I’m working on a column for Bark magazine about positive reinforcement. It’s such a simple concept once you get it, but it’s a bit like riding a bicycle . . . it takes awhile to be able to do it comfortably and effectively. In the column, I want to stress that it is the receiver who defines what is “positive reinforcement,” not the giver. I find that to be one of the biggest mistakes that we humans make: doing things we think our dogs like, that they actually define as aversive (and therefore act as positive punishment, exactly the reverse of reinforcement!).
The most common example of this mis-communication is when people praise and pet their dogs either in ways the dog does not enjoy (especially patting on top of the head) or at a time that the dog doesn’t want to be petted (while playing with other dogs for example).
One of my goals for the column is to broaden people’s definitions of “positive reinforcement,” and I’m going to provide some examples of things we humans might not think of off the top of our head. Here are my two favorite examples. One is from Karen London, Ph.D.. CAAB, (who writes a great blog for Bark by the way). She was out in the country with her newly acquired lab cross when they flushed a deer. She called Bugsy to come just before he sprang off in pursuit, and to her joy and amazement he turned and ran back to her. Alas, she had mistakenly left her treats in a different jacket and had no treats with which to reward him. She couldn’t even take off running to let him chase her because she was in cross country skis in cross country ski tracks, facing the wrong way. But, ever the quick thinker, Karen reached into her pocket and took out a used tissue and gave it to Bugsy when he arrived. Voila! Her dog was thrilled at this acquisition, and Karen’s creative thinking laid a foundation for a solid recall for years to come.
My second favorite story, (continuing along the lines of “yucky things that dogs love”), was at my farm when I had an Advanced Outdoor Training Class. One of the students had a hunting dog who had no interest in anything but sniffing out wild birds and eating sheep poop. Now, if you’re not familiar with sheep, sheep poop comes in piles of small, dry pellets that producers call “berries.” And it’s just grass, after all, albeit a bit recycled. But that explains why I suggested my student just pick up a handful of sheep berries, put them in her pocket and use them as reinforcements. There were no parasites in them that could harm a dog, and although one wouldn’t want to give too much to a dog at one time, they were the perfect reinforcement for this dog at that particular time. Jokes have been made that if times get tough I could package the stuff and sell it . . . but as effective as it was (it IS what the dog wanted, after all!), I don’t think I’ll find a market for it.
Here’s my question for you: Do you have an example of a creative reinforcement? Something your dog loved that is beyond the usual dog treat-exuberant praise-click & treat menu that we all know and love? I’ll bet many of you do, and I sure would love to hear it. If you send it in, I might use it in the column, so no secrets!
Meanwhile, back on the farm: Rain rain rain. Sure is green here, looks like Ireland. Life in general has been a tad challenging, what with a young puppy and Jim’s arm in a brace and my injured knee (but good news — no surgery.. yeah! It’s supposed to be as good as new in two months, phew.). Hope and Will played much of the day yesterday, so good to see. Will gets tired though, and so today he seemed like he needed a rest. I am quick to let him go upstairs when he looks like he needs a break. I sympathize!
Hope shows no signs of wanting to stalk Sushi, but boy does he want to play with her! What an irresistible play bow.
Unless, of course, you are a cat:
But here’s a highlight: we’ve been working on coming away from the cat when called, and bless his furry little heart, Hope came off right away when I said “That’ll do.” Good boy. Of course, we’re working on not bothering the cat in the first place, but hey, it’s only been 3 weeks. In the photo below I’ve just called him, he is just turning away and is starting to come toward me. Jackpot . . . that was worth 10 treats in a row from the treat bag. (and do you love the look on Sushi’s face?)
Shalea says
My greyhound really wasn’t interested in sitting until I realized that just a good ear scritch/cuddle was more relevant to him than any treat I could offer. (No, he didn’t read the part of the book which explains that sighthounds are supposed to be “aloof.”)
Barb says
Trish, I can’t think of any really vivid examples from my experience. But I remember a story that you told on your radio show one day. If my memory serves me, it went something like this.
You had some people over, and one of the dogs caught a baby bunny. Someone said that you couldn’t get the bunny away from the dog, and you spent some time working with the dog and had him/her drop the (by this time inert) bunny. Then you let the dog have the bunny as a reward.
It is something that I have always wanted to try, but so far, my dogs have always assumed the posture of “Here she comes; eat faster.” with their fresh caught food. The exception was the other day with a baby chipmunk. I did get them to drop and leave the dead baby with cubed Natural Balance. But I didn’t let them go back and finish the snack. Part of my hesitancy is that there are two dogs in my house now, and watching them tear a baby creature apart is a bit more than I want to see.
Christine says
Oh my goodness Hope is so adorable! I just love his coloring.
Using poop as reinforcement reminds me of a time when my older dog was a little puppy. She was obsessed with rabbit poop! For weeks I had been working on the “leave it” command and she was doing so well. I decided it was time for a test…so I took her outside and walked her (on leash) next to a pile of rabbit poop with super yummy treats in my hand. She glanced at the poop and I said “leave it” and rewarded her when she looked at me. Feeling so proud of her I said “GOOD GIRL!!” and she immediately proceeded to dive head first into the pile and consume at least 1/2 of it before I could get her off of it. Doh! I realize now that 1) she wasn’t quite ready for my test and 2) rabbit poop always wins when compared to any other treat! 🙂
Our second dog (1 year old) loves ice. She’ll do just about anything for some ice cubes!
Denise says
When my Eskie ignored me because he HAD to get over yonder to sniff something, I rewarded him for re-engaging by running over to whatever it was and letting him have a good sniff. It’s gotten to the point now where I often have to tell him to “go sniff” on a walk because he’s so darn busy watching me. He also gets rewarded with distance when he is polite around strangers – distance being what he really craves in that instance. Those are not at all creative, I know, but they are incredibly effective and worth repeating often. Sadly, I’m not a very creative trainer but I do appreciate all the tips from those of you who are.
Don’t know how Sushi feels about dogs in general but my cat and dog play together regularly and often it is the cat who initiates the game. Their play styles are quite different so it takes some accomodation on both sides. Sometimes Amelia – the cat – is a bit too enthusiastic and Hugh will look to me for interference even though he outweighs her by about 20 pounds. She also sits in the window and looks for us when we are in the yard or go for a walk, evidently offended that we’re having fun without her.
Sheep berries. Wow. Never knew they had a name. Maybe you should do a test marketing though. Hugh would be wild about them!
Frances says
What a beautiful bow! And what a very good puppy to come away when asked. I see that “Stupid dog!” expression quite a lot on the faces of my ginger cats. It is good to hear that Willy and Hope are getting on well together – even Sophy needed a rest from puppy play sometimes, and there are only 6 months between her and Poppy.
My two dogs are completely different when it comes to rewards – Poppy (toy poodle, 12 months) loves a cuddle (although food is better of course), while Sophy (18 months) can even be take-it-or-leave it about food if she is not in the mood and the food is nothing very special. The thing she does love is for me to get right down on the floor and put my chin on my paws, in a play bow that invites her to join in. She is a papillon, and I am a rather hefty, non-supple, middle aged woman, so this does not happen all that often, which makes it even more special to her! I also let her keep the treasures she finds out walking, unless they are truly dangerous. That way she lets me see what it is, and accepts a swap if I ask – and fortunately usually loses interest in the dried out half rabbit, or particularly wonderful sheep dropping, before we get back to the car. They are both hugely enthused if I am simply very silly – bouncing around singing silly songs, playing follow my leader, hide and seek – exactly the games I would play with very small children. As you can imagine, I am getting something of a reputation for eccentric behaviour amongst my neighbours …
They are both very happy, polite little dogs, though – which I am sure has a lot to do with being brought up on reward based training.
Khris Erickson says
I was teaching a class outdoors a few years ago and one of the dogs in my class couldn’t be less interested in any of the treats we tried with him. The following week I brought a container of bunny poop. The top of the container had holes in the top so that the scent would come out. When we started working on heel I had the owner mark with praise, and then bring the container in front of the dog’s nose for a few seconds of sniffing — it worked like a charm!
Leoanrd "Buzz" Cecil says
What I call Premack Tuesday. Every Tuesday the garbage is collected. People put their garbage out in plastic bags. My 2.25 year old Flat-Coated Retriever ( http://web.mac.com/support.notation/Site/Velas_Reactivity_Training_Progress.html ) Vela loooooves to sniff garbage bags. She doesn’t rip them open or take anything out. She just looooovvveeees to sniff them. So I let her – for a price. She might have to give me a good “look-at-me”, or do a couple of twists. Or simply walk nlcely off-leash past the garbage bags. And her reward is … to go sniff.
greetings all!
Vela’s Buzz
Deanna in OR says
I have also used “go sniff” with my Collie, Willow. She just picked up on the meaning of it when I would say it, after releasing her from something like “heel”, just as she was putting her nose to the ground. (She is a collie, after all, with a very long nose that she knows how to use!). This worked great at a couple of recent agility trials–NADAC “FunRaisers” that are very casual, no running order, so you just line up and wait your turn (often for 5-10 minutes)–easy to run out our usual reinforcers–treats. In a horse arena, there is plenty to sniff! I can get her attention back on me, play a little, then say “Go Sniff” again to reward for the attention to me.
I’m not sure where I got it–probably from your books, Trisha–but using “life rewards”, letting the dog do something they want to do as a reward, is something I encourage my puppy & beg. obed. students to mix in as rewards, with treats, to help dogs get “weaned” off of treats as they become more fluent. “Go sniff” is one example. Another example is teaching “wait at the door”, where the reward for wait-until-released is getting to go through the door–no treats required. It’s a rare dog who doesn’t want to go through doors that we want them to wait at!
For our Border Collie, Tenaya, who absolutely lives to play tug, we taught her a very quick “drop it!” by immediately following the drop with a “take it!” and the game resumes. 9 times out of 10, a “Drop it” is followed by a “Take it”, so she views the “Drop it” as just part of the game. She learned the meaning of “Drop it!” as a pup by holding a treat over nose, which she would get when she dropped the toy to grab it, but by quickly resuming the game, we moved on the life reward instead of treats very quickly.
Laurie says
My eight year old Aussie is obsessed with flying snow or splashing water. When near a source of either, he gets rewarded for his recall, a sit or a good stay with a kick of snow or splash of water. He has great recall in our winter months in Maine.
My four year old Aussie would most always rather have a treat than anything. But when I find a really good stick, he finds it an excellent reward for me to hold it out for him to take so he can shake it back and forth and chew it a moment before running away with it. That way it is all his nd he doesn’t have to compete for it.
KateH says
My first dog as an adult loved to rip and tear any kind of paper items or cardboard she found . Since I recycle as much as possible, including folded cereal and other food boxes, the paper bags that held them were an attractive nuisance. While I worked on “leave it” and tried to keep her from obsessively trying to get to were they were stored (I didn’t have a good space in any closet) I ended up making the carboard tubes inside paper towel and toilet rolls a greatly preferred toy and reward item by actively playing fetch and tug games with them and using aversive “naahhh” sounds when she tried to take mail or newpapers, then offering either a ‘brand new’ tube or at the very least, part of one we’d played with. When she did tear them the pieces were easy to clean up (and I just tossed them in the recycling) and if she swallowed any of them I wasn’t too worried because I only use recycled paper products with tubes that were made with unbleached cardboard.
Amanda & the mutts says
It’s not really something that would work in a training class, etc but I have been practicing rally courses with my dog both in our yard and at all the local tennis courts. Our first show is this weekend so I’ve been getting more intense with her lately (knowing I’m going to be a basked of nerves and trying to prepare her). I’ve cut the treats down to only one or two during the course. When we finish the course, I have her sit for a few seconds, slowly unclip her leash and then jump up throwing my arms in the air and shouting “zoom, zoom!”. She immediately goes into a full speed zoom-fest racing in circles through the rally signs and making all kinds of noise for a solid minute. I find that the promise of “letting it all out” when we’re done is a great way to keep her attention and ‘spunk’ harnessed through the course. (especially since we do really long courses at home in practice) I also think it keeps her from burning out on the sometimes boring exercises.
Stephanie says
My standard poodle wrote the book on creative reinforcement. He likes food all right, but nothing in the universe compares to people clapping for him or laughing at him. We did agility demos for a long time with an entertaining group, and he’d eat up the appreciation and laughter like it was going out of style.
One particularly vivid memory was of an agility class that we did. It was hot and his focus was complete crap, with him being very easily distracted. We were running a line of jumps and Crow (that’d be the poodle’s name :)) ignored the last jump to bounce happily over to the instructor, with me standing exasperated behind him.
All the rest of the class burst out laughing. Crow stopped dead in his tracks and turned around to retrace his steps, keeping one eye on the crowds to see if he could get them to do it again. The instructor said, “Don’t you DARE laugh,” and I called him back, and we continued doing agility.
But oh, does laughter and clapping reward his behavior. Sometimes bad ones. 😉
Roberta Beach says
I am fostering a 5 month old black and tan Coonhound puppy for American Black & Tan Coonhound Rescue. When I take him outside for his business, I praise and pet afterward – 4 days later, he started coming to me on his own for his reward. “Sit” was learned in this crate while waiting with the others for a meal. If he were quiet, I would hold a kibble over his wire crate till he sat, the said “Sit! Yes!” and give him the kibble. This past Friday, we were outside en masse; I asked him to sit only using a hand signal and time – he SAT! praise and petting ensued. Twice more at that time and now he is rather, though not quite, consistent. He has only been here 2 weeks. Some adopter will be very, very happy with this very smart and personable boy. He also likes to nap in my lap – so far he can as he is still mostly legs….
Darin says
Maybe not so creative – but effective…
For Come (we use Here) from the back yard we do catch and release – the dog comes to the door, receives a treat, ball, scratch, whatever and then is released back in the yard and told “Go be a Dog!”. We do this as many times a day as we can remember when they are young – makes the Here pretty solid for their whole lives.
For a dog fearful of the agility teeter – we rolled tennis balls down the teeter – she loves balls more than life itself.
And for the dog that caught a mouse in the garage – “drop it” for a dirty sock out of my gym bag – gross but effective.
And strangely, for all my dogs, figure 8s between our legs with back/butt scratches just makes them all get helicopter tails :).
Hope’s play bow is precious – puppies are the best 🙂
D~
Roberta from Vancouver Island says
Oooh, I love this thread.
My border collie x shepherd x husky hates getting her nails trimmed. When I bring out the clippers she hides in her create, body and head turned away from me, paws tucked under where I can’t reach them.
I spent almost a year trying to create a positive response to nail clipping with various high value food reinforcers. She’ll normally do ANYTHING for turkey, but if I even put the clippers on the floor across the room from us, she wouldn’t even touch the turkey.
We had an epiphany one evening a few months ago. She loves to chase. Not fetch, just chase. I brought out a laser pointer and put it on the floor beside the clippers. After thinking for a bit, she approached and lay down on the floor. She will now voluntarily hand me a paw and let me clip one nail in exchange for 10 seconds of chasing the laser pointer. In one session we went from a dog who wouldn’t let me near her nails to a dog who was willing approaching me and offering up her paw repeatedly in exchanged for me making that crazy red dot fly around the room for a few seconds.
She still doesn’t like it – she turns her head away from me and slouches her body – but she puts her paw in my hand and holds it still while I clip. I just had to find the right motivation!
Another postive reinforcer for her is to be able to chase me, or to run beside me and tug on her leash. Running with me while playing tug is a sufficient trade for being called out of the dog park or called away from that smelly thing she was about to roll in. Food is not.
Now that I’ve figured out what my dog really loves (chasing, running, playing, laser pointers, water coming out of a hose), I’ve found that I can use any of these things as motivators.
I read Karen Pryror’s “Reaching the Animal Mind” a few months back, and in this book she talked about using cues as reinforcers. As I understand it, she’s found that when teaching an animal something new, after they’ve succesfully done what you’ve asked them to do, the reward is a cue that they already know well. And then that gets the food reward. I think. I must admit I was a bit confused by it, although the idea was an interesting one. I’d love to learn more.
Trisha, have you had any experience with this?
Susan says
I can give 2 possible examples from working with Gimmel. Her all-time, hands down favorite thing to do is to stand in the creek while I throw rocks over her head, which she jumps out of the water to try to catch. Once, we were not yet down to the creek, still up by our condo building, when I saw (and Gimmel saw) a dog she doesn’t like. She stiffened, I called to her, she looked round and we both took off down to the creek where I nearly filled it in with thrown rocks. The other dog walked past us and Gimmel never even looked his way.
The other thing was while we were at the barn and I was cleaning and filling the horses’ waterer. Gimmel always wants to wrestle with the hose, and has done-in a couple of them this way. When she listened to my “off!” while the hose was running and I was scrubbing with the bucket brush (double whammy there) I had nothing close by to give her, so I threw the bucket brush. Now it’s her favorite and most reliable retrieving object.
hope looks so sweet and innocent trying to play with Sushi. Will she relent in time and play with him?
Beth says
Tennis balls! Great reward for practicing a steady sit/stay with a dog that likes to chase them, and it doubles up as distraction training! Put the dog on sit/stay, wave the ball around enthusiastically, throw the ball, and then after a pause give your “ok!” release and let the dog go.
Martina says
Hi,
I’m naming things my dogs love to do, like sniffing, digging, pointing, scanning, running, marking, drinking etc. so that I can then cue them to go sniffing, digging, pointing, scanning… after a click for whatever behavior we just have been working on. I sometimes sent my dog back to a manure heap right after calling him away from it, and last winter I used one especially conveniantly placed heap as a Jackpot for pulling me on the dogscooter.
As he also loves to jump, I let him jump on something or just right up in the air. And there are some favorite pet tricks (walking backwards, playbow and “fury” (rearing up like a horse on his hindlegs ;D), fingertouch, running through my legs, etc.) that I can use as reinforcers for other behaviours.
Judi says
My Australian shepherd, Kyah, lives to be in the car. She doesn’t really care if the car moves or not, she just likes to be in it. Many years ago, she was training in agility and learned how to do the weave poles. She was kind of slow at them (novice trainer and novice dog!), and I wanted to work on speeding them up. I ended up putting weave poles in the front yard close to where the car is parked. If Kyah wanted to go in the car, she had to give me fast, correct weave poles. At first she tried to pop out early, but when that didn’t work, she started whipping through those weave poles to get to her car.
Adria says
My dog is nuts for watermelon…
But other than that, I haven’t used what follows as a reward, really, but she chose it one day herself:
I have a reactive BC/something mix- only reactive to dogs, but generally a pretty high-anxiety girl in any situation. We’ve been working for about a year now with click to calm/control unleashed and she’s doing great! We’re not back in off-leash agility classes, which I honestly thought would take years to get back to (she’s only 2 1/2 years old).
Anyway, one day there were a bunch of new dogs in class, and I could tell she was stressed, but managing it… We were up first for the run and I put her in a start line stay. She looked around a bit, which is fine, but held her stay beautifully, despite the dogs behind her. The minute I released her, she pulled a perfect 180 degree turn and ran straight back into her crate and lay down. – To get there, she had to maneuver through the other dogs.
I haven’t used it as reinforcement, but I’d say that in that high stress situation, for her, the most reinforcing thing was get home to her crate. I can’t fault her for that- and I’m not sure how I’ll use this- but it was definitely an unusual behavior for her to pick (not to say I’m not extremely proud of her for her choice!).
Sorry if this is off topic- but it seemed in line with “unusual reinforcers” remark… again, not package-able..
Adria
brandy says
I’ve been working on getting Fred to pee as soon as we go outside instead of wandering around a while first. (He has a weak bladder, so I have to take him out about every 2 hours – I don’t always have time to wander down the street!)
One night he saw a rabbit in front of a building down the street, and he really, REALLY wanted to go chase it (chasing after the rabbits in front of this building is a common thing for us to do this time of year). So much so that he wouldn’t pee. I kept taking him out, keeping him in our yard for a few minutes, then taking him back in when he wouldn’t pee after a couple of minutes and tying him near the door so he couldn’t go off and pee in a corner somewhere. Then 5-10 min later we’d go out and try again.
After three tries, he finally peed. And in addition to his usual treat, the second he was done peeing we took off running in the direction of the rabbits! Let me tell you, that really drove the point home. The next night when he saw them again, he peed immediately and was again rewarded by getting to run after them. Since then, he’s been MUCH better about peeing quickly than with treats alone!
Patrice says
As long as Tooey is walking nicely, we will walk toward the squirrel. As soon as the leash gets tight, I simply turn around and walk the other way. Then when the leash is loose again, we turn around and go back toward where the squirrel was. Usually, the squirrels are smart enough to have left by then, but their scent is still there.
Also, Tooey loves to be allowed to jump up and lick my face. However, to get that, she must sit nicely at the door when I come home. If she jumps up before given permission, I turn around and walk back out the door without looking at or talking to her. She mostly sits now.
Then there’s competition. Whoever sits first gets the ball thrown to them. I notice it has sped up both dogs’ sits (at least when they’re together).
Janice says
What spectacular examples you are getting from your readers!!!
To tell the truth, I don’t use a clicker because I am too much of a klutz to use it effectively. My two 6 month old border collie puppies are currently being trained on the down-stay with the reward of going outside. I take each individually from his/her crate (sitting politely in the back of the crate is required for the door to open) and we go to the door. I started on sit and now am working on down. Get puppy to down and then open door. If puppy rushes the door before the release, the door closes before they get to it. If they wait until I give the release (and I am starting to work on making eye contact as well) Vrooom, they are out the door and able to play.
I loved the photos of Hope and Sushi. Now I want to know how you did such a good job training Sushi? I have several cats who Hiss then Run when the puppies come close. This is making “don’t chase the cat” very hard to train. Chasing a running cat is far more interesting than anything I can offer instead.
ROFLOL the story about using sheep poop as a dog treat!!! Gosh if one could market nanny and ewe berries and llama pellets as dog training aides, heck, I could be laughing all the way to the bank…..
Gail says
My Corgi, Hobbit, loves food and toys a LOT, but the holy grail of reinforcers is the water hose. He’s obsessive and obnoxious about it but it’s actually how I taught him to stay in the weaves until the very last pole. Hit that last pole, little man, and we’ll make a mad dash to the best thing on the planet!
Rachel H. says
Gromit loves to chase/herd water streaming from a hose — especially interesting is the impact zone where it hits the ground. So, when I need to hose off his rear end (why must dogs have diarrhea?), I reward him with some hose chasing. Now he runs to the spigot and presents his rear when I wrinkle my nose and say “let’s hose you off!” 🙂
Jennifer Hamilton says
Because Portuguese Water Dogs are naturally mouthy, rather than fight mother nature, I decided to work with it. As a result, anything my puppy brought to me in her mouth, she could have (assuming it was safe of course)…anything I had to take from her mouth was off limits. As a result, she will always bring me what she finds and wants to eat or chew before eating or chewing it. This has been a lifesaver when she has found things that are not safe or potentially toxic, and I can easily exchange them for something she would love much better (super duper jackpot).
The funniest example of her behavior in action was when I had her at work with me at my corporate office. She wandered out of my office, making the rounds visiting the staff. She was gone for quite a while and I heard she was on the other side of the building. About 15 minutes later, she came walking in my office with a large syrofoam clamshell to go box with a total burrito, rice and beans dinner still inside. Turns out someone had thrown it in the trash and she had fished it out. Not only did she bring me the whole container, untouched inside, but she did it without dripping any bean or burrito sauce across our new cream colored carpeting. I retraced her path and not a single drop had been leaked…sparring me the expense of having to have the entire 11th floor carpet cleaned (or replaced). In addition, I didn’t have to worry about whether I would have to have styrofoam and aluminum foil removed from her gut. Her jackpot for bringing me the whole meal untouched? You guessed it…I unwrapped the burrito and put the entire meal on plate for her to eat.
Melissa says
Sometimes I think my little Erik likes the process of doing something more rewarding than the reward at the end. With this in mind I started using our Nina Ottoson Brick puzzle as a jackpot. The rewards in it are ordinary, but the process of rooting around moving the parts of the toy to find the treats must be something of an anticipation heightening thing.
Erik also seems to have a burning need to “connect” sometimes. If he gets bored or socially frustrated he comes and barks at me. I discovered that any reaction from me was a reward for this behaviour. If I so much as look out of the corner of my eyes at him, I can see his face light up. All I can do is thoroughly ignore him while the barking escalates and when he finally gives up and is quiet, I look over and say something. I think this would work a lot better if he didn’t so often get knee-jerk reactions out of me from that barking. But I have at least managed to encourage him to think of other ways to connect. He tried gazing up at me and got loads of attention for it. And he tried poking me with his nose and I rewarded that as well. Anything that’s not barking!
Kivi’s favourite activity is to wrestle with a monkey puppet. He found this puppet partially buried in a pile of old furniture and garbage bags of old clothes when our street was having a large item pickup day (or roadside cleanup). Kivi pulled this big, hairy monkey puppet out of the rubbish, gave it a good shake, then lay down right there on the side of the road to cuddle it and chew on it. Never being one to pass up a good reinforcer, I let him bring it home. Of course, Erik wanted it as well and they argued (my boys never fight, only have sibling-esque arguments and slap-fights) about who got to carry it until I took it off them, and then I had them arguing about who got to walk closest to me and the monkey. I wrap my arm in a towel and put the monkey puppet on when I want to have some wild fun with Kivi. That was how I taught him to jump up on his hind legs. Nothing much else he’d ever jump for.
And yes, I have a pet rabbit and have tossed rabbit poo as a reward. 😉
Liz says
This is my favorite example of a creative reinforcer. It is from Eileen who is on the Sue Ailsby Training Levels list that I am on. I hope she doesn’t mind me posting this, I am sure you can ask her permission directly to use/reference in your article.
http://www.youtube.com/eileenanddogs#p/u/12/JktNjrwnU7g
(For those who don’t watch the video, she trained better/more consistent weaves by rewarding her dog with the garden hose. I thought this was brilliant.)
Beth says
Besides tennis balls, my Corgi Jack loves to meet-and-greet with both dogs and people, so much so that it has taken me a couple of years to convince him to focus on me if he sees another dog out on a walk. He’s three now, and we’ve just started agility. I had him at the park yesterday practicing off-leash heeling patterns, and some basic sit-stay-wait-release to heel exercises.
First, there had been some sort of event at the park recently and the ground smelled of crumbs. Second, a toy-sized loose dog decided to join in our training session and follow me closely, hoping for one of Jack’s treats. Jack was visibly frustrated by the little dog getting in his way (he wanted to play but was trying so hard to stay focused on me). Jack was wonderful, moving around the little dog to stay in a near-perfect heel and ignoring the tempting smells on the ground. Then a Golden Retriever Jack is friends with came bounding down the hill, tailed by her owner, who always makes a big fuss over Jack. My little guy was so focused, staying on a sit and trying very hard not to pitch his ears towards the other dog.
The best reward of all? After a few treats and an enthusiastic series of “Good boy, good boy, good boy!!” I gave his release word and simply let him charge with full Corgi enthusiasm to say a happy “hello” to his friends, both dog and human.
It was unplanned, but a perfect end to a great training session.
Stephanie says
When I was little, I remember slowly spitting while over my boxer and she loved licking it up. I never tried using it as reinforcer. I’ll have to see if my current dog likes it. Arbo, my current dog, is very friendly so sometimes just being able to lick and sniff and be rubbed is reward. My son loves to play with bubbles, and we’ve recently tried getting Arbo to pop the bubbles as well. He doesn’t seem super excited about them, but I expect some dogs may find it very rewarding.
Kat says
Like many others I find the best reward is often allowing Ranger to do what he wanted to do. Visiting my parents they had a large cardboard box of brand new baby chicks in the garage and since the weather was chill had the garage door open to the house as well as a heat lamp above the chicks. Of course Ranger was totally fixated by these tiny darting creatures and wanted very much to explore them up close and personal. With him on leash and using a series of body blocks, downs and the clicker I explained that the only way he was getting anywhere near that fascinating box (which by the way was covered by an old window screen) was to be very very calm and controlled. when he showed me he was calm and controlled he got to go and watch the chicks and inhale their enticing aroma. The rest of our visit he was allowed in to visit chicks as long as he was accompanied by a responsible adult and was calm and controlled. Once I removed him because he was getting excited but that was the only time and my sense was it was more him testing to see how much leeway he had (none) than him losing his control.
Pamela says
I’ll second Christine’s use of ice cubes. They’re very attractive to my teething pup and fun to chase when they slide around the floor.
I’ve done something similar to Beth with my golden retriever, Honey. Honey comes to work with me every day. My office looks out over a park where a local home schooling group brings their kids for play time and enrichment activities.
The kids love Honey and she looooooooooves them! When I see Honey’s biggest fan, Eric, at the park, I get in some quick sit and stay practices before releasing her to run over to him for a big wrestling match. Eric’s presence serves first as a test of her self control and second as a positive reinforcer of her good behavior.
A few people here have talked about “sniffing” as a reward. I’ve also found that as a wonderful reinforcer, especially with my last dog, Shadow, a hound mix.
Susan says
My favorite thing that dogs find reinforcing- that often end up reinforcing the “wrong” thing has to do with how people use leashes:
Getting a leash clipped on (with dog jumping around and not sitting still)
getting leash removed at a dog park (while dog is pulling towards the party!)
Creative treats I’ve used:
pocket lint (hey, at least it usually smells good, as there were treats in there at one point!)
“air cookies” (yes, I’ve pretended to give my dog treats and watched him swallow!)
whatever is on the ground when out for a walk- I used a pinecone today, a piece of grass will do in a pinch (not as a treat, as a very short lived tug toy!)
jumping up to touch my hand (held around shoulder height) and other active tricks such as weaving between my legs and backing up. These would be work for my Spaniel/whatever mix Kyp!, but are joyfully performed by my youngster Arie as reinforcement for less active endeavors.
spray from a hose- Arie loves this, the other DON’T and I occasionally use it as a reinforcer when working agility. Also go to the pool- all my dogs love this one!
Haven’t used sheep poop yet, but years ago I did run my one dog over to a pile of horse poop as a reinforcement when we trained agility in a barn- this was my easily distracted, neurotic Pointer mix. Wish I could say he became less distracted after that, but…. well, we did call him an Australian Pointer because he liked to go walkabout!
Back when I still trained Kyp! in agility, I used “schmoozing” as a reinforcement after a run, letting people know ahead of time that they needed to give her lots of attention and butt scritches. I haven’t mentioned butt scritches yet, but they are a staple of reinforcement for Kyp! (whose primary motivation in life will always be FOOD!)
hats, socks, and shoes. I was giving serious consideration to getting a bite sleeve for Arie when she was a pup, to use as a reinforcement in agility, as she would often attack me (I almost had a nipplectomy a few times!) after an exciting run. Fortunately we’ve (mostly) been able to channel that into jumping into my arms and killing her toys. BTW- one of her favorite toys is a sheet. I had put it on the windshield of the car before it snowed, and then I left it on the ground. I was working Arie in the yard, (yes in the snow) and told her to get her toy- and she opted for that instead! I have since just left it out there, and she loves to attack and shake it,and bring it to me for tugging.
Susan Mann, Brodie, Kyp, and Arie
Sarah says
I walk my pit bull Ernie on a traffic lead, and as a reward for a really good, focused walk, we’ll go to the field across from my house and have a good tug – with his leash!
I’ll drop the lead and tell him to “get his leash,” and he’ll pick it up and give it to me for a tug, then I’ll release and tell him to “get outta here.” He’ll run out about 15-20 feet, then turn around and come running back for another quick game of tug.
When he was a pup, I used this game to reinforce his recall, but now he knows the drill and gets so excited about the tug he doesn’t even wait for the command before turning around and coming back for the tug.
jennifer says
My recently-rescued pitbull mix Agnes is 1-ish years old. She loves stalking/pouncing on cockroaches and eating earwhigs when I take her out for her “last-call whiz” in east Los Angeles. One night she came back to me when I called her name, and I pointed out an earwhig for her to attack. I think I scored points for that one.
Alexandra says
Wow, I’ve used letting my dog eat bunny poop as a reward, but that was off the ground. I’ve never put it in my pocket! lol, that was a such a funny story about the sheep poop!
I’ve used water spraying from the garden hose, sniffing the part of the yard where the bunnies hide, permission to run and play with other dogs, going outside and into the backyard to run around, a dirty sock from the laundry, and permission to jump on me and lick my face as reinforcers at various times. I don’t think I can top sheep poop in the pocket or a dirty tissue.
Ravana says
Trying to pass our Dog Scouts of America test at camp my dog and I ran into a snag when he had to walk past a (very relaxed) cat (in a secure crate) and ignore it. My guy HATES cats (he is teased by feral cats at home) and we were having difficulty being in the same room with a cat without my guy barking his fool head off and lunging at the poor thing. Finally I got one of his stuffed toys he sleeps with and brought it into the room. If he looked at the cat and then turned away he got to beat the stuffing out of his toy. I added to the level of difficulty until after about an hour he was able to walk across the room and ignore the cat so that he could maul his toy.
Also, when I was trying to teach him how to walk nicely on a zip line I rewarded him for not pulling on the line by letting him choose what direction we walked in. If he pulled on the line I would turn us away from his chosen path at the next intersection. When the leash became slack he got to control the turns again. It worked better than any of the more traditional methods I tried.
Finally, I realized a few years ago that I didn’t have to carry treats for rewarding good behavior immediately. I could say, “You earned a treat!” and when we got home he would run to his treat jar and wait. I will keep a running tab for him now (adding treats for great behavior and removing them for awful behavior) and he remembers how many he is supposed to get when we get home. I’ve tried to cheat him, but he won’t leave the treat jar until he gets the right amount (up to five, he seems to only know numbers up to five).
Judith says
My Doberman loves to chase big flying birds. (Think migrating geese or crows) So when the opportunity arises and I’ve determined that the flight trajectory is one that won’t head her toward the highway, I’ll call her or ask for a behavior and then release her to “Go get’em!”
Pat says
I have a wonderful memory of when a reinforcement failed (or did it?): Harley was a large blue merle collie we were about to show in Green Bay. I had a new treat for him-homemade venison jerky from a hunting neighbor. We were practicing baiting in the parking lot prior to showtime. I offered Harley a piece of jerky-it fell to the ground. I picked it up and placed it in his mouth-it fell to the ground. Again, I picked it up, put it in his mouth and held his muzzle- telling him it was something really special. When I released his muzzle, the jerky fell to the ground. Harley took a step forward, lifted his leg and whizzed on the jerky. I felt a momentary flash of enlightenment! My dog had communicated with me in a way that even I could understand!
We lost Harley when he was 13 four years ago but since that show in Green Bay I have had more respect for my collies and have tried to understand what they were telling me.
Pat says
Once had a lab x that loved to chase balls – good way to teach a quick away sit or down, as well as a stay. Reward ~ go get the ball!
My current Terv loves to chase into the water hose! I have him sit while I water the flowers, then tell him “break” and he gets to run into the water flow and chase the water. He is NOT interested in balls, so this is also a fun sprint. Also works well for away sit, stand or down.
On the other topic, the Terv loves to play with the cat – and vice versa. They play tag, wrestle, etc. Too funny to watch the Terv drag the cat off the chair arm or window sill and then they begin! Other starters is Alex walking directly over the cat… then they each turn a time or two. It is solid hair from the top of the 50 lb Terv to the bottom of the 11 lb cat!
Jenny Chun says
My dog Lucy has skin allergies and is a particularly itchy dog. She has been discouraged in the gentlest of ways to not scratch herself to the point where she is raw. She does exercise major self restraint and because of that she actually doesn’t look like a typical dog with bad allergies- meaning red and patchy. Since I know scratching feels sooooo good to her and that she rarely gets to do it, I will sometimes use it as a reinforcer. Her favorite spots to be scratched are on the rear end and the muzzle.
Heidi Meinzer says
My Sophie, the Shepherd mix, is not very food oriented — but she loves to be touched! There is nothing like a good butt rub as a reward! She also loves to herd and chase. Unfortunately, when you live in an urban area such as right outside of Washington, DC, it’s a little hard to give her an outlet. So she resorts to chasing flies and digger bees in the back yard. I’m working on practicing recalls out in the yard, and releasing her back to herding the insects. She loves herding stuff so much that I’ve started driving her out to a farm every other weekend or so to herd real sheep — she loves it! I’ll have to round up some sheep poop while I’m out there! 🙂
Julia says
I have a Labrador Retreiver who shows no intrest in food or toys or chase or anything to get his attention. He is not interested in tug or retrieving. All he does is listen for noises – noises he has heard many times or noises that are new. Walking is hard because of new noises He is 18 months old. Does anyone have any ideas on how to train.
Another Kate says
This isn’t a dog story, but a cat. My tortie, Pumpkin, wasn’t at all food motivated like my other cat, but one day I discovered she’d sit for the laser pointer. So, while not as awesome at Roberta from VI’s use of the laser pointer, my cat learned to sit with it. I probably could have taught her more, but there was a problem: if I don’t use the laser pointer enough (for her), she starts knocking things off shelves and other annoying behaviors to get my attention. Needless to say, while I’ve been able to train two cats to sit and give paw (and my dogs to do many things), Pumpkin has only learned to be a crazy tortie, which comes naturally to her.
Kat says
Just a quickly want to add a word of thanks for this posting. At the park today Ranger performed beautifully but all I had in my hands was his brush and no pockets anywhere. He got to play fetch the brush–which turned out to be a better reward than I’d thought as I’d been brushing him which he tolerates but does not love. Grabbing the brush and shaking it violently appeared to be most satisfying.
DeAnna says
I find that training itself is sometimes a great reward for Corrie, my BC/GSD/mutt. He’s easily bored, and while life is pretty good for him, he could always use more mental stimulation. So if he’s chill and relaxes and lets me work for an hour or so, he gets a brief training session. He gets so excited when the clicker comes out!
In fact, I should go do that right now 🙂
p.s. His very favorite reward of all time is a boomerang. My partner is into them, and has had to buy some special ones that Corrie can catch (the wooden ones are hard and brittle). It only took a few throws for Corrie to figure out that you have to run in the direction *opposite* of the throw in order to catch it. A boomerang is even better than a frisbee, and that’s saying something.
Claire says
When my dog was in her first agility class the running joke was that she should be the spokes person.. er dog.. for “ahhh the power of cheese!” She will do ANYTHING for cheese and her absolute favorite is the squeeze cheese!
Jenna M. Pitman says
I have worked a ton of doggy daycares and learned quickly that with some dogs (some) I could use squirt bottles and hoses to reinforce behavior that I wanted. Some dogs love playing with the water so much that they will do anything for it. I even taught one specific Border Collie mix (who had a bad habit of barking insanely so she could get the squirt bottle) a variety of tricks to use in order to get what she wanted.
Julia says
I envy many of you people. Where I live dogs must be leashed at all times. There is no park to run free. If your dog is off leash he must be in a fenced yard. And no I don’t live in an urban area.
Alexandra says
@ Julia with the noise-interested Lab – have you tried clicker training him? Loading the noise of the clicker to the reward of the treat might be more relevant to him since you say he’s most interested in listening to stuff. Also make sure you are using treats that are REALLY exciting, like salami, hot dogs, or some other kind of deli meat. You might have to experiment a bit to find the right treat that is really tasty. Start in a very quiet place with few distractions and slowly work your way up to training in more noisy, distracting places. Baby steps.
Shannon B. says
A recent foster dog, an adolescent JRT mix, was the toughest dog I’ve had to train loose leash walking. When Chloe was adopted I still hadn’t gotten the job done. I used head collars, no-pull harnesses, click + treat, penalty yards, being a tree, etc. One day, I was standing still, waiting for her to deign to come back to me, and focused on all the things that were good about her so I wouldn’t lose my patience. When she finally gave me her attention, instead of giving her food, I started singing softly to her, using her name and praise. Her face lit up. Her body relaxed. We were able to get further down the street with soft singing than with any other tool or reward.
Kira says
I have two Shibas. One decided that coming in from the rainy soggy yard was not fun, especially if it meant having to get his paws wiped clean. He is very food oriented and even a treat was not enough of a lure recently. I had read your post about doing a play bow, turning away from him and running into the house. HOLY MOLEY talk about creative reinforcement. It worked like a charm and continues to work extremely well. Once inside we have a variaible surprise–treat, praise, a game of fetch, pettingect. The paw wipe is next and way less of a negative experience. The best part of creative reinforcement is thinking like a dog and seeing it work especially with a Shiba that can decide on a whim that that lure is no longer interesting.
Lydia says
I had no treats when I wanted to reward something great. I fished around in my pocket and pulled out chapstick. I acted like it was the most interesting thing in the world and pulled off the cap. He got to sniff the chapstick and thought it was wonderful. Would that always work, I don’t know but in a pinch it did. Also works in daycare or a dogpark where you can’t have treats handy.
Liza Lundell says
It was totally by accident. I took my basenji to the line at lure coursing. She was flailing around with excitement. Just as she threw herself to the ground in a sphinx down, the lure started and I released her. Down is still, 10 years later, her favorite! Her drop on recall and moving downs are wonderful. I wish I could pull out a lure to reward her for heeling!
Carolyn says
i’m just glad to see Sushi is still around. have you found remedy for your allergies? please consider dedicating one of your future entries to elaborating on Will’s (continuing) desensitization to herding Sushi.
Nicola says
One of my friends is a preschool teacher. A child in her class brought her fox furs (tanned) which were too scary for him. Needless to say, the dogs produced beautiful heeling or whatever for the reward of sniffing the fox fur.
It is more negative punishment than positive reinforcement, but my favourite trick if one of my dogs is not focussing in a training session is to put that dog away and train another dog – my dogs all focus wonderfully now. The best reward in my house is training – the dog is the centre of attention and not having to share Mum!
Pamela Reid tells of bringing home a small pet rodent and letting her dog sniff it as a reward – I can’t use that as the most rewarding thing about my rats is their movement, not their smell.
Beckmann says
My most creative reinforcement so far is ‘dig hole’ on the ground. In a forrest, if there is a danger or when I see a little too much arousal in my dog then I call him to me. When he is excited he is not interested in food and I do not have anything with me besides treats. So whenever I call him he comes and then before he reaches me, I start digging a small hole, by the time he reaches me he joins digging:-) It’s a great fun!
Jenny Chun says
I forgot to mention that my dog, Lucy, loves to sniff. In NYC, the most exciting day for walks is probably garbage pick up day as everyone leaves large trash bags on the sidewalks. I’ll ask her to do things so she can go smell them. Other people look at us like it’s gross, but she loves it.
AnneJ says
When our adolescent dog went through a stage when he was afraid of the car I used the sheep as a reinforcement for getting in the car. The sheep were at our house, but we’d go hop in the car, hop out and then go herd sheep. It worked great and didn’t take long before he loved the car.
Eileen Anderson says
My little hound mix, Zani, loves to collect small objects, for chewing or just to “have.” After I caught her with the toenail clippers a couple of times, I thought “Duh!” Now I clip a couple of nails, then let her have playtime with the clippers.
Marci Haw says
In addition to using a lot of Premack set-ups (releasing to chase squirrels, go sniff, etc., I let my rescued boy try everything I eat in an effort to identify reinforcement opportunities. The most unusual, highly rewarding items have been pieces dill pickles and radishes, cooked cauliflower, licks of mint lip balm, and candy (used VERY sparingly).
Anna says
I am not sure everyone would agree that this is a good reinforcement but sometimes you have to go with what you have. Rudy is 18 months old and has a good recall in the house, class and fenced in yard but on the rare occasions he escapes the confines of my house the neighborhood is his oyster and I can just drop dead before he will come by just calling him. One day he did escape and rather doing the natural thing of panicing and chasing I remembered he is really drawn to the sound of a sweeping broom, so I got the broom and started sweeping then I called “Rudy come” sure enough he came charging to me so I swept my way into the garage, shut the door and let Rudy have a good wrestle with the broom. He slipped out yesterday so I called “Rudy come” and reached for the broom and he was there before my hand touched the handle so I released him and let him have a broom wrestle.
Frances says
Thinking about it, my cat Tilly has the whole positive/negative thing off pat with the dogs. If they are rude, or too boisterous, she gets out of the way fast and refuses to play (and I call them off). If they ask very, very politely, and use the proper cat body language, she just possibly may deign to play chase with them. I watched my papillon, Sophy, playing stalking with her the other day – when did a dog learn to crouch down behind the kerb to hide, while wiggling the end of her tail?!
Kathy says
Pinecones! My Cairn Terrier loves them and will work all day for a tossed pinecone.
Barb says
A student in one of my classes feed her dog dandelions. The dog was allergic to so many foods but could eat those and would do most anything for a flower.
Another dog I trained loved to chase and pop bubbles, after a good performance I would just swing the wand and he was jumping and snapping.
Shelly says
Hope is such a beautiful pup. It’s funny, when my cat, Hobbs, was still around, he played like a dog. We did fetch, he sat for his food, all the good stuff. Once I brought Calvin home, Hobbs realized he was a cat, and all those “dog” behaviors were suddenly beneath him.
Lucy, my Pug, is always more interested in what’s “over there.” So, when we were first trying to work on recall, I would reward her by investigating what was right here. She would come to me, I’d mark with a “Goooood Giiiirl” and immediately start digging in the grass for imaginary worms and other goodies. Her recall has improved greatly with this.
Amy W. says
Snowballs. I’ve used my dog’s (Axle) love of chasing snowballs to reward him for staying in the yard and not venturing into the snow covered street while I shovel the driveway.
Skipping Rocks. When at the dog beach, I can use my dog’s (Axle) love of chasing rocks to reinforce just about any behavior I want: come, polite greeting with another dog, pay attention and watch me, etc.
Chasing the water hose. My dogs (Axle and Skylee) have a habit of following me around the yard while I water the plants, often stomping all over the plants. If they wait patiently and don’t cause destruction while I water, I will spray them with the hose when I finish with the plants. They love chasing the stream of water.
ABandMM says
That Hope puppy is just way too cute!
I use the sniff/loose lead walking as a reward for my dog. On our daily walks after a few moments of walking in approximate heel position (we aren’t *that* precise) or a good “Stop/Wait” I’ll let her go sniff the sidewalk and let her walk at her own pace. That may mean a bit of foraging or lagging, but as long as the leash is still loose and I’m not being dragged about, it is fine.
I have also let her chase squirrels up the tree or the rabbits into the bushes as a reward for attention, but I can probably make better use of those opportunities.
Hound-mix Abby also thinks that the trash and debris left on city streets are way better than any treat I can offer her, so I do have to watch out for what she is sniffing so that it doesn’t turn into scarfing down undesirable things.
The book “When Pigs Fly” by Jane Killion
http://www.dogwise.com/ItemDetails.cfm?ID=dtb919
has some excellent ideas on how to find out what reinforcers will work for you dog, especially if you have a dog that isn’t into food, or when you don’t have treats with you. (Positive reinforcement, clicker based ideas).
kate says
In home the unusual reinforcers:
their all time favourite was giving them a toilet paper roll to shred for interrupting barking at a cat who was staring and taunting the dogs in the window.
“Thank you” is my cue to signal “thanks for letting me know something is on the property, now you can just get back to chilling”
sometimes I use:
*Treats (like chips, anything but dog treats) to scatter on the floor to “find it” after thanking them for stopping the barking and leaving the window
*racing to the bedroom to jump on the bed and hide under covers to play cover monster
If we’re out in the woods:
*digging is a HUGE reward, even if I have to dig the hole before they have recalled back to me 🙂 they get all excited when they see me at a distance moving the dirt around as if there’s some ground dwelling creature I’m in hot pursuit of 🙂
*racing the opposite way towards a pond or river so they can play in
*pine cones, leaves, tall grass to roll into sand to roll into or squeal around in
* racing to a high stump, or rock and so they can play king of the castle and jump on top of it or walk along it, or over it, or under it, or do a bow on it…it’s like taking a child to a park where there’s the coolest jungle gym.
*even if we’re walking in the city, park benches are great to get the dogs to recall to me so they can jump up and walk along, the world is their agility ring!
They love it, pretty much anything I make a big deal about, they won’t want to miss out on the fun.
Pike says
The world of functional reinforcements that actually work for Ronja the hound, has opened up for me since learning about BAT – Behavior Adjustment Training – from Grisha Stewart (Ahimsa Dog Training in Seattle, WA).
As mentioned earlier ” go sniff” is a very powerful reward for any hound; also temporarily walking away from another dog as a reward for relaxing even a little bit during a tense approach works wonders on this reactive dog.
Love the examples – especially the broom-recall!
em says
What wonderful examples! Hope is looking cuter and cuter every day. I’m so happy that he is fitting in so well with your family.
As the owner of a non-food/non-toy motivated dog, (initially, Otis was suspicious of anything that smacked of a ‘bribe’- as a rescue with health issues and minimal human socialization prior to being picked up by animal control, he learned that treats and wheedling/reassuring praise were often accompanied by pain and unpleasantness. It took nearly a year before he could accept treats as a reward without become anxious and resistant-likely suspecting a trap.) Fortunately, he is a gentle, cooperative dog. Training was not nearly as difficult as it could have been, (despite a disastrous, and totally counterproductive group obedience class) but I could have used some ideas like these when he was learning.
Now he will respond to simple, low-pressure requests like sit, down, etc. for treats, but for for harder, more emotionally charged things (leave the nasty thing, chase-breaking) he doesn’t really respond to anything as well as attention. He seems to enjoy smiling and clapping when he comes from a distance, but for close work, he responds best to more low-key responses- a quiet ‘good boy’ or a gentle touch on his back or ears keeps him content and focused. I often ‘give it back’ when it comes to toys-Otis has a limited attention span when it comes to his toys, even the ones that he loves, so handing or tossing it back to him whenever I ask him to drop it for me works out, because after a ten minutes, he’ll drop it in front of me, unasked, wander off and do something else, so I can pick it up and put it away without having to ask him to give it up. (He fully expects that I’ll pick it up and carry it for him and he always remembers that I have it. When he feels like playing with it (no more than once or twice a day, maybe less), he’ll come up and touch his nose to the bag I carry it in).
Actually, teaching Otis to ‘fetch’ (still a somewhat loose concept for him-what he likes to do is get the ball and run around with it, dropping and pouncing on it, rolling it down a hill and lolloping after it, flinging it in the air, etc.). Despite his joyful but somewhat unstructured approach-Otis will reliably bring the ball back to me periodically and always when asked. Since he had no basic drive to fetch and no experience playing with toys at all when we adopted him, I made ‘fetch’ into an experiment of sorts, just to see how much attention my seemingly independent, inattentive dog was actually paying to me. In a large but fenced area, I threw the ball. He lolloped after it, picked it up, and played with it a bit. While he carried it, I kept my eyes on him, smiling. Whenever he moved in my direction, even by accident, I clapped and cheered. If he dropped it, which he did constantly at first, I would silently look away from him-the further away he was, the more extreme my inattention-a few feet, I’d move only my eyes. A few yards, and I’d turn my head, a few dozen yards, I’d turn my back. I don’t know whether this is positive or negative reinforcement (it depends, I suppose on whether one sees it as rewarding with attention or punishing by withdrawing attention), but it took twenty minutes to teach my “hard-headed” non-fetcher to bring me the ball every time.
Alex says
Though I never chased after her for a ball when she was a puppy, of course my Dutch Shepherd-cross learned that “Keep Away” was the best thing ever. Now, after some training, she’s become much more reliable at letting me near her when she has a toy, but I still like to reward her self-control sometimes by initiating the keep away game: I say “I’m gonna get you!” in a sneaky way, and she grabs the ball and takes off running. It’s freakin’ adorable. <3
Sarah Stremming CPDT-KA says
From the time that my dogs are puppies I make everything a toy, and I always have rules concerning toys (this rules out “stealing” non-toy objects). This way I can make a toy out of anything anywhere we are. I have made toys from bits of trash, sticks, pine cones, I have even removed a shoe and tossed it as a fetch toy. I also love to put cues on less-than-desirable behaviors that the dogs love to engage in so I can use them to my advantage. For instance I have a young dog that loves mouthy play. I put play-biting on cue (“RABIES!”) and let her bite my arms and hands when she does something brilliant and I don’t have anything else to reward her with. She loves it! I also let my older dog go visit (stare at, gotta love BCs) the small pet cages in Petsmart as a reward for heeling down the aisles.
Nadja says
Fetching a toy (or anything for that matter) out of the water. Not on land… out of the water! It’s the only thing that gets my dog excited and I enjoy reading this, hoping to find something that I will be able to use once the winter time is back…
Jorden says
Thanks so much to Roberta from Vancouver for you post about the laser pointer! Rosie loves to chase that thing, but it never occurred to me to use it as a reward! She is all about food (for anything and everything – a bit to the point of obsessiveness), but I love the idea of trying this for something different and fun. So many great ideas!
trisha says
A note of caution about laser pointers: Behaviorists like me spend an inordinate amount of time working with people whose dogs have become compulsive about laser pointers… and then lights shining through the window, and then rays of sunlight or reflections off of a shiny surface. I had one client whose dog became dysfunctional, staring for hours at the wall waiting for a light to appear. Of course, we don’t see the examples of all the dogs who have no problems with laser pointers, so we see a skewed sample. However, I’ve seen enough trouble to be very very cautious about them.
dogbreedstore says
A great and innovative example of a unique and extremely memorable reinforcer occurred in 1980. This was before clicker training was popular and the Koehler method was very much in vogue. I had a friend who leaned more towards the latter. It was quite a heated topic of discussion for us. But she and I both had a “eureka” moment which absolutely convinced her of the value of positive reinforcement.
She was working with her Briard, who on this day had a visiting bitch to breed. After her first recall, which was done with the sort of speed and enthusiasm she rarely saw, she immediately let him breed. Story has it, he never blew a recall again!
Megan says
While teaching my young pup Badger to watch the chickens, not lick them, I was suddenly out of treats when he did his best job ever of looking at me for direction etc. that I quickly grabbed an egg from my apron pocket and cracked it open for him right there. He was so surprised! And he now minds his manners very well.
Nancy Langston says
I can’t top the Briad’s reward, but when my young pit bull does a nice recall away from a deer on our hiking trail, he gets to track the deer as his reward. And once, when he recalled away from a deer carcass when we were snowshoeing in the woods, he got a hunk of haunch to lug home with him. He was pretty pleased with himself. When he’s polite with the chickens, he gets to eat their feed, but only if he shares.
Pike says
Yes – to laser pointer caution.
Ronja’s best friend Denali – a usually very laid back shepherd mix- became so obsessed with light reflections that he could no longer wear his collar with his tags on sunny days. And when the collar came off he switched to chasing his own shadow like a dog possessed.
After having played the laser pointer game for just two months, it took almost two years to wean him off his obsession. And it sure helped, that the Pacific Northwest doesn’t feature too many sunny days.
Cassie says
I didn’t have time to read all of the responses, so I hope I’m not repeating anyone-
When I walk my little pit bull Jethro I keep an eye out for gross fun things that I know he’ll like (dead stuff, old garbage, etc). I make sure to say his name so he looks up at me and reward him just by being the cool chick that is tall enough to know where the good stuff is. This rewards him for being his usual calm collected loosh leash walking self, and for having the good sense to find me interesting enough to respond to on a walk.
With new puppy owners that are trying to get their puppies housetrained, I always try to explain to them that they have to determine what their pup likes to do. If it’s get back inside because it’s too hot in Texas- then coming in as soon as they pee is a great reward. If they loooove to play around outside, then they need to make the reward a quick romp in the yard, or sniff around the apartment complex. It’s amazing how many of them never thought to look.
On the question of known cues being a reinforcer- I must say I think it is absolutely the case. For my dog, you can see his whole body lighten when I tell him to do something he knows well. He loved our training sessions and so associates the things he learned with the fun he had learning them and the good stuff that happens when he does what I ask him to do. This is clear in other ways even for a dog who didn’t learn stuff the fun positive way- A cue can be anything- not just “sit” or “down”. It is merely you asking for a behavior – the fun comes when your dog knows there is a reinforcer on the other side of it or when the behavior itself is reinforcing it (Like “sniff it”).
Amy says
My Malamute’s biggest reinforcer (short of buying her mice or gerbils to kill) is milk. She’ll go absolutely crazy for milk. The creative part is trying to figure out how to easily transport and deliver it to her.
DeAnna says
I love love love the RABIES command! Cracked me up.
Trisha, I would love if you would post sometime about warning signs for compulsive behavior, and how much is too much. The laser pointer brought it up in this thread, but there are various things that we’ve stopped playing with because we were worried that our BC-mix seemed to be getting just a *little* too into it. I’ve never started with a laser pointer (as fun as I think it would be), because I know Corrie has the ability to get overboard about such things.
I would love to hear some behaviorist input about that grey area between cute obsession and full-on compulsion in a dog, and what sort of warning signs an owner should be looking for.
Jen says
Eye boogers. My hound mutt loves her own eye boogers. So, being the crazy freak I am, I’ll clean them out and immediately use them as a treat. I think storing eye boogers might be a bit much.
And of course any thing any of the other dogs have must be way better than what the subject dog has.
And grass clumps from the lawnmower. I have used those on more than one occassion. Can also be combined with the what he has is better than what you have technique. To dog: You think the grass clump you have is good, check out this one I’m about to feed your brother…..soooo much better than yours.
Shelley Karber says
16 years ago I started my first agility dog (a Shih Tzu now at the bridge) in the sport because he was afraid of inanimate objects that moved (cupboard doors, chairs on wheels, bushes that bend in the breeze, umbrellas, you get the idea). He was a puppy mill rescue and was 2
Grimmsmama Kim says
For my female aussie mix, who it took a loooooooong time to get to tug with me in “public” (with other dogs around), i used a soft sheepy fleece for a bit but when I managed to let that devalue for her I stuck it in a hamster cage for a few days and then brought it out to reward something speedy at agility. SWEET B’JESU!! for the poster with northern breeds – it may not be quite the satisfaction of the finishing move but it was really intense for my Zen.
I’ve also had a few occassions where I’ve used my cup of coffee or an iced coffee drink to reward the dogs for something – not with a lot of actual liquid but with the pleasure of getting to lick out my cup and lots of cooing about how special they are to get it and a bit of dramatic – “oh should i give you my cup, maybe, maybe not, oh boy you are soooooo goood”. Nice impact on the preceeding behaviour (which is typically calling off of something or a fantastic weave pole performance!.
JJ says
My dog will drool for watermelon and sugar snap peas.
One thing I’m really proud of is probably more in the category of distraction than reward, but I think someone could be creative and find a way to use it as a reward. The discussion about getting a dog to tolerate nail clipping reminded me of my own situation: I sand my dogs nails with a *very* loud tool that probably also sends vibrations up my dogs legs. I do not believe Duke had ever had his nails done before he was in the shelter. They were so bad, they had been growing crooked.
Now-a-days, when it is time to do nails, I say “time for tickles”. Duke loves it – and here’s why:
JJ’s Cheesie Pop
Duke loves cheese, but cheese has a lot of calories and is gulped down in a fraction of a second without chewing. I needed something that would last and provide a very big distraction. Peanut butter did not interest him that much and didn’t last that long anyway. Finally, I came up with the idea of putting 1 to 2 tablespoons of cheese in the bottom of a ceramic cup. I also put in some kibble or other delicious edibles. Then I microwave it all for at least 40 seconds, sometimes more. I get it to the point that the mixture is stuck onto the cup like super glue and is hard as a rock. Almost, but not burnt. All Duke can do is lick it. Duke will lick it for a very long time–like an hour or more if I get the mix right and let him. Duke will me me do anything to him while he’s licking his lollipop.
I think you could use this as a reward in some cases.
I mix it up over time. Sometimes I uses different cheeses. Gouda doesn’t melt very well. Smoked cheeses give a nice added aroma. Putting the cheese in a kong sometimes works, but Duke the Great Dane has a very big tongue and the kong holes are small. The cups tend to work better for him. Also, a hard cup gives him nothing to do but lick and lick, forcing it to take a very long time.
Oh the drool that builds up on my carpet. It is a weekly giant puddle of slime. But his nails are good.
Betsy McCoy says
My rescue border collie mix pup, MerciMi Patience, loves feathers. We have a flock of chickens and geese – all behind a pasture fence so chasing is NOT an option. Merci loves to pick up stray feathers and proudly prances around carrying her treasure. Of course, nothing beats a good pile of poop. Balls of dried grass blown out of the lawn mower are also favorites.
On another note, I just put Merci in a gentle leader. She’s in her evil adolesence (I explain this period to my students as a time when you send your little girl off to school in a plaid jumper and knee socks and she comes home in a long black trench coat with her tongue pierced. Aughhh!). Her favorite activity on leash was to jump up and bite at my various body parts. I was beginning to look like a domestic abuse victim. I put her in the gentle leader yesterday and after a few bouts of pitching a fit or pouting, she got it. HOORAY!! I have my little girl in the plaid jumper back. It also extends to her behavior in the house, as well. What a great tool (and no, I don’t sell gentle leaders).
Roberta from Vancouver Island says
Re: Laser pointers. Yes, they can become objects of obsession, as Trisha mentioned. Our laser pointer comes out only when I need a high value reward, and I do monitor her carefully. Her level of arousal does go way up, but I’ve started using a trick that was mentioned on this blog a while back, which is to end the play with it shining on my foot to indicate that it’s done. She’s figured this out, and after a few hopeful glances she goes off to do something else.
So much like Jenny Chun scratching her dog’s itchy skin as a reward, this is a high value item that I use with care. But if it means my dog willingly lets me trim her nails,, I have to tell you that I’m going to use it.
Trisha, thanks for the reminder of the “dark side” of laser pointers.
Amy W. says
Thought of something else –
I often walk/hike with my dogs off leash. If they are being good on the outing – meaning they stop when asked, slow down and wait for me, come when called, and so forth – I will let them choose which trails to take or which direction to go. And if they want to go off the trail, and it’s an area I’m comfortable with – I will let them explore (with me lumbering behind them, of course) for a little while at least. I do have to admit, we’ve been a little turned around a time or two, but that scent marking thing my male does as we go along appears to also serve as a homing device. Scent marking – for when you can’t leave a trail of bread crumbs.
Carrie F. Glavin says
I just wanted to say I love your article in BARK. Its the second thing I read righ after the smiling dogs.
Alexandra says
Just wanted to echo the caution about the laser pointers. We have some friends whose dog can’t wear her ID tags outside anymore because she endlessly chases the reflection if it’s sunny outside. She will also routinely get fixated for long periods of time on reflections from a watch, a glass of water, or even a simple shadow on the ceiling or floor. This all started with the laser pointer game.
Jen in OH says
I once used a cat as an impromptu “treat.” My beagle/husky/lab mix Maggie has never mastered the art of recall over her desire to track down a good scent, so she’s never allowed off-lead in our small-town neighborhood. Following her love of sniffing is a love of cats – she wants to play with them, lick them, snuggle with them – anything to be near them. One day she accidentally got out through a flimsy screen door and headed across the street. She had that intense stiff-shouldered-ears-tipped-forward-I’m-not-listening-cuz-I’m-scenting look which meant I had only seconds before she took off in earnest. Luckily my mom’s cat was in the front yard with me (my folks live next door and Maggie and the cats are buddies). So I grabbed poor Stubbers and held him in the air and yelled, “Maggie! Kitty!” I was floored and thrilled when she lifted her head to look at me and the cat and came running back to us. I carried the cat in the house with me and Maggie followed, and I put the cat down and let them play for a little while. It’s not a reliable method that I could recommend, but Maggie’s love of kitties helped me head off a potentially bad situation. 🙂
trisha says
Jen in OH, and everyone in everywhere: First, I knew you would all come through with some great ideas and stories, but you have absolutely blown me away with your creativity. Jen’s story about the cat is HILARIOUS, and just adds to my admiration for so many of you. Although I agree grabbing a cat and holding it up in the air probably isn’t a method we could recommend, the image of it created the best laugh I’ve had all day. My injured knee is wearing me out (the doc said: imagine a major league baseball player hit your knee cap with a wooden bat as hard as he could) and my pup has some kind of medical problem, given that he has to urinate every 10 minutes (yeah, am checking out the obvious potentials…) and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate a good laugh right now. I’ll pair “Kitty bait” with Sarah’s “RABIES! ” cue, along with so many other fantastic ideas and laugh and smile my way up the stairs . . . you are all just amazing.
Ravana says
Jen–Doesn’t EVERYONE feed their dog the eye boogers after they clean out the dog’s eyes? I’ve never had a dog who didn’t want to eat that goo.
On obsessing. It reminded me of another reinforcement. My guy is obsessed with a park in town which is full of nut trees and therefore full of squirrels. On every morning walk he tries to lead me to that park right away. The rule is that we won’t go into the park unless he poops (or else we can end up taking a whole walk without him pooping). Some days he’ll poop quickly and then turn immediately towards the park and on others we’ll be walking home and almost get to the park when he’ll get this, “Oh no! I didn’t poop!” expression on his face and will RUN to the curb. So I guess I use the obsession as a reinforcement for doing is duty.
AnneJ says
Oh, I thought of another one that goes along with the eye boogers reinforcement. Our sadly missed old guy Farley used to love to eat toenail clippings so I’d reward him for sitting to have his nails done by letting him have the bits that came off. And I didn’t have to sweep.
Frances says
Not at all creative, but we have had a bit of a breakthrough in the last few days. Sophy – unlike my first papillon -has never been greatly into toys or rough housing. She is a relaxed, laid back little dog, which makes her wonderful to live with, but a bit difficult to get enthused about training and games. She has now decided that the tickle tummy game is BRILLIANT – I have an open mouthed, giggly little papillon asking to play it, and throwing behaviours at me to try and persuade me. So, just because your dog didn’t like that particular reward last week, doesn’t mean everything may not have changed next week! (She joined in tickling Poppy’s tummy – Poppy loves all that sort of thing – and seems to have cottoned onto it from that.)
Ashley says
I love the idea of creative reinforcement! I have 2 digs, a 9 year old terrier mix and a 6 year old shih tzu. Both of them love being outside and sniffing things. Lately with the nice weather I have been using opening the sliding glass door or window (leaving the screen in place), as a reward. They love it.
My terrier mix is also quite a licker. In cases where I need her to be calmer or I have no treats, I let her lick my hand a few times. She has been very responsive to it though I still dislike her obsessive licking.
Hannah Branigan says
Here is another water-hose-as-reinforcement video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBLsdJTbWR8
This is my 12m Terv puppy, Spark, using the opportunity to chase water from the hose as reinforcement. I also use it as an Off Switch game, because she gets pretty worked up chasing… well, anything. So we chase for a while, start getting excited, then do something calm, like sit or down. I do the same game with ball and tug toys.
Jana Rade says
Jasmine will do anything if there is a promise of a walk to be anticipated. For her, a walk is the main reinforcement. She’d stand on her head for it! 🙂
Janae Ulva says
I don’t have a particularly creative positive reinforcement but I have a story that is similar in the aspect that sometimes with dogs one has to think fast.
Back when I had a German Shepherd I was training obedience on a Schutzhund field along with a other people and their dogs. A women had her Doberman on the field, off leash, and I don’t know why but it took off like a shot at my dog. I was freaked thinking ah oh dog fight. In a split second I realized that the jute tug I had in my hand might distract the Doberman and threw it off to the side when the dog got in close. It worked! The Doberman ran for the tug and a fight was averted. phew!
Another time, while riding my bicycle after a really long day of working, working out and peddling every where, a German Shepherd came running out at me. I was in the middle of a big hill and there was traffic. I didn’t have the strength to try and out run him not to mention I had my water bottle in my hand. That was it, I aimed for him and squeezed the bottle. Right between the eyes. It worked like a charm. To this day I have two water bottles when I ride – one for me to drink and one to fend off charging dogs 🙂
Mary says
This is really late, but I think it’s a fun one. I especially like this reinforcer because it would clearly be punishing to so many dogs, except when it’s not! It’s a great example of how we can’t necessarily decide what is or is not reinforcing for a dog.
Water sprayed in the face. I happened to capture a 30 second video of my dog responding to this reinforcer the other day:
Amy from Maine says
Hi Tricia!!
My little aussie/pap mix LOVES to run the fence line that borders my horses when the horses get running around. I try to discourage it and what works best is when I bring out a lunge line. Chasing the lunge line is more reinforcing than racing the fence line with the horses. I can now herd my horses in from the back pasture with this little dog so long as I have a lunge line with me for him to play with instead. Before, I had to manage him by leashing him because the prospect of chasing the horses was WAY too much for him, he would SCREAM and SCREAM. He now expects his lunge line when we go bring the horses in. Works GREAT! His need to chase is transfered to the lunge line!
Another example that isn’t mine, but is pretty cool – my favorite agility instructor’s young BC is OBSESSED with the ocean and waves. So much so that he was totally blowing her off so he could race and play in the waves. She used that to help teach focus on jumping and doing agility and working with her instead of playing in the ocean. Watch this video where she is teaching him to go to the water on cue only……
http://www.youtube.com/user/kavaadch#p/u/16/IgAAYIH-9eE
Kris from Brushyrun says
Having raised and trained beagles for many years, it is rather interesting that I now own a dog that is NOT food motivated — my Cardigan Welsh Corgi, ‘Indy”. Most of my beagles would give you the world for a single piece of dry kibble… while Indy might examine a slice of bacon or prime rib for upwards of five minutes before deciding if it is worthy of consumption.
For Indy, the most effective means of reinforcement happens to be “work” itself — he absolutely loves to have a job to do. I believe it is the close interaction with his person, and the focus of attention that is inherently rewarding for him. When Indy is off lead and gives me a reliable recall despite a potentially distracting situation, the very best form of positive reinforcement is to pull out a lead, clip it on, and then go through a series of Rally-O exercises.
Even though Indy can and does obey off lead, the leash continues to have very positive associations for him (likely because so many public places require that dogs be kept on lead, and Indy enjoys going places)… so I use that to advantage. Indy loves to perform a variety of turns and pivots and the like (Rally-O style), along with the classic ‘push ups’ (alternating sits and downs). The more challenging the series of commands I present him with, and the more he needs to actually think about what he is doing and pay attention, the more he seems to enjoy it. While I will always love the hounds, training my Cardi has been quite a refreshing experience — they are so entirely different in terms of what they find motivating/rewarding. A good example of why dog training is not a case of “one size fits all”!
Melanie S says
I’ve only just had time to read through all these great responses to the post.
My whippet really loves pepitas as a food positive reinforcer, you know, the inner kernel of a pumpkin seed… yep, he loves those. They rate only a little below dried liver treats.
When we’re out an about and he’s off leash and becomes distracted by something, or is getting a little further ahead that I’d like, I call him and if he comes back well I’ll often say a quick “Well done” with a stroke along his body and then I say “Ready…” and hold a crouching, poised to run pose. Slip seems to love the anticipation and locks gazes with me, waiting until I say either “Okay!” or “Way you go!”. Other times I don’t do the “Ready…” I just say “Well done” as soon as he returns and immediately follow it with “Way you go!”. My intention is to reward his good return with what he really wants to do which is to accelerate and free run again, and I also want him to know that returning to me doesn’t necessarily mean the loss of free-running.
Denise says
I know this is late but your Bark article got me interested. My Boxer mix loves to sniff and lick my ears which is quite convenient since I always have 2 of them with me at all times… 🙂