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Teaching a dog to hold things


simba
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After much patience I have managed to persuade my dog that if she pokes an object in my hand good things happen. I am having difficulty getting her to do anything more than that- getting her to grab anything, mouth anything, to poke objects on the ground etc.

 

Her default reaction when confused is to paw at it or to stare at me and wait for something to happen, and then bark at me for being stupid. She was a big chewer as a pup but has never been one to grab objects from you or take them when they're thrown, for instance. She paws things and she pokes them, she can ring a doorbell with her paw, but picking up objects has never been her thing.

 

The terrier was a natural fetcher, I didn't actually have to do anything to teach her the concept except praise her when she brought them all the way back.

 

There is no reason she 'needs' to learn this. It started as a way to give her her food in little bits so she doesn't wolf it. But I would just like to know how to communicate this concept to her, get her to perform this particular behaviour.

 

I was trying to back-chain it (that's probably the wrong term): dog pays attention to your hand and gets food, then dog pays attention to object in your hand and gets food, then dog interacts with object, then dog mouths object, then dog mouths object from floor etc. But we've hit a wall at the very start.

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I meant to title this one 'grab' things, but I started it just after reading through everything on the other thread. I didn't even notice myself typing that word.

 

I wouldn't have started a new thread only that (a) Betsy's dog is mouthing things so I am a big step behind her and ( B) my dog is much older so I don't know if the approach would be the same.

 

I can't even get her to poke the object open-mouthed which might mean I was getting somewhere. If I put food inside an object on the ground, and rewarded her when she mouthed the object, would that help or hurt?

 

Edit: just to clarify I have read everything and watched all the videos on the other thread.

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I meant to title this one 'grab' things, but I started it just after reading through everything on the other thread. I didn't even notice myself typing that word.

 

I wouldn't have started a new thread only that (a) Betsy's dog is mouthing things so I am a big step behind her and ( B) my dog is much older so I don't know if the approach would be the same.

 

I can't even get her to poke the object open-mouthed which might mean I was getting somewhere. If I put food inside an object on the ground, and rewarded her when she mouthed the object, would that help or hurt?

 

Edit: just to clarify I have read everything and watched all the videos on the other thread.

 

So she will touch things with her paw, but not her mouth?

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She will poke them with a closed mouth, I managed to get that far with praise and treats (that is if the object is in my hand.) But she is more likely to offer touching things with her paw.

 

Once she managed to give me a black eye while playfully flailing a paw at my face. Try explaining that one to friends. "No, honestly, I'm not being abused, I wasn't in a fight, the dog just punched me. Yes, I know how that sounds."

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I'm using 'Yes', I have a clicker but I haven't used it with her yet, just with the other dog. But she at least gets 'yes'.

 

A big issue is that she isn't offering me anything that is an improvement on the behaviour she's doing at the moment (poking the object while it's in my hand).

 

At the moment she gets that I want her to poke the object I'm holding, with her muzzle. If I try to put the object on the ground she will sometimes poke it and seem to get everything instantly and really 'understand' it. Then next session she will go back to using the paw.

 

The object in the hand she is consistently poking with her muzzle, whereas she used to just slap at my hand with her paw.

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No, she doesn't 'do' toys at all. She grew out of that aged about 2 and just never showed any interest after that. If an object doesn't have food in it, she's not bothered. The only time I've seen her bite objects is when they have food inside (kong, plastic cup) and even then often she will just hold or bat them with the paw. She doesn't carry her kong around, for example. It stays on the floor, firmly under the paw, and she bites the opening of it.

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What I had been intending was something along the lines of this: http://laurawaudby.blogspot.ie/2009/12/how-to-teach-your-dog-to-retrieve.html

 

On reading this, I am thinking of maybe trying Maralynn's approach:

 

"I started with Kenzi by just holding her muzzle and mark/reward. Then open her mouth and mark/reward. So she was ready and comfortable with me holding and positioning her mouth before I ever added in objects.

When I added in the object (a dowel) it was easy to get her to open her mouth and put it in. I'd put the dowel in her mouth, mark, take it out and reward."

 

I remember someone on the boards had a method of throwing a 'ball' made of cloth-wrapped treats. When the dog chased after it and picked it up, they got different treats.

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Does the dog make any attempt at gabbing a toy if you act super excited about it, waving it around wildly, but you aren't trying to shove it in her face you just tease her. Kind of like keep away where she knows you're excited about it but she can't have it or even get a good look at it.

 

Sorry if that's confusing, but it is a hard action to describe with text...

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Get a plastic screw container from the hardware store (small partially-clear cylinder, squeeze to dispense stuff from inside). Put treats in the container. Teach pick up first with treats in it that you shake out for her, then switch to treats coming from your hand (treats still in container), then try an empty container and generalize to other objects.

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Cass C- bupkis, no joy. She looked at me for a bit while wagging her tail, realised there was no food forthcoming and no rattle of the kibble bag, and stood patiently beside me waiting for something more interesting to happen.

 

 

D112358- what are they called, just plastic screw containers? I will have a look out for them next week.

 

The other dog has just lost all the toys except for one big heavy ball, too, which doesn't help.

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I had to trick a puppy into picking things up by slathering salmon oil all over a piece of stick and waiting like a stalker for her to notice it and put her mouth on it. When she was interested I picked it up and teased her (just a little) with it until she really wanted it and then I used the command (I use "get") and started training it from there. As I recall, when she had the salmon oil licked off I made her 'get' it so I could "refill" it.

 

Took a bit, but she got it. It was the disconnect - her not understanding what I wanted - so I had to set something up where SHE wanted to do the thing I wanted and then pounce on the act and give it a name.

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I give up. It is THE simplest thing to teach a dog and I just cannot do it. She's a clever dog, the other dog can fetch things upside-down and backwards with the tiniest amount of input from me, and I just cannot seem to explain the concept to her at all. She's just getting totally confused, it's been on-and-off trying to teach this in short sessions for ages, and no progress whatsoever.

 

 

D112358- I just tried that. Her method is to wedge it under her paw and lick vigorously. She chewed the opening of it, once. Big party with treats for that, and then she didn't repeat it. Basically the same results as with the kong or the other food-dispensing toy.

 

Normally she gets things in one session, you have the basic foundation of the behaviour down. So she's a clever dog, I just don't have the skills necessary to teach this.

 

Do you ever just want to give the dog to someone who would actually know what do to with her?

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Sweet Jesus. I can just about buy the dog hearing the human talk things over with them and figuring out what to do. But who taught my dog to (a) read and (B) use a computer?

 

 

She just grabbed on to the stick. Like she had been doing it all her life. I held it out in front of her and she grabbed on to one end of it, and once I fed it to her she offered it again 6 or 7 times in a row, impeccably, like she'd just copped on to what this was all about. I went out and got a stick, like when I started trying 3 months ago, and she chewed the end of it and suddenly lightbulb moment.

 

Even if she never gets to the 'fetch' end, even if this behaviour never ever gets repeated again, I am so proud.

 

Sorry to double post in such a short space of time, but I thought it might be interesting to people to see the time stamp.

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I love it when a behavior suddenly clicks for one of my dogs! I was teaching Lyka to cover her face with her paw and she just refused; I had pretty much given up on it, then suddenly out of nowhere she started using that trick every chance she got. I've heard that sometimes a dog just needs time, without the pressure of having to do the behavior, to think about what you are asking them to do.

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Again this morning. She remembered again this morning.

 

You know, it shows how easy it would be to mistake cause and effect. Yesterday I was at the really annoyed stage where you would go and do something odd.... and then the odd thing would have worked! So if I had, I don't know, used an e-collar, called an animal communicator, followed some 'weird old trick' someone's great uncle swore by, I would now be jumping up and down with excitement and convinced it had done the trick.

 

When really the secret is obviously to post on here. I mean, every problem I've posted on here about has improved rapidly minutes to months after posting about it. So the only real explanation is magic.

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Again this morning. She remembered again this morning.

 

You know, it shows how easy it would be to mistake cause and effect......

When really the secret is obviously to post on here. I mean, every problem I've posted on here about has improved rapidly minutes to months after posting about it. So the only real explanation is magic.

..or telepathy from so many well-wishers

(Congratulations on your on-going success)

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  • 4 weeks later...

That is awesome! Good job. keeping it fun for her will make it easy. Once she is consistent and having fun you can move to the next step, if you are wanting an obedience retrieve. I have heard that instead of teaching a hold, you teach a give. this is how I did it with my 3. it worked well.

 

Congrats again!

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What do you mean, teach a give?

 

She still looks totally confused if it's more than a foot away, and resorts to pawing at my knee again. But I reckon with enough repetition I might be able to gradually get it to the point where she understands vaguely that she has to bring it to me. Just getting her to interact with it was such a huge thing.

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