Not food motavated and such a brat!
 

I have been trying to teach my little Lula simple tricks. She has "sit" down and is ok with "come" and "pretty" (sit pretty) but she will often simply walk away when I am trying to train her. I have tried with treats as well as her toys. She just doesnt feel like she needs to entertain me, I guess. *sigh*
I watch all sorts of training videos on YouTube but it seems their dogs actually pay attention. Mine however could care less. She is 3 months old and everyone keeps saying that you need to start young, I just dont know what to do.

Anyone know of any super motavating treats/toys/love/ANYTHING!

Have you ever tried pieces of boiled chicken breasts as treats?

I would love to read what other might say because I am having the same problem. My thing is that when she was younger she use to give high 5 and paw and sit but now its like HELLO!!! she forgot and when I try to retrain her she thinks I'm playing with her LOL!!!! As far as treats I've noticed that my Roxy LOVES bill jac from Petsmart and or Nature's recipe treats... I just cut them up in 3 that way you have more to give... Treats go fast and its not cheap ;)

So far I have been rotating between a wellness treat, sea mobility, chicken breast and cookies... she seems to loose interest in a treat if i use it regularly. what a pain! :P

When I use toys as a treat she will go into play mode, listen for about 2 minutes, then start rushing the toy and bark at it to play. I dont want to encourage barking so I try to rarely train that way.

training for tricks
 

My suggestion is a clicker and a really special treat that they get only during training sessions. Warm hotdog or tiny bits of cheese. Keep sessions 4-6 minutes, they have the attention span of a gnat! LOL See the photos below of three of mine "having school". They are very attentive to the clicker & treat!:thumbup:

I tried the clicker a few times... my boyfriend on the other hand has yet to use it. He may be my biggest problem training. He isnt as consistent as I am and when he is around she thinks of him as a bog toy and looses all train of thought.
I might need to hurt someone's feelings if he cant follow the rules. perhaps take disciplinary action! haha!

SOOOO cute, and very true!

I would also suggest training them after a play session, and before dinner time so they are not full of energy, and also hungry. SMALL, DELICIOUS treats are good, and quick training sessions.

If it seems like she's not interested, she may be confused or frustrated. Start with something simple she knows, like Sit, so she knows she's not just being taunted with delicious food she will never earn.

Oops, meant to quote HarleyYorkie.

great advice!

when I get home from work we always potty, eat, and then take a trip to the park. perhaps between coming home from the park and when the boyfriend comes home will have hardcore 15 minute training sessions!

I think I'm going to discourage him from any of the training (tricks) until she has it all down and is a little more obedient.

Ill update ASAP!

Sounds good, but I would just do a 5 minute session. :) Keep it easy for her, at least to start. Set her up for success.

haha, when she loses interest, so do i... i doubt it will last 15min but that will be the time I put aside for it. ;)
Thank you!

Okay. Not to beat a dead horse, but one rule of training is to always end on a good note. So if it seems like she's getting bored, give her something she knows how to do and end it. Always leave her wanting more. ;)

Maddie gets little pieces of cheese, the only thing that I have found that works for her. Now she won't "sit" or "lay down" without knowing that I have a piece of cheese in my hand. She is such a little stinker!

Ok so you are training to long and need to slow it down.
Rule of thumb is train only in the commercial breaks of one, one hour show and that is enough for the day. There is no reason to even split that into two half hour shows twice a day. For me every interaction with my dog is training time andso are yours as well we just tend not to think that way so a quick sit for a meal or to go out reinforces what you want to just be there when needed.
Also instead of feeding supper or breakfast use that for training treats instead.
You should be taking out the valume of treats you use to train from thier food anyway. Plus it does not really need to be treats it can be word and touch and play instead.

I have one dog that will do a jig for good boy.
Another the will do anything to play with a ball.
I know of one that works for sheep poop.... yes that gross but we are talking an aggressive dog and we needed him to work.

So trick is to try lots of treats ans see which one works for him and use that along with the normal kibble... he will start to wonder what to do t oget the gog stuff and even work just for kibble.

JL

After work we continue to do our potties, and eat some food before we go to the park or for a long walk into town.
Yesterday we went downtown and found a new friend named Cooper and they "chase" played for a while. Today after work we have a playdate with another yorkie down the street that also likes to "chase" play.
Newburyport, MA is such a dog friendly little sea port. There are friends to make behind every corner. I dont even need to bring her foldable water bowl (one les thing to tote around in her baby bag) becuase most of the shops have dog bowls outside.

After our daytime activities (before dinner) we sit down to train. I put aside 15 minutes for this. The 15 minites is for ME (ok do i have treats ready? where is that freaking clicker? is she eating the brick?).
Taking QuickSilver's advise I am doing tricks until she seems to be slowing down, then we do one last "sit!" she gets a bigger peice of treat and lots of praise. Right now she likes her non-fat string cheese but that can suddenly change. *sigh*

I go back and forth between treats and toys, she doesnt always get a treat either. Im trying to get a result of her obeying comands even if she cant see the reward. The hand that I use to do her comands (she knows sit without me saying it) doesnt hold the food.

I have been told not to use her kibble as a training treat for various reasons so I think Ill stick with the toys and treats. Like I originally said, she isnt very food motavated so kibble isnt going to do me any good. Up until recently it has been a struggle to even get her to eat that. :P

I think ending her training on a fantastic note. is helping, she will sit and look at me like she wants more now. I may do 2 short sessions a day, I just hope I can fit it into her already busy day.



(a few days ago on one of our walks we were stopped by a local photographer, she posted my little Lula-Mae Famous online. Im going to post the pics in the pic forum under Mrs. Famous, in case you want to check out my little spoiled brat)

That's so cool. :) A lot of people take pictures of Thor, I find myself hoping he makes it into a local paper some day.

Do you feel like the training is helping? Is she learning new commands, or getting better at her current ones?

It's cool you are using a clicker, by the way. I would love to use one with Thor, but he is scared of the noise.

How far do you plan to take her training? Here are some things I wish I had imprinted right away:

* Start work cue: This just tells her training is going to begin. Someone here says "Homework!" and you can add a sign if you wish. Thor cues much better to signs than to words. For a long time, he didn't seem to understand that words had any significance to him at all, and he still seems to think about half of my verbal commands mean "Sit".

* End TASK cue. So once you have her Sit or Stay reliably, you don't want her to decide for herself when she is finished. I unfortunately trained Thor on the cue "Okay", which he responds to very well, even when it is not directed at him. So if he is sitting and I tell someone "okay", he gets up. You might try "That'll do".

* End ALL WORK cue, meaning you are finished with training. That means (1) treats/training is finished. It will also come in handy when you have taught her the Come command. Thor responds to Come very well, gets his treat, and then immediately rushes back to whatever it was I called him away from in the first place. You want to teach your dog that her default mode is to be hanging out and waiting for her next command. For this, you can use "Go Play!". You can do a little "shoo" motion with your hands, or slap them together in a way that says "all finished."

Make sure to use Go Play! consistently to release her. Even if she starts out by rushing off on her own, say "Go Play!" to associate the words with her action.

Hope this helps. :)

We took a clicker training class, and I found the clicker was not the best method of training for me. The idea with the clicker is to train them that the sound of the click is something good, and they will get food if they hear the click. I had a problem clicking at the exact moment of the proper response. For example, if you are training to sit, the click has to happen as soon as their butt hits the ground. I was always holding the clicker upside-down or I'd get excited and say Yes, instead of the click, and the click took too long coming for proper reinforcement, so I stopped using the clicker and substituted the word "yes" instead. I also used the word uh-uh, and it just means what he's doing won't earn him a treat. It's different than the word no, which means, "Stop that behavior." Dogs have to be hungry to train, and the hungrier they are the more they will listen. If you feed normal meals, and then try to train with treats, you have to up the food value too much, they might work for one or two treats, but then want something even yummier, or the get bored, so I train Joey with all of his breakfast and half his evening meal. I didn't do this during the trick training class, and Joey gained a pound in six weeks, it was a pound that he didn't need, and took some time to get it off, but it has made him much more interested in his regular food.

I found that Joey learns hand signals so much faster than verbal commands, and I have to be very aware of subtle movements my hand makes, because he associates these with a different trick rather than my words. If I use long words, like rollover, I try to do it sing-songy link so it's distinctive. My advice is to learn the hand signals yourself first, so you will be consistent. You can make up your own, or use the ones many trainers use.

Here's a good link that describes some simple tricks and how to teach them. Remember, training should always be fun, we worked on one or new two tricks a week in two short daily sessions, always ending with something he knew, so he could leave with positive feeling. Try not to link all the tricks together and reward after each trick in early training, otherwise some dogs, when told to sit, will sit, roller over, crawl, play dead, and give you a high five. Later, you can teach medleys! Dog Tricks! Shake, Crawl, Beg, Kiss, Roll Over, Bow, and more!

Mine respond better to hand signals also

i use the clicker method without the clicker, we use "Yes" and "Wrong" for our clicker and markers

Lula and I just got back from the Vet.
Poor girl has been put on a bland diet becuase she isnt argreeing with her new kibble. I have been ordered to home cook her food for the next few days but I may just continue this as she LOVES chicken now. I have been boiling chicken breast with a clove of garlic and she goes nuts over it as a training treat.

I think I may take the advise to have her do tricks for her meals and end the training with her dog bowl full of "treats"! haha. She will love that, I just hope she doesnt loose interest in her meals as quick as she looses interest in her treats.

She is doing great with her training now that I train before her dinner. Everyone is so impressed when I have her do tricks (I think mostly due to her size). We are still under 2lbs at almost 4 months. I cant wait till she gets bigger!

we have "come", "sit", "down", and "pretty" (sit pretty) down and will be starting on "circles" today.
I would LOVE to get her to do "bang" for play dead. Someday....

Just a few thoughts. Clicker is a better marker when working fast shaping and more acturate. When I work aggression it fast and hard and ugly so I tend ot forget the click and just keep feeding the behaviour I want and see that is good.
If we are in full flip out which is rare we are to busy doing damage control to click.

That said it is still better to use a metalic click to mark and if the dog is afraid try several other methods. pen click, I click is softer, in the pocket, under duct tape, just some thoughts.
If using a word yes and wrong come up in normal conversation to much and should be avoided think up a fake sound not word related at all to use. Some use a tongue click.

JL