WalandLibby

You could have fun teaching the pigeons lots of things, their capacity is quite extraordinary (especially on visual tasks). :-)

This behaviour can be understood easily without reference to hierarchy. If a dog wants to get through a barrier (fence, door, crate door) it will tend to bark. When that works (the door opens) the behaviour is reinforced and becomes more likely to be used again.

Have you seen ppl training animals for shows like those at Seaworld? They will usually have a system where they can mark the behaviour of one individual in a group - often by marking and then pointing at that animal. It is something that the animals need to learn, and if there is any inclination by your animals to compete for resources, then it can certainly be a problem. It would only really be fair imo to work with other dogs around if they are also in a position to work for rewards (such as for lying and watching). Karen Pryor has a clicker that makes a range of sounds, so that each animal can have their own click, I haven't tried that though. I imagine that when I was a beginner that would have added an extra challenge to my already stretched coordination. Actually it might challenge my coordination still. :-) When I had multiple dogs, they each had their own verbal marker. It needs to be used with rewards, but they can be used with anything that the dog likes. More powerful rewards are more powerful reinforcers (have a greater effect on behaviour). While it's fairly common for clicker trainers to use toy rewards for at least some behaviours, for behaviours that require calmness or precision usually treats are more efficient (until the dog understands the task at least) because the dog can swallow a treat faster than it can do most other things and be ready for the next trial and because the dog will stay in a state of mind (unless it's a particularly foodie dog, but that's another story) where it can think. Toys often get more excitement and speed built into the behaviour from the beginning (so good for agility).Many clicker trainers (myself included) think that verbal praise is usually a conditioned reinforcer like the click itself - it represents a 'real' thing that the dog wants - and so is unlikely to be as powerful as some other (primary) reinforcers. But you can only judge a reinforcer by it's effects - if the dog is putting in effort to get whatever you're using, then it must be reinforcing for him.

Can you carry her? Because she may get great benefit from seeing all that activity - by 16wks her development will be at a stage where she's much less receptive to learning how to deal with those kinds of challenges and variation in the environment. A lot happens in a pup's development in those 1st few mths, and there's not much time to waste. If you can set it up so that she is given nice things by ppl and has short, safe training sessions in these kinds of environments (doesn't need to be anything too fancy - just a few lured 'look at Mum's face, while being held' with generous rewards is fine), it will be all the better for helping her develop into a calm, sociable dogs. Gorgeous pup btw.

Mich&Jake - Can you leave him in the house and go outside without him freaking out?

The professional won't do the work for you - there will be plenty for you to do, believe me ;-) (SRD - if it is SRD that he's got - is often a *lot* of work to resolve.)It is a problem that needs to be treated in a highly systematic, structured way and I really don't think most ppl could do it without someone to guide them.

While you work on SRD it's actually important not to let the dog have these panics - they set you right back and they don't provide any opportunity for his independence to develop. Think you might need a pro to help with this. PM if you'd like me to refer you to someone.

oops, put my message up twice...

If you decide against a crate kaaia, an alternative is a short tether that only allows her to get on her bed and to a water bowl. Definitely less expensive.

You can still follow the suggestions I made above if you're taking her to a specific area of your flat. I'd keep her on lead while you do this (and I'd carry her there rather than walk her over the carpet).There are pheromone drops that you can use to communicate to a dog that this is the right spot, although I've never found them very helpful. And I suspect they'd be even less helpful when as in your case there may be traces left of other times she's toileted in other places, telling her that those are the right spots. That's great - you don't want this hiccup to mess with her trust in you. I think most ppl who have used a crate will tell you that their dogs become really attached to their crates. My sensitive boy hears something that frightens him and goes straight to his crate - it's the safest place he knows. But you do have to do it right - you don't want her to freak out while she's in there or she will become likely to avoid it. So the crate should not signal to her that she will be left by herself, rather that you will be around, poking a steady stream of nice things through the bars for her. Your awareness that she is likely to freak out is valuable information - I would suggest that you get a small crate, big enough for her now, that is easy to move around the house as you move. If you can get it, Susan Garrett Crate Games dvd is great for teaching dogs to love their crates and show very self-controlled behaviour around them.

This is what I suspect was going on with my boy. Have heard that fussy children who only want bland food often have intolerances to the chemicals in more highly flavoured things. Would not be at all surprised to find that something similar was going on with at least some fussy dogs.

What you've written kaaia suggests that her surface preferences for toileting are back-to-front compared to how we would like them to be. Crating (or other strategy for confinement) will be a godsend, because it seems that free access in the house will as you say, result in her finding her own toilet areas. Most dogs, unless excessive confinement has forced them to toilet near or in their sleeping area previously, are reluctant to go in a crate, and will chose to hang on. This is what I would do... If she's not doing something with you, then, for the time being, she shouldn't be free in the house. (If she's actually doing something with you, like a training session or playing or cuddle session, you'll get more opportunity to intervene and take her outside than if you're just hanging out together, because she'll have to change gears before she can pee - a pup doing nothing in particular can move to peeing much more quickly and drawing less attention to themselves than a pup engaged in another activity). Every 1 - 1.5 hrs she should be taken out, don't play with her, just wait (have treats), set a time limit - say 5 mins - if she goes within that time, reward. If she doesn't, when she comes back inside put her back in the crate and take her out again in 1/2 an hr. Keep doing this until she goes. I'd be reluctant to allow her free unsupervised access to the house even soon after she's been. Be generous with treats - I would give her something when I picked her up to take her inside (otherwise she might start avoiding letting you catch her) and when she goes in the crate (so that she doesn't think she's being punished). Hope that helps :-)

Has she been doing this all her life? I did this briefly while my boy was sick and it was soooo much work. You deserve a medal!

I don't think any of the normal policies cover expenses to do with reproduction, do they? I'm pretty sure the ones I looked at didn't.The interest rate is pretty awful if you let it go beyond the interest free period, but at the specialist centre that I use, you can get a GE carecredit card as emergency credit. They're much too generous with credit, tend to give much more than you ask for, but they can really reduce the stress of wondering how you're going to pay for something. I hope your girl and babes are ok?

I have a print out with comparison of several policies (somewhere, not sure where). And it's not new - when I actually looked at some of the policies online the prices were out of date. Can't remember details exactly, but there were limits on how much could be spent on radiography, medication, hospitalisation etc. I think most limited to $1500 on cruciate work, I've been told that's enough to cover that though. With the limits on how much will be paid for a particular condition or in single yr, with a diagnosis of cancer for eg, an owner could still end up with many thousands to pay over and above what the insurance will pay. And I think vet costs are likely to continue to increase as we become able to treat more things.

'Look at that!' by Leslie McDevvitt (Control Unleashed) might help - it's a particularly user-friendly approach to counter-conditioning. It's pretty counterintuitive I know, but at a distance where you know that you're not putting yourself or anyone else, dog or human, at risk, and where you can be pretty sure your dog will be able to take offered treats, click or verbally mark the dog for looking at 'the thing' (whatever that is) and reward. You can see the stress go, and pretty soon you have a dog who's reluctant to actually look at the thing that previously it couldn't take it's eyes off, actually it gets hard to have anything to click for - you have to be fast lol. The 'thing' becomes associated with the c/r so that the dogs thinks for eg - there's a dog, that predicts a treat, look at treat deliverer (you). Then you can start clicking for that sequence of events. Once this behaviour is strong (which usually doesn't take long at all) you can move closer and do it again. Counterconditioning can certainly be done without a marker but it's less precise and efficient in it's action in that case - the treat is likely to be associated with many more elements of the environment.

Just been thinking about how lucky you are to be enjoying your first puppy. You must be having a ball. These days there is so much more opportunity for new owners to develop their knowledge so much faster than when I started out with my first dog 16 yrs ago. The internet is one of the best things that has ever happened to the dog world, imo. Have fun.

Most of the policies only pay out a proportion of the total that they can pay in a yr on any one thing. I suspect that the policy you have is the one I was considering, precisely because it doesn't have sublimits. In any case, I'd left it too long to get the policy, my dog was too old. But as I said, I would not have been able to claim the whole amount of the treatment he needed last yr, as the total amount they would pay in a yr was only 1/2 what his treatment actually cost. If I had only recently insured him I guess that would have been lucky on my part, but if I'd been paying for the insurance since he was a puppy, it would have cost over the yrs far more than what I could have claimed. I pay about the same amount for my car insurance as I would for insurance of one of my animals and can make much larger claims.

Glad that the behaviour is settling down, Black Magic. My experience is that the *big thing* is not to pull against it or try to get it out of their mouth. Then it will turn into her fave tug toy, and that's a pain! Of course, later if you want to do agility you might need to deliberately teach her to tug on it when you ask her to, but I think it is better to do that deliberately - it's easier to be clear with her in that case when is the right time. Playing with her while she's on lead I think is a good idea, as then she's less likely to think that the 'only' toy she can get when she's on lead is the lead itself.

There doesn't seem to be a clear explanation as to why they do (they can after all throw up just because they want to, no grass needed) but it's not usually a problem. I guess if it continues then it's worth talking to your vet about. There was a paper published recently by Sueda and others that looked at grass eating and found that of the dogs in their study, only 9% 'frequently' appeared ill before eating grass, and only 22% frequently vomitted afterwards. Being younger was associated with an increase in frequency of plant eating; an increase in consuming non-grass plants; a decrease in regularly showing signs of illness before eating plants and a decrease in regularly vomiting after consuming plants. They concluded that it was 'normal' behaviour of healthy dogs. Hope that clarifies it a bit (although like I said, it's still a bit of a mystery).

How often have you been taking her outside kaaia? I think she's saying that she's not ready yet to be the one responsible for the decision to go outside, and she probably needs to be treated in this regard like a brand new 7wk old puppy again for a while. Also (it won't really help in resolving the behaviour, but I'm just curious) what kind of environment was she kept in by the rescue group that had her? The time there may have confused her about the right surfaces to use.

I don't think they offer this in Aus?.....they only do a Cert IV in Companion Animal Services here. No, I did it here. I'm pretty sure the US Delta society doesn't offer an equivalent course. (Although I'm planning on starting a course with CASI soon - can't wait.)They've changed the name to Companion Animal Services since I did it.

Another thought, kja, the place to go to get inspired about the possibilities of clicker training is Youtube. Just do a search. There are some very exciting things there.

It doesn't allow us to take the communication between person and dog for granted does it - it shows us all the places where they have no idea what we're on about.

Most of the policies don't provide very much for what you pay. And most of them have sublimits, which I think limits their usefulness. I was considering insuring my guys, but my dog was sick last yr, and his bills were about twice what I could have claimed if I had the policy I was thinking of getting, so now I don't regret not getting it. I think keeping a special credit card for your animals is a better idea, personally. (I have been told though that if you get insurance then they won't get sick, might be worth it if that was the case ;-))