Violetismycolor asked in her comment to my previous post: “How did your dog learn all that?” I think she was referring specifically to the number of words he understands, and maybe to his insistent communication with me about my cat’s behavior on one occasion. But there’s a lot involved in both, and it has to do with our overall approach in how we live with and train our pets. My answer went long, so I decided to make it a new post.
I think of training pets as a lot like training people. Our pets are like children to us, so it’s possible we talk to them more than many pet owners. Plus, they’re always with us. They spend most of their time in the house, usually in the same room with us, except while we sleep—we don’t let them sleep in our bedroom. Ken and I are fortunate that, for now, we don’t both have to spend long hours away from home and leave our pets to their own devices. They spend so much time with us they know what’s expected. So when we do leave them alone in the house, they tend to continue with the same behavior they do when we’re around. At their ages, this now consists of sleeping most of the time.
Constant, loving human companionship makes pets happy, but it’s both good and bad for training.
Some owners of show and performing animals (we are neither) keep them in kennels when they’re not training or working with them. This helps them avoid unintentional training, which is inevitable when animals are exposed to people’s day to day living patterns. Once unintentional training takes place, it’s never really unlearned.
My dog learned the word “soup” by accident, because I used a common word to refer to something unique to him, something he had a great deal of interest in. That was unintentional training. I also give my pets bites of leftover foods after meals, when it’s appropriate food for them, and you’d better believe they’ve come to expect that. If we eat something they can’t have, they’re disappointed and they let us know it. So our pets are now like spoiled children, at least about leftovers.
Those show owners and trainers don’t leave the animals to themselves all the time. They work with them every day. Pets left alone too much are more likely to train themselves to misbehave in some way or to not learn much at all because there’s no stimulus and little motivation. Dogs are especially social, and being left alone too much can cause them a lot of emotional stress.
We’re a far cry from professional trainers. There are also some things we put up with as “good enough” in order to have our pets with us, and not make every minute of every day a chore, as it would be—for all of us—if we picked at everything they do. The simpler we keep the rules the more likely they are to follow them.
I think one key to training house pets is talking to them a lot, addressing them by name, using consistent language—the same word for the same thing or action. Training has taught our pets that our words and hand signals carry meaning. On the good, intentional, side of our pet training, we agreed ahead of time on what words and gestures to use for commands.
Another key, at least with this dog, is the individual animal. He’s the most trainable dog we’ve ever owned. His personality is such that he loves to learn new things and loves to please us. Training sessions have always been something he looks forward to. They’re playtime to him. We let him know, with a lot of enthusiasm, when he pleases us. We’re also careful, when he does something wrong, not to get too angry with him. He’s so eager to please he actually gets a little depressed when he’s in trouble, so rewards and praise for the good things are important. We keep punishment to a minimum.
The trash problem was the only habitual transgression we’ve had to deal with, in his case, and now that he’s older and wiser, that’s not much of a problem. We’ve also learned to manage the trash promptly and keep it out of reach. As blogdog mentioned in her comment to my last post, sometimes our pets train us.
We decided, since our dog was going to be a large, powerful animal, training was of utmost importance. We commited ourselves to the time and expense. So he went to puppy school and later my husband took him to formal obedience training. We practiced his training with him a lot, at home, right from the start.
Obedience training classes are most valuable as training for the owner. They teach you how to work in a structured way, and they demonstrate how the animal learns. The result—if you keep at it—is a dog that’s a joy to have around.
Expectations are also important. If a pet isn’t expected to learn things, it likely won’t learn much that you want it to. The pets we’ve been fortunate to have with us have seemed to love figuring out what we’re getting at, once they realized we were communicating with them. They’ve figured out what was important to us and what wasn’t. I can see the light in my pets’ eyes when they have those “aha” moments and realize what we’re attempting to get across. We also remain aware, ourselves, that they’re learning all the time, just as people do, and they’re communicating with us. We stay alert to what new things they’ve learned, and if they’re desirable behaviors, we encourage them.
We’ve come to understand the most severe punishment they usually need is a sharp tone in our voice at the time of the undesirable behavior and some crate time if they don’t get the hint. Crate time is just like a time-out for a child, or like a kid being sent to his room. We do our best to end a training session on a positive note. Bad behavior is behavior, it doesn’t mean the animal is bad, and we let them know we forgive them and we still love them.
We try to be consistent and persistent in what the rules are and what the consequences will be. We do our best to catch them in the act, if they do something wrong, and provide an alternate behavior they can get praise for if possible. We try to ensure we don’t correct a behavior one time, but let it slide the next, or praise something one day and scold it on another. Sometimes we have to stop and ask ourselves, is this something we want to encourage? We do our best to follow through.
We’re not perfect, we get tired and cranky, we forget, we melt down at absurdly cute behavior. We make mistakes. But we have a goal, and that is happy, healthy pets we can stand to live with.
Our current cat, Emily, has been more of a training challenge than a lot of our other pets. We adopted her as an older adult, who’d been badly mistreated at some point, then nearly starved to death. She was terrified of us at first. When she got in trouble she acted as if she expected to be beaten, so we had to be extremely gentle yet firm in our approach. Starving made her an opportunist about food, so we have to be careful about leaving food or trash out for any period of time, and we have to watch her weight, because if allowed free access to food she just keeps eating. It took time to get her to understand we had rules, but eventually she began to catch on. She still has some ingrained behaviors we wouldn’t want a kitten to pick up, so we’ve decided to keep her as an only cat.
Other cats we’ve owned from kittens have learned a lot from us. One used to “sit” on command before eating, as Sarah mentioned her dog Jasmine does, in her comment. (We don’t keep pet food out all the time—they have mealtimes.) We’ve also had excellent results teaching cats to use scratching posts instead of the furniture and so forth. Cats can be as trainable as dogs. They’re certainly as intelligent. But they do need a little more convincing, and more commitment on the owner’s part, if you want to teach them to follow commands. We always knew we could train them, and we became even more convinced of this when we saw a trained house cat show at the San Diego Wild Animal Park years ago. Those little cats amazed us. We’re usually content just to teach our cats basic house manners.
I think the most important way to approach owning a pet is through planning, learning and responsibility. It’s sad to see people approach pet owning as a whim, or as more about fun than accountability, who grow tired of the pet when it’s no longer a cute puppy or kitten. Dogs left to run loose (a problem we have in my town), or not trained or controlled, cats that live their lives outdoors and die early from disease or misadventure, families who seem to go through one pet after another in rapid succession. All these make me sad or angry. If we respect animals the way we hope to be respected, all our lives are better. If we’re responsible, our pets and the people they encounter are healthier and safer.
Anything an animal does naturally can be encouraged and become conscious behavior, and if the animal and human interact well, the animal can learn to do it on command. But it takes a willingness to work at it, as well as awareness, persistence, consistency, motivation, time, and trust. If you show pets you love them, and don’t let yourself get frustrated, they come to think of training time as fun. Then success is just about guaranteed.
1.
With Jasmine, there are some words we’ve repeated so often that, combined with a particular tone of voice, are understood by her: ball, chew, no, Jazzarooni, to name just a few. Oddly enough, the one word I haven’t been able to teach her is “cat” and I don’t know why. Heaven knows, I use it often enough! Maybe not always in a context and with an intonation that says to Jazz that this is a word to remember….
BTW, what did you think of Six for Gold?
Comment by Sarah — August 24, 2005 @ 11:12 am
2.
I absolutely agree about training and consistency, Barbara — any dog is capable of learning basic “house manners,” and it’s up to you what else you want them to do. Dogs may not exactly speak your language, but they are as capable of picking up words as any small child — repeat it enough and they’ll attach a meaning to a word.
One of my Beardies always gave me the impression that he thought I was kindly but dumb: “I’ve learned all these English words, and in all the time we;ve been together, you’ve never picked up a single word of dog!”
Comment by blogdog — August 24, 2005 @ 12:43 pm
3.
Sarah, Thanks for the reminder of pet nicknames. Oh my! I tend to assign them out of the blue, and ours have been called so many names you’d think they’d grow confused, but they seem to like the attention. I won’t mention my list, since its full of silliness, and, er, I don’t want to embarrass my pets, who’ve been so understanding, as long as I only use those names in private.
As you may be able to tell from the dearth of reviews here lately, I’ve been lax in reading much new fiction recently. I haven’t yet had the pleasure of reading Six for Gold.
Comment by Barbara W. Klaser — August 26, 2005 @ 7:18 am
4.
We adopted Jessie 4 years ago. We think she is about 6-years-old. With these sorts of adoptions, the case records are often sketchy. Her life before us is pretty much unknown, and like most previous relationships, she brought some baggage along: an occasional temper tantrum when she would tear into her bed and fling stuffing up to the garage rafters, or she’d dart from the house (like a desperate hostage) when ever we left the doors unattended for a nanosecond.
The day I drove up the driveway of the local animal shelter, I spotted Jessie walking with a volunteer. I knew instantly she was the dog I wanted. A thorough background check on me took over a week. During that time I visited Jessie every day – crawled into her large cage to sit and visit and brush her. Once I passed inspection, I brought her home. Her papers listed her as a cocker spaniel and her name was Gertie. Trust me, there could not possibly be even a molecule of cocker in her bloodline. She’s strictly mutt – a combination of colors and bone structure that defy speculation. We quickly ditched the Gertie name.
At the time we lived on the coast with a very, very small yard. Jessie was quite prissy in those days – she loathed the touch of grass so much, we put stepping stones down so she could do her duty in the yard. Despite our abundant love, she ran away several times. I think she had trust issues. It’s a miracle she even survived the system because she had been in so many shelters.
We now live in a home with an acre of land. The first month we lived here, she wouldn’t come indoors. When she wasn’t sleeping on a bench in the backyard where we finally put her bed, she spent endless hours exploring. She still looks so regal when she sits on her bench and scouts her kingdom. We moved here during the rainy season, but that didn’t deter her. Overnight she became our little tomboy – sloshing through our overgrown yard – the days of stepping stones forgotten.
Jessie has mellowed. She doesn’t dart anymore. Doesn’t pitch fits anymore. She asks so little of us, gives so much. She’s overprotective of me ever since she had to defend me from an attack by a HUGE dog. Jessie weighs 30 pounds. I think the attacking dog weighed 2 tons. Rarely is she silly. Though she has such an engaging mutt look, she’s all business, doesn’t miss a thing. We give her lots of fresh water. We scratch her chin, rump, belly, and that sweet behind-the-ears place. We love our Jessie.
Comment by Reenie — August 26, 2005 @ 8:15 am
5.
Oh, do tell what happened with that dog attack, Reenie. Here’s one of mine, it was some years back. I was placed in a very dangerous situation, and note that I don’t say which street this happened on.
***
I was walking my dog on a public street, leashed with the GentleLeader® harness. We were just enjoying the day, trying to get a little exercise, when suddenly, a large dog from the front yard across the street from our position jumped up, barked, and started across the street toward us, its tail not wagging.
I shortened the slack of my dog’s leash and pulled on it to turn his head in the direction we were headed, sped up my pace a little, and said, “Heel.”
The unrestrained dog kept approaching, even more quickly. It barked once again. Two other dogs joined the first one, from which direction they came, I either didn’t see or no longer remember.
I stopped. I noted that one of the dogs was smaller, but two of them were at least 80 pounds. I kept a firm grip on my dog’s leash, but granted him the full length of slack available. Lots of unfriendly sounds and growls were exchanged. The three snarling dogs began circling us.
“Go away. Go home. Go away,” I commanded loudly to no avail. They continued to circle us—we who had trespassed on their public street territory.
Fortunately, a person from the house across the street came out from her front door, and yelled something. She walked to the edge of her front yard, the yard the first dog had come from, and stared at the ugly scene. I yelled to her to call the dogs off. She refused to say a word to me, she stared with wide-open eyes and a scowl on her face.
The aggressive dogs kept circling us, but one looked toward the house when the human sounded out something I didn’t understand followed by, “Come.”
One of the dogs stopped circling us, stood still, then looked back and forth between the woman across the street and us. She continued to call to her dog.
My dog was upset and so was I.
She called to them again, this time with a sharper and louder tone in her voice, “Come here.” Finally, her dog obeyed, it was the one who first approached us. It slowly crossed the street back to its house. The other dogs remained. With the first dog’s interest having waned, they backed off a little. My dog continued snarling. Time seemed to stand still, but eventually, the other dogs turned and ran away.
The human, still in her yard, had grabbed the first dog by its collar. She continued to stare at us.
I barked out, “Keep your dogs under control.”
She never spoke once to, or answered me, directly. She continued to stare with wide-open eyes and a firm, unfriendly set to her face.
I felt she considered us the problem. I started walking again, and pulled my dog’s attention away from the scene. I shortened the leash considerably. I noticed my heart was beating fast and hard, my breath shallow and quick, my skin tingled and felt flushed.
***
My licensed dog and I were walking on the public street, enjoying the day. I don’t know what would have happened had the unrestrained dog’s owner not been home, or refused to call off her dog. Thankfully she did.
Now that I have written this out, I understand why the human was unfriendly toward me. Instead of thanking her for having called her trained dog off, I told her to keep them under control. Sarcastically: It was my fault for having walked my leashed dog on that public street.
Comment by Ken — August 26, 2005 @ 1:29 pm
6.
Ken, your story gripped me in recollection. Our episodes are different, but fear is a common denominator.
We were living on the coast then. I loved taking Jessie on walks – I could have used a fur boa for a leash and she would have still yanked and choked for all the anticipation of a good trot and lots of bushes to sniff. We were barely beyond our property line when my neighbor pulled up in her SUV. Everything in her life was big – especially her dog. He was an unusual breed of German Shepherd – not the airport security type – bigger with long hair. It was bred to perfection – perfect genes – and was a perfectly high strung killing machine that indiscriminately hated all dogs. No accident, his name was Tonka – built like a truck. (I should add that I grew up with German Shepherds and think they are fine dogs.)
My neighbor was returning from the groomer with her perfectly coifed dog. She let him jump from the car with no tether. She didn’t see Jessie and me, but Tonka didn’t hesitate. It was weird. Everything happened in slo-mo. Tonka took huge galloping leaps with obvious intent to tear Jessie from stem to stern. The guaranteed feeling of doom was surreal because the attack was inevitable and we were so vulnerable. I started yelling – the distance Tonka had to cover before pouncing was a mere 25 yards or so. I do know that both Jessie and I hunkered down, prepared to protect each other – we both saw the imminent danger. Thank goodness my neighbor was right there, but Tonka did not respond to her voice commands. She had to run to our rescue and pull Tonka off. I was livid – very shaken. I hobbled inside with clothing torn, blood pouring down my leg. After I had a few moments to collect my thoughts, I called to inquire if Tonka was vaccinated for rabies etc. Of course he wasn’t. My neighbor was extremely contrite and I was quick to forgive – but it was a rattling experience I will never forget.
As a result of this episode, Jessie doesn’t cozy up to other dogs – in fact she is downright unfriendly. I sought a trainer to try to remedy this. I found one in the yellow pages – he was excellent. When we engaged his services we did not realize he was the trainer that worked with Nicole Simpson’s dog after her murder – you can imagine the issues that dog had! But it is unfortunate that the experience seemed to change Jessie forever. But we gained a heightened sense of loyalty to each other.
Comment by Reenie — August 27, 2005 @ 1:36 pm
7.
I neglected to mention that my mother adopted retired guide dogs, German Shepherds. They were lovely, so gentle. It was a unique pleasure.
Comment by Reenie — August 27, 2005 @ 6:41 pm
8.
Reenie, that was indeed a dangerous incident. You were torn up yourself by Tonka? Or was that Jessie’s blood on your leg? Did these neighbors commonly let Tonka out of the SUV without any restraint?
It took me the necessity of two similar incidents to realize I couldn’t walk my dog in public. I understand that most trainers of show dogs will never take them on a public walk, specifically because of the risk their future prize winner will learn other dogs’ aggressiveness and become unfriendly themselves toward other dogs when they’re in the show ring.
None of the aggressive dogs in the incident I wrote of above were of the breeds often mentioned in news items as being ‘dangerous breeds,’ nor were they in similar incidents. The attitude human owners of ‘out-of-control’ dogs often take seems patterned and is invariably that it wasn’t their lack-of-control over their animal that was at fault.
It’s quite a denial mechanism. Perhaps, however, it’s a projection mechanism: its easy to look at a Rottweiler (or a German Shepherd) and blame that dog for any aggression, even when its leashed and under control.
Who knows what they tell their friends!
Comment by Ken — August 27, 2005 @ 7:54 pm
9.
Great post…if we eventually get another dog (when John is ready), I will use your advice to help train him/her.
We had a blessing of the animals service at our church today and there were probably 40 dogs there (also a few cats, a ferret, a rabbit, a fish) and they were all incredibly well behaved. What a fabulous way to spend a Sunday morning service!
Comment by violetismycolor — August 28, 2005 @ 7:07 pm
10.
Ken, you made a good point regarding my flurry of fury. Tonka’s behavior was perhaps a product of so-so parenting and maybe he had his own history of being victimized – hence the learned lethal behavior. The blood in question was mine – a small scar lingered for about a year. I briefly considered that I may have sustained my injury through ‘friendly fire’ because I was tangled in a mish-mash of teeth. But I honestly think it was Tonka that tore into me while intending to tear into Jessie. I have not mentioned other incidents with hostile dogs while walking Jessie. Very disturbing and finally I just stopped taking her for walks.
On the lovely upside note, I have also attended services with animal blessings. It is always a joy – lots of giggles. Most pets are such a pleasure. Ken and I have just had bad encounters.
Comment by Reenie — August 29, 2005 @ 5:27 am