I use a combo of methods, all patched together from various trainers. The trainer I use as my base is Flinks, because his methods cross train the dog for OB and Protection, ie, calm grip on the prey item translates to both the retreive and the sleeve work.

I use the marker training from Ivan B., because it makes it very clear to the dog when they have got the exercise right. And, you don't have to hide the ball, the toy can be in plain sight. That way, I know what I am rewarding, and the communication is very clear, the dog learns very fast.

Dildei's methods, in my opinion, have more of the potential to set you dog up for errors in the learning phase. Since there is no marker, and no focus work (as in Ivan B and Flinks, respectivly), you are rewarding the dog for what he is doing at the moment he is rewarded, which is usually looking at the hands. Then you have to use compulsion (no matter how lite) to fix the problem. Or the dog doesn't learn at his optimal pace. I know my timing is not so good as to be able to reward a dog faster than he can get out of position, or break focus. The dog learns faster with drive, focus, and marker. And my timing can be a little off, no harm done.

I notice a lot of people use food for the heel, at least in the beginning. The only thing I use food for in the beginning is the eye contact work, and training what the markers mean. Then I use the same exercise, but with the ball. I abandoned food early on because, at least for my dog, training = ball, and she will start playing tug of war on body parts if I train for too long with food. But ball training was a huge part of her foundational training, so I train with what my dog likes. Also, since I have a weak dog, I have to use her strongest drive to get her through some of the distractions.

I'm teaching position first, simply because, as a newbie, it is easier for me to teach. First, I use the ball as a lure to teach basic 'fuss' position. When as she has the general idea, I teach position changes. I loop the end of the leash around her hindquarters, and very slowly move out of position, from, say, 12 oclock to 3 oclock, guiding her (not correcting her) to move along with me. This works best with her; there are no sudden moves to distract her, the leash is not 'new' equipment, the dog dosn't break focus to see what the heck your doing by jabbing with your hands, and you don't lay the foundation for bad habits that you will have to use correction for later. Fence work (heeling by fences to correct position errors and forging and sitting straight) didn't work. She heeled perfectly next to a fence, but imperfectly away (even for a few yards). I generally insist on perfection in the learning phase, so the dog is conditioned through body mechanics. Mark, reward, release, repeat. Variable reinforcment. When the dog has this down, faster moves, clockwise and counterclockwise, sideways, backwards, then you are ready to move on (this is where we are in training).

For markers, I use my voice, because I had problems with the darn clicker; too much equipment. I don't use a word, because I find I use it whenever I am praising the dog in general, for nothing. I don't use a tongue click, because then the dog notices your mouth movements before the click, and thinks that is the signal. I use 'Ha'; it is flat, unemotional, you can use it without moving your mouth, and the dog can hear it under distraction.

Once they get the position itself down, I imagine that moving forward wouldn't be too much of a problem. You have already addressed the eye contact issue from the beginning, forging has been (in a way, at stationary and some movement) addressed. But just in case, here are a few problems that I foresee cropping up in the future:

1. When you move forward, the dog forges, because his prey drive gets him out of position. Speed increases drive.
Possible solution: Go back to position work, and do small incremental steps forward, slowly, with high coiled drive. (This was one of our problems.) Teaches the dog self control in drive, and you can extend the picture (heeling through drive) through repetition. Make sure YOU are not the prey object.

2. Heeling in protection, the dog looks at you, not at the bad guy. Looks like you out there doing a ballet, not a kick butt protection dog who knows where the threat is, and is just waiting for a good excuse, ala Eastwood in 'Dirty Harry'. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />
Possible solution: I like Flink's approach to this. Treat the two types of heeling as two different exercises, one with eye contact, one without. This is were Bernhard's method of focusing on the reward pays off. The dog looks to where the reward is coming from, focuses on that, and is rewarded. Also, you use, through voice inflection, different sounding commands, but same word, to give the dog a heads up on what's going on. Then again, the guy with the jute is a BIG clue too, but how do you teach the dog to stay in position? Bernhard's solution is simple, and the dog learns quickly.

3. The dog lags, or is not quick enough, or is distracted by minuta.
Possible solution: Get a new dog. Not enough drive. Or your timing is so poor that I can't even analyse what is going wrong. Or foundation was done with compulsion. If the dog is quick with the stationary work, and slows down, and shows avoidance behaviours when you transition, you are the problem. Too much pressure. Retrain the dog using positive methods, and insist on perfection during the learning phase, to minimize compulsion, until the dog can handle it during the distraction phase.

4. The dog goes after the prey item before the signal and release, biting you in the process in the face, arms and hands, spinning and generally going nuts. Also throws behaviours at you to get you to throw the &*^&%^% ball, becomes a blur of sits, downs, and finishes.
Possible solution: Fun dog! This was my problem. The dog doesn't understand the elements of marker work. Go back to focus work, and marker training, with distractions.

So, any critque? It has taken me a while to piece together something that works for me AND my dog, so a certain element of retraining was involved with our work, So we are a little behind where she could be if she had someone who had a method down from the getgo, or someone with more experience adapting methods to different dogs.

Christ, this is a long post, didn't mean it to get so long.

Hello? Anybody there?? Helllloooo! (my footsteps echo in the long-empty room)

<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Ann,

I have found that luring is a good method for teaching general ideas; ie, 'fuss' means somthing to do with the seft side. The dog gets the ball/ food only when they are on the left side.

For me, it is not so good at teaching precision work, which is why I abandon it for marker training early on. Luring as a great way to start, but not the best way to continue or finish. You have to use other methods, because the dog is cueing in to the placement of the themselves relative to the ball, not relative to their position to you.

The problem with luring is that the consequence and antecedent are one and the same thing (which is why the ball is hidden in most drive training). once they learn that they are the same, it gets harder to train it out of them.

Ann, the biggest problem I see with "luring" is a lack of understanding how to wean the dog off of the "lure". If you understand that, it's then just another training tool. I can't use the kong for my dog till he REALLY understands what I want. He's way to drivy otherwise. I'm also a big believer in the motivational methods....till the dog completely understands. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

By the way, thanks for the kickstart VC! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

 Quote:

I can't use the kong for my dog till he REALLY understands what I want. He's way to drivy otherwise. I'm also a big believer in the motivational methods....till the dog completely understands. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

By the way, thanks for the kickstart VC! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Bob, just curious, why don't you use the kong from the beginning? Do the training goals for your dog exclude using pure drive training? Or is it focus, or a correction issue?

Just curious about why you decided to use food as foundation as opposed to prey/play.

Curtis,

I cut up a whole hot dog in 2 or 4 ways (sometimes I use the whole hot dog). The cut is from one end of the hot dog to the other end so I'm able to work with long strips.

I position my hand and hot dog in a way where I can manipulate my dog's head to come straight up while his shoulder blades are parallel to my left leg (aligned with my hip is technically more correct).

First you want to take the dog out to the field and wait for him to initiate interaction. As soon as he does, reward him and start walking backwards while the dog is feeding in front of you. You can push the dog away here and there to stimulate opposition reflex and reward him immediately for driving back into you.

As soon as you see good work of the dog driving into you for reward, your going to want to turn your body to the right and drop your hand to your left side where you get your dog to be shoulder blades next to your hip on the left side and head extended up to attention position.

At first you will want to constantly feed through the whole pattern. (of course not all on the first session...you will want to put him up in the beggining after 2 or 3 minutes of him driving into you and being rewarded) Keep feeding throughout the whole pattern until you see your dog start to look stable about where position is. When he's able to do this through turns, variations of speed, about turns, etc.. then start to withhold food for a few steps and then feed. This starts to reward the dog for behavior as a consequence and not luring. He's still being rewarded for following the hot dog but you better believe he's also learning where actual position is.

Looking into the eyes is a different story. I'm train that in seperate sessions at first so that he knows how to look away from reward to get reward.

I try to go as quick as my dog allows me to from following the hot dog in position to looking in my eyes while in position for reward.

Some people do spit food out from the mouth. I used to do that but I prefer to either hold it in my hand next to his face so he has to look passed the reward and up into my eyes or I keep it in my pocket or when he start becoming more advanced I'll put the reward somewhere else near by and release him to it after good performance, etc. I'll also just vary where I put the reward constantly so that he thinks it can come out from anywhere and that so long as I say the word YES the reward WILL come.

You can also wean on to the toy so that you get more persistant heeling (if your dog is high prey drive of course)

I think you can also learn a whole lot from the Ivan tapes but it is totally different. I pay more attention to his proofing techniques. I believe that's where he really seperates himself from the other trainers.

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And is it possible if any negative associations with this was a result of the "trainer" not properly using this method, or even the wrong dog for this method?

Ah, yes...I should have been more specific and cya'd by using the traditional disclaimer: "it depends on the dog...and trainer". <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Short answers to your questions: yes, and yes.

I started with food luring and switched to a ball on the group trainers advice. Only I never understood how to wean the dog off the lure. That was not part of the training advice I was getting and not until I saw Ivan B's tape about secondary reinforcers was that made clear, but by that time several years had passed and other negative reinforcers had taken place. Shame on me.

So yes....the problem was a result of the trainer not properly using this method.

As a newbie I followed just about everyone's advice except my own. (Again, shame on me...)
Compulsion for attention worked on the groups trainer's dog. I was told my dog was simply "fooling" me by not obeying (attention) and to "prong the sh*t out of her". Wrong advice for the type of dog I was training, as it was anxiety, not avoidance that was driving the lack of performance. But by the time I understood that, it was too late; the damage had been done. A more experienced trainer may have been able to correct the situation, though I have learned since that once anxiety goes into avoidance, it's pretty hard to reverse; I was not an experienced trainer.

So yes...the wrong method was used on the "wrong" dog.

Even so, I'm not willing to try it again. I will use the method outlined by Jeff in future training....similar to the Ivan B method.

Melissa,
You use it much like I do. I have found with the dogs that it works best with, are the ones, that have food and toy drive, but more toy than food drive. For example, the dog I'm training now, if I had started with a toy, which I tried to see which would work better, he would constantly lunge for the toy as I'm luring him, I definatly didn't want to correct him for lunging at his tug, so I used food, because it really made him trace my hand movements, and more calmly because he knew better than to lunge for a treat in my hand. Therefore I was able to get him to trace the movement I wanted. He still hadn't fully learned heel but when he would trace my movements pretty fluently I then moved to his favorite toy a small tug, and that got him more into drive but he didn't have to concentrate to hard on the movement I wanted him to do because it was in the early stages of muscle memory, but it made him think damn this can really be fun. Plus while doing the movement he didn't lunge for it because he had not gotten use to lunging with the food, so as I moved to the toy there was nothing there to fix. He only got rewarded with his tug which I made him focus on for a few seconds before I dropped it to him only once he was in the position I wanted and he obeyed my command of sit. I then weaned him off of the toy and onto following my hand for guidance, by this time he is really getting the hang of it because of repetition and strong muscle memory. I slowly wean my hand off always being able to quickly throw my hand out to help him if he gets off track, until my hand is no longer needed. I did this for the actual heel and the finish. Once I knew for sure he knew beyond a doubt what heel was, then I went drive,compulsion (to tighten him up), and back in drive again. I have found a big part of teaching heel which varies from dog to dog, is really when to teach it. some dogs need it after bitework, some need it before, some need it after playing fetch on a day with no bitework. I think teaching it is 50% and knowing when to teach it is the other half, like I have said I have found this to vary with every dog, JMO.

PS: this is in a nutshell and most likely isn't thorough, I'm not into writting scripts, LOL <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

I use to be quick to critisize what Chris is talking about. I became good friends with some ladies that are very seriouse AKC obedience people. They have Dobies. I was training their Dobies to pass their WAC.I started training with them in obedience, they had a nice A/C and heated training building. Their dobies where unbelievable in obed. One of the things I learned from them is exactly what Chris is talking about. I do believe in teaching heel as a position first. I like to teach a seperate command for eye contact and introduce it in something other than heel position. I believe there is a time and a place for what Chris is talking about.In the begining I like to do what Chris is talking about while using NO commands. Its not even an excercise to the dog. Its just a an enjoyable inter action between the handler and the dog.The dog can learn how to do great right 180 degree turns,left 180 degree turns, 360 degree turns, auto sits and downs with no commands or even a leash. The dogs enjoys it.If the dog lags or looks away just run away in a different direction and start walking and when the dog is in position again, its all good again.Its just great imprinting and the dog is learning on its own all the mechanics of the excercise and the joy of interaction with the handler. Ofcourse prey exceresises are being taught seperately and you eventually will switch over to rewarding with a prey reward. When the dog is switched over to the prey reward the intinsity of the dog is higher and corrections thru the leash are tolerated more easily.With a seperate eye contact command you are able to correct the dog for not looking without confusing the dog about if it is or isnt in correct heel position.I also dont ever let a dog see my arm move while correcting a dog for being out of position while heeling. I hold the leash tight against my hip and correct the dog by quickly stepping in what ever direction I need to move in to correct the dog.This way the dog is concentrating on my body position as opposed to my arm movement.It might or might not see my arm move when giving a low level correction for eye contact.

When training a young puppy (8 weeks and older), is it best to teach the puppy eye contact before position? Isn't a 8 - 10 week old puppy to little to learn the position? While teaching eye contact with a reward, should I use the fuss command and as soon as the pup looks into my eyes, reward it? Of course, keeping this "training phase" very short. This would just be the imprinting of the word fuss, which would teach him to look into my eyes. Is this a good way to start a young dog? Then when the pup has a little more attention span, I could teach the position. Any advice on when to start teaching this would be helpful. Thanks,

Curtis

Melissa, it's definately a focus issue. I started out with SAR training and his kong is a gift from god for a "find". The SAR work is total drive work, but the kong was never presented till he made the "find". I can now use the kong with the Flinks retrieve method. I show it to him, he makes the find , I give the reward. He's finally setteling down to using it for an obedience reward, but intially he was just to crazy for it to concentrate. Luckily, he has a great food drive also. He just doesn't loose all though process for food like he initally did with the kong. With his agitation collar on, his reward is a 8" bite tube. He's at a point where I can put the different collars on, then give him a choice of "rewards" and he chooses it based on what collar he's wearing. I didn't teach that.