Examining the Canine Good Citizen Program

Mar 202011
 

AKC’s Canine Good Citizen program is in many ways excellent: it invites people to begin training their dogs, to teach basic manners, to go to classes, and even to walk into the “ring” for the first time.  I have long supported this appealing program, have taught CGC classes, and have directed many novices to it as an appropriate beginning…

However, the CGC program, and state legislative resolutions endorsing this program, has some profoundly worrisome potential consequences for future dogs and their owners.  Please take a few minutes to carefully consider not only the details of the program, but also the way it might be used or manipulated in coming years. These questions may not immediately seem correct—they are contrary to how you have likely thought about the CGC program for years or decades—but they are well worth our careful contemplation.

First, let me recount a disturbing historical pattern: time after time leaders in the dog world have supported seemingly positive ideas that have been usurped by the Animal Rights movement to divide animal owners into little groups that could easily be conquered. Our own programs have repeatedly been distorted into weapons against dogs and the people who love them:

  1. We encouraged spaying and neutering for most casual owners for lots of seemingly good reasons and for years we told people it was the responsible thing to do. Animal Rights supporters took it over and legislated mandatory S/N.
  2. We encouraged people to revile pet stores, backyard breeders, puppymills, designer breeds. We said adoption was wonderful.  They took it a step further and said only adopt, and let’s make all those bad options illegal.
  3. We said vaccinate your dogs as appropriate.  They said keep all dogs ‘utd’ on all shots on our schedule, even if it is a bad schedule, or you are abusing your dog.
  4. We said that people should not get more dogs than they could handle as this would lead to inadequate care, they legislated that nobody can own more than X dogs.
  5. We preached that people not leave dogs in hot cars with the windows rolled up.  They tweaked that message to become never leave any dog in any car or you are an abuser.
  6. We encouraged people to provide better veterinary care for their animals, and now absurd veterinary choices like how often to clean teeth are being used to seize people’s dogs.

In essence, we have spent decades trying to share our views of the ideal, and how we can all nudge closer to perfection for our animals, and AR advocates have twisted our fundamentally good ideas to be horrific ideas by insisting that the loftiest of ideals ought to become the legal minimum.

I believe that the CGC is another initially positive program that will soon be used to divide dogs and owners. Just as in all the other cases above, the distance between the message that people should teach their dogs basic manners and the message that every dog must pass this test is a very short and slippery one.

Not only does the CGC set a very dangerous precedent, but also it contains some intrinsic problems:

  1. Dogs are NOT citizens.  People are.  People are responsible for ensuring that their dogs’ behavior is not disruptive to society.  The onus must always remain on owners to be responsible citizens, not dogs.  Otherwise we set ourselves up for ARs to start passing not only breed specific laws, but soon behavior specific laws.
  2. Dogs are not good or bad. They simply are what their nature and experiences make them, and “goodness” is not a relevant value judgment. Dogs that cannot pass this test are not bad.  Not even less good. Low drive, non-reactive, docile, agreeable dogs are not the only good dogs! There are many sorts of dogs (and other species) that may not be well suited to the CGC test but are fabulous pets.  People own different sorts of dogs for countless different reasons and in countless different ways. So long as they can keep those pets safely and humanely, that should be just fine.

The CGC program perpetuates the ever narrowing range of what is a “good” dog.  Prey drive, reactivity, fearfulness, over-confidence, exuberance, protectiveness, and playfulness are not bad. Whatever dog an individual wants to own is a good dog if its owner keeps it safely and does not allow it to impinge upon anyone else’s rights.  Nothing else should matter to society or our legislature.

People absolutely should be encouraged to teach their dogs basic manners, and much more, but as we support this process we must be extremely careful that we do not inadvertently support the notion that any dog that cannot pass a particular test must be a bad dog. If this is endorsed at the state level, what municipality would want to welcome dogs that are not good citizens?  What will happen to the millions of great dogs who are not suited to this test, or the millions of dogs whose owners are not willing or able to pursue the CGC?

The language and attitude of the CGC program plays perfectly into the hands of the AR movement. I have little doubt that the AKC believes it is a defense against such attacks—that by demonstrating how well-mannered these dogs are we prevent bad laws, but I believe this is exactly the same as the other examples I cited in that it will have the opposite effect over time—it will create a line that will eventually be used to criminalize everyone who is on the wrong side.  It may temporarily save the handful of dogs that have CGCs, but it will do so by sacrificing the vast majority of dogs and owners. Admittedly the CGC program becoming mandatory would be a huge financial victory for the AKC, and a huge practical victory for the AR movement, but it would be a huge loss for dogs everywhere.

40 states and the US Senate have already passed resolutions “endorsing the CGC test and supporting its effort to promote responsible dog ownership.”  Insurance companies have already offered discounts for dogs with CGCs. These are the first steps on a short path to making dogs without CGCs uninsurable and ultimately illegal. This test will simply become one more excuse to eliminate millions of pet homes and pets.

Some readers will perceive this post as being overly paranoid, others will feel that the benefits of the CGC program outweigh these risks, others stopped reading long ago! These are all fine responses, you must decide for yourself how you feel, I merely wanted to lay out some issues in hopes you will give some serious thought to future consequences.  It is no longer sufficient for us to innocently create programs that under ideal circumstances might be a good idea.  We must ask ourselves: How will this tool be used by those who seek to eliminate animal ownership?

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 March 20, 2011  Posted by at 6:15 pm

Helping Your Dog Learn to Love to Swim

Feb 262011
 

I am a passionate advocate of swimming your dog.  It is one of the very best all around exercise activities, it is a great way to cool them down on hot days, reduce parasites, keep your dogs clean, and generally have a great time.

The vast majority of dogs will learn to love swimming.  Some will take longer than others, and a few might never come to love it, but for most it will become a favorite activity and is well worth the time spent introducing.

First of all, there are a few things to avoid:

  1. Do not take your dog to the water—the first few times—unless you are ready to get wet.  I am amazed how many people I see on the beach trying to get their dogs to swim while the owners are wearing shoes and are running away from each wave.  You dog looks to you for leadership, and if you act like water is something to be avoided, they will too!  So make sure that, before you get anywhere near the water, you have removed your shoes, rolled up your pants, put on a swimsuit, or whatever else you need to do so that they will see you happily and enthusiastically entering the water.
  2. Do not force your dog—do not pull, push, drag, shove, or trick your dog into the water.
  3. Try to avoid the accidental entry.  Do not start out on a slippery dock, or a steep edge, or in a location where the surface of the water appears solid and your dog will try to run onto it and sink…

A few times before you head out to swim, take your dog to shallow water to splash around.  Warm, fun, shallow, where you can both run and play fetch and generally have a great time in the water.

Next, create an optimal situation for swimming:

  1. Pick a warm day. I know you may be excited, but rushing and trying to get them to enjoy going into the water when they are cold and uncomfortable will backfire.
  2. Select a great location:
    • Select water with no current or waves.
    • Pick reasonably warm water.
    • Look for a place with a gradual slope into the water so that they never have to step off a precipice—they just walk forward and find themselves swimming.
  3. Easy egress: a dog that feels trapped in a pool or other body of water is prone to panic and not want to get back in the water.
  4. In a perfect world, you find a pond that is narrow, so they do not have to turn around to exit, and can just swim a few feet across.  But these are hard to find, so if they have to turn it is not the end of the world.
  5. Take along a water loving dog, or a couple of water loving dogs. Seeing other dogs run and jump into the water can help your dog see that it is fun and not frightening.
  6. Have treats, floating kibble, and a few favorite toys in your pockets.

When you first arrive, head down to the water, enter right away, and start playing in the shallows.  Go out a few feet past where your dog can still stand, and lure him with whatever he finds most enticing.  Ideally you want him to swim just a stroke or two, get rewarded, and then swim back to solid ground so he know he can. Do this a few times, and then start gradually increasing the distance.  And really, that is it—once they are swimming comfortably you just start gradually increasing the distance and you are off to the races.  You may want to carefully introduce them to current and waves and dock diving, but essentially once they can swim these are all easy if you make them fun and go slowly.

Some dogs swim too vertically—instead of kicking with their rear legs and moving forward, they try to swim up and out of the water and their front feet come out of the water and splash and they get nowhere.  The key to helping these dogs is to motivate them forward—throw a ball or a treat so that they are focused on that and are pushing to get to the reward, and they will accidentally start moving forward, and will teach themselves that forward motion works better than vertical…  If necessary, you can support their rear slightly and help them to move forward.

It is possible that with some dogs, even after doing everything above, they will just not take that last step.  If this is the case, depending on your dog’s attitude, it may be time to force the issue:

  1. Find a creek crossing where your dog will have no choice but to swim or be left behind, and wade across.
  2. If your dog is of a size that he can be lifted, carry him out past the point where he would have to swim, face him towards shore, and gently set him in the water, still supporting him somewhat, and let him swim to shore.  Repeat this a few times.  Try to praise when he is swimming, not when he gets to shore.
  3. Find a pond where you can swim out and make them feel like you are leaving and call them to come to you.

I have had many dogs that needed no help—they just ran in and started swimming.  Some have taken a few trips, while a few have taken up to a year to really start loving water.  I have only had one dog over the years that never really came to like swimming.  He liked splashing and wading, but not swimming.  But in fairness, I do want to point out that the point of this is for your dog to have fun, so if your dog does not enjoy swimming, move on to another activity.  But most dogs, if you are a little patient and enthusiastic, will come to love swimming…

 

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 February 26, 2011  Posted by at 11:58 pm

Resource Guarding

Feb 162011
 

Your puppy is a delightful charmer most of the time, but when he has a favorite treat, a stolen sock, or gets near the food bowl or refrigerator, he turns into an evil beast …  What to do?

I write about this issue with some trepidation because in many cases it is not something that should be tackled without experienced assistance.  This is not because it is particularly difficult to resolve—in most cases it can be completely eliminated in a few weeks of relatively simple work.  Rather, it is because there is something of an art involved in determining when to implement which techniques, and applying the wrong technique in a particular case can easily exacerbate the problem or create new problems.  There are moments when confrontation will be effective, and moments when it will completely backfire, and unless you have been through it a few times they are very hard to tell apart… Additionally, resource guarding is not something to ignore or address ineffectively for very long—it is a behavior that tends to become ingrained with rehearsal and can be very challenging to eliminate once it is habitual.  So, I am going to enumerate a few techniques that are useful, but if you do not see immediate improvement, I would strongly encourage you to find an authentic expert to help…

The first thing you need to genuinely understand is that resource guarding does not mean you have a bad dog.  It is not a bad behavior, nor a sign that your dog does not love you.  This is simply an animal behaving in one of the most natural ways possible.  Virtually every animal has evolved to guard valuable resources.  Particularly wolves, who live in packs, have for millennia needed to protect what is theirs.  Those that did not do this died millions of years ago, so growling, snarling, snapping and otherwise telling your packmates that you are not going to share is very much hardwired into every canid. You also need to remember that after a snarl comes a bite, so be careful–your dog is behaving in a reasonable way, but you certainly can be injured, so do not push beyond where you feel comfortable.

Here are things to work on to resolve general resource guarding (note: if the resource your puppy guards is you or your lap, that is somewhat different, this list applies to dogs that are guarding food or toys):

  1. Give: you need to teach your dog to drop what is in his mouth.  This is not a negative—just another behavior.  He gives, you reward him with a treat.  Then you can have him get the object again, and then give.  He is learning to give on command and also that giving does not equate to loss.  Start doing this with low-value items and work up until he can give just about anything on command and get a treat…
  2. Leave it / Take it: you must be able to sit on the floor with your dog and toss treats, sometimes saying take it other times saying leave it, and having him absolutely listen.  If he cannot do this with low value treats in a controlled situation, you have little chance of success when he has something valuable and is 20 feet away…
  3. Stay and wait for treat: work on having your dog sit before you give him dinner.  Sit before you hand him a yummy treat, and hold the sit until you release him.  He needs to learn patience and delayed gratification, and that you control the resources.
  4. General deference: as a rule, dogs that are guarding resources tend to have an inflated sense of their standing in the pack.  They need to learn in other contexts that YOU are the one making the decisions.  A basic obedience class can go a long way to establishing the right relationship, as can a few training sessions per day on anything. In particular, they need to learn to hold a stay with distractions, to wait at the door, to get out of your way when you are walking, to accept restraint, to relax in the face of stimulus, and other subtle lessons that reinforce that they are not the decision-maker in this pack.
  5. There is no shortage of resources: I like to work on resource issues (at first) when my dog is not particularly hungry, and I like to give LOTS of treats and food and rewards during the training.  I want him to “feel” like his world is full of bounty and he does not really need to fight for resources because resources are virtually infinite.
  6. I will trade you something better:  I often call my dogs to me when they have a toy or something they like, and I give something awesome in exchange.  A piece of steak or something.  I do this all the time with things they have that are NOT critical, so they just become habituated to my calling them, taking what they have, and giving them something better.
  7. Management: while you are working on fixing this issue you need to make sure that your dog is not rehearsing the undesired behavior, this means whatever he is tending to guard you need to make sure he is NOT getting it and guarding it at random times.  Pick up socks, move the cat food, and in general make sure there are no opportunities for your dog to gain possession of high value items that are disallowed.
  8. Feeding by hand:  lots of hand-feeding, entire meals.  You want him to associate that the resources come from you.   That you are the key to his getting more.
  9. At dinner time, put his bowl on the ground, and reach down and drop a handful of food into the bowl.  Repeat until he has eaten his entire dinner, one handful at a time.
  10. Have him do a few behaviors while you are holding his dinner bowl, before you set it down.  End with him in a sit, and do not let him get up until you release him.
  11. Feeding from fork: feed really yummy treats from a fork.  This helps him learn to be less grabby and more thoughtful and restrained about taking treats.
  12. Hands in food bowl: spend lots of time with your hands around his food bowl.  Moving it, adding food, adding higher value treats, holding it, having it in your lap, etc.
  13. Feed him in different places.  Sometimes in privacy, other times in the middle of life.  Do not avoid him when he is eating, go about your business so he learns that people walking around are not a threat to him.
  14. Pet him when he is eating. Start gradually, you may be some distance away, but hang out at the distance where he starts to get tense, and gradually decrease this distance, never getting so close that he is uncomfortable, until you can sit next to him and pet him while he stays relaxed and eats.
  15. Incompatible fun behavior: practice doing something he loves that is also exciting and endorphin inducing as an alternative.  Call him away from a bone to come play tug or fetch.  In essence you are instilling the sense that the resource is less valuable than coming to play with you.
  16. Incompatible static deferential behavior: sometimes call him away from an exciting resource and put him into a down for five minutes and then let him return.  You are conditioning him to stop, listen, restrain himself, and relax in the middle of a rewarding resource experience.
  17. Growling at me does not work: in general if a dog growls at me, I make sure that the growl does not get him what he wanted.  If he wanted to push me away, I step forward, if he wanted to tell me not to take something, I take it…  However, you need to be very careful with this, because if the dog is growling from insecurity, you do not want to reinforce that insecurity by advancing, adding pressure, or taking something away.  You also need to be safe, so if the dog is going to bite, do not push the issue.  And, you need to be careful not to take away a dog’s best tool for warning you—there may be times in life when your dog needs to legitimately warn you or someone else, and you want him to know that growling is better than silent biting and that he will not simply be ignored if the issue is real and legitimate.
  18. Growling at me has negative consequences: with all the same cautions as above, there may come a moment when a particular dog growls and the right response is to correct him.  To tell him, “No, that crap will not be tolerated…”  If you think you are in this position, enlist the aid of an experienced and objective trainer who can confirm that your dog is being a jerk and needs to be corrected.  However, while I am a very positive trainer, I also want to make clear my view that this behavior cannot be tolerated, and there absolutely is a point at which I will not be nice.  Just as I understand that my dog is behaving reasonably according to pack mentality, he needs to understand that, according to the same rules, I am not a member of the pack to whom he gets to be nasty, no matter how much he wants something.  A dog that will growl or bite to protect “his” resources is likely to end up homeless, and will then likely fail most shelters’ evaluations and will be killed, so not fixing this behavior is not an option.

There are many additional techniques, but if you consistently and effectively work on these, all but the most dire resource guarders are likely to be fixed.  However, let me reiterate: resource guarding can almost always be fixed, and doing so is generally fairly simple, but you really need to be able to read your dog’s underlying emotional state and respond appropriately, so if you are not confident that you can do that, seek skilled help soon!

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 February 16, 2011  Posted by at 10:32 pm

A Challenge: Organize an Animal Lovers’ Day in your State!

Feb 062011
 

Whenever any animal care issue is discussed in the media or in the legislature, Animal Rights advocates describe their opponents as greedy, immoral, uncaring, “puppy-millers” who exploit animals for profit, or mentally deranged abusers who neglect or harm animals out of malevolence.

Such miscreants unfortunately do exist, but they are not the people fighting against the AR Bills.

The people fighting against the AR Bills are a third group that is neither the AR side nor the animal abuser side: the huge army of dedicated animal owners that are the very best animal caregivers and most committed animal lovers in the world who believe that animals can and should share our homes and that with proper care captive animals can have lives that are every bit as rich and full as any wild animal’s existence.

Time after time, these serious animal lovers, despite outnumbering the Animal Rights supporters fifty to one, are essentially invisible in the conversation.

We need to show the legislators who we are! We need to show them that the genuine experts are not HSUS bureaucrats with “no particular fondness for animals,” but rather are those people who devote their lives to animals and who possess authentic knowledge and expertise regarding what is best for animals.

Gov. Kulongoski plays with Sampson.

To accomplish this, we must put together extensive pro-animal carnivals next to each state capital during each legislative session. One powerful asset that we often underutilize in politics is our amazing animals: we took a baby lion in to meet the Governor, and pretty much every person at the capital came and sat on the floor with us and played with the lion, gaining some hands-on appreciation for the animal and listening to us explain what animals really need… Picture an agility demo, TTouch, dock diving, Sacco cart rides, exotic animals, tricks, flyball, a really nice petting zoo, disc dogs, freestyle demo, 4H, FFA, falconers, etc. Imagine free sweatshirts, calendars, pictures, bumper stickers, and pamphlets all reiterating our message: animals can and should be happy sharing the world with us.

We must showcase our community of genuine, serious animal lovers who do such an astonishing job taking care of their animals but are being painted as villains. Show legislators what truly happy and well-cared for animals look like.  Animal people get together for fun matches and carnivals and demos all the time for far less important causes. With a little organization we could pull together a great, uplifting, Animal-Lover’s Day at the capital in each state that would convey how adored, pampered, and happy our animals are, what a large and vibrant community we are, how much expertise we possess, and how many votes we represent.

Lawmakers often support Animal Rights bills because they erroneously believe such legislation will help animals.  We need to introduce these influential people to the real animals who truly need legislators to step up and help protect them from those who value delusive animal rights more than animals.

I implore anyone who is reading this to organize such an event in your state!  You need not be a great animal trainer or knowledgeable lobbyist, you simply need to utilize your organizational skills, get permission from the capital, and get the word out in your state.  If you do, an army of eager compatriots will materialize to pull together all the details and help you put together a great demonstration that will truly benefit the animals of your state.

So please, get out there and organize an Animal Lover’s Day at your state capital, and report back here, because I would love to hear how it goes…

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 February 6, 2011  Posted by at 11:04 pm

Are Animal Actors Paid More Than Human Actors?

Feb 012011
 

The other day I read a list of fun facts about “The Wizard of Oz,” one of which was “reports suggest each Munchkin earned $50 per week, while Toto bagged $125 per week.”

The notion that animals out-earn their human counterparts is one I hear occasionally, most often from a low-budget producer who is balking at the idea that an animal might earn more than he does…

I thought perhaps it would be useful if I explained some of what goes into the animal team budget, and why it sometimes seems like an animal is earning more than a human:

  1. Nine times out of ten, this just is not true.  On all but the smallest jobs, the actors earn more, often far more than the animals.
  2. Animals and trainers get no residuals. The actors may earn twenty times more in the years to come than they did on the day, while the animal team earns nothing after that day;
  3. The animal fee includes more than one animal, often 3 or 4 per character;
  4. The animal fee is divided between at least 2 on-set trainers;
  5. The animal fee subsidizes employees back at the ranch caring for the other animals;
  6. The animal fee includes weeks or months of prep time spent training and rehearsing the scenes.  You can just tell an actor to climb the ladder, but it may take weeks to train an animal to climb the same ladder;
  7. Animals never earn more: even when we are working on 100M movie and the actors are getting millions each, the animals and trainers are getting essentially the same amount that may have seemed large on a tiny production.  So the actor or producer will climb the ladder and earn far more later in his career to average out the small paying early jobs, while the animal has to earn a fair and livable wage on every project;
  8. It is quite expensive to feed even a few large carnivores per day;
  9. The animal team often works longer hours than actors: after wrap, the cast and much of the crew may go out for drinks and then back to the hotel. We are feeding, exercising, walking, grooming, picking up poop, changing bedding, and repairing tack, and then we may get up hours before anyone else to take the animals out for some exercise before filming begins;
  10. The animal team works 7 days per week: when almost everyone else gets a day off, we still need to be taking care of the animals, feeding, and practicing with them so they are ready for their next scene;
  11. An animal and trainer may have spent years of unpaid training to be ready;
  12. Sometimes the animal simply has a bigger part.  For example, Toto had a more central and larger role than any Munchkin and appeared in almost every scene of the movie, or Lassie or RinTinTin who put more butts in seats than most human actors;
  13. Sometimes the animal is extremely expensive to secure: there are countless actors available to play any role, there may only be a few snow leopards in the world;
  14. Often the animal has more experience and better credits;
  15. Transport: most actors drive to set in a Prius or get a ride from production while the animal team needs a large truck and/or trailer to transport animals and keep them comfortable and safe throughout the day;
  16. Facilities: many animals cannot be kept in an apartment, or even a typical house, so large acreages of expensive land are required;
  17. The animal department has a huge array of tools that need to be purchased and maintained.  Brushes, leashes, cages, beepers, clickers, looksticks, etc;
  18. Permits and licensing fees to legally keep animals and work them in the film industry are considerable;
  19. Animal companies need to maintain considerable insurance;
  20. Hazard compensation: working with animals generally means getting kicked, bitten, and scratched.  Often times it means working with animals that are easily capable of killing a person;
  21. Supply/Demand: every movie needs actors, only a few need animals.  This means that even the best animals may only work 20 days in their lifetime;
  22. After filming is complete, the animal trainer has to pay to feed and care for the animal for its lifetime, even if she never gets another job. Veterinary care, enrichment, vitamins, housing, food, etc.

So on most jobs the human actors really earn far more than the animals.  Even on days when it may appear that a single animal is making “more” money than many of the people on set, it is quite rare that the net profit of any individual person or animal in the animal department exceeds that of most actors.  In fact, if you look at most animal companies, it is rare that there is a net profit.  Most companies do this work because they love the animals and want to spend their days playing with them, and this work supports that passion, so none of this is a complaint!  We love what we do, and wanted to explain a few of the reasons that typical industry animal rates are what they are…

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 February 1, 2011  Posted by at 8:54 pm

Maximizing Puppy Potential

Jan 282011
 

I was discussing with a friend what I believe are the primary activities to maximize puppy development, and he asked me for a list, so…

In my opinion, your goal is NOT to have a perfect puppy; rather, it is to have a perfect dog.  The reason I stress this difference is that many people try to achieve adult goals quickly, and unintentionally overshoot the mark as their animal matures.  You need to think of your puppy as a sapling: not yet a tree, merely a potential tree.  It is your job to nurture, prune, bend, and otherwise create spaces and pressures so that as the puppy grows and develops it will become the best dog it can.  For example: let’s imagine that you have a puppy who is playing too enthusiastically, so you discourage play at every opportunity.  A year later, this dog begins to mature, and naturally reduces his playfulness by a significant percentage.  This natural reduction, coupled with your modification, yields a dog that has NO interest in playing.  Instead, you need to look at your puppy’s play drive, and his personality and breed, and make a best guess at where his play drive is likely to be in a few years, and then apply training techniques to increase or reduce that end-point rather than to modify the current behavior.

This article is not about socializing (which I discussed here).

This article is not about teaching “behaviors” to your puppy, although in the first few months I generally teach the basics: name recognition, sit, down, stand, come, stay, wait, spin, twist, speak, rollover, foot, other foot, feet up, feet off, head down, lift, mark, take, hold, give, get, hup, cover, shake, touch, press, sit-up, rise-up, left, right, easy, over, under, on-your-side, back, agility obstacles, etc.

This article is about core skills, attributes, and attitudes that will allow your dog and you to have a great relationship for decades to come.  These are the things that, without even really thinking about it, we start doing with every puppy the moment they arrive, and are always surprised when we meet dogs do not seem to have spent time developing.

  1. Attention:  I spend a huge amount of time rewarding simple eye contact.  Teaching my dog to look at my eyes, to look to me for cues, to look to me when distracted, to look to me when nervous. Without attention almost no training is possible.
  2. Drive: I spend lots of time building the drives I want, diminishing those I do not, and refining them all to mesh with my preferences.
  3. Playing the game: virtually every training session I ever have with my dogs is based on the notion that we are a team working together to achieve a shared objective.  My dog needs to understand that I am the leader in our team, but that I am there to help him succeed.  That in every transaction, there are paths to success and reward.  That if he can figure out what I want, I will give him praise and play and treats and whatever else he enjoys.
  4. Response contingency: I want my dogs to understand that they can control their worlds.  I set up lots of situations in which they can make choices to be in the wind or not, in the light or not, on the bed or not.  I want them to learn that their actions can alter and define their world.
  5. Problem solving:  almost every day I set up problems for my puppies to solve.
  6. Curiosity: I regularly introduce new items, and make sure they are fun or yummy when investigated, so he learns that novel items are worth investigating.
  7. Patience/self control: I want my puppy to understand delayed gratification. We do lots of Premack exercises in which I put a reward 10 feet away, but he cannot go get it until he does what I ask.
  8. Calmness/thoughtfulness/non-reactiveness in stimulating situations: this is closely related to socialization, but is not identical. I spend lots of times rewarding a thoughtful attitude in a challenging environment.
  9. Comfort in restraint: I want my puppy to be comfortable being held down, carried, or otherwise restrained.  We play lots of games in which he is held, and gets released and rewarded only when he relaxes.
  10. Confidence: I mostly work on this when socializing, but I almost always want my dogs to be confident, so I spend a lot of time rewarding this attitude.  It is MORE important to me that my dog be confident than that he has “manners” which I can always train later.  So In the first year, I reinforce confidence, even if he is putting his feet up, or chewing on something or doing something that I will ultimately not want…
  11. Respect: I want my dog to yield to me spatially, to release things when I ask for them, etc.  But training and earning respect in a young puppy must be very subtle or it will erode his self-confidence.  If he is extremely self-confident, then you may spend more time on respect, if he is less confident, you may not work on respect much at all…
  12. Settling when asked: I want my dog to understand that there will be times when I want him to go lie down.  Not play, not get into things, but just go settle.  So we work on this for brief periods right from the start.
  13. Look where I point.
  14. Body awareness: I want my dogs to be aware of their rear feet, their tail, where their bodies are.
  15. Connectedness: I want my puppy looking for me as the center of the universe.  This requires that, for many months, I be fun and interesting and warrant his focus.  It also requires that I give him focus, because if your dog is looking to you for cues and you are not paying attention, he will quickly learn not to look to you.
  16. Enjoy a wide variety of foods.
  17. Play with me: I want my dog to LOVE to play, so we do it often and joyously, and we end before he gets bored.  I particularly work on tug and fetch.
  18. Play with other dogs: many people do nothing to teach their dogs “how” to play with other dogs and are then surprised that their dog learns a style that they do not like.  I spend a lot of time teaching my dogs what is preferred: lie down with small dogs, do not go harder than a certain threshold, etc.
  19. Bite Inhibition (for details on how I train bite inhibition, look here)
  20. Body position matters: sit, down, heel, on-your-side, and many other behaviors are built on the notion that the position of a dog’s body matters.  So early in life I start instilling the notion that it matters whether the puppy goes under or over something, or on the left or the right, or sits or downs…
  21. Relationship of the dog’s position to my body or another object matter.  So I play games where it matters whether the puppy is on my left or my right, is looking at me or not, is looking at a particular object, etc.
  22. Swimming is fun. (not merely tolerable, but FUN!)
  23. Weather tolerance.  Wet grass, cold floors, rain, snow, heat, all are fun.
  24. Bathing/drying/nail-clipping/toothbrushing/ear-clearing are fun: it is amazing how much more pleasant life is with a dog that genuinely enjoys standing for a bath, so spend a few hours now making it fun and pleasant, and you will thank yourself for years to come!
  25. Car rides are fun. (not merely tolerable, but FUN!)
  26. Crates are fun, moving crates are fun, loud crates are fun. (not merely tolerable, but FUN!)
  27. Cats and other prey animals are not to be injured.
  28. Collection: I really want my dogs to be able to be running and quickly collect themselves to turn or jump or transition if necessary.
  29. Using your nose to find things: while most dogs are naturally very scent oriented, this skill can be significantly developed in their early months.  And the idea can be instilled that they need to use this skill when asked…
  30. Objects have names:  I do not need my dog to know 500 different items by name, but I want him to understand the concept that a specific word can be associated with a particular toy.

Those are the top things that I work on with a puppy in the first few months.  I did not really discuss the details of “how” to work on each of them since that would have made this much, much longer, but if you want specific exercises for any of these, let me know!  If you have favorite things you work on that I did not mention, let’s hear them!

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 January 28, 2011  Posted by at 1:32 am

Dog in a Hot Car

Dec 192010
 

One day in September, it was quite hot here, and I was walking to my car when I heard a dog barking nearby, and decided I would walk by and just make sure the dog looked ok and was not overheating.  Now, before I go on, it is perhaps important to say that I am not one who believes dogs should never be left in cars.  Quite the opposite, I believe it is great if people take their dogs with them, and so long as they take care of the dogs and the dogs are happy about it, I absolutely support taking your dog with you.  I believe dogs can be very comfortable and safe in cars and am outraged at the growing movement to vilify anyone who leaves their dog in a vehicle.

I determined that the barking was coming from a minivan parked in the sun, and the rear windows were open only a few inches.  The dog appeared fine from a distance, but I was still a little bit concerned, so I walked a little closer, and I was pretty sure that the engine was running, presumably so the air-conditioner could work, and everything seemed peachy.  At about this point, as I was about to depart, I heard a woman’s voice very hostilely shout, “He WILL bite you.”  I turned to look, and there was a lady, talking to some other people a few cars away, glaring at me.  I smiled at her, and said, “Hopefully not, since I am ten feet away and he appears to be safely contained…”  She scowled and said, “If you get any closer he WILL bite you…”

I understood her anger: she assumed I was another busy-body who was coming over to pass judgment on her without knowing the first thing about animals or her situation.  She was afraid I was going to call the cops or animal control or PETA. She had no way of knowing that I had no intention of doing anything unless there appeared to be a genuine and immediate problem, and that if there was a problem my only interest would be in helping.

This exchange struck me as a perfect example of one of the truly harmful things that the AR movement has done: it has turned us all into adversaries.  She was so worried about someone attacking her that she could not imagine or appreciate that maybe I was an ally just walking by to make sure her dog was fine.  Not only have they divided us into little factions that are ineffective politically, they have prevented us from working together to make the world a better place.  This hurts us all, most acutely the animals…

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 December 19, 2010  Posted by at 8:07 pm

Neotoma cinerea

Oct 052010
 

A few days ago, I heard some sounds coming from the attic and began to suspect that a rodent had decided that our home would be a nice cozy place to spend the winter.

I live out in the middle of the woods, and cannot be too surprised if occasionally wild animals decide that the warm comfort of my home might be preferable to the challenges of the wilderness, but I am not very hospitable to rodents.  They are too dangerous as potential disease and parasite vectors to my animals, not to mention the fact that each year they manage to do thousands of dollars of damage to the hoses and wires in our vehicles.

My first thought was, “Seriously?”  There are more than a few rodent-eating predators in my house.  It just does not seem like a wise place to set up shop if you are near the bottom of the food chain…

For several days I engaged in a primordial battle—man against rodent…  Intellect against instinct.  Knowledge against cunning.  And for several days I lost.

Finally, I determined that he was, for reasons not entirely clear to me, going into my bathroom each night, so I left the door open only a few inches and rigged a live trap so that as soon as he ran through the opening he would be in the trap.  I put a delectable combination of apple, peanut butter, and dog food in the trap. At around 2am I heard the trap spring, and went to check, and sure enough had caught the largest bushy-tailed woodrat ever.  I decided to leave him in the trap overnight.  I dubbed him “Bright-Eyes,” and headed off to bed, smug in my evolutionary superiority.

This morning, I loaded him into the truck and headed out deep into the woods to release him.

I took the cage out of the back of the truck and walked into the woods and opened the trap (I always wonder why they do not design have-a-heart traps with a release mechanism that does not require you to stay there holding the cage open while the angry animal comes out…)  He shot out of the cage, took one look at me, and sprinted as fast as he possibly could around me and towards the truck, where he instantly leapt onto the axle and climbed up into the engine bay where he remained hidden despite my best efforts to find him…

So, to recap, I gave him dinner, took him for a nice drive in the country, and then brought him home.  I now feel considerably less confident in my evolutionary superiority.

Round 2 to follow…

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 October 5, 2010  Posted by at 6:13 pm

The Greatest Music Video Ever: OK Go White Knuckles Dog Video

Sep 202010
 

Click Here to Meet the Animals

The Story of Making of the Greatest Music Video Ever from the Talented Animals Perspective

A few years ago I was in a meeting about an upcoming television show when the director took me aside and said to me, “My brother is in a band, and I have an idea for a great video that would need animals, could we get together and talk about this sometime?”  I grinned and said sure, knowing that everybody in Los Angeles has a relative in a band, and the odds of anything ever coming of that conversation were slim…

It was over a year later that Trish called and suggested that they were getting close and would like to set up a meeting to brainstorm ideas.  She casually mentioned that her brother Damian was the lead singer in the band OK Go, the most downloaded band in history, and I ‘might’ have seen a few of their previous videos like the ubiquitous treadmill dance…

Damian explained that they had been dreaming of this video for years, but that so far they had been unable to find an animal trainer with the right combination of skills, experience, and unfettered creativity to help them succeed.  “We want to make a video in which the dogs are the stars, Damian said. “We want the band members to support the dogs and dance with the dogs, and we want it to be magical and charming and something that has never been done before. No canine ‘agility’, ‘freestyle,’ or ‘obedience.’  And no cutsey tricks or circus acts.  Something new.

“No problem,” said I. “The trainers and animals at Talented Animals are the best in the world, and if it is physically possible, we can do it.”

For the next several hours we all sat around throwing out ideas and getting more and more excited: we had come up with some really great ideas that seemed achievable in a short of amount of time and we all thought would make a great video. Then Damian said something that sent a chill up my spine: “Oh, by the way, this will be done in one take, with no cuts…” Now for those of you who have never worked an animal on film, we use cuts and optimal camera angles for everything.  They are the tools that let us succeed.  Without cuts, the animals would have to all work at the same time with their trainers far away, and we would need to get each dog and trainer and bandmember and crewmember to nail every single behavior all in the same take.  Not bloody likely.

For the next several hours I patiently explained why we needed cuts in this video.  That we could do many more things with cuts than without, that we could nail the video in a few days because each dog would do their behavior in isolation and would only have to be perfect for 10 seconds at a time, but that 12 dogs and a goat could not all work together without a mistake for over three minutes straight.  And Damian patiently explained that one of the things that defined this video was that it was not going to rely on cuts or tricks or camera magic—it was going to be a continuous dance without cuts and we would have to work within that constraint…

Over a year passed and we were together again for two intense weeks of choreography and planning. Three dogs and two trainers sat in a small warehouse in downtown LA with the band, and Trish the choreographer, for two weeks of nonstop, delightful brainstorming.

Another year passed as we all worked to get schedules and finances and everything else to come together, and finally in the spring of 2010 we were ready to get started.

We developed an almost entirely new language for this video. Each of the 21 “sections” of the video had a name. Each prop had a name, and most of the animal behaviors had names. We would spend much of the day saying things like, “Can Sequel other foot Tim before he chung chungs over the popcorn wangs?”

Then we needed to select ideal dogs, find a location, and so much more…  After looking at several options, we decided Oregon was the best place to film this video: beautiful, no sales tax, excellent production resources, inexpensive housing, perfect summer weather, less bureaucracy, and of course Talented Animals has one of its main facilities in Oregon.

The Oregon Film Office was extremely helpful in finding housing for the band, recommending skilled and flexible crewmembers, and best of all securing an amazing location to film the video!

We had only four weeks total to make the video from beginning to end: two weeks to train the dogs, one week to rehearse with the band, and one week to film it.  Or so we thought!  Once we started, we discovered that much of the first two weeks needed to be spent figuring out the trainer choreography!  We had 12 trainers, two furniture movers, 12 dogs, one goat, 38 buckets, and a bunch of furniture, all of which needed to move around and be in the right place at the right time without anyone stepping in front of camera.  We ended up with stuffed animals, spreadsheets, flow-charts, and recorded audio instructions, and for many hours we tried various configurations until we finally found one that worked.  And then we practiced and practiced.

Of course, at the same time we were training the dogs.  Most of the behaviors were not that challenging to teach, it was the transitions and the positioning that were complicated.  And it was essential that the dogs were at all times having a truly joyous experience, so there were lots of breaks to go run in the field, take a nap, or splash in the pool.

Then Damian, Tim, Andy, Dan, and Trish arrived… Since we had been rehearsing without them we needed to learn how to work with band actually dancing their parts, and they needed to learn to work with the dogs. The band and Trish are about the most wonderful team to work with that you could ever imagine.  They are creative, collaborative, generous, imaginative, kind, and just all around fun. They are also serious and consummate professionals. I hate to tarnish the “slacker-rockstar” trope, but these guys work harder than you can imagine, and bust their asses to make their videos perfect, and we had no intention of letting them down!  We ran through the whole routine a couple of times for them with stuffed animals and then showed them the pieces with dogs, and while they loved 80% of it, there were several parts that were not quite as magical in execution as they had seemed in concept.  So we began tweaking those parts.  The challenge was that each person had a specific place to be at every moment, so each time we made a slight change there was a ripple effect.  Suddenly people were on the wrong side of the stage, or could not get to where they needed to be to perform their next behavior, or were crashing into one another.  It was chaos again!  As the days ticked by, we kept making changes and the routine kept getting better and better.  But we were running out of time, and while each behavior was solid, we could no longer string them all together.  Finally we put them together, but at half speed, and then we began steadily increasing the speed.

With four days left, we got out the slate and tried our first official take at full speed and with everything in place. We made it about half way before a mistake. Then again, and again, and again.  Many times we were virtually perfect, but we just got too far off the beat.  Or we would get to the end and the dogs would be out of sync with each other. Or a dog would not have time to make it to his next position.

Take 49 was our first true success. It was not perfect, but we made it to the end without any real mistakes and still in sync with the song.  “OH MY GOD,” Trish whispered breathlessly, “We did it…” And every person in the room finally exhaled!

After Take 49 we got better and better.  Sure, we still all made mistakes, and there were more than a few dropped buckets, chair collisions, and the like.

At around Take 60, a new challenge arose. The dogs all knew the pattern perfectly, and absolutely loved doing it, and they started going too fast. They would rush ahead of the routine and run to their next behavior, and instead of getting behind the beat we were now starting to get ahead of it, or have dogs running onto the stage before it was their turn. Every few takes we would have to stop and do one at half speed to remind the dogs that they had to wait for the right moment before they could perform.

First thing on the morning of the third day, we began Take 72, and by about the midpoint, we could all feel that it was going really, really well.  Each piece had been solid, and the rhythm and timing felt great.  Everyone was fresh and looked good.  This might be it…..  As we ticked off each challenging moment it felt more and more like this might be it, and by the final scene when all the dogs were lying on tables next to the band, there was a silent vibration in the room.  None of us were moving, or breathing, as Damian finally lifted his head and said, “We got it!”  We had all agreed early on that no matter what happened, we would not erupt into a loud cheer as we did not want the energy of that to startle or alarm any of the dogs, and everyone honored that agreement, but it may have been the loudest silent cheer ever!  And the dogs absolutely participated.  We were all hugging, laughing, quietly jumping up and down, high-fiving, and hugging our dogs in absolute gratitude!  They had done it, and we all knew it!

One of the biggest challenges of having no cuts in a video comes at the end when you have to pick!  By the end, we had filmed for three and a half days and 124 takes.  We had 30 complete takes, of which 10 were deemed excellent.  And in each of these takes there were magical moments, but we could not concatenate them into one ideal, we had to discard every take except one, even knowing that in some of the discards were some of our very best work.  That is painful!  For a brief moment I thought about going to Damian one more time and trying to persuade him to cut them together into one supertake with all the best moments.  But then I watched Take 72 again, and I saw exactly what Damian had imagined years earlier—one uninterrupted dance between OK Go and 12 amazing dogs.  There was something so special about NOT having “cheated.”  Somehow it came across on screen that this was real and had integrity.  This three-and-a-half minutes of unedited truth allows the viewer to connect with the band and the dogs and essentially experience the dance exactly as it was, and that is far more genuine and touching than any perfectly-polished and cut-together special effects extravaganza.

We have been fortunate enough to work on many wonderful projects: independent art films, $100M blockbuster movies, and just about everything in between.  We have worked with some of the great directors and actors in the world, and the most amazing animals. But I cannot think of any project we have enjoyed more than this one, nor any project of which we are more proud.  I hope from the bottom of my heart that watching it brings you as much joy as it has brought all of us who worked together to create it!

Note: It is very difficult for music videos to generate any revenue.  Making a video like this takes considerable resources: there are a lot of people and animals and equipment and props, travel, lodging, etc., and this comes directly out of the pockets of the bandmembers.  So please, if you enjoyed this song, video, and dogs, purchase the album or go see Ok Go in concert.

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 September 20, 2010  Posted by at 5:59 pm

Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road (Dog Trainer Version) by Roland Sonnenburg

Aug 082010
 

Pavlov: we fed the chicken on the opposite side of the road each day at 4pm until the chicken’s autonomic system actually began causing the chicken to cross the road at 4 pm without even questioning the “why.”

B.F. Skinner: on prior occasions when the chicken voluntarily crossed the road, this behavior was followed immediately by a reinforcing consequence.

Cesar Milan: I bullied, chased, poked, and intimidated the chicken until it raced across the road, because I am a strong leader…

Barbara Woodhouse: You just say, “Walkies” with the right accent and place a crumpet on the other side of the road…

Karen Pryor: by associating R+ with road crossing and P+ with standing still, with a VR schedule, and offering a reward in keeping with the Premack principle, we increased the intensity and frequency of the road crossing behavior.

Victoria Stilwell:  Who cares?? The important question is,  do these pants make me bumm look fat?

Bill Koehler: a few well-timed pops on the choke chain and the chicken was happy to cross the road.

Nicholas Dodman: I gave the chicken fluoxetine, sertraline, paroxetine, carbamazepine, and azapirone and then it was happy to cross the road.

Patti Ruzzo: I crossed the road, pausing every step to spit a treat out of my mouth like a human pez dispenser, and the chicken followed along catching the treats.

Electric Collar Advocate: whenever the chicken does not cross the road I give it an electric shock. But do not worry, the shock is no more than you would feel if you walked on a carpet wearing socks and it does not bother the chicken at all. The feathers standing up and the smell of burning flesh mean nothing. In fact, they are happier having nice clear communication than they would be otherwise.

Yuppie: chickens are just like little people in feather jackets, and if you love them and give them diamonds and feel sorry for them all the time, they will be happy to cross the road for you.

Paris Hilton: Because I put it in a Gucci bag and carried it…

Shelter director: Any chickens that do not cross the road will be euthanized for their own good, and the others we will “adopt” out tomorrow for only $200 each. Please send us money so we can keep doing more of this important work!

HSUS member: I do not know anything about animals, I have never been around animals and am not really fond of animals, but we passed a law mandating that chickens be kept without cages because animals belong only in the wild and cannot be happy coexisting with man, so now they are walking wherever they want.

PETA member: chickens have the right to live in world without roads. Any chicken that lives within a hundred miles of a road is suffering an inhumane existence and might eventually be hit by a car so we should kill it today to ensure that it does not die tomorrow.

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 August 8, 2010  Posted by at 2:39 pm
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