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Trick Ideas!


PuddleDuck
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So last week with the storms and everyone in this house going crazy, every night after dinner the girlchild (aged 3) and I would sit down and run bear through her tricks to kill some time. Now the kid is addicted and wants more tricks for bear. We taught her to shake her head (big ear flapping shake) in 4 days. The things she knows

Hi 5

Shake (paw)

Wave

Knuckles (bump fist with nose)

Extreme knuckles (has to leap to reach my fist)

Shake her head

Drop

Roll over

Sit

Backup

Open door (push with nose)

Wake up the girlchild (jump on bed, sit on kid)

Find (treats)

Beg (she has no balance, if she can't support herself on your hand/arm she melts into a uncoordinated toller puddle)

Watch (eye contact)

So I need some ideas on more tricks to teach her, and possibly steps to train the behaviour. Apparently they have to be 'fun'. Hit me with your ideas peeps! :D

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She's never been big on holding stuff in her mouth, my old boy learned it quickly cos he was so ball mad but bear isn't. The only thing she might do it with is a plastic bottle but only really hyped up. So I'm not sure how to teach her that, I'd really like to though! Tips would be great :)

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High five and low five. Stick your foot out for low five, if you teach it both sides you can get lots of fun walking backwards getting fives.

Scoot in- sitting between your legs and then walking in that position.

A hoop to stand in and a touch pad to stand on, then moving between the two.

How did you teach the head shake?

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High five and low five. Stick your foot out for low five, if you teach it both sides you can get lots of fun walking backwards getting fives.

Scoot in- sitting between your legs and then walking in that position.

A hoop to stand in and a touch pad to stand on, then moving between the two.

How did you teach the head shake?

We blew in her face the first couple of times, that always makes her flap her ears. Then the girlchild followed her around for 4 days yelling 'head' and throwing food every time she did it unrequested/unprompted. Then tonight she said 'bear, do head!' And she did! If bear doesn't do it I just blow into the air (me standing, her sitting about a metre away) and that seems to be an effective cue.

At my in laws yesterday she kept tickling their cat's ears and screaming 'head!' every time the poor beastie tried to shake her fingers off. It was quite funny. She's actually rather good at this training thing :D

Is the low 5 standing between your legs how they start to teach standing on your feet for dancing?

Has anyone ever taught sneezing on command? Apparently that's the funniest thing EVER :laugh: actually that may be how we got onto the head shaking, the kid blowing on her hoping she'd sneeze.

She also really wants to teach bear to hop (after a brief but hysterical 'I want a bunny' argument that ended when I said we'd teach the dog to hop instead) but bear has all the balancing ability of a drunk with hypothermia and a wooden leg, so I'm not sure if that would be possible.

Thanks all for the ideas. Any tips on how to train them would be great. Maybe we should start a dog tricks challenge!

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Retrieve to a bucket...

I've got no idea if there's a better way to teach this but it worked for me :)

I sat on ground with my legs crossed, a small bucket at my feet and my dog sitting in front of me, head over bucket. I encouraged her to take a small easy to hold object in her mouth and when she dropped it, it fell in to the bucket. She got a happy yes, treat. Kept this up for a minute or so.

Next session we practiced her dropping the object with her head turned in different directions but I made sure the bucket was under her head each time so when she dropped it she heard the thunk as it fell in the bucket.

I then put the object on my knee close to the lip of the bucket and when she grabbed it and let go it fell in the bucket.

I then started moving it from left to right knee and she started grasping the fact it had to fall in the bucket. If it didn't I put it back on my knee and encouraged her to have another go.

I then placed it on the ground and she (hallelujah) picked it up and put it in the bucket. Jackpot big time!

I was then able to start throwing it further away and she would retrieve it to the bucket. Every now and then it will miss and she'll either pick it up herself and have another go or I point to it and say try again and she'll pick it up and put it in the bucket.

Once she had that working I started throwing random things for her to collect for the bucket so she now gets keys, sticky tape roll, a soft ball, a kids toy etc, whatever is small and fits in the bucket. Its very cute :)

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High five and low five. Stick your foot out for low five, if you teach it both sides you can get lots of fun walking backwards getting fives.

Scoot in- sitting between your legs and then walking in that position.

A hoop to stand in and a touch pad to stand on, then moving between the two.

How did you teach the head shake?

We blew in her face the first couple of times, that always makes her flap her ears. Then the girlchild followed her around for 4 days yelling 'head' and throwing food every time she did it unrequested/unprompted. Then tonight she said 'bear, do head!' And she did! If bear doesn't do it I just blow into the air (me standing, her sitting about a metre away) and that seems to be an effective cue.

At my in laws yesterday she kept tickling their cat's ears and screaming 'head!' every time the poor beastie tried to shake her fingers off. It was quite funny. She's actually rather good at this training thing :D

Is the low 5 standing between your legs how they start to teach standing on your feet for dancing?

Has anyone ever taught sneezing on command? Apparently that's the funniest thing EVER :laugh: actually that may be how we got onto the head shaking, the kid blowing on her hoping she'd sneeze.

She also really wants to teach bear to hop (after a brief but hysterical 'I want a bunny' argument that ended when I said we'd teach the dog to hop instead) but bear has all the balancing ability of a drunk with hypothermia and a wooden leg, so I'm not sure if that would be possible.

Thanks all for the ideas. Any tips on how to train them would be great. Maybe we should start a dog tricks challenge!

We have a thread for that :) What trick Are you Training

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We never seem to teach the extension of a trick, so I can get the scoot in and I can get leg weaves just by luring. Can't get the feet on feet though, I can get him to waddle a few steps with me walking.

I like the bucket idea. Jake will use his mouth to squeak a toy but won't carry weight, I suppose the wrinkles might make it uncomfortable.

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Retrieve to a bucket...

I've got no idea if there's a better way to teach this but it worked for me :)

I sat on ground with my legs crossed, a small bucket at my feet and my dog sitting in front of me, head over bucket. I encouraged her to take a small easy to hold object in her mouth and when she dropped it, it fell in to the bucket. She got a happy yes, treat. Kept this up for a minute or so.

Next session we practiced her dropping the object with her head turned in different directions but I made sure the bucket was under her head each time so when she dropped it she heard the thunk as it fell in the bucket.

I then put the object on my knee close to the lip of the bucket and when she grabbed it and let go it fell in the bucket.

I then started moving it from left to right knee and she started grasping the fact it had to fall in the bucket. If it didn't I put it back on my knee and encouraged her to have another go.

I then placed it on the ground and she (hallelujah) picked it up and put it in the bucket. Jackpot big time!

I was then able to start throwing it further away and she would retrieve it to the bucket. Every now and then it will miss and she'll either pick it up herself and have another go or I point to it and say try again and she'll pick it up and put it in the bucket.

Once she had that working I started throwing random things for her to collect for the bucket so she now gets keys, sticky tape roll, a soft ball, a kids toy etc, whatever is small and fits in the bucket. Its very cute :)

That's awesome, thanks Roova!

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fetch a matching pair of shoes.

Fetch the named object...

find the thing under the towel

remote drop and sit and then from one to the other eg

sit, drop, stand, sit, stand, spin, twist, drop, roll over, stand, drop,

and I don't have "bow" yet but I'd like it...

I've been trying to capture an ear flick too. She's not entirely sure but in certain contexts she will try it on.

"paddle" - as in pump your front feet - is one I've managed to capture - or rather every person at the park with a treat has captured it, while I was trying to train zero paw movement - I missed a great party trick opportunity.

Targetting with nose, then each foot, then use that to get stretches... still working on this one too.

Back up is very handy in many circumstances.

and SG has a couple of lists.

http://susangarrettdogagility.com/2009/02/idea-list-for-shaping/

or do a search for "shaping" on her blog.

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