The Smart Dog U Blog

Epiphanies

I'm at ClickerExpo in Portland, OR. Since Thursday night, I've been in constant "learning mode," keeping my mind (and notebook) open to the talented trainers and speakers. Aside from the temporary stress I'll face Sunday morning when I'm giving my talk, ClickerExpo has provided me with many a-ha moments (as it always does). I don't know why I'm surprised at the a-ha moments -- I haven't been to a ClickerExpo that hasn't had a-ha's for me. 

Today, Ken Ramirez talked about adduction in animal training. From the ClickerExpo.com website: 

The main focus of this Session is to show attendees how to teach an animal the actual concept of adduction – meaning that once the concept is learned the animal could be given any two or more cues and combine them even if the trainer had never presented that particular combination of cues to the animal previously.

So for instance, let's say your dog already knows how to hold a paw up, and your dog also knows how to come when called. By using adduction, you could teach your dog to hold his paw up and come to you at the same time. It would look a lot like a hurt dog limping his way to you. This is an advanced concept and one that not many pet owners need to use. But for us dog trainers -- oh, we're in heaven with these concepts! It's fodder for many late night brainstorming sessions, and for new training projects that we'll undertake with our own dogs just to learn (and teach our dogs) something new. 

Ken's talk reminded me that very often I underestimate my dogs. And my own training skills. I get stuck in a rut of "everyday behaviors" and I forget to stretch both myself and my dog's learning skills. So, yep, I'm going to add some adduction sessions to my training when I get back from ClickerExpo. 

Karen Pryor spoke today on creativity, as it pertains both to animals and to people. I felt like she had somehow gotten into my mind when she listed the "excuses" people use to explain their ownlack of creativity. From the ClickerExpo website:

Creativity, the capacity for having new ideas and creating novel behavior, has always been treated as a natural gift—either you have it or you don’t. It was always assumed that animals don’t have the creative spark at all. Now, thanks to our modern training technology, we not only know that animals can innovate, we know how to train them to do so.

From Karen's talk, my mind was opened to ways I could find the tiniest bit of creativity that I have (we all  have creativity), and nurture it, grow it. Or, spoken like a trainer: I could set myself up to be creative, capture those bits of creativity, and reinforce that creativty. I could shape my creativity, just as I shape behavior in my dogs! A-HA! 

My project list is ten miles long. I've been making excuses for not starting to work on that list until now. After hearing Karen's talk, I'm going to set myself up for success, capture even the smallest approximations toward my goal, reinforce those tiny steps and before I know it, I'll be on my way to accomplishments!

ClickerExpo is a phenomenal experience for anyone with an interest in training. Whether your a raw beginner or you've been training for years, there are epiphanies to be had! ClickerExpo Nashville has a few spots left. Tempted to see what it's all about? Check out the program! And if you decide to go, look me up, I'd be thrilled to meet you and hear about your epiphanies!

 

Who's Afraid of the Clicker?

I spent part of last week in sunny Orlando, Florida, at the 2012 North American Veterinary Conference (NAVC). The NAVC Conference set a new attendance record for its 2012 conference. More than 6,000 veterinarians and more than 1,400 veterinarian technicians attended the conference in Orlando, Florida. Nearly 900 students from veterinary schools across the world were also in attendance.

I was there to talk with the veterinarians, technicians, and students about force-free training. I met hundreds of people and, with the exception of one, they were all enthusiastic about either learning more about clicker training or in implementing it in their practice. 

A retired veterinarian, who looked to be in his early 80's, stopped to chat. He looked at our material and with a sly smile said "I've found that a rolled up newspaper works really well." I laughed and answered "Yes, sometimes we do recommend that the owner use the newspaper to whack himself smartly on his head!" He laughed and leaned in to tell us a story about his son's dog. 

His son's dog peed everytime the son came into the house. The son would yell and holler, chase the dog around, then put him outside when he finally caught the dog. Upon hearing about the trouble from his son, this veterinarian's solution was textbook perfect, delighting me. (The solution: carry food [delicious food] and ignore the dog upon entering. After a few minutes, toss a piece of food to the dog, still ignoring. The dog quickly changed course and quit peeing when he saw the man.)

Clearly, this man knew intuitively how to work with animals. He hadn't learned it in school (in many veterinary schools, behavior is still an elective!), he simply learned by experience. 

Contrast this veterinarian with another who stopped by the booth. "You can't tell me that you train dogs without any punishment," he began. I smiled, hoping he was a kidder like the previous gentleman, and said "Yessir, that's exactly what we do!" Things turned south there, and it was clear that he came here for an argument. I love to teach people about positive reinforcement, but unfortunately, this man didn't really want to learn, he only wanted to argue. He told me tales about how he taught his son's dog to "respect him," and laughed at how the son "babied" the dog by using food in training. Here's the irony: if that veterinarian had attended any of the sessions at that conference on behavior ( there were many), he would have learned very quickly that his outlook was outdated and not recommended by veterinary behaviorists. 

Neither veterinarian had any experience with clicker training. But the second one clearly had a bias against the clicker -- against positive reinforcement training in general. Perhaps because he didn't want to learn. Perhaps because he was afraid of what he'd learn by using it. I'm not sure of the reason, but I'm glad he was the lone exception.

Happy Dogs, Happy Veterinarians

I took little Miss Caysun to the vet today to get her up-to-date on some vaccines. It was going to be a quick in-and-out visit -- shots and then we'd hit the door. As usual, things don't go as planned. The shots went ok, don't get me wrong. But I mentioned, in passing, "she's got a little bit of mange on her nose," the veterinarian took a look and immediately said "that's not mange."

What? Of course it's mange. Mange is easy. Mange is common. Mange requires little treatment. It's got to be mange. 

Nope, he said, mange isn't raised like that. 

Crud. Which is funny because that's both what I thought and what her nose looks like. 

Because I have the best veterinarians in the world, they made a little time for me in the schedule (I didn't need an appointment to get the vaccinations, since we'd just been in the week before for a wellness check and forgot to get the updated vaccinations...). And they had to do a little needle aspirate in her nose to see what's doin'.

I say that as if it was no big deal: just a little needle aspirate. That's because it wasn't being done to me. What that means is that the vet has to stick a needle into the rough, cruddy part of her nose and draw out some cells to look at them under a microscope. Yes, needle into nose. 

Ouch. 

It looked as painful as I'm sure it felt. I had to turn my head, I'll be honest. Little Miss wasn't a happy camper. After a couple of pokes, she decided she was done with all that nonsense. Thankfully they got enough goop off of and from inside the crud that they didn't have to fool with her too much more. 

The veterinarian and vet technician were terrific. They had some squeeze cheese spread all over a tongue depressor stick to keep Caysun's mind off of the needle in her nose. They went slow and easy, they let me feed her while it was going on. 

But there was a needle going into her nose! She wasn't happy. The moral of this story is: because she wasn't happy with what went on, I need to do some remedial veterinary work with her. I will be taking her back to the veterinary hospital when there isn't anything scheduled for her. I want her to have at least 5 visits that are exceptionally good. Visits where stuff like this happens (and only this):

• the veterinarian and the techs come out and play with her in the lobby
• the veterinarian and the vet techs come out and feed her sirloin (that I bring, of course) in the lobby
• she gets to practice already known (and favorite) behaviors in the exam room and earn delicious salmon, sirloin, etc. 

Why spend time going back to the animal hospital and working on these things? Isn't that a waste of time? 

Because Caysun's just 6 months old. She'll be seeing a veterinarian for another 14 years I hope. I want all of those vet visits to be easy and fun for both the dog and the vet. And if the dog's not happy, ain't nobody happy, especially the vet because it's hard (and dangerous) to examine a dog who doesn't want to be examined! 

So it's well worth those 5 or so "un-vet" visits to help dissolve this one unpleasant one. 15 minutes here and there are invaluable for when she's got an emergency and she needs to be calm while the veterinarians and vet techs make her better. 

My vets and techs are great. They're willing to spend the few minutes playing with and feeding Caysun when I drop by. They know it's a good investment of their time, too. 

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