Puppy Gaetz
I'm jealous; here's my student's new puppy getting started. I still have to wait a few weeks before mine arrives. Here's the kind of stuff I'll do early on in the puppy's career:
This puppy's lesson is split between tug, fetch, recall, and simple commands (shown in the video). In addition, Gaetz is working on personal play with mom, following, recall, and working on a platform as the first step in shaping with a clicker.
As you can see, Gaetz is precocious for play skills. By spending energy on developing those talents now, Gaetz's handler will be able to use them for a lifetime. Remember, the drives and interests you use are the ones you build, so it's important not to focus exclusively on food as a reinforcer in training.
My new puppy will also learn these things, probably split up in several sessions per day, each no more than a few minutes.
15 comments
I can’t get the video to play. Wonder if it’s because I’m on a Mac.
The video worked fine for me. Now regretting that I relied so heavily on food in training my puppy (year old yesterday!). The good news is that working for her meals worked great for her learning a ton of stuff. But if your puppy is working for all her food, it’s hard to find time to do more training with toys. Now she loves to tug, but I’m having to go back and teach her that a tug can be a reward.
Video worked great for me as well! I’m alittle confused though at what I was watching, sorry.
I first see just alot of play time…then next part of video was (I think the owner) learning how to position dog with food. I thought that the play was reward. I feel stupid…maybe I’m missing something so clear:( Loved that you posted this though and can’t WAIT to see your new baby!
I got it!!!! Never mind!!! :):):)
Need a bigger url. Can’t pull the video up.