Finally getting back to training and fun

 Since we've been attending the Play and Train classes at Warringal on Sunday mornings, life has become more settled at home. Peppa has had frequent tummy upsets and visits to vets, and we seem now to have found foods that she can stomach. 

And, best of all, we've found that her appetite is improving and she will take food as training rewards.

Consequently, we're able to play in the kitchen with the toys I bought from K-Mart. 

 

At the moment, I'm rewarding for simply not being scared by the new objects in the house. I was surprised, after fifteen years with phlegmatic Penny, to realise that Peppa is a totally different personality, who needs lots of time to adjust to novelty. (Penny thrived on novelty!)

Re-reading my own old blog posts

 Peppa raced out the door this afternoon when our neighbour called, and we did our usual heart-searching about our awful standard of dog training. 

And then I began to wonder whether we had the same issues, so many years ago, when we had Penny living with us. Our vet agrees with us in referring to her as 'Saint Penny', haha. In comparison to Peppa she was indeed a saint.

I thought I'd look back at my own old posts from 2007, when Penny was around the age Peppa is now. And I'm finding it not only entertaining, but also actually helpful. 

One thing I'm noticing is that Peppa is more of a digger than Saint Penny was. I might have made an error of judgment in letting her 'help' me when I was weeding around the strawberries. She sure did love digging that big hole! It was a bit of a pity that a few of the strawberry plants ended up strewn around the area. But hey, she had fun, and it wasn't all that hard to replant the ones she removed.

I guess we'll find out soon if I've created a 'digging monster'.

I'm going to do a search on my old blog for references to digging and see what comes up. In the meantime, I'm intending to scroll through fifteen years of Penny's blogs to see which links still work and make a note on each post as to which links are no longer viable.

training a lhasa apso

 When we brought Peppa into our lives, we knew it would be necessary to get her used to grooming. So we did our best, and she's used to being up on the table getting special attention (and extra special treats) every evening. Fortunately, she loves it. We did come up with the theory that she had seen her mum and dad being groomed and thinks it's part of being a grown-up dog. Who knows what goes on in the clever little head?

She's more clever than we thought she would be, and has trained her people pretty well. Here are some of the favorites:

1. Jump appealingly up onto the human's legs and allow said human to stroke your head and tickle you behind the ears, at the same time slo-w-ly, quie-t-ly stealing a handkerchief or  tissue from their pocket. If tissue, tear it to shreds and enable them to get some isometric exercise bending to collect the shreds. If a handkerchief, mouth it dramatically as if you're going to swallow it and might subsequently need to go to the amazingly expensive Animal Emergency clinic. Wait until the human races to get you a super-nice treat and willingly 'give' the hanky to them in exchange for the treat, and get praised for being so co-operative.

2. Whenever you see a baby gate left ajar, race into the forbidden room and ostentiously wait in the doorway for the command to come 'this way' and receive a treat for your obedience.

 

 

3. Go out into the backyard and bellow at the top of your voice at any movement in the adjoining apartments and wait for the command to 'come'. Race in and get a treat. 

I suspect she's working on a few more commands for the humans to obey. I'll report when she has us even more under her control. 

Oh, and now that I have a close look at that photo I posted, I think I'd  better get off this computer and do that grooming. Obviously today was a rather exciting and messy playday.

 

Lovely rain

 I was beginning to wonder if we were slipping once again into drought, despite the predictions that La Nina would give us a wet autumn (or some such thing that I don't quite remember). But the lovely rain has come and is staying all week.

Which brings me to the subject of dog-walking. I remember our vet once saying a dog must at least 'leave the property' each day. Well, in a most unusual event, Peppa didn't go for a walk today.

We did walk yesterday, even though it rained all day. We went to LaTrobe University and walked around under the shelter of the raised walkways. I wouldn't normally go there, but it was a holiday - Easter Monday - and I thought it would be okay. 

Having no walk today has proved Peppa is adept at entertaining herself. She has spent the evening jumping all over us and trying to drag our jackets off, racing out the back and barking piercingly at any movement, chewing anything within reach and generally being annoying, to be frank.

I realised it was my fault for not giving her the opportunity to go out today. Lesson learned. However, it did also make me realise that we're not doing enough training to allow her to use her intelligence. So, later this evening, we spent twenty minutes training.

She surprised me. We revisited: weave between my legs/sit (and wait for the release word)/ walk nicely beside me on my left/ find a treat hidden at the other end of the house/ drop/and...best of all, free shaping where I put an empty cardboard box in the middle of the kitchen and praised any looking at the box or touching it with her nose.

I'll admit I've been underestimating her and forever comparing her with Penny, who was a delight to train. It turns out Peppa, too, wants to use her brains. It's just that she's not really in the business of trying to please the humans. She lives with us, not for us. I guess we should have known this, having read up on Lhasa apso personality traits before she came to live here.

Now I'm going to look back through my old posts to look at the training we routinely did with Penny. A great reason to revisit Penny's lifetime with us. It will be sad but worthwhile.

 We've enjoyed the first two episodes of A Dog's World With Tony Armstrong. In the most recent one, called 'Super Senses' , he looked at studies that investigate whether certain breeds have common behavioural characterists. They concluded that this is probably true to a certain extent, but individual experiences and individual personality traits also play a part.

Well, given that we had researched Lhasa Apsos before we bought Peppa, I suppose it should  be no surprise to us that she's so completely different from our beloved Penny, who died in 2019. 

We didn't realise at the time that Penny was a dream dog in terms of her trainability. Peppa is more of a challenge, to say the least. If she's out walking and sees something interesting, she's deaf to any human voices and impervious to the lure of any treat. 

So it might be quite a long time before we'd trust her off lead. On the other hand, it's wonderful that she's quite happy to trot along with us on lead, and as we have a big yard, she gets plenty of chances to zoom around. 

She is an independent learner, though. There's one room she's never allowed into (haha! she says, I'm quicker than lightning, so try stopping me slipping in when you open the baby gate.) She's decided if she creeps in when you aren't aware, she can sit at the  gate and wait to be given the command to emerge, at which point she gets a nice treat.

 Just a quick update on Peppa to keep this  blog alive. She's had ongoing issues with her eyes, but a couple of courses of medications seem to have settled the problems for now, and keeping up with the facial grooming helps. 

We're bemoaning the fact that she's not well-trained, and today I thought, 'Well, whose fault is that?' So off on a short training walk in the street, with lots of high-value rewards. She was great. She does get a walk every day, unless the weather is really against us, so it's not as if she doesn't get lots of stimulation. But sometimes it can be easier to let her just roam at the end of the lead. Lazy humans!

In general, she's a delight. If you don't mind sock-stealing... 

As you can see, butter wouldn't melt in her mouth:

physiotherapy for an old dog

Penny seems to have a weakness in her right  rear leg, so we're doing 'reps'. Or maybe we should call them 'sets'. Who'd have thought it would be so complicated being an old dog?

Anyway, Penny doesn't care what we call them. She just wants to eat the food she's offered. (Usually little bits of raw carrot.)

She puts her front paws up on a little stool.

I tap her left rear leg and she lifts it and I support it gently, not taking her weight, but just reminding her to keep it in the air.

Seeing she's totally focused on gobbling the food, she seems to hardly notice she has her weight on her weak leg. 

I think it might be working, because she jumped from the footpath into the back seat of the car recently, the first time in months we haven't lifted her in.

I wish she didn't lick her paws, though. You can see how stained they are. We're working on that problem too.

mental stimulation for an old dog

A  friend sent me a newspaper cutting about canine freestyle, and it reminded me of the fun Penny and I used to have when we were both younger.

I  sent my friend an old clip of us at a canine freestyle club, in the days when that was a new sport for Australia. OMG. It was NINE years ago! Now I know Penny and I are old...

Anyway, it got me thinking about the fact that I worry that life is boring for Penny now, because her creaky limbs probably aren't up to twisting and turning. We might have a go  at some modified canine freestyle, but our floors are slippery and I'd have to set up carpets.

In the meantime, an internet search for something to do has turned up this fun sport, canine nose work. This clip shows the progression of some simple home training and we're  going to try it soon.

When your dog is old

It's hard enough to admit to myself that I'm old. But to admit that Penny, too, is in her senior years...is confronting.

I was just looking back through my old posts, searching for a photo of a pvc pipe agility jump I'm giving away on Freecycle, and feel quite sad that so many of the fun things Penny and I have done in the past are no longer appropriate. She can't get up on her hind legs, and has quite a lot of arthritis in all limbs, so many favourite tricks are now out of the question, also most agility and indeed, a great deal of the active training.

Here's the agility jump that has made me feel so nostalgic.

On the other hand, recently I came across this skateboard ramp on the side of the road for disposal.

I reckon we could have some fun with that, and what's to stop her doing a little bit of weaving, provided I space the poles far apart? As I've posted previously, I'm a great believer in recycled items as agility equipment. After all, it's free.

I've just read Karen Pryor's post about adapting training to the changes in your old dog. Most encouraging. And I liked a few of the points in this post, also.

Yes, we will still have active fun together!


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Penny the dog works on the basket trick

Mitch and Molly said, on my post about kitchen training of the basket trick, that their mum is thinking of teaching them to 'hold'.

I was really glad to get that comment, because I'd been scratching my head about where to go next with the trick. (We got the idea from Ludo.)

So I'm reminding Penny of the 'hold' behaviour, which she hasn't done for months. She used to know how to hold a toy, but has never done it with a basket, so I didn't expect too much of her. She only had to mouth the handle of the basket at this stage. (Apologies for my loud voice. I do get a bit excited when Penny shows me how smart she is!)

how not to train your dog

Penny and I were in a local park and came across a discarded lunch, consisting of two pieces of bread and a fried egg. I didn't notice the fried egg. I thought it was three pieces of relatively low-interest dry bread. (Of course, subsequent events proved Penny did notice the succulent egg.)

 We approached the food and practised "leave it' with great success. Penny turned away and received her treat - rabbit meat treats.

 We did it again.

 And I, flushed with success, decided to do it one more time, and to film it. Bad idea.

 

kitchen training for dogs

It's been a while since Penny and I have played games in the kitchen, so I thought I'd post this 'warts and all' series of clips from yesterday.

I placed two familiar toys in the doorway of the kitchen...

...after throwing an assortment of toys around the floor. (I have no idea why I did that, seeing it had nothing to do with the training except to add some confusion, but I enjoyed tossing them out of the toy box and seeing Penny dash joyfully around.)

The idea was for me to show a toy to Penny and she would go to find the matching toy.

She was pretty good at it, seeing we haven't played this game for nearly a year. I didn't react to the wrong toy being fetched, except to continue to ask for the correct one. It was funny to see her tail drooping as she realised she wasn't going to be praised for the wrong one.

However, it was lovely to see the wagging tail the rest of the time.

No one watching her could doubt there was some problem-solving going on. Have a look!

when a successful behavior causes an injury to a dog

Dogs are very specific about behaviors they've learned. One of our favorites with Penny is to drop something as we walk along, and then after a minutes or two, cry, 'Oh, no, where is it?'

Penny races back, touches the lost item with her nose, we shout for joy, and she hurries back to us for her reward...
leaving the found object where it is, for a human to collect.

Pretty good trick, lots of fun for us all.

A couple of weeks ago, as we walked at Rosanna, Penny played in the creek and I was throwing her Whirl Wheel into the water, but I accidentally threw it onto the opposite bank, up a metre-high steep embankment.

In retrospect, I know what I should have done. Walked away, philosophical about the lost toy. After all, what did it cost? Fifteen measly dollars!

But I said those words - 'Oh, no, where is it?' and allowed Penny to laboriously pull herself up that little cliff, through the long grass, across the scrubby plants, until she found it. And, to my dismay, she headed back, down the cliff, across the creek and waited for her reward, having shown me where it was.

I had a second chance to let it go, forget the toy. But did I? No - I let her go back again and again, changing my instruction to the usually reliable, 'Find your toy! Get the toy!'

By this time there was a circle of humans gathered, cheering Penny on, and she received a spontaneous round of applause when she figured it out and came back with the toy in her mouth.

So I have only myself to blame that she now has a limp. We went to the vet a couple of days later and he thought it was a problem with the left shoulder, but that it showed no 'structural damage'. It should recover with rest. (By the way, he asked me what I thought I was doing, letting Penny go through grass that most likely hid a poisonous snake...)

But it isn't better. I think we didn't rest enough. (For instance, we went walking with our puppy friend.) So now we're having a no-walks policy for about five days. Lately it has been horrible hot weather here, too hot even at 11 pm to go out for a walk, so that suited us fine.

Today is cool - thank goodness! So I lifted Penny into the car, to convince her we were off for her usual walk, and then lifted her down at a local park that I'd normally consider too boring for a visit. She mooched around in the shade for seven minutes - don't know why I chose seven - and home we came.

She found some interesting smells, I contemplated nature for a while, and I guess it was a win-win.

socialising a puppy

When Penny first came to live with us, we were fortunate that we were told to introduce her to as many new experiences as we could, before she moved out of the critical age where she would be receptive to new experiences and learn not to fear them.

We travelled on the local trains, looked at ducks in the park, trained next to fast-moving cyclists, walked through our busy local shopping centre - amongst many other experiences. We always included lots of fun training and play in our schedule.

It was an age when everything was exciting and interesting:
a milk carton...

a doggy mat...

even a box of tissues.

I was browsing the Net today and came across an article suggesting that one of the differences between modern wolves and dogs may relate to that earliest period of socialisation. An evolutionary biologist at the University of Masscahusetts, Kathryn Lord, conducted a study that seems to show that wolf pups begin to explore their environment while they are still deaf and blind, whilst dog pups stay inactive until they have developed sight and hearing.

When a wolf pup explores at first, it may be frightened of a sound, but becomes accustomed to it. Later, when it begins to see, it may be frightened all over again by the sight of something. So, as each new sense comes into play, the wolf pup has to learn to cope with new experiences.

Dog pups, on the other hand, go through this period of accustoming themselves to things - like humans, horses, even cats, for instance - all in the one period.

I guess this has interesting implications for taming wolves.

I wonder if it would apply to dingoes also?

a dog learns from another dog's blog

I've been having an interesting conversation with Johann's mum. She has two great video clips of how she trained Johann to succeed with the wooden Nina Ottosson Dog Casino.

First she taught him to focus on the little pegs that close off the drawers.



Then they moved on to pulling the pegs out of the holes.



So far we've practised Penny touching the peg for a reward from my hand. We moved on to clicking when she knocks the peg off the game, because I thought that might be closer to what we need finally, when she'll have to pull up the peg and throw it off the Casino so she can pull out the drawer to get the treats.



Johann's mum has mentioned the command 'pick it up' and Penny knows that well, so we experimented with that.



(I just can't seem to co-ordinate using the clicker and stopping myself from saying 'Yes!'. Luckily Penny's used to my muddled training methods, lol.)

a dog waits for the command to eat

Penny has always waited for a release command before starting her food, and she will also allow us to take the bowl away during her meal - probably because that only happens when we are adding to her meal, because we've forgotten something that was supposed to be in the bowl.

But she sure gives us those 'puppy eyes' to tell us to get on with the job if we make her wait too long.

I can't usually get such candid shots of her, because she doesn't like the big 'eye' of the camera pointing at her, and usually turns her head away. I got this clear shot by using a phone instead of a camera.

I've mentioned previously that I really like this new bowl, which I bought from The Cup & Mug, because it's solidly made, and easy to keep clean. 

You can see how it didn't move shift on the floor when Penny changed position to clean up those pesky little bits of food that escaped down the side of the bowl.

kitchen training

Now that Penny is feeling better after her biopsy but isn't allowed to go on long walks, we've returned to doing some kitchen training. Today I thought I'd revisit a trick where she is supposed to look at a toy in my hand and choose the matching toy from scattered items on the floor. It's delightful to see her returning to her happy self. We'll still put the dreaded cone of shame on at night, at least until Tuesday, when we go back to the vet to get the stitches taken out. It went okay (except for my embarrassing tendency to repeat commands!), but I suspect Penny isn't sure what I'm on about.

Japanese discount store treasures for dogs

A new Japanese discount store called Tokuya has opened near us, and it's quite an adventure to shop there, because all the packaging is in Japanese. A friend and I came away with a collection of 'treasures' this afternoon - some of my items were dog-related, of course, or I wouldn't be writing about them here, lol. Their website is also a treasure trove - of hilarious English. But who am I to laugh, when I can't speak more than one word of Japanese? Well, maybe two, with awful pronunciation...

Anyway, back to the dog-related goods.



The first one is what I guessed to be plastic spikes to place around seedlings so Penny won't walk on them. Wonderful!



Great packaging - the message is clear. (I think...)
Here they are in position.



Next was the cutest little freezer-pack, just right for keeping Penny's treats cool in summer when I'm using the great little Black Dog treat pouch.





The third is an expanding pole. I guess it's for hanging things in a small space. But it will make a good target stick.

We tried it out in the backyard. The sticks come in lots of lengths. This was the smallest, I think. (Please excuse the terrible dog-handling technique. I can see I'm out of practice. We'd better start doing some targeting once more.)

returning to training

At last, Cindy, our long time trainer, has restarted her regular sessions! And what have I discovered, after a year away from training? I've discovered that Penny is still clever and I'm still clumsy and uncoordinated. But Penny doesn't care and I sure don't.

Cindy lent me a book called 'The Other End of the Leash', after I told her how much I enjoy the author's blog. I haven't read far into the book yet, but in the early part the author, Patricia McConnell, looks at the ways we humans use our bodies when interacting with our dogs.

So today, on a lovely spring day, after a quiet time in the sun for Penny and hard work in the garden for me,



three of us set out for Yarra Bend Park.

We practised 'come', to get ourselves in the mood for some work, and tried out the idea of leaning slightly away from Penny to avoid crowding into her body space when she arrives. Did I say leaning SLIGHTLY away? I think my directions from behind the camera might have been unclear, lol.



On the other hand, Penny did beautiful 'comes', racing towards her human and sitting precisely in front.



Even though Penny's 'come' is usually good, we thought we'd try the idea of calling her and moving away as she arrived. Patricia McConnell explains the logic of it like this:

The best way to get a dog to come to you is to turn away from him and move in the opposite direction (which is actually "toward you" from the standpoint of the dog)...Dogs want to go the way that you're going, and to a dog that's the way that your face and feet are pointing.

In a way it was silly to be changing our established 'come' command, but it was fun to vary things and see what happened. After all, we're not practising for obedience competitions, we're simply out to have fun and communicate well with Penny. Here's a picture of her arriving in a rush as her human walks off in the opposite direction.

positive thinking and dog training

Jaana, in Estonia, the winner of Honey's Dancing With the Doggy Stars competition, has begun writing about her training methods. I read with interest her post about the need for the human partner to think positively.

I've learned in the past that if I get stressed about what I want Penny to learn, it goes badly. My reason for trick training with Penny is to give her a chance to use her intelligence and to have fun, so I agree with what Jaana has said.