn't' take more than 10-15 minutes for her to pick up any of the tasks listed above.
The training principles that I HAVE to remember with Tess are:
1. It needs to be her idea
2. Drilling does not work with Tess
3. Hands off approach works best (see number 1)...
4. She may be stubborn and willful, but paradoxically is very sensitive to any sort of negative reinforcement - But it won't show up right away. It seems to slide right off her without any sort of impact.....but over the course of several days I will notice a deterioration in the relationship. Is positive training more work? Yes - it requires me to have patience and make sure there aren't holes in the foundation work. BUT, in the end it's LESS work because Tess ends up training herself, with my support, rather than me trying to lecture her on the proper way to use her body.
5. When teaching a multi-step behavior, Tess does best with several days off between introducing new stages.
At the end of last week it became apparent that Tess was showing signs of over-training - lack of motivation, lack of relationship, and just generally "checked out". I have a tendency to focus on a list of 5-6 things every day and when I get "focused" on something, to do it every day until we have it down. I'm just a little OCD (just a little I swear!) and feel the most comfortable when I work through something in a very methodical, systematic way. However, I have a dog that enjoys spontaneity and new things!
Tess is very good for me.
So....I set a challenge for myself. In the next 7 days I would teach Tess 7 new things. No repeats, no practicing what we learned the previous day, and no drilling what we already know. Just 7 brand new tricks and skills in one week.
At the end of the day, even if that particular "trick" isn't finished - IT'S OK!!!!!! We can go back to it at a later date (days or weeks later) and finish the behavior. This works for Tess much better than drilling. I have to keep reminding myself how damn good she was after the 3 week winter break. Not only did I take a break from school, I took a break from any serious training.
Sometimes giving Tess time to think about a task is better than any drills I could devise. The handstand trick is a perfect illustration. I introduced the handstand by having Tess back up onto text books, and after 2 days quit before going to the next step: transitioning her to placing her back feet on the wall (higher than her head). Ten days later I was at school with a friend picking up some supplies and on a whim I asked her to back onto some books against a wall......and BAM! she totally avoided the books and hit the wall with both back feet! She had transitioned to the next step. For the last couple of weeks Tess has consistently performed a handstand with a wall for support every where and anywhere - against trees in the park, lightstands in the parking lot, walls at school, the xpen in the house. It's been about a week since we've worked on the handstand trick (I'm senstive to the fact that doing a handstand if a fairly strenous trick and I don't want her to over do it physically). Yesterday I was shaping a different behavior and she started offering a handstand without any support of an object!
I think much like our muscles get stronger after exercise during the rest and repair phase, Tess's mind makes new connections when she is allowed some time to connect the dots. So many of the behaviors I want for agility and our other activities require her to figure out how to synthesize information and training for the task at hand. I can't do it for her, I can only make sure she has the foundation training for task, support her while she tries to figure it out, and let her know when she's close, and then go wild when she nails it.
We are on day 4 of "7 new things in 7 days".
-Day 1 she learned how to go through a cavelleti grid of irregularly placed poles. (Agility foundation behavior, paw awareness. She was so excited by the site of poles on the ground she was bouncing 5 feet in the air trying to get to the poles while I was setting up. It reminded me how much she LOVES new things and figuring stuff out for herself).
-Day 2 she learned how to go around an upright pole (agility foundation behavior)
-Day 3 I shaped her putting her head between her front legs and her forehead on the ground. (Trick, stretching, flexibility behavior. The start of a yoga position trick....downward facing dog of course!)
-Today I'll be teaching her to bounce in and out of a PVC square (foundation behavior for running an A-frame in agility)
-Day 5 plan is to shape her to put 2 paws (hind and fore on the same side) against the wall. This will eventually turn into a waltzing behavior of us dancing together.
-Day 6 plan is to shape her to jump over my leg
-Day 7 plan is to teach her to shake (she knows how to high 5, but everyone who says hello wants a shake)
I've been so impressed with Tess over the last 3 or 4 days. I had forgotten how smart and engaging she is. Her focus is incredible when suitably motivated. It doesn't' take more than 10-15 minutes for her to pick up any of the tasks listed above.
The training principles that I HAVE to remember with Tess are:
1. It needs to be her idea
2. Drilling does not work with Tess
3. Hands off approach works best (see number 1)...
4. She may be stubborn and willful, but paradoxically is very sensitive to any sort of negative reinforcement - But it won't show up right away. It seems to slide right off her without any sort of impact.....but over the course of several days I will notice a deterioration in the relationship. Is positive training more work? Yes - it requires me to have patience and make sure there aren't holes in the foundation work. BUT, in the end it's LESS work because Tess ends up training herself, with my support, rather than me trying to lecture her on the proper way to use her body.
5. When teaching a multi-step behavior, Tess does best with several days off between introducing new stages.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
An approach to training and behavior
I came across this quote when researching behavior problems that have as their basis a medical issue:
"Regardless of the time commitment you can make and the route you want to take, it’s essential to remember that animal behavior is a science, not a religion. It’s important to learn from others but to also observe and evaluate with a scientific eye. This takes practice and generally requires actual class or book study.
Don’t do what you’ve always done just because you and others have always done it, or blindly follow someone else’s advice without being able to evaluate whether it makes sense or the outcomes are truly beneficial. Learn from everyone you can, even if you disagree with their overall approach. Always look for ways to improve, and always question whether what you are doing is really the best way, or whether there is a better way."
I STRONGLY believe in this. This statement sums up the way I approach endurance, dog training, or anything else. I touched on this subject when discussing the importance of "continuing education" over at Boots and Saddles.
~Quote came from this website
"Regardless of the time commitment you can make and the route you want to take, it’s essential to remember that animal behavior is a science, not a religion. It’s important to learn from others but to also observe and evaluate with a scientific eye. This takes practice and generally requires actual class or book study.
Don’t do what you’ve always done just because you and others have always done it, or blindly follow someone else’s advice without being able to evaluate whether it makes sense or the outcomes are truly beneficial. Learn from everyone you can, even if you disagree with their overall approach. Always look for ways to improve, and always question whether what you are doing is really the best way, or whether there is a better way."
I STRONGLY believe in this. This statement sums up the way I approach endurance, dog training, or anything else. I touched on this subject when discussing the importance of "continuing education" over at Boots and Saddles.
~Quote came from this website
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Now there's talent....
...Or stupidity.
Did you know that I can ride a bike, eat a bag of popcorn, AND feed popcorn kernals to the puppy running beside me on a leash?
Me neither.
Did you know that I can ride a bike, eat a bag of popcorn, AND feed popcorn kernals to the puppy running beside me on a leash?
Me neither.
Monday, January 30, 2012
Dog Food continued!
The power of an anecdote.......and the bias of the anecdotal experience.
And let's not forget the tendency to put more emphasis on evidence that supports an existing belief framework!
I'm very aware of this, which is why I decided to put my personal experiences in a separate posts. This is the post where I name brands and explain what my current feeding routine is.
I would be a lier if I said I wasn't influenced by what I've seen personally and thus tend to critically evaluate the literature coming from a position in favor of high end kibble/balanced raw diets.
But I wasn't always this way.
Until a few years ago I firmly believed that it didn't matter what you fed, as long as it was an AAFCO certified food - specific ingredients didn't matter, protein source didn't matter, etc.
What changed my mind?
A friend got a German Shepherd puppy. This puppy scratched, and had a "sensitive stomach" (ie - very soft stools, diarrhea). Although I scoffed at the notion, this friend started doing some research on diets and eventually, after working through most of the big brands (Purina, Hills etc.) he decided to switch to Taste of the Wild when the dog was ~1 year old. I saw this dog every 2-3 weeks and I was AMAZED at the difference. Harley looked GREAT - an amazing coat, the scratching dissapeared, and she begin to have more normal stools.
My conclusion was - the dog had some sort of allergy, possibly grain related, that made it necessary to switch to a more limited diet. I wasn't ready to generalize the need for a high quality diet/grain free for all dogs.....
Over the next couple of years I started reading more nutrition literature, both for humans and pets and became convinced that grains such as corn and wheat may not be the best thing for human or dog digestive systems - even if there wasn't a confirmed allergy. I experimented with cutting processed grains out of my diet and saw differences in my health......and started to seriously consider how much including the entire real FOOD mattered - not just the components of what was once food.
So......I switched my cat over to Taste of the Wild. Mickie is a middle aged cat that was feral before I adopted her from a ranch I worked at. She's always been skinny and scruffy - even with free choice food and an indoor lifestyle. I was buying the cheap cat food - not the cheapEST (the feedstore refused to sell the cheapest stuff to me because they knew she was an indoor cat and they said it would make her stools too stinky). After a month on Taste of the Wild I was amazed - she was sleek and shiny, and now, a year later is actually starting to get chunky. She sheds less and just looks absolutely amazing. She's always "looked her age" but now looks like a 3 year old and people can't believe she's probably closer to 12 years old (I've had her for 8 years). I'm still really really really impressed. People who knew her "before" always exclaim about how good she feels and looks now - even without knowing the only change was a diet change.
About this time, friends and family started switching their animals to Taste of the Wild or similar products (grain free, but not necessarily top shelf, high protein food) - and I saw the same story over and over. Each of the 4 or 5 animals switched to this type of diet looked better, smelled better, had less stool problems, and had positive behavior changes.
By the time I got Tess in May 2011, I was convinced that most dogs would do better if fed a diet low in grains, with a focus on whole foods. I wasn't comfortable feeding an "all stages" diet, so I fed a Blue Buffalo puppy diet. Most days, she got some fresh fruits and veggies, as well as the occasional chicken neck. After a few months, because she is a medium sized dog, I decided to switch to a Taste of the Wild fish diet, and kept her on it until she was ~8 months. At that point I switched to Nature's Variety "Instinct" duck and turkey meal kibble. About 2 months ago, I read that rotating brands/proteins/and types of food might be beneficial. There's nothing definite, and most of the "research" and information is being done by a single company (Nature's variety) so I'm a bit skeptic - HOWEVER - I'm not comfortable putting 100% of my puppy's nutrition in one company's hands, so I like the idea of "covering my bases" by rotating between brands.
I'm currently rotating my proteins, but I think if I had a dog that seemed prone to food allergies, I might reserve a couple of proteins so I could introduce a "novel" protein later if I needed too.
I started adding a raw diet about a month ago and I've been really happy with it - it's easy, her stools are even easier (she's with me all day in public so I get to see them a LOT).
My current feeding routine is this:
Raw: up to 50% (AAFCO certified, rotate between proteins and Nature's logic brand and Nature's variety)
Kibble: 50-100% of the diet (Rotate between high quality grain free brands that are lower in protein - no more than 80% - and rotate between proteins. Currently feeding Nature's Variety, will rotate between Taste of the Wild and others)
Canned: up to 25% (rotate between high quality grain free and different proteins, mostly use this as a high value reward during training. I like "Evo" brand, but will probably switch to a different brand for my next set of cans).
I believe that variety, rotation, and whole foods are a key component for dog diets.
Sorry this post is a little disjointed. I have a HUGE lab this afternoon (4 hours) and writing this during a potbelly pig behavior lecture - so a little distracted :)
And let's not forget the tendency to put more emphasis on evidence that supports an existing belief framework!
I'm very aware of this, which is why I decided to put my personal experiences in a separate posts. This is the post where I name brands and explain what my current feeding routine is.
I would be a lier if I said I wasn't influenced by what I've seen personally and thus tend to critically evaluate the literature coming from a position in favor of high end kibble/balanced raw diets.
But I wasn't always this way.
Until a few years ago I firmly believed that it didn't matter what you fed, as long as it was an AAFCO certified food - specific ingredients didn't matter, protein source didn't matter, etc.
What changed my mind?
A friend got a German Shepherd puppy. This puppy scratched, and had a "sensitive stomach" (ie - very soft stools, diarrhea). Although I scoffed at the notion, this friend started doing some research on diets and eventually, after working through most of the big brands (Purina, Hills etc.) he decided to switch to Taste of the Wild when the dog was ~1 year old. I saw this dog every 2-3 weeks and I was AMAZED at the difference. Harley looked GREAT - an amazing coat, the scratching dissapeared, and she begin to have more normal stools.
My conclusion was - the dog had some sort of allergy, possibly grain related, that made it necessary to switch to a more limited diet. I wasn't ready to generalize the need for a high quality diet/grain free for all dogs.....
Over the next couple of years I started reading more nutrition literature, both for humans and pets and became convinced that grains such as corn and wheat may not be the best thing for human or dog digestive systems - even if there wasn't a confirmed allergy. I experimented with cutting processed grains out of my diet and saw differences in my health......and started to seriously consider how much including the entire real FOOD mattered - not just the components of what was once food.
So......I switched my cat over to Taste of the Wild. Mickie is a middle aged cat that was feral before I adopted her from a ranch I worked at. She's always been skinny and scruffy - even with free choice food and an indoor lifestyle. I was buying the cheap cat food - not the cheapEST (the feedstore refused to sell the cheapest stuff to me because they knew she was an indoor cat and they said it would make her stools too stinky). After a month on Taste of the Wild I was amazed - she was sleek and shiny, and now, a year later is actually starting to get chunky. She sheds less and just looks absolutely amazing. She's always "looked her age" but now looks like a 3 year old and people can't believe she's probably closer to 12 years old (I've had her for 8 years). I'm still really really really impressed. People who knew her "before" always exclaim about how good she feels and looks now - even without knowing the only change was a diet change.
About this time, friends and family started switching their animals to Taste of the Wild or similar products (grain free, but not necessarily top shelf, high protein food) - and I saw the same story over and over. Each of the 4 or 5 animals switched to this type of diet looked better, smelled better, had less stool problems, and had positive behavior changes.
By the time I got Tess in May 2011, I was convinced that most dogs would do better if fed a diet low in grains, with a focus on whole foods. I wasn't comfortable feeding an "all stages" diet, so I fed a Blue Buffalo puppy diet. Most days, she got some fresh fruits and veggies, as well as the occasional chicken neck. After a few months, because she is a medium sized dog, I decided to switch to a Taste of the Wild fish diet, and kept her on it until she was ~8 months. At that point I switched to Nature's Variety "Instinct" duck and turkey meal kibble. About 2 months ago, I read that rotating brands/proteins/and types of food might be beneficial. There's nothing definite, and most of the "research" and information is being done by a single company (Nature's variety) so I'm a bit skeptic - HOWEVER - I'm not comfortable putting 100% of my puppy's nutrition in one company's hands, so I like the idea of "covering my bases" by rotating between brands.
I'm currently rotating my proteins, but I think if I had a dog that seemed prone to food allergies, I might reserve a couple of proteins so I could introduce a "novel" protein later if I needed too.
I started adding a raw diet about a month ago and I've been really happy with it - it's easy, her stools are even easier (she's with me all day in public so I get to see them a LOT).
My current feeding routine is this:
Raw: up to 50% (AAFCO certified, rotate between proteins and Nature's logic brand and Nature's variety)
Kibble: 50-100% of the diet (Rotate between high quality grain free brands that are lower in protein - no more than 80% - and rotate between proteins. Currently feeding Nature's Variety, will rotate between Taste of the Wild and others)
Canned: up to 25% (rotate between high quality grain free and different proteins, mostly use this as a high value reward during training. I like "Evo" brand, but will probably switch to a different brand for my next set of cans).
I believe that variety, rotation, and whole foods are a key component for dog diets.
Sorry this post is a little disjointed. I have a HUGE lab this afternoon (4 hours) and writing this during a potbelly pig behavior lecture - so a little distracted :)
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