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One of the big challenges in training for any dog sport, and certainly obedience, is that you are never training your dog under the same conditions you’ll be facing in the ring. There are always a lot of variables that are part of the competition picture that are different from what your dog sees in training. Yet we still need the dog to perform the behaviors, even though there is a little bit different picture.
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What we are talking about here is the concept of generalization. This concept is not always well understood in the dog training world, and I think it can be a source of confusion.
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My friend and KPA colleague, Nan Arthur pointed out that a lot of trainers refer to generalization as “taking it on the road”. But she believes, and I whole-heartedly agree, that the process can and should start much earlier in the training.
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As soon as your dog has learned the gist of the behavior, you can and should begin changing the picture in small ways. Mixing up the small details, preserving specific common elements of whatever the critical parts of the cues are supposed to be, will make for a stronger behavior in the long run and avoid getting stuck with a problematic plateau. .
#dogtraining #dogtrainingtips #clickertraining #clickertrained #positivereinforcement #forcefree #forcefreetraining #dogtricks #rewardbasedtraining #professionaldogtrainer #dogtrainer #dogtrainersofig #operantconditioning #workingdog #workingdogs #workingdogsofig #sciencebased #sportdog #positivetraining #obedience #obediencetraining #dogobedience #competitiveobedience #competitionobedience #obediencedog #awesomeobedience #belgiantervuren #belgianshepherd
If you asked me to name the single most important thing you can do for your dog, it would be this.
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Keep your dog feeling safe.
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This is not to be confused with your dog being safe, or whether or not you think your dog is safe. This is about keeping your dog *feeling* safe. Which means identifying what your dog finds stressful or scary by learning how to observe and read their body language to recognize when, where, and under what circumstances they feel uncomfortable, and doing whatever you can to avoid those situations.
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This can mean that your dog never visits another dog park.
This can mean that even though it’s a beautiful Sunday and you’d love to have brunch on a patio of your favorite restaurant with your dog, your dog stays home.
This can mean that you politely (or not) decline requests to pet your dog.
This can mean that when children come over your house, your dog is in another room with a yummy Kong.
This can mean that you walk your dog during quiet times of the day.
This can mean that you drive your dog to walk them in a different area.
Whatever it means for you and your dog, keep your dog feeling safe.
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You are your dog’s best and only advocate. You are what stands between them and the rest of the world, a world where dogs are set up to fail every day with often heartbreaking consequences. This doesn’t mean that we don’t also actively and *humanely* work to help our dogs feel more comfortable and confident in this world, but it does mean that until they do, WE HAVE TO KEEP THEM FEELING SAFE.
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Our dogs are relying on us, it’s our job to have their backs.
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#keepyourdogfeelingsafe #fearfuldog #reactivedog #advocateforyourdog #dogtraining #positivedogtraining #positivereinforcement #forcefreetraining #forcefreedogtraining #forcefree #fearfree #sciencebasedtraining #moderndogtraining
This trick seems to be a fan favourite so I’m bringing back this video from the winter! I’m still surprised he even picked it up, I was just messing around, not knowing what I was doing. Fortunately he’s smarter than I am.
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#horsesofinstagram #horses #horse #horseriding #horsebackriding #equestrian #equestrianlife #quarterhorse #blueroan #roan #pony #instahorse #instahorses #clickertraining #positivereinforcement #forcefree
Intrinsic motivation is that thing that lets you come back from an intense day of skiing, riding, parkour, dancing, martial arts practice... and have NO IDEA how you got that big bruise on your leg.
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You KNOW it must have hurt! And yet... it didn’t, at the time.
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That is the magic of “nature’s pharmacy.” The analgesia of focused high activation of the nervous system.
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But now imagine you are just sitting at your desk doing tedious homework, and someone pokes you in the arm. OUCH!!!!!
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It HURTS!
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You stub your toe on the way to the kitchen.
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You stub your toe in the middle of a soccer game.
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You trip and fall on the way to your car.
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You trip and fall in the middle of wild ground play with your horse
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Someone grabs your arm in an acro yoga class ♀️
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Someone grabs your arm hard while you are grocery shopping
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Someone kicks you you while in a martial arts class. ♀️
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Someone kicks you because you are in their way at the office —> ♂️♂️♂️ they are going to jail. And, oh yeah, it hurts like a mofo.
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With physical and/or emotional stress, context is EVERYTHING!
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Of all the crazy things I once believed to my core, perhaps the worst was this:
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“It’s no big deal to hit a horse... look what they do to each other!!! ♀️”
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Mammals largely share the same fundamental neuro/endocrine responses. We are far far far more alike than different, because the kinds of things we talk about are happening at the older parts of our brain/nervous system, not the “new kid on the block”, the prefrontal cortex.
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It is NOT anthropomorphizing to make comparisons between how we feel when having fun and how horses feel. Nervous system’s gonna nervous.
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This is one of the main reasons we often use intense play and showing off with a horse that is struggling with restrictions in movement — we WANT nature’s good drugs to help make it feel less hard, less painful.
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It’s why we do not typically use slow, low-key, totally relaxed simple movements with a horse that struggles in movement —> they do NOT give the protective “feel-good” effect of the brain’s opioids, cannibinoids, and nor-Adrenalin.
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Horses feel pain *just like we do*.
Time for some Archie ASMR.. does Archie love food? You betcha! Just look at all that drool! And I was told shepherds weren’t all that drooly...
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#gsd #germanshepherd #adelaide #dogtricks #dogtraining #positivereinforcement #forcefree #gsdstagram #bigdogs #sniffandbarkens #animalsinfluence #dogsofadelaide #mukbang #asmr #cronch
cheap date. this little shrimpy works for free vegan gelato and unlimited face licks.
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p.s. let’s add this to the How to Train Your (Blind and Deaf) Baby Gator series. I haven’t talked about this in a while but here it is... when we first adopted Pearly, we had never done any training with any of our dogs (other than the usual)... they are good dogs, why do they need training? (actual thoughts from #pearlysmomsbrain™️) Training was for “bad dogs” ♀️ (smh @ 2016 Pearly’s Mom) and people who had money to spare. But then we adopted Shrimpy. She started out as this demure, almost helpless little babe and quickly morphed into a wild beastie (Pearly pls forgive me for using that hideous emoji to represent you but facts are facts, girlfriend. also side note: if your dog became a hellion in the weeks/months following adoption, you’re not alone. this is normal. more on this some other time.) But still, we didn’t train her. Why? Because I was naive and discounted the potential of a sensory impaired dog. When people on Instagram would asked “how do you train a blind and deaf dog?”, I would reply “you don’t.” ... but then, I wised up. There was no way we could go through life with this wildling in our home. She wasn’t happy and neither were we. Enter our trainer (oh hey @animalbizhi!), who after even just 1 session was already giving us the tools and the knowledge so that we could build a meaningful, joyous life with our most special nugget. Fast forward to two years later and I have well earned bragging rights that Pearly is a polite little shrimpy who minds her manners even when her impulses tell her otherwise. #goodgirlgator
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#blinddog #deafdog #doublemerle #positivereinforcement #forcefree #sciencebaseddogtraining #fearfree #pittie #pibble #rescuedog #thedodo #tongueouttuesday #tongueout #tot #dog #ilovemydog #mydogiscutest
Credits go to @archer.the.gsd
When you try and take a selfie with your almost 50kg dog but he punches you in the back on the way through..♀️ I’m not sure what I expected tbh.
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Tag a friend who needs a hug!..or maybe a punch in the back.#selfiechallenge #dogselfiechallenge
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(For licensing or usage, contact licensing@viralhog.com)
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#gsd #germanshepherd #dogtraining #dogtricks #forcefree #positivereinforcement #gsdstagram #funnydogs #pups #pixiecut #shorthairdontcare @9gag @ladbible @unilad @theellenshow #dogsofadelaide #adelaide #dogs #animaladdicts