Positive/Motivational Methods in Protection

[spidey]

Most people here don't seem to understand the logic of going through all this trouble (electric mats, electric sleeve, specially designed e-collars, etc.) to squeeze out a few extra points on a dog that has already proven himself, but personally, I admire the owner's commitment to achieving his goals.

I've been reading this thread with interest, because I know next to nothing about Schutzhund, but find it fascinating. But the above doesn't make sense to me. Surely if the dog has already proven itself, it is likely working as hard as can be expected (for the dog to still enjoy the sport, at any rate), pushing harder with methods like those outlined above just doesn't seem fair to the dog (I don't mean from a "fuzzy-bunny/poor ickle baby puppy" perspective, but more from a "reasonable goal for this particular dog" perspective). It seems (to my ignorant eye anyway) like the owner is more concerned about himself and a couple of extra points than the dog.

[Storm]

Originally posted by Ramon
It's a bit off track, but I still think compulsion has its place depending on what you want for your dog. I would guess that without compulsion in his training his best pull would be about half that. The reason I say that is because as soon as I incorporated compulsion into his training, which was all motivational at that point, his pulls went up dramatically. I don't think this philosophy is totally unrelated to Schutzhund. Afterall, it's a dog sport. If anyone has won at the National level in Schutzhund without depending heavily on compulsion, I sure don't know who it is.

Compulsion is a training tool and has its place, unfortunately abused so much as people don't know how and when and what's done is done the association is there and if incorrect, you got a problem. Applied incorrectly once again and again all in an attempt to rectify the previous issue, it now collectively worsens a problem.

When you say you incorporated compulsion into your dog's weight pulling program, how did you go about this? Once again a lot of times compulsion is relied on to fix a dog who through incorrect foundation work becomes "unreliable" Our last years national winner is a dog who is traind with very, very minimal compulsion because the initial training with the dog is clear and consistent. Ever check one of Raiser's old tapes on protection? Sure very advanced at that time era but compared to todays times........................

[Doug Wendling]

I wanted to make this point before and forgot, but I think the article covers it pretty good. We use compulsion in our training, very mild depending on the dog, but if the dog is to high in drive, you need to step things up. I don't want to get into the definition of compulsion vs corrections, we (this board) went there once before and did not resolve anything ;), so it is enough to say I believe these are two different things.

Anyway, Matt the reason I started with the above is this is how we control the nutty dogs. Maybe we start out cradling (which to me is a form of compulsion, you are restraining) the dog and making him be quiet. Maybe we grab them just behind the mouth kind of on the cheek while being cradled and tell them quiet. Depends on the dog, (this is so hard describing it without being able to show it) this form of training can take a long time depending on the drives of the dog and when the dog is started in this style of training. This is the first step in drive capping if the dog needs it, then we go on to asking the sit, down, etc. .

but, what I was describing was a method of keeping the dog from forging while heeling in the protection phase

Matt, I understand what you are saying, but to me teaching the heel comes much later in the training. It is kind of learning how to run before you can crawl. Simple stuff first, I don't know maybe you do that?

I can think of two dogs that this has worked great on and if it worked on these dogs with time and patients it should work on any dog.....

The first is a patrol dog. The first 4 years of his life was spent with the trainer cranking a very high prey drive dog through the roof, using the whip, etc., they had this dog screaming with excitement with everything they did. When the handler did a building search and made his announcements you could not hear anything other then the dog screaming (which by the way isn't good for court). You could not set foot in front of this dog without him going through the roof with excitement. Well, after a couple of years of baby steps and a ton of patients he is quiet and in higher drive then ever before on his building searches and whatever else we do with him. This dog was an extreme in my opinion.

The other dog is a Pit, he is a craaaaaaaaazy dog, a ton of fun to work, but this dog is a true prey monster. It took a bunch of blood, sweat and tears from the handler to accomplish this, but it works.

Their is another young dog, to give you another example of a dog with extreme drives that it has worked great on. He is soon to be a patrol dog, he is a young Mal from KNPV lines. Here we used a e-collar (this to me is compulsion, not a correction you need to know how the dog takes things when doing stuff like this) as a form of distraction as his drive was building to keep him in check at first. The handler could not get the dog to quiet long enough to start to get the point across to the dog. So, we used the e-collar at first. I handled the remote, because the handler had his hands full of young dog. It was used on a low stimulus just as an interruption to the dog to remind him, hey their is another part to this equation, the handler! Because he is a young dog and did not have much bad training, some about 10 months worth, but not years it did not take to long.

We use no corrective words during this, just kind of utter some sounds, here again just to remind the dog their is someone else here making the calls. We don't use corrective words no, etc., because what the dog is doing is not wrong, he just doesn't understand what we are asking yet. We also need to remember that corrective words are meant to be drive killers (example, stop what you are doing, etc.) we want our dogs to stay in drive. We need to show them, some take more time then others, but it does work and it is worth the time and energy spent.:)

[Doug Wendling]

Ramon
Not to beat this up I know he is not yours and you are not the trainer/helper. But, this maybe a place where a properly timed e-collar will work? But, the dog NEEDS to understand how to do a hold and bark and express himself in the guard. Now, you may say he does a H&B already, but he may not really understand what is being asked of him? Like in my other post this is not a good way (over the Internet) to try to explain this. Here can be some of the problem, we teach dogs pictures in our training. When the picture changes many times the dog does not know how to react to this new stimulus. They may be able to get him to do a "clean" H&B in training using corrective methods. But, if the dog does not understand what they are asking him to do what do you think will happen the first time something strange happens to the dog in a trial or someone really takes it to the dog like never before? More often then not this is where heavy handed training starts to come undone. The dogs were never taught to understand things, they were just told to accept and do, period.

Here is a good example I recently worked the back half of a large trial. Now, these were all SchH 3 dogs some many times over, so they knew what they were doing right? These dogs knew what a drive was, etc. Here is what we (the helpers) heard from many competitors after their dog did protection.

"Well, you ruined my out and silent guard."

Here is what happened, the dogs were taught (or maybe I should say force fed) this out and silent guard. Most of the times it is done because it is easier and quicker, but I won't get into that. Well, in training it went fine, I am sure they trained and trained and never had a problem, but that is all they ever showed the dog. And they never really taught him anything and took the time to make sure the dog understood what they were asking of him/her.
Well, now comes this big trial and two guys they never worked on before. The nerves are up and everything is magnified. Maybe the dogs were never drove that hard before, maybe a lot of things, who knows? But, what happened when the dogs were going to do their silent guards is the dogs started to bark. Why, because things were different, the picture change and they did not know how to react to all the new stimulus. They did not know how to understand and process all these, maybe new feeling. So, they went to another behavior rather then stay with what they were trained to do. Just a few thoughts.;)

[Ramon]

Originally posted by Storm
When you say you incorporated compulsion into your dog's weight pulling program, how did you go about this?

Before I applied compulsion, he already knew the "Pull" command. He just didn't feel like doing it if the load was getting challenging. After I introduced the prong collar, he knew he had to pull the load to keep from being corrected. In competition, you are not allowed to use corrections of any kind, but without the corrections applied during training, he wouldn't exert anywhere near the effort that he does.

[Storm]

Pulling weights under compulsion, where does the dog release? Can't imagine this being fun.;) I like the "capping" concept where dogs are taught to contain the drive in aspects, channel it and release when most desired, but unfortunately you need a dog that can work with oodles of drive and relate to capping as a containing exercise and not a corrective exercise.

Doug, typical people blaming the helper for their dog/training issues. The dogs must have been content in their normal environment with the exercise taught but under different cirumstances, unsureness can easily make the dog resort to a different "behavior" to try and "resolve" the unsureness. So IMO the exercise was not proofed and not clear in the dog's head as if it was the dog would have stuck to what it knows.

[Ramon]

Originally posted by Storm
Pulling weights under compulsion, where does the dog release? Can't imagine this being fun.;)

That's easy: food, praise, toys, etc. at the end of a short pull or during a long pull.

[Mick Trainer]

I have not read the rest of the thread at all so if this has been said, sorry.

For me the best motivational exercise in bite work is still the sleeve to sleeve to teach the out. Teaches a very clean out with the dog understanding what to do easily. Paints a very pretty picture and allows the dog to learn a very clean avoidance "out" and outs them straight into drive/fight.

An oldey but a goody.

Mick.

[Storm]

Originally posted by Ramon
That's easy: food, praise, toys, etc. at the end of a short pull or during a long pull.

Easy on the motivational side sure but with compulsion? Ever seen a forced retrieve done, force in the concept here, unless your degree of compulsion varies here? Rewards with certain behavior don't necessarily "revitalize" a dog but in turn may re-inforce unpleasant associations or displeasure. My point in a certain case if I need compulsion where it shouldn't be necessary, what is the use? The attitude to compulsion in not disregarded in a blink of an eye and once you have gone the compulsion route, proper compulsion, it is a process to bring the dog and his attitude back through it once again.

[Storm]

Also, without a dog working or driving for or towards something it is compulsion. Heavy compulsion with a piece of food thrown into the equation means nothing as it is the compulsion that primarily gets the "work" done here and the food/toy is not the link between start and finish. Also if a dog is not primarily working/driving for the "motivator" why will he resurect himself for compulsion with toy if the dogs drive was not enough initially? Or rather after all the sh** associated with the exercise and the dog primarily working with compulsion and not driving out of its own there is a missing link as the reward, which in the first place is not enough to get the dog there is now supposed to overide the dogs mindset with all the compulsion? Well sure with the compulsion we can get dogs to do a lot of things, I'm not disputing that, it is just the dog's attitude while he works and if we use compulsion how we go about bringing back attitude with the dog having first used compulsion to "lift" the drive. In Sch obedience compulsion can be a tool to elevate drive.

[Ramon]

Originally posted by Mick Trainer

For me the best motivational exercise in bite work is still the sleeve to sleeve to teach the out. Teaches a very clean out with the dog understanding what to do easily. Paints a very pretty picture and allows the dog to learn a very clean avoidance "out" and outs them straight into drive/fight.

Mick,
Can you go over this process? I think I might have seen it, but I'm not sure.

[Mattweiser]

Originally posted by Doug Wendling
I don't want to get into the definition of compulsion vs corrections, we (this board) went there once before and did not resolve anything ;), so it is enough to say I believe these are two different things.

:D :D US?? Nah!! :D :D

[Muckdogs]

Great thread so far boys, keep it going. Doug, thanks for the contribs. We were thinking you wouldn't be back after that compulsion v. correction thread. Anyway, These are all good techniques that have been posted. Ramon, as far as the dirty biter goes, I think that if you really want to clean it up a double sleeve aproach would help. First off, I would only have a right sleeve on when the dog came around the blind. Usually, a dog that has gone therough the repititions will park to the left (sleeve) side of the helper in the blind and bump or nip the sleeve, unless he is a real whore, and will take a good shot at the helper. Using a right handed sleeve will help the dog sit straight in front of the helper, or at least move him to the right side a bit. Positioning can be corrected by an additional handler working the long line prior to the primary handler clearing the blind. I have seen and worked right sleeves and both sleeves in the blind and it has helped some dogs. As far as the whore biting, IMHO, you need to use a little correction from the 2nd handler immediately when the nip happens. To me, its a classic case of gettin a bit of a nut before the primary handler gets there. I'll bet that the dog doesn't do it on the b&h when sent straight in in full view of the primary handler. But could be wrong. I've even seen where the helper works a remote until the primary clears the blind and takes over, if you don't have a 2nd handler.

I've also seen both sleeves worked in the blind, simultaneously, so the b&H and the out are worked at the same time, alternating right to left. This is the method Storm was talikng about, I think. Right, bite. Out, Left, bite, out. Left Bite, out, Right, bite, out. this way, the dog never knows which side to favor.

[Mattweiser]

another thought for a dirty biter (AKA Whore Biter ;) ) is to remove the blind, and go back to an open field.. reteach the exercise!!.. it is possible that the dog is getting extra juiced up because of the closeness in the blind, and the context of the blind....

You guys know I am a huge fan of backing up in my training....

In order to move forward, one must be willing to back up, sometimes to the begining!!

You can quote me if you like ;)

[Ramon]

Originally posted by spidey
Surely if the dog has already proven itself, it is likely working as hard as can be expected (for the dog to still enjoy the sport, at any rate), pushing harder with methods like those outlined above just doesn't seem fair to the dog (I don't mean from a "fuzzy-bunny/poor ickle baby puppy" perspective, but more from a "reasonable goal for this particular dog" perspective). It seems (to my ignorant eye anyway) like the owner is more concerned about himself and a couple of extra points than the dog.

You're right, the owner does have goals for himself. His goals are different from mine, but I respect that. Sure, he can get more dogs (he already has a few), but how many puppies do you think he will go through before he gets another national level dog? How much will it cost? How much time will it take? Dogs that can win at the national level are very valuable. To give you an idea, I know someone who has a very nice Sch I GSD bitch from working lines. Overall, she is the best GSD I've ever seen. One of the best trainers in the country offered him $15,000 for that bitch. That trainer would rather spend that kind of money for a good adult prospect than use it to buy 4 or 5 puppies, raise them, train them, and maybe get a good one out of the bunch that has strong nerve, good drives, good hips, etc. If you have a national level dog, limited funds, and high aspirations, your best course of action might be to get every point you can out of that dog.