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I do use treats occasionally as part of training, but I am gradually coming to the conclusion that their use is not only unnecessary, in most cases, but can actually be detrimental. This is probably not not news to the stock working community, where the high value reward is more work. However, I am thinking about sport and general obedience training, where training treats are part of the culture.


I think my views started to change when I was fostering Glyn and Beau; one severely overweight, the other just plain obese. I needed to do some basic training with them, but I needed to keep their food intake down. I happily discovered that I the treat pouch was barely needed. But treats are still OK if there's not a weight problem? At least they do no harm, I thought. Maybe. Maybe not.


Since Glyn and Beau left (they both got adopted on the same day, but to different homes), I have tapered off training treats to the point where I no longer have them in the house as routine (I do indulge my dogs in "after-dinner" treats, so they do get some goodies). Initially, I imagined that treatless training was going to be less effective or slower. A succession of foster dogs have shown me that I was wrong; by abandoning the treat pouch, the dogs are more focused on my body language and learn faster and better as a result.


I am very much a pragmatist, and avoid the black and white stricture of dogma. Yesterday, I picked up a couple of sample packets of treats at an adoption event and used them up while we practiced down stays during a brief period when the dog park was empty apart from us. Just a bonus for the dogs. In fact that little episode, plus the thread on "High value treat recipes" started me thinking. Are we gaining anything using training treats? Are they necessary at all? Can dependence on them be down right detrimental?


[ Disclaimer: my foster dogs all came from a Border Collie rescue and I have precious little experience with other breeds. ]

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No experience training, all the usual disclaimers- but I like teaching self-control using treats. You know, the bit where you ask the dog not to eat something really tasty until you let it do so.

 

And for trick-training which is 'just for fun', I think (perhaps wrongly) that it adds a bit of excitement for the dog.

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Interesting thoughts.

 

What sports are you currently training for, and what levels are you currently working at? Have your scores, or your rates of qualification improved since weaning back on treats?

 

I don't ask to be snotty - I know that question can come off that way. I am genuinely curious because one's personal goals and experience can be a factor in such analysis.

 

Personally, I've been learning to take my training to new levels by taking steps beyond the initial use of treats in training, and to build more solid fluent behaviors. I have recently gotten to a point with Dean where I walk into an Agility ring with him and I am not even thinking about the fact that I don't have treats or toys on me and we are good to go. However, the accomplishment here really is in taking our training, which started with food, to completion.

 

At the same time, I'm not seeing where use of treats in the initial training of behaviors and concepts, the initial stages of bridging learning to fluency, nor in creating the beginnings of attitude, drive, and desire to perform is detrimental.

 

I'd be interested in hearing more about why you would consider this to be so.

 

In response to the great questions that you posted:

 

 

Are we gaining anything using training treats?

 

For sport and manners training, and for behavior modification, I would say absolutely yes.

 

Most dogs want them and will work for them without needing to be taught to do so, or can be taught to do so easily. Yes, I know there are exceptions, but I actually have yet to meet a dog who will not work for food if the handler is willing to use something the dog actually wants. (Some handlers do refuse to use food the dog actually wants, but I do not consider that a food motivation issue)

 

The concept of "treat means this is correct" is something that most dogs pick up on fairly easily. Paired with a distinct marker, it is a common language between dog and handler that can serve to communicate hundreds of skills and concepts.

 

There are a handful of things I have trained without using food, but in those cases I was using skills that the dog already had that I had used food to train initially. For instance, I taught Dean to knock toilet paper rolls into the bathtub by simply pointing to the roll and praising when he knocked it over, but he already had good targeting skills (taught with food) beforehand. Or I used something else that the dog wanted as a reinforcer, such as toys or access to something. By and large, I have found food to be the fastest, clearest, easiest, and most effective way to introduce new skills and concepts.

 

 

Are they necessary at all?

 

Necessary? No, not technically.

 

But I would say that for the introduction of complex sport behaviors, they are often the best tool for the job and I would not choose to omit them.

 

 

Can dependence on them be down right detrimental?

 

Dependence is the key word there.

 

To train well with food, the handler must be adept at helping the dog move from doing needing the food to being fluent (knowing and being able to do the behavior in various environments without a reinforcer directly present).

 

Unfortunately, there are many who don't really know how to do that. That is more what I would consider detrimental than the treats themselves.

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What sports are you currently training for, and what levels are you currently working at? Have your scores, or your rates of qualification improved since weaning back on treats?

I no longer take part in any dog sports, so all my training is basic training directed towards making my fosters more adoptable and preparing them for their new homes.

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With pups I use their kibble for training. They must earn their meals one piece at a time. When I need high value treats, like a nervous dog in public, I use things like string cheese, chicken liver, etc. They get tiny little pieces, smaller than the nail on my pinkie finger. On days like that they get a bit less kibble. Treats are excellent and sometimes critical in certain situations.

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I hardly use any treats in everyday around the house manners. For those behaviors it's pretty much "these are my expectations" and I use lifestyle rewards such as tone of voice, body language and petting. But I do use treats in shaping tricks or more complex behaviors with excellent success. With the latter, my body language has minimal contribution and I'm doing my communicating through a clicker.

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Food. The original bargain between man and dog, says Stanley Coren, or someone. Man fed dog to keep it near his cave because a dog's heightened senses warned of strangers and predators. In return, dog got to live a bit longer and with a full belly. Fear, the need to eat, sex drive, they're primal drives, which is why they're the reinforcers of choice to teach a behaviour and make it stick. If you teach something using food and you do it well, there's no reason the dog would "forget". The best way to keep him sharp on it, though, would be to food-reward for it occasionally, which would qualify as random reinforcement. The theory is that dogs are gamblers so rewarding this way is very motivating. Does any of that fit into your experience with him, I wonder?

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Food. The original bargain between man and dog, says Stanley Coren, or someone.

Maybe food is the primary motivator. And then again, maybe that's just a myth. I wonder if leadership isn't at least as important than food? Would my dog go and hunt her food if I nothing to put in her bowl? Most certainly she would and not only that, she would likely offer to share her catch with me!.

[Yes, I have seen her catch cotton rats and offer to share.]

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OK, (dons flame-retardant suit...)

 

I have owned more than one dog that was actually put off by the brandishing of treats when they were working. When I first began working with my Doberman, (I got her at the age of 11 months) she gave me more than one look of complete disgust when I attempted to “lead” her with a treat. She loved to work, loved to “get it right,” and held those who waggled treats in her face or drizzled syrupy patter all over her – “Who’s a clever girl? Oh, what a good dog!” – were viewed with thinly-veiled contempt.

 

No, I want my dog to do what it is told. I don’t want it to be so distracted by liver bits that it forgets what it is supposed to be doing. Given half a chance, any reasonably intelligent dog will find working to be at least as motivating as working for treats. A dog has a mind. If it is given a chance to use it, it will grow in intelligence – or at least in the ability to use its intelligence to solve problems. Shutting a dog in the Skinner’s Box of “Do this for Mummy and you’ll get a yummy treat!” is disrespectful of the dog and crippling to its potential as a rational creature.

 

Flame on! :)

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I no longer take part in any dog sports, so all my training is basic training directed towards making my fosters more adoptable and preparing them for their new homes.

 

I would say that it would be much more realistic to train basic manners sans training treats, although it is not a choice I personally would make, than sport skills that need to be highly precise and trained to a level where the dog can perform them in busy, distracting, and/or stressful situations in event after event over many years.

 

Especially if one is integrating new dogs into a household where resident dogs can model good house manners for the newbies. I'll admit to taking full advantage of allowing current dogs to show a new dog in my home as much as possible.

 

Even when it comes to manners, I would say there are certain behaviors and concepts that I would always incorporate food training into, but I would say that I personally consider the use of food far more essential in our sport training than household manners training.

 

As far as leadership goes - I consider clear communication an essential part of leadership. Use of treats to teach and convey information can fit in with that role very nicely, especially when the handler knows well how to use the food for that purpose.

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I have owned more than one dog that was actually put off by the brandishing of treats when they were working.

 

I didn't take it the OP was trying to give food while working. Any self respecting Border Collie will refuse food in those situations. When training basic obedience, agility, etc or trying to desensitize, treats generally work great.

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Dear Doggers,

I'm certain my personal experience learning to train dogs without treats has convinced me they're not necessary. I am equally certain those who learned to train with treats think they are.

 

I am unconvinced by those who claim to be training for "off-lead, no treat reliability" by using the lead and/or treats and/or ecollar to reach their goal. First tools become defaults.

 

(If I lost my whistle and had laryngitis I would be as helpless as the ecollar trainer with dead batteries or the treat trainer with an empty treat bag.)

 

Dogs are remarkably accommodating of our training theories and - I believe - will be mannerly enough for most people whatever method is used. I also believe that the quickest way to train tricks is with treats. It may be that the most efficient work to train for agility is with treats - I don't know enough to judge.

 

With those provisos, I consider treats a form of "dog money". Some dogs are jesuits and not terribly interested, others yearn to be Goldman Sachs. I don't use treats because I don't need them either for complex sheepdog work nor the sort of manners my dogs require so I can take them anywhere, off leash or on.

 

I remember meeting a woman at a trial who was "moving over from agility to 'herding'".

 

"Oh," I said, glancing at her dogs. "Well it's good to give older dogs something to do."

 

Startled, she blurted, "They're only three!"

 

They were so fat I mistook them for fat old retired dogs. I asked, "What have you got in your pocket?"

 

Yep.

 

Donald McCaig

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I didn't take it the OP was trying to give food while working. Any self respecting Border Collie will refuse food in those situations. When training basic obedience, agility, etc or trying to desensitize, treats generally work great.

I didn't either. I wouldn't even think of offering treats in the case of a dog doing real work. They would undoubtedly have their mind on the task at hand. A treat would likely go unnoticed, or ignored.

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OK, (dons flame-retardant suit...)

 

I have owned more than one dog that was actually put off by the brandishing of treats when they were working. When I first began working with my Doberman, (I got her at the age of 11 months) she gave me more than one look of complete disgust when I attempted to lead her with a treat. She loved to work, loved to get it right, and held those who waggled treats in her face or drizzled syrupy patter all over her Whos a clever girl? Oh, what a good dog! were viewed with thinly-veiled contempt.

 

No, I want my dog to do what it is told. I dont want it to be so distracted by liver bits that it forgets what it is supposed to be doing. Given half a chance, any reasonably intelligent dog will find working to be at least as motivating as working for treats. A dog has a mind. If it is given a chance to use it, it will grow in intelligence or at least in the ability to use its intelligence to solve problems. Shutting a dog in the Skinners Box of Do this for Mummy and youll get a yummy treat! is disrespectful of the dog and crippling to its potential as a rational creature.

 

Flame on! :)

 

 

haha! never!

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A friend showed me how she had trained her herding breed dog to circle sheep. She stood still with the dog at her feet, and 4-5 heavy sheep nearby. She asked her herding breed dog to circle around the sheep and come back to her position. The sheep remained in place. Thereupon my friend reached into her pouch and gave the dog a treat. I didn't know how to respond. I may have said (it was quite some time ago), "That's nice," or something similar, and then I'm certain I followed-up with, "Now, have him move the sheep around in a purposeful way." She apparently didn't hear the request. She could currently be doing wonderful things with sheep (haven't seen her in years), although in my experience herding breed dogs don't need treats to learn stockwork, and it might distract them.

 

I used food treats to train my BC puppy basic obedience commands. Seemed to work well. If I train another puppy, I'd like to see how it goes without use of food. I subsequently found that praise (often in the form of cheer leading/hand-clapping) for distance agility training was all that was needed. My dog gets into a mode that I can see in her eyes and posture, as if she says, "Okay, bring it on...what do you want me to do...what are we going to do next?" For us, I don't think food was ever needed. -- TEC

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I subsequently found that praise (often in the form of cheer leading/hand-clapping) for distance agility training was all that was needed.

 

Oooooh!! Please do share!! Exactly how did you get 12 weave poles fluent, at a distance, top speed reliability, regardless of entry angle, with just hand clapping?

 

I am very, very interested in this!! Especially in how you faded the clapping, but maintained both precision and drive, particularly in competition situations.

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It's an interesting question. I think the use of treats is a huge improvement over using aversives which was the common way to train, not using a vocal praise. I am to impatient to rely on shaping exclusively to train and so happily will use treats as a lure to get the dog going in the right decoration.

In my own life I use treats to train tricks or new behaviors, to me it's quick way of saying you got it right, once they have it down, it's usually just for praise. Treats are a learning aid, to be faded.

In agility we usually work for toys in training , but I think running agility with me has become self rewarding but I have invested heavily into getting to this point, if I am repeating a sequence so I can figure out what I am supposed to do then I play tug after each attempt, it keeps his interest up especially as he has usually got it right, it's me we are training. When we run a whole course or long sequence I find that after our celebration he really has limited interest in the tug. In a trial environment I am always pumped up, and we always end our runs with him leaping at me, and me hugging him, he is far to big to catch and after that he really doesn't care for food or toys.

To be honest I can in no way see treats as detrimental unless the trainer is continuing to rely on them to get the behavior and not fading them away.

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Treats sure don't seem to get in the way of my dog using her brain and they certainly aren't a put off to her. And I'd classify her as at least moderately Treats sure don't seem to get in the way of my dog using her brain and they certainly aren't a put off to her. And I'd classify her as at least moderately intelligent ;)

 

 

 

She likes the total package. She wants to train, she wants to get it right and she really likes those treats too...

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I use food in training all the time, and my dogs are extremely fit. They go for daily runs, and I use their dog food for in home training. When I begin working on distractions I use higher value treats. I also use a lot of life rewards (sit/stays at the doorways are rewarded by being released outdoors, etc). I also use toys in training. I don't understand why people are adverse to training with food, since eating is necessary for a dog's survival. Why is it better to give the dogs meals for 'free"? I can understand why treats would not be a necessary part of stock dog training, because I'm sure access to working sheep is a much more powerful reinforcer than treats, but at the end of the day it's still a reinforcer.

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Given half a chance, any reasonably intelligent dog will find working to be at least as motivating as working for treats. A dog has a mind. If it is given a chance to use it, it will grow in intelligence – or at least in the ability to use its intelligence to solve problems.

 

 

Have you trained many lurchers? The most intelligent, problem solving dogs in general, but also independently minded.

 

Two things motivate most of them - chasing and food. Most of us are trying to stop them chasing so the incentive to stop has to be strong.

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I use food in training all the time, and my dogs are extremely fit. They go for daily runs, and I use their dog food for in home training. When I begin working on distractions I use higher value treats. I also use a lot of life rewards (sit/stays at the doorways are rewarded by being released outdoors, etc). I also use toys in training. I don't understand why people are adverse to training with food, since eating is necessary for a dog's survival. Why is it better to give the dogs meals for 'free"? I can understand why treats would not be a necessary part of stock dog training, because I'm sure access to working sheep is a much more powerful reinforcer than treats, but at the end of the day it's still a reinforcer.

 

Agreed.

 

Some breeds like the BC were created to work with people and read them very well, others weren't. Our BC likes food rewards as well as toys but he would work without them. Some behaviours he would do as well with or without such rewards others he wouldn't.

 

Take the dog in front of you and use whatever works. We had someone at training who used sheep wool gathered from barbed wire to motivate her Pointers. It's not a shameful thing to be flexible within your own principles.

 

We have people come to training who believe that their dog needs only praise to do as it is told. It immediately becomes apparent how wrong they are.

 

I don't like luring for fear of distracting a dog from thinking about what it is doing and I find other and more subtle ways of getting a behaviour started. With my first dog (a lurcher) I made the mistake of luring too much and I also didn't fade out food rewards properly - my inexperience, not an inherent fault of using food rewards. At one point I worried that I would never be able to let him off lead to run and without food the likelihood was that he would have run away and probably been shot. Having to keep a pocket full of treats was a small price to pay for his being able to lead a normal life.

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I don't use toys or treats in herding training, but we do use words of praise as a reward. In all of my other training, obedience, agility and flyball I have used toys or treats for training.

 

I'm sorry, but if you went to work every day and never got paid you would have a pretty bad attitude. Even when a dog is doing something they love, they are eventually going to have a hard time with some aspect of it and are going to need some type of reward to push thru. I would especially use a reward when teaching something new. Once they know something it's a variable schedule of reinforcement. The reward is whatever the dog really likes and will probably not always be the same thing.

 

I have fostered many dogs and find that especially with the rescues they need reinforcement. Many of them have never learned to learn, some of them have been treated harshly for being wrong, etc. I have found that clicker training can change a dogs attitude about learning and really turn them on to it. My current foster dog absolutely loves free shaping. He is smart as a whip and so far has figured out everything I've shaped in minutes. Last night we were working on backing up. If you haven't tried free shaping I encourage you to try it. You'll see the dog thinking and trying to figure out what it is that gets him the reward. I swear the first time I worked this with our current foster dog you could see his face light up when he figured out what I wanted him to do. So far we've shaped touching his nose to a ball, going to a mat and lying down and backing up. If you've never done free shaping this is done with no words, no body language, no hand signals, only the clicker and rewards in a hot/cold type game. The dog is definitely thinking.

 

Gina

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I don't like luring for fear of distracting a dog from thinking about what it is doing and I find other and more subtle ways of getting a behaviour started. With my first dog (a lurcher) I made the mistake of luring too much and I also didn't fade out food rewards properly - my inexperience, not an inherent fault of using food rewards. At one point I worried that I would never be able to let him off lead to run and without food the likelihood was that he would have run away and probably been shot. Having to keep a pocket full of treats was a small price to pay for his being able to lead a normal life.

 

While I am in no way opposed to luring - I use it liberally and have never had trouble moving a dog from lured behaviors to the dog thinking through the behavior (often I will move to a shaping/capturing approach once the dog has a physical feel for the new behavior), I have gravitated a lot more to targeting to introduce new behaviors. (All sorts of targets - hand targets, target sticks, pivot and regular platforms, mats, ground paw targets, toe boards, etc.)

 

I am actually hoping to experiment with my next dog and introduce almost everything initially with targeting. The exception being the handful of things that I free shape or capture.

 

Obviously, I will only do this if the next dog is appropriate for this approach. It would not have been appropriate for Tessa who needed "follow food" at first to get out of her head enough to do anything at all, although now that we are way past that I use targets with her all the time and they work beautifully.

 

But it is an experiment I am eager to try. Food will still be involved, as I will mark/reinforce through the targeting process, but I plan to not use it as a lure to get initial behavior at all, if possible. I want to see what is different, what is better, what falls short, if true food lures are omitted altogether in favor of targets.

 

This will require spending time on targeting before we go into any training classes, so the dog and I are ready to keep up with the class while using a very different approach from everyone else, but that's something I'm willing to do at this point in my own development as a trainer and handler.

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I honestly do not understand the venom people have against treats in training. I really don't. Obviously in situations like stock work I would think the stock would be a MUCH higher value than any food would be. But training other, less instinctual behaviors? Why would you throw that option out?

 

Dogs are all different and the idea to train them successfully is to reward them with something of extremely high value to the dog. What is or is not high value to the dog varies from dog to dog. Tug, ball, treat, working... depends on the dog.

 

My older dog (papillon) has what I call negative toy drive. She hid from toys. She is a very naturally behaved dog and a dog with a nice little work ethic. She's been a breeze to teach just about anything to because she's one of those dogs that just wants to be a good dog. We started agility when she was 8 and yes, we used food. She goes over the MOON with food. We've used that drive for food to teach her to play and use toys as rewards. Eventually agility became its own reward as she's a very action oriented dog that thinks it's fun to do things faster and faster and faster. You start out treating for every behavior but wean yourself out to where the dog is doing full courses happily. By that point agility itself is hopefully becoming the reinforcement. For my stressy dog though we still give rewards because in some situations the reward of agility is not enough to overcome the stressors. She also is a foodie.

 

Anyways, I think it's probably pretty easy to train certain breeds and individuals without treats just in everyday life and manners but I think treats can be invaluable for more complex/precise behaviors. Especially with a very food driven and not otherwise driven dog. I always think it's pretty silly to be against using treats. I want to have as many things my dogs absolutely LOVE as possible on my side when we're training.

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