"Stand was easier, but more confusing to him. I could not lure him up out of a sit position, so I had to lure him to step towards me at first, but I would click as soon as he was up. Then I only clicked when he stood but didn't walk towards me. This took about an hour. He knows stand by verbal cue alone now."


Just a reminder: don't name it until you love it.

If you have now named it ("stand"), then you have named whatever his present performance is.





Also, you mentioned "filling in the training gaps."

I'm a HUGE fan of starting over with markers. It will go fast with familiar commands and not so fast with new ones, but it will be much more educational for the dog.

Part of your goal is to teach how markers work ....

If you teach him with markers a command he is familiar with, he's going to grasp quite quickly the role of the markers.




JMO!

hey connie i agree with all that you are disagreeing with me on lol .

yes you do use the food in your hand to get them to follow it , but the food is positioned such that the dog does not see it . rather than looking at the food , he is following this thing that ( always , often , sometimes . . . ) produces good things . he knows that you have the food , you just don't show it to him .

john the difference is in the presentation . if you are using the food as the visual cue , rather than your hand , that is what the dog is working for , as opposed to being manipulated into a position or behavior ( by following your hand , or some other physical gesture ) in the hope of some reward .

it is the difference between you saying " this is what i am going to pay you " , versus the dog thinking " i wonder how much i'll get paid ? "

at first , you might be rewarding at a rate of 150% per mark , but as soon as the dog is showing some proficiency in the behavior you can modify the rate of reward .


sorry if it seems like i am beating the semantics to death . . . just trying to help

The "stay" command is an AKC thing. If you've given the dog a "sit" command it's expected it will remain in that position until another command or release is given. Of course that requires the dog to understand duration and that's built gradually.
Food becomes a bribe when the dog will perform ONLY when it sees the food present after you "think" the dog knows the command.

Gotcha. Don't know if this is right but here's what I do. I'm only using food initially to move his head where I want. Then I use empty fingers, then I make the hand motion less obvious as Im introducing the word, i.e. look at me, then i fade the hand motion out all together. I demand more and more duration from the eye contact. Then at the end of a session he gets a run through of all the commands he knows, with the new command mixed in. If he stumbles, using the hand motion usually helps. I figure this is more fun and ends on a positive note.

His down is getting faster, but now I'm teaching him that he can go directly from down to sit, without standing first.

I tried some free shaping again last night. It did not go very well. I feel like Wyatt has low self esteem. Can I improve self-esteem through marker training somehow?

I don't think I'd be putting the new command in with the old if it's not solid. When the dog doesn't 100% understand then all you teaching the dog is that the command can be ignored.

"Can I improve self-esteem through marker training somehow?"

Absolutely!
Don't toss to many commands at a dog. Each command should be a happy, rewardable event in the beginning. Put together (chain) only the very best together and randomly. NOT always in the same order.
If your dog will obey a command with your back turned to it then it's probably ready to be put with another command. Always randomly! don't fall into a pattern.

John, IMHO, self-esteem in your dog will increase exponentially as the dog gets better at marker training. At least it did with my current dog. When she figured out that she could teach me to give her a treat for doing some simple behavior, she wanted to train all of the time.

My GSD used to have a slow down...honestly, he's a lazy boy and not super fast in anything.

What I did was to really get him engaged with me...his favorite toy is a Kong Wubba. So we did this:

1. He knows I have the toy. We play a little fetch and I take the toy away.
2. I give him the down command. He's super eager to get the toy back, so he naturally moves faster.
3. As soon as he downs, BOOM! fun stuff happens. I mark with YES! and throw the wubba.

Food didn't get the same response as a toy, so we used a toy for quite awhile. Note: he already knew what down is, was just slow.

Wyatt has much more prey drive than food drive. My last American bulldog was the same way. The problem is he won't drop his tug toy or ball without me grabbing his collar, and waiting for him to let go. It kills the whole groove of learning with him.

I appreciate all the help and pointers. We are taking a break from marker training for a while. He is refusing the treats I got him; they give him gas and the runs. I tried using his dog food, but he's not happy to work for it.

John, the rewards should never cause him GI distress.


Remember that they must be counted in with meals when you figure his daily food, and remember that they should be real food when you are doing lots of rewarding.


If you tell us what you are using, we can help. (No, I agree that kibble isn't HV enough for any but extremely food-driven dogs, but I betcha we can give you suggestions that will work.)

Tiny pieces of all-white-meat poached or baked skinless poultry are extremely cheap and simple and also extremely unlikely to cause any GI distress in any dog. And that's not my only ace.


Purchased treats that give gas and diarrhea are bad, period. Don't buy them.

But they honestly have nothing to do with marker training.


Anyway, if you want suggestions, let us know. We've all accommodated the need to fit HV rewards into the daily food. Heck, lots of us do FST, which involves laying tracks with food.

There should be some sort of food reward that will excite him. If not then teach a clean out with markers. Once the dog learns that outing the tug/toy is rewarded with another bite then it will happen.
Can you stand still and keep the tug from moving? Hold it against your leg to immobilize it? Once the tug is still most dogs will let it go. Just mark that release and reward with another bite.
The tug has always been my fav reward for the dogs simply because it involves YOU. The ball as a reward takes you out of the game as soon as the dog has it unless the dog has a huge desire to retrieve it back to you.
When the dog lets it go DO NOT move it or you then put it back in play. The dog will automatically make a grab for the movement. Mark the out BEFORE you move it. When you do move it move away from the dog. Don't shove it at him.