It’s been a while since my last blog post because I didn’t know what I wanted to say. I have been training dogs and doing behavior work with them as well for nearly two decades. I am at an interesting time in my career, thinking about what’s next for me and what direction I’d like to go in professionally. I love agility, I love animal welfare work, and I love behavior work. At the same time, I am not sure how I want to tie it all together.
I have been attending educational training and behavior seminars for years. It’s been a while since I have learned something new and innovative. Two weekends ago, I attended a seminar with Dr. Amy Cook, PhD. She blew my mind; Amy has taken what I know about Play (yes, capital ‘P’) to a whole other level. The reason I capitalized the word ‘Play’ is because she uses it as a therapeutic tool to rehabilitate a dog with anxiety or fear. Play is used to reduce, and sometimes, even eliminate stress. She shared anecdotes of dogs being worked with using her ‘The Play Way’ protocol. This protocol resulted in a reduction of stress and anxiety, even in situations not related to the original issue. Truly magical!
She made me think! Perhaps I have just taught Marvel incredible coping skills, and perhaps he isn’t comfortable in situations that traditionally caused him stress. How can I find out how he is really feeling? What would be possible if Marvel was actually comfortable? Mind blown.
Amy explained that one way to determine if the dog is comfortable in a specific situation, is to use a ‘fragile’ behavior, such as play, as a barometer to see where the dog is emotionally. This is just one of the many things that I learned this past weekend. I will be exploring this with my dogs, as well client dogs. I am still simmering…and I am excited! This might be the missing piece to the training journey I have been on with Marvel these past 4 years.
Something I talk about in my Face the Fear courses is similar to what Amy talked about her in seminar: it’s important to give the dog the ability to process what is going on in the environment. Let the dog check out the trigger and solve the problem he is experiencing internally himself. The difference is Amy takes it further by saying let the dog do this without you managing the dog. Mind blown again. By asking the dog to turn back to you, or cueing the dog to look at the trigger, or giving him treats while he is looking at the trigger or turning away from the trigger, doesn’t give the dog the opportunity to process the possible trigger. And the key to allowing him the opportunity to process is distance—be as far away as possible where the dog notices the trigger and can dismiss it (look away on his own), but not obsessively focus on it. This type of behavior modification work is called B.A.T., short for ‘Behavior Adjustment Training for aggression, reactivity, and fear in dogs.’ The protocol for this was developed by Grisha Stewart.
I have been incorporating the B.A.T. protocol in the work I do with shelter and client dogs for years. Amy takes this one step further. She believes that if the dog can look and dismiss something in the environment that is causing stress or fear in the dog (such as another dog or a person) and then return to play with the handler, the dog is letting you know he has solved the problem of this trigger. Over time, the distance between the dog and the trigger can shrink. The magic of this goes further…this technique has been successful in building confidence in dogs overall, not just in situations involving the trigger specifically. Amy shared a testimonial of someone who used this technique of ‘Look and Dismiss’ followed by ‘The Play Way’ to address a trigger. The person then found that her dog’s reactivity inside the car when driving around town completely disappeared. Magic! We can’t really know what the dog is thinking in any given moment, but Amy has reminded me that we can keep asking them if they are okay.
There are three major things I took away from this seminar that has me reinvigorated about the field of dog behavior:
- Getting consent is an important piece of training and behavior modification for a dog, especially if the dog is anxious or fearful.
- There is a distinct difference between coping techniques and rehabilitative techniques.
- It’s always important to be open minded—as soon as you say you’ve seen it all, you could very well miss something revolutionary and mind blowing!
I look forward to exploring these concepts with my own dogs, clients’ dogs, and shelter dogs in the upcoming months. I will keep you posted of my journey!
At the beginning of every year, I celebrate both the new year and my dog, Tricky. She turned 9 years old on January 2. For me, each dog is associated with a chapter in my life or a journey that I am on. Instead of measuring my life in the years of each decade, I do so with each dog. The journey I have had with Tricky has been a meaningful one for me. Our life together started during a difficult time. Within a year after adopting her from the shelter where I worked, I had lost two dogs to cancer, and, separated from my now ex-husband. It was a time of loss and transition for me–I couldn’t have done it without this little dog. After my divorce, Tricky was the reason I got out of bed when I was depressed. The healing power of an animal can be miraculous.
I recently met with a client and her new puppy. The puppy, four-month-old named Daisy, weighed fifteen pounds. It was expected that Daisy would be at least forty-five pounds when fully grown.
Daisy was taken from her litter at five weeks of age and placed with a rescue. By the time she was adopted, Daisy was eight weeks old. That meant that she was missing a good bit of important social experiences that puppies are usually exposed to. Careful introduction to people, children, appropriate dogs, other puppies, places, things, sounds, sights, and novel objects was begun right away. Daisy’s adopter saw the importance of this plan and enthusiastically followed it to the letter.
When we met again to evaluate Daisy’s progress, I noticed that Daisy was happily pulling her adopter towards me while on leash. At our third session, Daisy again pulled her owner to me, this time with even more strength and gusto. I knew it was time to teach this puppy the meaning of “good things come to those who wait!”.
Because my client was so keen on socializing her puppy, she had happily allowed Daisy to pull her towards anything and everything. Her intentions were good; she wanted Daisy to feel brave and comfortable in the world by exploring anything that came to Daisy’s attention. The problem was that Daisy was also learning to pull anywhere, anytime, even if that meant dragging her human along for the ride.
Within a very short time, Daisy was going to be a sizable dog. Pulling her family members wherever she wanted to go could be a problem for obvious reasons. Not everyone welcomes forty-five pounds of dog slamming into them! If a person preferred to not meet Daisy, Daisy wouldn’t understand why she was being prevented from approaching. This could lead to leash-induced frustration. This example is only one the many good reasons it is important to teach a puppy the meaning of “not now, dog!”
As a behavior specialist, I am always thinking ahead: how does what is happening today influence how the dog may behave in the future? An always-important aspect of dog training is to teach tolerance to frustration and to build impulse control.
I acknowledged my client for her admirable commitment to her dog’s emotional well-being and development, and then we created a plan to teach Daisy to visit people, only now, on cue!
Here was our plan:
- We practiced various impulse control games, teaching her how to “leave it.” Daisy’s adopter practiced these games for a couple of minutes every day.
- We practiced rewarding Daisy for walking next to her human on leash. Daisy was rewarded at her person’s side, building value for being next to her. I asked that she practice this every day when she took Daisy for a walk.
- We carried high value treats that were sure to capture Daisy’s attention even in the face of distractions.
- We worked on teaching Daisy to sit before greeting people, starting about 20 feet away. In the beginning, if we were any closer, Daisy was too excited to perform the behavior. Over time, we were able to decrease that distance to about 5 feet away.
- We put greeting people on cue, using the verbal cue “Go say hi!”
- We practiced by using people Daisy already knew before taking it on the road with new people. Much easier to ask friends and family to help train Daisy in a set-up, versus trying to train this new skill in real-time with people who may themselves be too excited to greet a happy puppy!
Using the protocols described, I am happy to report that little Daisy quickly caught on to this new game and is now much easier to manage on leash. This will be even more appreciated (by everyone!) when she reaches her full size (and weight!)
It’s been a year since I’ve blogged—and I have a good reason! I took a full-time position as a Director of Pet Behavior at the North Shore Animal League America. There was and is a lot to take on so it was occupying my full attention. I have since been able to carve out some time to write again, because frankly, I missed it.
In this blog, I want to talk about a topic that is near and dear to me. Not just because of experiences with my dogs, but from what I see working in animal welfare. A dog can show anxiety and fear in different ways. Sometimes, it’s not obvious that the dog’s behavior is a symptom of fear.
For example, my dog, Marvel, a Jack Russell/Yorkie Terrier mix, displayed fear by barking, lunging, and charging in appropriately. I was actually contemplating not doing agility with Marvel because his reactivity was so bad. And I LOVE this dog performance sport. I am one of those people who uses vacation days to attend agility competitions and seminars.
Marvel’s reactivity showed up as alert barking and charging people and dogs. He was so sensitive to the environment that it seemed like his brain was exploding. At a seminar, two and a half years ago, Marvel actually left the training ring and charged a very large dog that was walking into the building. Thankfully, the other dog was a nice dog that was just startled by my little 7-pound Firestarter. I felt badly for anyone affected by Marvel’s behavior. I was also concerned about Marvel’s safety and mental health. The elevated levels of cortisol (stress hormone) and adrenaline were not healthy for him.
One year after I committed to working on Marvel’s reactivity, we attended our first agility trial. Marvel was a ROCKSTAR! I was thrilled with his ability to stay in the game and focus on me. And most importantly, he was HAPPY!! My personal goal is to try out for a World Team with Marvel by 2018, possibly even sooner. This wasn’t possible one year ago—it wasn’t even on the radar.
Dog training and behavior modification is an ongoing process with any animal. You are never done practicing skills. Just like training agility, you have to regularly work with your dog to maintain his skills and build his confidence. As an example, we had a setback a few months ago at a trial. Marvel was fast and focused when in the ring and moving from point A to point B around the trial arena when on leash. However, when playing off leash, fetching a ball, with the rest of my canine crew, Marvel did charge after a dog walking right by us. We were in a fenced-in area but because he is so small, he was able to slip under the fence. Fortunately, Marvel did not bite the other dog—only charged at her, barking. I felt badly that the dog and handler were startled. Although it was a personal blow and I felt terrible, I learned from it. I have worked hard with Marvel to teach him to have self-control in specific contexts but I hadn’t spent enough effort teaching him to generalize that self-control to other contexts. The only way to generalize his self-control is to work it in different contexts. I also recognize that Marvel is using all of his brain-power to play the agility game with me, so expecting him to be able to stay focused outside of the agility ring is probably really difficult for him. Now, Marvel stays on leash at trials and seminars unless we are in the ring.
Why am I sharing this? Because setbacks will happen. They are part of the journey. When it comes to modifying behavioral issues, we are never done. Be kind to yourself and learn from them. I am also sharing this personal example to help you understand how the canine brain works. If your dog understands a cue or behavior in one context, it doesn’t mean he will understand it in a different context—especially if you haven’t specifically trained him in that new situation. And of course, adding anxiety and stress make it even harder for the dog.
So the takeaway lesson here is ‘practice, practice, practice’ –forever! Yes, your dog’s behavior can improve and you will be able to breathe more easily…and remember to be mindful of how your dog needs your support in various situations.
As you know, I’m a dog trainer. Many of the calls I receive are from dog owners who are experiencing some kind of problem with their dogs. I am known to be a problem-solver—people come to me to fix problems with their dogs. This can include issues ranging from basic housetraining to a dog that is fearful and barking and lunging at other dogs. I love what I do and I’m really good at it.
The problem I frequently observe is that people train reactively instead of proactively. Clients call after a serious behavior issue already exists. Understandably, clients want to know how to stop the dog from doing something the client doesn’t like.
Recently, my associate was working with a client whose young dog got enjoyment out of barking at and grabbing his wife’s pant legs. Basically, the dog was having a great time harassing the wife in order to get a reaction out of her. The dog had learned that he would get what he wanted (his owner’s attention) if he behaved this way. My associate gave the client many tools to start addressing the problem, however the client insisted on wanting to know what to do in the moment when the dog behaved that way. His focus was on the problem itself, instead of on how to transform it. That’s where we come in. Our job is to teach dog owners how to train proactively instead of reactively. We created a behavior modification program for the client where we taught his dog a variety of alternative behaviors along with impulse control. At the same time, we taught the client how to manage the dog in a way that prevented the dog from continuing to practice harassing-type behaviors. It’s still a work in progress, but we are on the right track.
Sometimes clients do call to start off on the right foot with their new puppy or newly adopted dog. As soon as the dog comes home—or sometimes even before (which trainers love!)—the new dog owner has already chosen a trainer to work with. An experienced trainer can spot things in the dog, as well as the owner’s interactions with the dog, that could cause problems down the line. By shining light on them and changing the way the owner communicates with the dog, proactive training is accomplished.
So call a trainer before a problem gets out of hand!
Clarity and harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
A client recently admitted to me that she has not been carrying treats with her on walks with her dog. She said it is annoying, can get messy, and she just didn’t want to deal with it.
I told her I understood–it’s definitely one more thing to remember. But, I know that she will not get the results that she expects without consistently rewarding her dog for the behavior that she wants.
I’m going to show her how she can set herself up for success with a (small) dog walking bag. It will need to have room for a house key, cell phone, poop bags, and treats, everything she needs for every walk with her dog. A great source for the bag is LeSportSac. I’m also a fan of fanny-packs–yes, we’re bringing back the 80s! Hands free treat portability with little mess!
I reviewed a very important concept in dog training and behavior modification: reinforcement builds behavior. The only way a retirement account grows is if you make investments into it and give it time for the interest to accrue. You will not see immediate returns on it. It requires patience—think marathon, not sprint. The same thing is true of dog training. The more rewards you give your dog when teaching a behavior, the more value it has for him, the more likely he will repeat the behavior you desire. For the dog it’s very simple—it’s not about control. It’s just about what feels good for him in that moment. Dogs live moment by moment, so we make the investment by carrying treats and rewarding more of what we want in order to build the behavior that we want.
I also realized that it wasn’t just about value for the dog–the owner was not seeing a value in preparing treats in advance or bringing them with her on walks. She believed that at this point she should have control over the dog–that’s what every dog owner wants. When I see her at our next session, I am going to remind her out how awesome her dog’s recall is at the dog park. I will explain that through the timely delivery of reward (treats) and by taking the time to build the behavior of recall, she now has off-leash, vocal control of her dog. She reinforced her dog’s behavior and now she is reaping the benefit of that work. I hope this will help her to understand how rewarding appropriate behavior on walks with treats will result in better behavior on walks by her dog.
Clarity & harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
It’s been a whirlwind these past couple of months because of my upcoming wedding. Well, it’s come and gone, was the best day of my life so far, and it’s now time to get back to focusing on dogs. I will be sure to share about our wedding experiences with the dogs in upcoming blog posts.
Many of you have been asking how Marvel is doing. Thank you so much for your concern and checking in. Between wedding planning, operating my business, medical/physical issues with first Marvel, and now Tricky, I haven’t been able to set aside time to blog and let everyone know publicly. In my last blog, I shared that after a tough few months, I had finally accepted who Marvel is. In the “good Marvel” department: He is an awesome little dude that brings so much joy and laughter to our lives. In the “could be better Marvel” department: He also is sensitive to many different things; He barks and lunges at dogs who are in close proximity; He doesn’t want people who he doesn’t know extremely well, and trusts, to handle him; He does not want to be touched when he is resting; He guards his space and food items. All the “could be better Marvel” behaviors increase when he is in pain or under stress.
Marvel’s problem behaviors increased intensified suddenly in early January. It seemed to have intensified out of the blue, but in retrospect, I was able to track the changes in Marvel’s behavior, some more subtle than others, that have occurred over the past 6-10 months. I believe this is how dog behavior change frequently appears to their owners–the owners don’t recognize a serious problem (or problems) developing until it’s too late. That is exactly what happened to me. I was too close to the situation to be able to see the whole picture. In retrospect, Marvel’s sudden intensification in aggression opened my eyes–I’m actually grateful for it. After a thorough process of analysis and evaluation, I was able to better understand what was going on with my dog. As a result of that understanding, I was able address it sooner rather than later.
After several vet and physical therapist meetings, we figured out Marvel was sore in early January. The pain he was experiencing in early January magnified what was behaviorally already there. Perhaps it was from agility, perhaps it was from wrestling with his sister, Tricky. I also believe the three-day weekend of agility activity, with Marvel at the center of it all, put him over threshold. All of the things that trigger him stacked against him and he became overwhelmed. It probably took days for his nervous system to calm down. These physiological and physical issues likely exacerbated behavioral issues that were already developing and I was finally able to see them with sharp clarity.
Marvel is currently doing really well, both physically, mentally, and in training! In the next blog, I will write about what I have been doing to modify his behavior while managing him to minimize incidents of reactivity.
Clarity & harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
I posted this originally on my DogCentric Facebook page. I received so much interest, I figured blogging would be a good way to continue sharing the message. I’ve also expanded on it a bit.
Sometimes when you have a dog with behavioral issues, such as reactivity, you can’t always do what you want to do…sometimes you have a picture in your mind about how you think things will go with your dog and what your life together will look like. And then your dog develops behavioral issues and that changes things.
When I adopted Marvel at 5 months, I had this vision in mind that he would be a rockstar agility competitor and that all I had to focus on were skills supportive to agility, other than general manners to be part of a family. He also was friendly and social with people and other dogs–really lovely. As he matured, all this began to change–especially so in the last 4-6 months. Marvel started to charge at dogs, barking and nipping to get them to go away. He also barked at people close to him when indoors. He no longer wanted people that he didn’t know extremely well petting or handling him.
I’ve finally embraced who Marvel has become in the past month. As a result of embracing the journey and not focusing on the end goal, Marvel is teaching me so much about living with and training a dog like him for agility. I learned a LOT about Marvel this past weekend in regards to his reactivity. He improved in his impulse control and demonstrated better understanding with the training. Most of the time, our focus was working on Marvel staying with me in that environment rather than working the agility sequences. We had to skip a few exercises because it would have been too much for him to handle at this time. The result of managing his threshold throughout the workshop: a couple of smokin’ fast runs, staying with the momma, at the end of the day!
The universe works in interesting ways–made me chuckle today. I received a call for a new client who has a dog with the same exact issues as Marvel. I’m clearly the right dog trainer for her.
Clarity & harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
With the recent behavioral issues and medical concerns we have been dealing with around Marvel, my trainer brain has been on overdrive. One of the things I’ve been thinking about is whether his recent reactivity is a behavioral issue, rather than a medical issue. And if it is, was there anything I did to contribute to it.
Tricky is being worked on for a sore muscle–handling.
As a trainer, and a terrier owner, I distinguish petting as different from handling. Petting is about stroking the dog in a way that is pleasurable for the dog. It’s often solicited by the dog in some manner. Handling is different. Handling can include: inspecting the dog, manipulating their body parts, and moving the dog physically. Examples of these handling maneuvers can include baths, vet examinations, grooming, inspecting for ticks, putting on clothes, pulling the dog off the couch, picking up and moving a dog from one spot to another, picking up a dog and holding him in your arms…you get the picture. It’s often NOT solicited by the dog nor enjoyed by the dog.
There is something many of us in the dog training field call SDS, “Small Dog Syndrome ”. It’s the sassy-ness and ‘bad attitude’ that people believe small dogs can have. It’s not a real thing–but rather a way to label the possible result of what many people, including myself to some degree, do to small dogs: things that they would not do to a large dog, such as an 80 pound Rottweiler. Small dogs are often physically managed and manipulated against their will simply because of their size. This can create frustration in the dog and/or distrust of hands reaching for them. This can result in an aggressive display by the dog when he or she feels ‘invaded’. Not all small dogs feel this way but in my many years as a dog trainer, I have met many dogs who do.
Although I have been good about not letting strangers reach for Marvel and pick him up, my fiance and I have been guilty of doing this. I have put clothes on him when the weather is cold and he doesn’t like to wear them–he tolerates them and I’ve done some work so that he does tolerate it. So even though these are not huge things, they could become completely intolerable when the dog is in pain. Perhaps this is what happened with Marvel last week.
Marvel in my arms after I cued him to jump up.
Some of the things I have done so that I don’t have a dog struggling with “SDS” is to teach Marvel to jump into my arms instead of me reaching down to pick him up. I have also taught him to Hand Target (touch his nose to my hand) to get him to move from point A to point B. He also knows specific words and hand gestures so that he is moving on cue versus being physically managed. There is so much more to living with a small dog and how to prevent them from becoming aggressive to handling that I will address in a future blog. I will also continue to share our journey, both medical and behavioral, with you as we try to help our little guy feel relaxed and comfortable.
Clarity & harmony…a better way of living with your dog.
I have been a dog trainer and behaviorist for 13 years. I’ve advised hundreds of clients and worked with hundreds of dogs with various aggression issues. For the first time, one of my own dogs is now biting. Starting this past Monday, Marvel has been biting anyone who reaches over him to pet him or pick him up. He started off by reacting to strangers. He is now biting people such as my fiancé who is normally one of his best friends. He hasn’t bitten me yet but he’s shown signals of discomfort and communicating NOT wanting to be touched.
As a dog owner, who is also just a regular human being, of course I am upset and emotional. My brain is going every which way, only making me more upset…”what if this is truly who he is, a biter; what happens when we have kids; what if no one could ever touch him again except for me; what if it’s something medically really serious; what if I did something to create this..” That inner voice we all have is sending me to some very dark places.
Thankfully I have a fantastic community of fellow trainers who have been supporting me through this past week and the rapid changes in Marvel’s behavior. They’ve helped me put my dog trainer hat back on and create a plan of action for my little guy. First thing I did is see the veterinarian to rule out any possible medical issues. Marvel has shown sensitivity about being handled–but never as severe as it’s been this past week–especially by people he doesn’t know really well. Through training, I have been able to significantly improve his comfort level about handling. Because his behavior has changed so much in such a short amount of time, the first thing to rule out is any medical concerns.
I am also going to keeping Marvel below threshold. This includes my fiancé not doing anything Marvel might be uncomfortable with (such as picking him up or brushing him). I am also giving him a complete break from agility, and not working with his handling issues or meeting new people. I will be keeping him home, keep things simple, and wait for more information from my veterinarian. I’ll keep you all posted.
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