[nagdu] Defiant poodles running away from corrections

Thu Jun 25 11:14:50 UTC 2015

You got it! You know poodles! 

-----Original Message-----
From: nagdu [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Tami Jarvis via nagdu
Sent: Wednesday, June 24, 2015 11:23 PM
To: NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users
Cc: Tami Jarvis
Subject: Re: [nagdu] Defiant poodles running away from corrections

Kerri,

That tag is a poodle game... With Mitzi, it's become ritualized at harness time, although not so much now that she is retired and a walk is a luxury that she doesn't get often enough. Loki is getting more inventive and prolonging the game. He will go to someplace I can't reach him, so I walk away and he comes out... If I go to the door, he will get there ahead of me, but he's finding it amusing to duck out of reach even there. He thinks he is very funny! I don't always have time, but I think I'm going to start arranging things so that I can just grab Mitzi and take her for a walk instead. His current walking harness fits her and works really for retraining her for retirement, so I can just pop it on her and leave him home. With her, if she pushed the game too far, I would just grab the cane and head off without her. I left for a whole half hour once, and that cured her... She would still play the game but only so far.

I don't correct, so that's not an issue for me. I use negative reinforcement but not in the same sense. Loki will go to his crate when I suggest it to him, and he will come to what I call tie down, which is actually me just holding a leash to keep him out of trouble. He's gotten to the point where he brings me the stuff he steals straightaway, so that's turning into useful retrieval and finding. He still steals certain things, but the game has gotten to be ritualized so that I know what he's stealing and don't have to chase him down for it or find him hiding somewhere to shred it. He's finally starting to do less picking up stuff in the first place, so there's hope. He's a puppy, and I figured puppies steal stuff, so why not go with it and use that to teach him the whole drop it, leave it, bring it routine and make a game of it. 
/shrug/ If he goes to far, he gets to relax in his crate awhile until he's settled down or be on the leash by the couch and not have any fun. 
He's funny, though. Recently, he's started getting paper out of the recycle can by my husband's desk and making a lot of noise with it so I will order him into his crate. Except that he doesn't even wait for the order, just goes to the crate as soon as I start to turn around to stand up, so then I obligingly say, "good crate!" and toss in a couple of treats as I close the door. What I want to know is why he doesn't just go into his crate if that's where he wants to be? Mitzi would sometimes do strange stuff like that, too. Maybe it's trying to figure out what the rules are that I only think I've taught? Or what? Who knows? /lol/

One thing I have found is that if the poodle wants to play and I don't like the game, I simply don't play but walk away... Then the poodle comes to me and I turn the game to what I want and can use it to train the behaviors I do want in a fun way. I don't get a great feeling of control out of it, but I get what I want and we have fun.

Tami

On 06/23/2015 11:02 AM, Kerri Stovall via nagdu wrote:
> Hey Rox, thank you for the reply. I would love for that to work, going to her and moving her away, but she runs away from me and jumps around trying to make it a game of catch, me catching her. And I don't think it would do any good to chase her. So I may try to recall her with the food and treating, and the whistle may work too. But that's part of my problem is getting to her to move her, because she runs from me when I step toward her. Looking forward to hearing from you again. Thanks.
> Kerri
> Sent from my iPhone
>
>> On Jun 23, 2015, at 12:25 PM, The Pawpower Pack via nagdu <nagdu at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Kerri,
>> Usually, it's a good idea when your dog is doing a behavior that is self-rewarding— like barking, to go to the dog yourself and physically move her away from what she is barking at.  Asking a dog to recall to you as you see just teaches them to ignore the cue.
>> Here's what I suggest, if the dog barks, stop what you are doing, go over to the dog, put her back on the lead, and have her lay next to you.
>> You can also click and reward for quiet.
>> Now, you are going to have train the recall cue again since the dog has stopped acknowledging it.
>> Start with the dog on a short leash and use her favorite thing as a reward for coming back.  For many dogs, that's food, but I know some poodles are not that wild about food.  You can also use a toy.  The most impootant thing is never give a cue like recall that the dog will not or cannot obey.
>> Some handlers have had success associating a recall cue with feeding time and a whistle.
>> Blowing the whistle as the cue to eat, and using the same whistle za recall cue.
>> Good luck!
>>
>> Rox and the kitchen Bitches:
>> Mill'E, Laveau, Soleil
>> Pawpower4me at gmail.com
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>>> On Jun 23, 2015, at 11:11 AM, Kerri Stovall via nagdu <nagdu at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi all,
>>> As most of you may know, my husband and I both received poodles from 
>>> Pilot Dogs back in April. We have just begun to let them off leash 
>>> in the house as of a couple weeks ago, and I do know that this is 
>>> just the beginning of their learning process for house manners. So, 
>>> my question is this. How can we keep them from running from us when 
>>> they know we are unhappy with their behavior. Here's a little of an 
>>> idea of what's happening. As I now understand more fully, poodles 
>>> are barkers, and they will bark at anything they hear or see that 
>>> they are interested in, so pulling shades down doesn't work because 
>>> the shades are already down, but they bark mostly at audible noises, 
>>> like the air conditioning unit rattling or something like that. It's 
>>> not every minute or anything like that, but it's often enough and 
>>> they keep it up long enough to get to interfering with things. So 
>>> when we tell them quiet several times and it doesn't work, then we 
>>> will try calling them to us, but of course they know
 they are not behaving so they run the opposite way, even if the word no is used for other things than barking, any kind of misbehaving they will run away from us when we want to call them to us to distract them. They also will try to play with us by jumping around just out of reach, when they know we are unhappy with them. So I'm wondering, is it time to go back on leash for a while? I want to be able to do instant corrections or whatever else I can do with my dog, and I'm not sure if Lee will be up for it, but I hope so, so that he can get a handle on it. They are stellar dogs when they're apart, but when together their come command needs a lot of work because alb they want to do is play. lol.  Now my dog, she will still run away from me even when Lee isn't home or when his dog is elsewhere in the house, if she knows that I'm about to get onto her for something. I never correct her for coming to me though, I make sure the come command is always rewarded instead of corrected. But I j ust want her to come to me so that I can distract her from whatever she's doing wrong. Any help would be great. Thank you to all.
>>> Kerri and Sadie
>>>
>>>
>>> Sent from my iPhone
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