How are your room mates with him? Any interaction from them?
Ideally they should become part of his family/pack.

They don't spend any time with him. One of my roommates treats him like a human and just wants instant love from him, and the other is really kinda too busy.

They've been really patient about him not warming up to them instantly though.

 Quote: John Stowe

Every time I go for a walk I get 10 minutes of hell where im constantly working him, starting/stopping, corrections.. I have blisters on my hand. The last 50 minutes he walks at heel with the occasional bolt towards the curb to investigate something. This from a dog I was told was "un-walkable"

I would rather the dog self-correct with a prong collar and get a marker for doing the right thing than get corrected so much with a flat leather collar that you're getting blisters.

The blisters are not so much from the corrections but him pulling when we first start the walk.

I got a clicker and some treats today. I taught him what the clicker was and to look me in the eyes in 20 minutes. I started to introduce his name towards the end.

He is not normally huge on eye contact unless he wants something, and he was confusing his name for "come" so I went back to basics.

I was losing hope at first as he wasn't seeming to get it, and I was having to click at split second glances in my direction. He was spending most of the time either staring at the floor avoiding eye contact, or looking at the cup I put the treats in. By the end he was staring me down not even bothering to lower his head to eat his treat.

All in 20 minutes
I'm amazed

That's great, John!


Here are just a couple of beginner tips.

I'm not sure whether you loaded your marker (mark and reward until the dog connects the two and starts to look for the reward when he hears the marker ... then you know it's loaded!).


No duration yet!


When the marker has been loaded, it's very much easier to lure or capture any simple desired action.




" I started to introduce his name towards the end. ... He is not normally huge on eye contact unless he wants something, and he was confusing his name for "come" so I went back to basics."

If you use his name for the recall, I would not use it in any other commands. JMO. Also, for me, the only reason I use the dog's name at the beginning of a command is because I always have a pack around, and often other people's dogs being trained; I probably wouldn't otherwise.

If you are using his name to get his attention, take a look at these engagement clips:
http://leerburg.com/flix/category.php?categoryid=57



Do you have either of the first two Leerburg marker DVDs? http://leerburg.com/219.htm or http://leerburg.com/training-with-food.htm ?




You are going to continue to be amazed at how eager the dog is to learn with markers.

Im using his name as a "look me in the eye" command, not a recall. I did load the marker first, and he looks directly at the treat cup when he heres the click.

I dont have any of the leerburg DVD's unfortunately.

"Im using his name as a "look me in the eye" command, not a recall. "


Ah .... gotcha. Someone else before you may have used his name to mean come (the recall), since he was confusing his name with "come" when you used it. (Many people do call the dog using his name.)

Oh I'm pretty sure the previous owner did.

20 mins to get it is fine but I would continue that basic marker loading with no commands for a few days at least. You want a solid foundation the same as any training and 20 mins just tells you he's "starting" to understand.
Be very aware of your timing. That's critical in ANY training.
Great that your giving it a go!

The timing part I have down. I used it to teach him stand which he is really good at, and to look at me, which he is still working on. He already knew sit and down, but I've had to reinforce those to teach stand.

1 - How do I improve speed? He sits great usually, he stands great, when it clicks to him what I want, but down is super sloppy. He ignores sometimes and I end up repeatedly pointing to the ground. He'll put one leg down and have one up.. He'll keep his elbows 2 inches off the ground. I won't click until both front elbows touch, but he still tries to cheat. Any ideas?

2 - I know from my last dog that I don't have the smartest breed in the world. Training Positive is a youtube channel from someone I believe to be pretty talented at clicker training. His GSD will touch, lick, scratch, move around on, or whatever to figure out what he has to do. Does this come with time? If you could see what Wyatt looks like after 1 minute of not getting what Im trying to teach him. Calm, head still, drifting off into space... eyes half closed, with 6 inch chains of drool coming out of both sides of his mouth. There is nothing going on in his brain other than he just had the best meal worth of treats he's ever had in his life.

MOVED to a new thread at http://leerburg.com/webboard/thread.php?topic_id=33730&page=1#383743


Edited by Connie Sutherland (10/05/2013 09:52 PM)
Edit reason: moved