Kato the Dobernutter

[Richard]

Ok, we got Kato on the 17th May 2008 at 22 weeks so he is 7 months three days old now......

he has always had to wait for meals, even though he wants to be at his food like an Exocet Rocket, food down lasts about 30 seconds and its gone...

so he has to walk with me at a sensible heel....circle round and sit for me....wait..whilst i walk into the conservatory, and whilst i walk back to him for praise then release...

problem is he tends to anticipate comands and is just gagging for the release.....

this week we started on putting a recall in as well.....he is expecting a release to eat his grub...but instead he is getting a recall to run in the wrong direction away from the food....

Its very much a work in progress.....the sit would be better if it was a nice present to front sit , but the objective is to get that recall working in the face of distraction.......

noticed that house is a mess and i look worse so please ezxcuse that..........


Direct Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=kSgOOBfaG50

will post an update version in a few weeks to see if thier is any improvements.

Rich

[Hetty]

Hi Richard,

I've watched your video.......OK it is only 50 seconds of you working with your dog but this is what I see.

Some ideas to work with:
1. Try to train one single goal.
Your dog was asked to perform 8 single exercises chained together (heel/sit/down/stay/from down into sit/wait/here/sit) before it would get a reward that he also identifies as a reward.

2. Use reinforcers that have value to your dog
Your voice rewards & stroking does not mean anything to him. If you say good boy and try to stroke him he wants to go out as his real reward is outside.

3. Clarity - Give clear signals.
"with me" you call him with to me and in the heelwork you say lots of heel heel heel and also with me. Try to just say heel. Do not say heel for every step the dog takes. Only repeat the command if he has forgotten what he is doing.

"back up sit"
A sit is always a sit, no matter where it started from. As your dog does not have a degree in English, you should just keep it simple for him. Just say sit and wait until he does it and praise.
Also you have to say it 3 times before he sort of does it and then he gets a praise. So by doing so you tell him that he can ignore everything you say two times as long as he does it the third time.

4. Ask for what you want rather than for what you don't want
"uhuh" (you say this about 4 times in 50 seconds of training) does not give any other information than what you do now is wrong. In young dogs it is better to remind them what is right. So in stead of saying uhuh, you just repeat the command, when followed up correctly you can praise. Praise will teach him more than uhuh does.

Uhuh will really demotivate dogs to work for you as you nag and take them outof operant mode.

5. Do not reward for things you do not really want
The finish of the recall and the dog is sitting looking away from you and getting praised for it. You call the dog, the dog is distracted you say uhuh, so he sits but turns himself round to look at the distraction, you say that is a good job. But is it??? You could have repeated the command "to me" in stead of saying the uhuh and then praised for the correct sit in front of you weatching you.

6. Do not allow the dog to take control
It looks like you have already trained this before you filmed it as the dog already went down before you told him to. So he decides what he is doing next and then you say the command. The dog should not be in control of when to start what section of the exercise. If one of my dogs anticipate I will make them stop and start again when I tell them to. So in this case I would have asked him to sit and then praised him for that and then do the down on my cue.


Now how would I train this.......
First I would want to train the recall exercise in such a way that the dog really understands what it has to do. Only by reinforcing and not by punishing (uhuh).

1. Sit on the edge of your chair
2. Lure your dog with a sweetie in between your legs into a sit (dog is facing you, so not like what he is doing in the video)
This position needs to be rewarded a lot of times (up to 10,000 times)
3. Throw a sweetie away for your dog, so the dog runs away from you to get it
4. Call your dog (with a sweetie in your hand)
5. When the dog comes back and sits in front of you he can have his sweetie.
Again these last 3 steps need to be repeated lots (up to 10,000 times)

Then when he understands his exercise completely you can start working with distractions.
Then again you want to work a single goal, so just do the recall exercise with distraction.

I hope you won't take this the wrong way, as it is meant to help you to train this dog to a higher standard.

[Richard]

no not at all Hetty thank you for taking the time to mak such a good set of observations.

yes , he does do this as a regular thing...every meal time, it started on day one as just a sit and wait and has built up over last six weeks the recall away from food was added only this week.....

think i agree pretty much with all your points to be honest, the only difference i think is that i want to build up the lengh of chain, before the big reward of a feed...but do agree that getting each stage of the chain done badley is not ideal we do work each part of the chain excersise individually , but when chaining together as you saw he will anticipate the next move if he can....

yes knew finish of recall was poopy as facing away......will get camera girl to move next time, as i normally get him to recall to other end of house and then he does get the sit correct to the front position looking at me.....lazy teenager didnt want to move

when you say about practicing the recall 10,000 times i assume the dog dosent actually get to eat the treat you throw away???

only the one that he comes back to you for??

yes really helpfull feed back, its only when you video yourself or have an expert watch you that all your mannerisms and flaws can be identified.

Cheers Hetty


Rich

[Hetty]

Hi Richard,

As you can not do the 10,000 repetitions in one day or even one week it is not a problem that the dog is allowed to eat the sweetie you throw away and the sweetie that he gets when he comes to you.

You can use his normal meal nibbles for that and just take some of them outof the food bowl before you start training. His big jack pot can then still be the bowl with food (or what is left of it after your session).

[Ozzy]

Interesting watch and read including Hetty's comments -thanks for sharing Richard

The one thing I never considered doing is making Ozzy work really hard for his main meal. He does have to SIT or DOWN or UP and wait for release but that's about it.
All the other training I do before his meal time with little treats so I can treat more often and the 'single steps' instead of a long chain (basically what Hetty said with 'One Goal only').

I never really thought about it before and I can understand your line of thinking....however, I would be a bit of a loss if I had a really bad training day and Ozzy would just not know what he's doing. If it's only little treats I can just ask him to do something really simple and reward him and therefore finishing on a positive note. But it would feel wrong to give him his meal for it if I expected/asked for so much more. So what would you do? Take the meal away and try again later? Not feed him? Or give him his meal for something simple? Which of course then would not make him work hard next time around as he had it for simple task last time...I'm personally not convinced that using a main meal as a training tool/reward would work for me. The only reason I make him do something is NILIF. That's just me, and I'm not an expert (as you know) but I just thought I mention it in case it has any relevance to you.

Anyway, Kato looks great and I'm looking forward to see the next video
Happy training,
Sara

[Hetty]

If your dog dog doesn't work then you can't feed him, neither when it is working for the bowl of food nor if it is just a little tidbit. It's no use giving a reward for work not well done.

But also you should not expect something that is too difficult for the dog to do correctly and then say you won't get fed.......

[Richard]

hmm thought id make a couple of training notes

been ruddy busy with new flat so trying best not to neglect dobernutter

still work on that same pre food rooutine, and was getting good sucsess, we did get k up to a terrific , fly at me recall, with huges leap piroet into a sit along side , this was working really well untill he overshot and put his bottom straight through a plate glass cupboard door that used to be in the hallway

not cuts but sit at position is a litle more controoled now.............

playing ball...............

we have a drop comand, which works in the house, but when playing ball i can get a sit but the drop seems to be overcome with tooo much excite ment.......but have found new command

if i give the call 'ready' he drops ball and sits in quivering excitement waiting for next throw

obviously ive ended up embeding the 'ready' command as a cue for next ball is about to be thrown....hence he drops the boring ball in his mouth in preparation...
that i then pick the ball and throw it seems to have escaped him......


As ive said before dobes dont really get a brain for the first couple of years......

or perhaps thier trainers

Rich

[Richard]

oh and hes broken wind so bad tonight hes actually left the room in disgust and gone to his nightime bed in the hallway

Rich

[Sonia]

Why teach 'drop', means you have to bend over to pick it up! Teach to put the ball in your hand

Sonia

[Richard]

WAs pm'ing to Nick, and decided to copy part of PM into the forum

very hectic at the mo with moveing out of family home, only plan is to campain K hard next year in showing to get his champ red ink, most likely not with me as as handler, as my 65 year old mum is so much better in the ring with him, but hope to run him in obedience rings for next year,

never had a dog with so much potential , so long as he stops growing , getting fed up with being asked if hes a great dane cross...............

also have moral problem that at the moment have him on a show weight check chain, halti was absolutly no ruddy use, but found he was so good and relaxed in a show ring on a old fashioned choke chain that have used it on day to day wallks, thinkin of postin video of correct use of old check chain which for 95% of time is relaxed over shoulders, and gives gradual feed back as we walk, but know that id never qualify APDT using an1980s choke chain....

i blame my mum in her 60s with two duff hips, she had to baby sit kato for two weeks. was determinded to taKE him out so went back to what she knew best,,,,,,,,,,,a choke chain...had him walking on a relaxed lead in 15 mins....she and k are about the same weight

i grew up on barbera whoodhouse, my mum is pretty much a clone, but you should see her in a ring placing K's feet and stacking him up. joke is 30 years ago when we had our own show girls we always used proffesional handlers as my mum never had the confidence to take her own dogs into the ring , well unless i was doing junior handler comps.......

so here you have it folks im using and old fashioned choke chain to walk K.................

not i think an admission of defeat, more honesty, halti was causing so much stress , and putting a wear line on his nose, K is not a puller and does NOT gasp for breath as he walks, and im very consious af keeping a relaxed lead for as much off the time as possible, most of time choke chain is round his SHOULDERS,not his neck.......he has 18 inch neck i use 36 inch chain,

now id love to fuel the pinch collar debate but i hope my use of a chain is acecptable


Rich

[Sonia]

I tried my Lab on a choke chain and I do know the correct way to use it, I still couldn't hold him on that if he decided to lunge!

If you are using the choke chain correctly and Kato is responding, which it sounds as if he is and I guess your Mother being the same weight, it hasn't caused any damage to him! A vet I know said that using a choke chain can damage the oesophagus and he doesn't like them. But each to his own I say, as long as the dog does not suffer pain. The problem occurs when the choke chain is used incorrectly. I won't get any deeper into this! I would prefer it isn't used but if nothing else works............

Sonia

[Richard]

thanks Sonia

its not a case that nothing else works, a halti head collar is excellent but wears a strip of fur on the top of his nose

a choke atually seems a lot less 'invasive' he dosent fight it like a halti.and he gradual titening seems a more gentle reminder, fortunatly the pulling like a train is over or yes it would do damage,,,,,

spent last half hour crying watching the kodi videos on his thread,funny if anything K2 i more loving and a bigger cuddle monster and has actually trained faster than K1, but still miss the original dobernutter

Rich

[Sonia]

Richard, I get a tear in my eye just looking at Kado's photo on the bottom of your writings. So it must be sweet pain for you to see his videos.

I am pleased that Kato is helping to make the pain more bearable, he sounds a fun dog, all legs and affection

Sonia

[Richard]

kato i year and one week old 39.4 kg

no signs of brain arriving yet

[Richard]

happy Birthday Kato

[Richard]

[Richard]

[Sonia]

Happy Birthday Kato and what a handsome boy you are, with or without brain

Sonia

[LisaBC]

Happy Birthday Kato
and how can you say no brains, hes a man and I can see 2 very well formed brains in the piccie of him laying down!

[Sonia]

Sonia

[Richard]

so kato is now 13 months old, so ive had him 8 months now....

im a big believer in not taking anything at a rush, so some might be surprised its only been the last 2 weeks he has had regular off lead runs.....he has been off lead a few times, but only in short bursts in safe locations where ive felt happy plus usually with a saftey dog to round him up if needed.

the mian problem is that ruddy prey drive for birds,....kato will just chase and chase...even trying running on the sea in order to chase.........and not learning repeatedly that the wet shiny stuff is no use for running on.......

a gull can be chased for anything up to a mile, and in a field with a flock ive seen him run himself to a foam ragged for over half an hour.................

But i think the light at the end of the tunnel is coming....as ive managed to transfer most of his prey drive over to ball drive

unlike Kodi who only ever chased the ball down then ran around like an idiot with his prize, kato actally comes back!!!!! every time!!!!!!ok it might have included a lot of slammimg into my legs, as brakes not that effective, and we did have horrific jumping up problems, which with an open mouth and teath at 6 feet in the air were a little 'interesting'

but we now have screatching holt, with ball rolling to my feet, and a quivering sit, which at the moment just about holds till the ball is thrown.

ive extended this to a quivering wait, as i thow the ball up and kick it, but once the balls fully away ........hes off!!!

today we went to the long grass and bushes, and i held him in the sit, held colllar threw ball meduim distance, before getting him to 'find' from tommorow we will start using dummies, and working on a steady hold before release.

the up shot is that if a gull flys over head.......he dosent chase it.....however the crows i think rather like him too much and actually tease him coming down in front of him as we play and hes still 50/50 if the crow flys 10 feet in front of him at a hieght of 5 feet off the deck.

but i think sometimes you have to accept lifes not always gonna go exactly to plan.

REcall other than on crow problem now running at around 95%

we went for the first time to the forest of Bere this week for 2 hours off lead walking with all sorts of other dog sents and deer trails...........think i had 2 times i asked recall more than once, and one was followed with a 'well you had bring me back some venison for tea then' but only out of sight for a few seconds before bounding back from the depths of the undergrowth.

hes big hes stupid and stilltrys to pull on lead especially on the first half of any walk,,,,but its slowly coming together.

i recon another 5 or 6 years and he will be pretty good

Rich

[Richard]

lol just read back 4 months to get from playing fetch in house and garden, then small fenced tennis court size space to a full size open space....................

and i proberly took short cuts and have sloppy form!!!!

Rich

[Nicola]

, and we did have horrific jumping up problems, which with an open mouth and teath at 6 feet in the air were a little 'interesting'

Rich

Richard I feel your pain. Literally. Currently have the tooth shaped hole in my leg to prove it. Complete accident on Carl's part and in fact you can see where the first tooth went in (whilst clumsily tring to grab a toy), and then AS SOON as the opposite tooth made contact (small bruise) he spat me and the toy out, which is an interesting insight into bite inhibition, although again re-iterates the damage that a dog can do even in error and with no malice intended. Im certainly glad that I dont have kids or regular little visitors, put it that way.

all good fun, and in fact proved to be a (painful) turning point.

we too managed a complete off lead walk yesterday for 4 hours in the countryside (apart from anywhere near livestock and game)

Keep at it. we are getting there...................

[Richard]

lol guess im lucky having a retractable nose!!!!

though my beanie got taken off my head a couple of times in the excitement of everything

Rich

[Richard]

my rough tough butch Dobermann




Rich

[Richard]

Kato and his Aunty Paisley....note who has the bone............

He might be 20lbs and 4 inches bigger but she's deff the boss

On that Visit Paisley actually ran under Kato's tummy hes that much bigger!




Its a funny worls to discover a friends 7 yo Dobe is the sister of his father.......


Rich

[Richard]

Oh i didnt choose the sofa!!!! its hideous!!!!! it was left in the flat and i cant work out how to get it out!!!!

Rich

[Sonia]

Family history for dogs Kato's Aunty looks cute, are there any family likenesses in their behaviour?

Sofa isn't too bad, at least you don't have to worry about the dogs being on it!

Sonia

[LisaBC]

You will be in need of spray paint for Kato as the sofa and him clash slightly

[altered angel]

I happen to like the sofa - is that wrong? lol

I like Kato's T-Shirt more, as you said, he looks really 'mean' in it (awww)