Breakthrough!

Today, Doppler and I had a breakthrough in learning/training the cue “down.” I had thought it was going to take a long time for him to finally get it. SSD trains “down” by first having the dog sit. Then, holding a piece of kibble by the dog’s nose, you slowly lower your hand. The dog follows your hand down and you click as soon as the dog’s forelegs hit the floor. After luring the dog (using treats is called “luring”) three times, you do it without a treat, and the dog continues to follow your hand down.

Or at least that’s how it’s supposed to work. Doppler would either pop up out of his sit and stretch his neck down to get the treat, or he would look at me blankly once I stopped luring him. I could practically hear the thoughts in his head: “No treat in nice lady’s hand. Gonna keep sitting here. Sitting gets me treats. Want treats. Gonna sit till I get treats.”

It was frustrating, because “down” seems like such a basic cue, but I kept working with him. We did very short training sessions. I would lure him three times, and then sometimes only manage one un-lured down before ending the session.

Today, however, he finally got it. On a whim, I decided to try giving him the hand cue without using a lure at all. Wouldn’t you know, he plopped himself right down on the floor! And did he ever get a party! He got several treats and lots of praise. When I gave him the cue again, plop! right down on the floor again. We repeated this about eight times. I think he would have made it to 10, if Fire hadn’t come over and distracted him. Success!

Fire was funny to watch during Doppler’s training session. He stayed in a down right by my side, but I ignored him, because I wasn’t working with him. Well, poor Fire was just drooling away, and I guess he finally decided he needed to try something else. The big guy got up and retrieved the sugar spoon I had given Doppler a few days ago, and brought it right to me. Guess he thought if he upped the ante and retrieved something, he’d get a treat. (He did, although I didn’t click him for it.)

Doppler has been playing with the sugar spoon for several days now. He loves to chew on it on the dog bed. As a service dog, he’s going to need to be comfortable putting cloth, plastic, metal, wood—almost anything—in his mouth. Since I seem to have a surplus of sugar spoons, I figured he might as well get used to metal. He loved it! The video is him going nuts the first time I gave it to him. 

Our next challenge is the play retrieve. You’d think, since he’s a Labrador RETRIEVER that he’d happily chase toys and bring them back. Well, he’s happy to do it once, but when I give him a treat to reward him for bringing it back, he then just sits in front of me, trying to get more treats. I’m going to just try verbal praise, although I’m not sure how well that will work to get him to let go of the treat. We’ll keep working on it.

Doppler is a crazy barking machine, but he has significantly reduced the amount of barking he does when he goes up and down the stairs. I’ve been giving him treats when we get to the top of the stairwell, but I suspect that it has less to do with the treats and more to do with the fact that he’s getting bigger and the stairs don’t look as scary. Doppler is definitely the big guy of his litter. People don’t really believe me when I tell them he’s 11 weeks old. When we were out and about yesterday, we saw a lot of surprised faces once people learned how old he is.

Since PawsAbilities was this weekend, I took off work yesterday and today. (PawsAbilities was awesome. If you didn’t go this year, you better plan on going next year. I can’t wait to take Doppler.) Doppler spent the weekend at the sitter, and he was wonderful for them. I’m so proud of the little guy for being so good. Anyway, since I didn’t have to work, I took Doppler to Crossfit717, Target, and Christmas Tree Shops—at least two new places for him.

At Crossfit717, we watched people work out. There was running in the workout, so we worked on not trying to chase people. Doppler quickly realized that he wasn’t going with them, and he just sat and watched them. Then we went inside and he walked on Astroturf for the first time. The little guy didn’t even hesitate, and even better, he didn’t assume it was grass and try to pee on it! Music was blasting inside, but it didn’t even startle him. He just looked around as if trying to figure out where it was coming from, and then kept trotting along at my side. I showed him the kettle bells (which Fire thinks are pillows). Doppler got to meet Coach Dan and my 5:30 a.m. workout buddy, Wayne. Doppler’s funny when he does greetings. He gets this blissful expression, like he so happy to be petted by people. One thing we’ll be working on is keeping his attention on me. He sits nicely for the greeting, but he keeps facing the other person. 

After 15-20 minutes at Crossfit717, we headed out to Target. I got a cart, since I needed to get a big container for Doppler’s food. Plus, then he could get more experience walking next to a cart. He did pretty well, although he did try to hop up on the rack beneath the cart. Next, we headed to Christmas Tree Shops to stock up on spices. He walked on a loose leash like a champ and did a pretty good job ignoring all the people who kept saying “Awwww!”

Once we got home, the little guy crashed and spent the next hour or so snoozing away in his crate. 

(In this video, Doppler is snoring at work, not at home. Different location, same thing. If I didn't hear it myself, I'd never have believed such noise could come out of a sleeping puppy.)

Only Quiet Puppies Get Attention

Quiet puppy in his crate

Raising a puppy for Susquehanna Service Dogs is 10% dog training knowledge, 90% patience.

Patience to open and close a door 10 times before the puppy waits for the cue to go on through. Patience (and speed) to pick up the food dish 7 times before the puppy waits for the okay to chow down. Patience to spend 10 minutes to walk 6 feet down the sidewalk just so the puppy walks on a loose leash.

And patience to outlast a barking, whining, crying-so-pitifully-you-just-want-to-snuggle-him puppy.   

Doppler is generally quiet in his crate. He goes in quietly at night and sleeps from the time I go to bed to the time I wake up. He’s quiet in his crate at work, snoozing away or chewing on one of the many toys that Fire uses as pillows. He’s quiet when I bring him back home at lunch time and crate him for the afternoon.

He’s definitely NOT quiet, though, when I come home from work, crossfit, the grocery store—basically anytime I come home and he thinks he should be let out of his crate. Then he starts making sounds that I have never heard come out of a dog. He barks. He whines. He cries. He moans.

Because he’s being raised as a service dog, I have to train him not to bark. He needs to learn to be quiet in his crate and everywhere else. Barking does not get him the thing that he wants. As SSD says, quiet puppies get attention.

Doppler usually starts barking about 10 seconds after I get in the door, and he keeps it up until he sees me. I’ve been waiting until he’s been quiet for at least 15 seconds, and then I let him out. However, that didn’t seem to be working. I think he figured he could cause a ruckus and then just stop when he saw me, which is not what I want him to learn. So today, when I got home from work, I completely ignored him for a good 10 minutes. (I knew it wasn’t imperative that he go outside right away.) I fed Fire, changed out of my nice clothes, started a load of laundry, and read about 10 pages in my book. Doppler barked. He whined. He pulled out all the possible noises that he could make.

But somewhere around the second page in my book, he got quiet. I stayed out of sight reading for another five minutes, and only then did I walk over to his crate. There he was, lying calmly. If he had started barking again, even once, I would have turned around and gone back to my book, but he kept his cool, and out we went.

I’m going to use this method every time until his default setting is “quiet.” I have high hopes and lots of patience.

In other news, Doppler did fantastic at my training workshop! I came prepared with power treats and lots of toys, including the bacon-flavored bone. It took him a little while to settle down, and he kept trying to chew on the chairs and table, but eventually he fell asleep. He only barked a few times right before the lunchtime break, but I suspect that was just because he needed to go out. Since the presentation was still going on, I just hustled him outside so he wouldn’t keep disturbing everyone else. Overall, I think he did splendidly for a 10-week-old puppy.

Doppler snacking on a carrot during my workshop

Oh, and Doppler learned a cool new trick! Or at least I think it’s cool. I can drop the leash at work and he will continue walking beside me as if I were still holding it! Cool, huh? He’s definitely getting better with self control.

At ESC (early socialization class) last night, we started learning two new cues: “down,” and “go to bed.” We’re shaping “go to bed,” which means that we break the behavior down into tiny steps. We started by putting a towel on the ground and clicking and treating the puppy for looking at the towel. Then we clicked and treated for walking toward the towel, then for stepping on the towel. Eventually, the puppy will go to the towel, lie down, and stay there on cue. Doppler was coming along nicely, considering it was the first time he ever did it. Almost immediately, he was walking onto the towel. I have a feeling he’s going to pick this cue up pretty easily.

“Down,” on the other hand, is going to be more of a challenge to train. We started by putting the dog in a sit and then luring the dog into a down by holding a treat in front of their nose and s-l-o-w-l-y lower the treat to the ground, clicking and treating as soon as the dog’s elbows hit the ground. Well, at first, I moved the treat too quickly and Doppler just stood up and stretched his neck down to try to gnaw the treat out of my hand (ouch, puppy teeth!). When I moved the treat more slowly, he plopped down to the ground. Success! Click, treat. I did that three times, and then tried it without a treat. He went down without the treat a few times, but then he seemed to lose interest and just sat there. I worked on “down” with him again today at the office with similar results. “Down” seems like such a basic cue, but I think I’m going to have to be patient with him. He may need to be lured more than three times. I might also try doing very short training sessions, ending them before he loses interest. I have no doubt that he’ll eventually learn “down.” It just might take a little longer than “sit,” which he picked up in about 15 minutes.