I have been training my dog to heal with markers. I first put a treat in my mouth. Then I will say "Fuss" and walk forward with her looking right at my face, and I have began intermitantly rewarding her working my way up to about 4-5 seconds of healing at the longest. The problem is when I say "Yes!" and treat, she jumps up and snaps at the treat coming out of my mouth, and I don't like it. Any ideas on how to get her to stop jumping at the treat? Should I correct her for this?

Is the "Yes!" making her anticipate the treat, and jump? You might try to decouple "yes!" from treating. The point of a good marker is that the dog knows that the marker means a reward is coming because of what you did when the marker was issued, there can be a slight delay between when the marker comes and when the treat comes (though, the smaller I think the better)

Try saying "YES!" and then taking another step before treating.

As always, if this is terrible advice I hope someone will correct me.

I would just correct the dog, not to hard, because you don't want to take drive out of the dog.

Just let him know, this is not the thing to do. and correct every time.

It worked for me.

best of luck
ted

I would not jump into correction right away, after all the dog was taught that the treat comes from there....I would try what David suggested and maybe even try to treat from a treat pouch on your hip.

We cannot teach a habit (whether it be on purpose or not) and then start correcting it, the dog will not understand that.....


(Ted, one thing, if you ever need a home for that Kelpie, call me , he is absolutely beautiful)

I'm working on this right now, I've decided to use a toy instead of a treat spit from my mouth. First of all hard to talk with my face full of cheese or hotdogs .. 2nd it is hard to aim the spit of the treat at a moving dog without her breaking out of the heel or having the treat bounce off her nose and then the exercise is really finished!!

I like using a tug for this exercise in my experience it is easier for the dog to understand. Though I'll still spit treats for recalls and other exercises.

I use a smaller tug and hold it close to my chest with both hands. I have her "by me" and look at her so she knows something is up lead off with the left leg and say "heel" she will heel along looking alternatively at my eyes and then the tug so she is still very focused on me still, but intrerested in the tug. If she forges or lags, I stop but not say anything and if she is confused I give the "by me" and she scoots right into return to heel position. Then we start again ..

I reward her with the tug when she is in the return to heel at the end of a leg or put it into her mouth while heeling and give her a romp on the tug. I vary the timing of the reward too. i.e. if she lags and I have to ask her to return to heel I'll praise her and then heel again after we've done a leg of the yard I'll drop the tug to her after she has heeled for good length of time.

My dog is really heeling well with a lot of focus and this includes a pile of distractions using this technique. I am going to try to have her ready for the Shutzhund BH and the CKC CD by November. I am pretty confident that we can do it thanks to help of my coaches in person and from the Leerburg forum.

My GSD started to do this also and is too ball crazy to switch to a toy reward. So I treated from 3 different place - my mouth, my pocket, or a pouch behind my back. We don't have a problem anymore I also wonder if a lower value treat would be better. My young GSD goes crazy for certain treat and they actually cause her to lose focus. She works best for boring treats lol.

You can also try a short waist lead. When the dog jumps he corrects himself. Should take care of the problem itself. A less valuable reward is also a good idea, as is the other advice given.

Rick, in addition to others' suggestions, I would just completely leave out the "yes" if that's what makes your dog jump at your face. There's no reason for the yes in heeling that I can see. Just treat when the dog is in correct position. Jumping at you is not correct position, yet your dog is getting the reward since her timing is to jump as you say yes and release the treat.

Just simply leave out the yes. The treat is good enough and needs to be given only when the dog is in correct position, at the sit beside you during the heel as well as the walking during the heel.

 Quote: Howard Knauf

You can also try a short waist lead. When the dog jumps he corrects himself. Should take care of the problem itself. A less valuable reward is also a good idea, as is the other advice given.

That's a great idea!

Thank you, all!

I tried putting the first treat in my mouth, then treating her from the pouch. I still said yes, but she didn't jump upon me saying "yes" at all for some reason. Perhaps she was looking at my mouth as I would release the treat, and saw some sort of cue that I was going to spit it out then. I don't know, but I will continue to mix up the different places I treat from, as she is not jumping at my face anymore. I did spit out the treat a few times, and I also said "fuss" while not putting a treat in my mouth, and she still did the heeling perfectly, looking right at my face, so I think she is pretty sure of what to do with the command.

I love marker training! It is so fun! And Bella is very food motivated, which makes it even easier!