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Food in Training: Part IIHow do we use food in training? There is a preciseness needed in understanding HOW to use food. In this microepisode Libby and Emily talk about the “how” of training with food - what to do, when to do it, the frequency and rate, and more. Rewarding desired behaviors through shaping and capturing is called "operant" conditioning - this episode gives a primer course on how to do it and resources for learning more!
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Episode Transcript
Emily 0:09
Welcome to pod to the rescue.
Libby 0:11
Rescuing the dog is just the first step. We're here to help with everything that comes next.
Hello, and welcome back to pod to the rescue. Today we are bringing you a mini episode at training basics on using food and Training Part Two. And today we're going to talk about the how, last training Basics episode we talked about the why. So definitely go back and listen to that one first, if you haven't yet, and listen on four tips about how to use food.
Emily 0:42
Yes, and I think we're going to do this in two parts. This is going to be how to use food and training through what we call operant conditioning, which really just means training, where the dog learns through consequences. I know that for some people, positive reinforcement hasn't been successful for them in the past. And so they have kind of a bias going in. I had it as well previously, like, quote, positive reinforcement doesn't work. I tried it, it didn't work. So what I think people don't understand is the mechanics of it. There is like a specific way that you use positive reinforcement, so that you have success. I think it's similar to anything that you would do like if you got a piano and you tried tinkering on the piano and you didn't know what you were doing. Chances are you wouldn't know how to play piano, even if you tried it for a while, you would need someone to teach you about notes and the chords. And so it's the similar situation, I believe with positive reinforcement, just a little bit of knowledge can go a long way.
Libby 1:54
Absolutely. If you're just throwing food at your dog, you're you may not get the results you are looking for. And a lot of people try it that way. They just throw food at their dog hoping for a certain outcome. And it doesn't work and they get frustrated and they give up. So hopefully this episode will help you a little bit better understand the how behind this.
Emily 2:19
And then that last thing I just want to say before we start talking about the mechanics is this is not just for easy dogs. I think that's another misconception that our society holds that you know, you can change train your poodles and your fluffy little dogs and your golden retrievers this way. But if you have a real problem dog with aggression, you need to go to punishment. And that's actually not true at all. I took a huge intensive certification. Master's in aggression course with Michael Chicago, he is a certified dog behavior consultant through the Ay ay ay BC. And he's one of the most renowned experts in the world on dog aggression. And everything we learned was through positive training operant conditioning, we didn't use force.
Libby 3:12
Yeah, totally. I mean, I have a blue healer, a young blue healer who comes from working lines, she has some trauma in her past, she has a high drive high energy dog. And using positive reinforcement using food works for her. It's a big misconception that this doesn't work for aggressive dogs or high drive dogs.
Emily 3:38
And I have a pyrenees
Libby 3:40
So trust us when we say like we, we we have we understand the needs of dogs with serious behavior issues.
Emily 3:49
We should probably start with operant conditioning, which is dogs learning through consequences. So what we want to do there is we see a behavior. We mark the behavior, and then we reinforce the behavior. Libby, you were just discussing Kathy's Sdeo has a little program called Smart times 50.
Libby 4:16
Yeah, it's what it's a great program. And it's like you said it's great for beginners if you're just starting to use food and training. Smart times 50 is stands for see Mark and reward training. So you see a behavior, you mark it so the dog knows what the desired behavior is, and you reward your dog the way Kathy suggests using this in your everyday life, is to just count out 50 pieces of kibble from your dog's breakfast, put them in a little container and every time throughout the day that your dog does something you like. You mark it. So I if I'm just hanging out around the house. I use a word. I use the word yes, I say it in the same way every single time. It sounds like Yes. And Daisy is looking at me. Because she just heard her marker will Arcor word. And when Daisy hears that, that word said in that tone, she knows that, oh, I'm going to be rewarded for what I just did. This could look like in your everyday life, if your dog is relaxing in her bed, while you are cooking food in the kitchen, rather than she's hanging out underfoot, she's doing what you want relaxing in her bed. You want to mark and reward. And because reinforcement drives behavior, definitely go back and listen to part one, we talked a little bit more about that, the dog will learn that what she is being reinforced for is behavior that she wants to repeat.
Emily 6:06
It makes great sense to me. Yeah, we we can sometimes call that like, almost like the easy way to train a dog or like the lazy way. Because they're offering behaviors all the time, they're doing all the tax roll occurring behaviors that are actually really wonderful. Like sitting or laying on the bed, that was a great example. And we tend to ignore those behaviors. And we know that ignoring behaviors will actually have those behaviors show up less frequently. So we ignore the great behaviors. And then we tend to be like my dogs jumping on the counter, I'm going to like, interact with my dog to do something. So that is not jumping on my counter. No, I love your example of you're cooking dinner daisies in her bed, and you're rewarding or reinforcing the behavior of her being in the bed. Even if you go over, you know, you mark it, you go over and you feed her and she gets up, you've still like basically put like a nail in a two by four, framing of a foundation of the behavior. I think we should talk a little bit about this whole marking concept. Because definitely, yeah, I just one thing I did not understand. Like, I think that food and training gets a bad rap. Because people don't know the actual little mechanics of it. And I think marking is such a crucial piece. Because if you see Daisy in the bed, you walk over and go to give her the food without marking it and she gets up and then you're like, I got the food and what do I do. So you give her the food, she doesn't know what she got the food for. Not really building a behavior. So the but in the moment, like you can't be like the like the food immediately gets into her mouth, you know, unless you had one of those treat and trains. The marker makes almost a snapshot of the behavior that she will then get paid for. So as that happens over and over the behavior gets stronger and stronger.
Libby 8:11
Exactly. And for listeners who have heard of clicker training, the clicker is a marker, the event marker. And it tells the dog that reinforcement for the behavior you just offered is available.
Emily 8:29
I love the clicker. But I do love using a yes is when I also do. And what's nice is you you can do both. So your clicker training session. Like I'll do that, like I'll have three minutes and I'll grab a couple of hot dogs do a little clicker training session. And then on my walks, I don't bring a clicker with my own dog because it's just like okay, now I have my tree pouch and my clicker and my leash like, but yes works almost as well. And you've almost always have your lips and your tongue with you.
Libby 8:58
Unless you happen to leave them at home that day. No, I agree with you. I use I use clicker training. But I use the clicker more often when we're doing something like, okay, we're doing a five minute trick training session or something like that. But if we're on a walk, or if we're around the house, I don't carry a clicker on my person at all times. But my voice is usually available.
Emily 9:26
And a lot of these people are probably thinking do I have to do this for 10 or 12 years? Like no once the behavior is learned, you can ditch the clicker and even on walks now sometimes, especially if it's like cold out and I have my you know hoodie up, I'll just reward her for being next to me. You know, and as time goes by if your dog is really doing great, you can reward with other things. We're not saying like only use food you can start like especially Daisy loves the ball. You know, other things can be reinforcing any behavior They offer you should reward in some way.
Libby 10:04
One of the reasons we love using food and training and we love using it this way with a marker with an event marker is because it tells the dog what to do, what not to do. Because your dog doesn't know what the word no means.
Emily 10:29
We were saying no is not a behavior, let's give them clear instructions is like what do we want you to do? And what would be reinforced?
Libby 10:38
Exactly. So that is where using food as reinforcement comes in, it's teaching them to do something not not to do something.
Emily 10:49
So a good example of this is my peonies, she's 90 pounds. And I had her a couple of months. And she decided that jumping on people who came in was really great, especially because it was the pandemic and she was really lonely, you know, like, not that many people came over. So I taught her how to get up on a little platform. And it's so cute. I had a few people over yesterday, she just kept going back up standing on the platform being like, on the platform, everybody come over and pet me. So when people come in, she knows that's a cue to get on the platform. And she can't jump on people because she's on the platform. And I feed her on the platform, I tell people you can pet her. As long as she's standing on the platform, it takes that like energy at the door away. And she knows this is basically my reward spot. And whenever we say reinforcement, just think reward. Like really, that's all it means is it's a paycheck.
Libby 11:43
So let's talk about that rate of reinforcement and reinforcement history real quick. So Emily, can you define for listeners, what is a rate of reinforcement?
Emily 11:55
Okay, so that when I go see private clients, because I'm actually a trainer in my real life, it's probably the number one thing that people don't comprehend, which I don't blame them. It's not what they do, I don't understand what my dentist does. They shouldn't understand what I do until I teach it to them. But we tend to be extremely stingy with our traits, like people walk with like five treats in their pocket and give a treat for like one little behavior that they like on a walk. So when when you're training a new behavior, the rate of reinforcement, which means like how many treats you're doling out, should be somewhere in the 10 to 15 per minute, no, your training sessions should only be like five minutes long. So you know, it's a lot of food and three to five minutes. But you know, you're really you want to keep the dog engaged. So back in the olden days, when I, when I first went to dog training, we were taught to push a dog's butt to the ground, and then maybe be like, good dog and give it a treat. So many reasons not to do that. Like, just, you don't even need to get into why just not a great plan. And, you know, your dog sits naturally. So you're sitting there and watching your dog, your dog sits, say yes, give them a treat. So that's capturing. And then shaping is where you basically this is more complicated. And we'll have to link to some videos on shaping, but it's kind of a cool concept. It's how they get the dolphins to jump through the hoops. And it's how dogs learn all sorts of behaviors. Okay, so when you're shaping, you want that high rate of reinforcement, and what we know is that animals learn faster with a higher rate of reinforcement. So, you know, if you just dole out one treat every three minutes, they're not going to learn as well as if you're like, really fast. I think a lot of this will just link to some really great trainers that we follow on YouTube like Sarah Walsh Kikopup shaping is really fun.
Libby 14:08
It's so fun. It's a great way to build a relationship with your dog, too. Okay, so Emily, one more question for you on some of the mechanics of this, what if my dog isn't offering any behaviors that I want? So let's say we are to use your door greeting example. Someone comes to the door and she's just spinning circles. She's barking, she's jumping up and there's nothing here that is, is desirable. Nothing that I want to mark and reward, is it? She's just so worked up like what do I do?
Emily 14:48
There's two things there. One is we always used to say, you don't train during the Olympics, you don't train during the recital at Carnegie Hall. So if you're, you know, Your dog has a problem jumping up, people put in some sort of management or put the dog away, and then bring it out on a leash and do all the training, not in that high energy moment. Or even, like have, you know, hardest on your dog and slip your fingers in between the harness. And yes, it's I guess, technically it's forced, but I would just like, gently, like, keep them from jumping up. So you're not like pinning them down or anything, you're just, you're like, okay, like pet, you can pet my dog, but all four feet have to be on the floor right now. And I would have treats and be rewarding. So it's like, here's how we greet dogs. Ideally, though, your dog will be managed away from the door, so you're not even in that situation.
Libby 15:41
Okay, so make it easier for her until she's able to handle the Olympics.
Emily 15:48
Exactly. So you get your behavior really solid. And then you might always need to have some sort of management. And then there's also just other things that you can do, which we can get into how like, but like scatter, feeding, you know, if your dog's nose is on the ground, eating, they're not jumping up, you can also ask them for a sit and like, high rate of reinforcement, you know, feed the CIT, I'm always a fan of management. If you think that your dog can't handle it, put up a gate, put them on a tether, and tell the people you cannot greet the dog. If the dog is, you know, jumping and leaping to get to you. Yeah, because jumping on the person is very rewarding. Anyway, it's a pro social behavior. Now, when I see clients post pandemic, I'm like, You should be grateful that your dog is jumping on people, because there's so many dogs that you walk in, and they're like, you know, because they're under socialized. So we can work on jumping, but let's keep your dog social.
Libby 16:49
I feel like we could we could do an entire training Basics episode just on door manners and door greeting.
Emily 16:55
We maybe could
Libby 16:56
actually should. Okay, listeners, stay tuned for that. Yeah. So is there anything else we need to cover about us about the how of using food and training?
Emily 17:07
I guess the most important thing is that I think why food in training gets a bad rap is because a lot of people consider it a bribe, which is kind of lorring your dog, you know what lorring is one of the ways you can use food, which sometimes, you know, if you're in a sketchy situation, like, feel free to put that treat right near his nose and lower him out of there. Yeah, you know, if if your dog is thinking about jumping up at someone at the door, you can lower them away with a high value reinforcer. But I wouldn't rely on lorring as your main way of training a dog because then it's that show me the money concept, which I did for years before I knew about trading, like, I have my tree come I have the tree, I rattle the treat bag and your dog comes like, then you don't have your treat bag and the dog doesn't come. So really the treat bag is a cue that reinforcement is available. So really, it's like you need to teach the dog like touch my hand at when I say touch and reinforcement will be available. So you don't you know, your body, your cue tells them Come on back, and then you reward it. And if you reword it, you know, 1000 times and the one time you don't have your food with you, you still have a dog that listens. Hmm, that's so important. It's so important. I had dogs were without that little shaky bag, they wouldn't listen to me.
Libby 18:32
Yeah, and you know what I think sometimes in our society, we have this moralistic standpoint about using food as a reward. And it has, I don't know where it comes from. Using food is morally neutral, there's not, it doesn't make you a better or worse person to reward your dog with food, or to lure them into the car to go to the vet with food. Right? It's just we don't have to attach a morality to it. It's how mammals learn. So don't be afraid to try it.
Emily 19:08
Yeah, this is real behavioral science. This isn't just something that like we came up with, because we love dogs.
Libby 19:14
I mean, we do love dogs.
Emily 19:18
You know, I was just talking to someone recently, and I believe in positive reinforcement and force free training for so many reasons. And, you know, it's also scientifically proven to be a great way to train However, I also was saying, like, why would we rescue dogs and bring them in our house? Only then to turn around and hurt them? Yeah, like anyone who's getting a dog and rescuing a dog obviously has a huge heart. So let's just not hurt them once. Yeah, bring home
Libby 19:51
make their life better every step of the way.
Emily 19:55
Berg Reyes
Libby 20:00
Thanks for tuning in. If you liked this episode, don't forget to rate and review. It helps other folks like you find the show. To find out more about our programming and adoptable rescue dogs, you can visit summit dog rescue.org thanks to Mike pesci for the original music and to Alex Lee Ammons and for the love media for graphics, production and editing. See you soon on pod to the rescue.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Welcome to pod to the rescue.
Libby 0:11
Rescuing the dog is just the first step. We're here to help with everything that comes next.
Hello, and welcome back to pod to the rescue. Today we are bringing you a mini episode at training basics on using food and Training Part Two. And today we're going to talk about the how, last training Basics episode we talked about the why. So definitely go back and listen to that one first, if you haven't yet, and listen on four tips about how to use food.
Emily 0:42
Yes, and I think we're going to do this in two parts. This is going to be how to use food and training through what we call operant conditioning, which really just means training, where the dog learns through consequences. I know that for some people, positive reinforcement hasn't been successful for them in the past. And so they have kind of a bias going in. I had it as well previously, like, quote, positive reinforcement doesn't work. I tried it, it didn't work. So what I think people don't understand is the mechanics of it. There is like a specific way that you use positive reinforcement, so that you have success. I think it's similar to anything that you would do like if you got a piano and you tried tinkering on the piano and you didn't know what you were doing. Chances are you wouldn't know how to play piano, even if you tried it for a while, you would need someone to teach you about notes and the chords. And so it's the similar situation, I believe with positive reinforcement, just a little bit of knowledge can go a long way.
Libby 1:54
Absolutely. If you're just throwing food at your dog, you're you may not get the results you are looking for. And a lot of people try it that way. They just throw food at their dog hoping for a certain outcome. And it doesn't work and they get frustrated and they give up. So hopefully this episode will help you a little bit better understand the how behind this.
Emily 2:19
And then that last thing I just want to say before we start talking about the mechanics is this is not just for easy dogs. I think that's another misconception that our society holds that you know, you can change train your poodles and your fluffy little dogs and your golden retrievers this way. But if you have a real problem dog with aggression, you need to go to punishment. And that's actually not true at all. I took a huge intensive certification. Master's in aggression course with Michael Chicago, he is a certified dog behavior consultant through the Ay ay ay BC. And he's one of the most renowned experts in the world on dog aggression. And everything we learned was through positive training operant conditioning, we didn't use force.
Libby 3:12
Yeah, totally. I mean, I have a blue healer, a young blue healer who comes from working lines, she has some trauma in her past, she has a high drive high energy dog. And using positive reinforcement using food works for her. It's a big misconception that this doesn't work for aggressive dogs or high drive dogs.
Emily 3:38
And I have a pyrenees
Libby 3:40
So trust us when we say like we, we we have we understand the needs of dogs with serious behavior issues.
Emily 3:49
We should probably start with operant conditioning, which is dogs learning through consequences. So what we want to do there is we see a behavior. We mark the behavior, and then we reinforce the behavior. Libby, you were just discussing Kathy's Sdeo has a little program called Smart times 50.
Libby 4:16
Yeah, it's what it's a great program. And it's like you said it's great for beginners if you're just starting to use food and training. Smart times 50 is stands for see Mark and reward training. So you see a behavior, you mark it so the dog knows what the desired behavior is, and you reward your dog the way Kathy suggests using this in your everyday life, is to just count out 50 pieces of kibble from your dog's breakfast, put them in a little container and every time throughout the day that your dog does something you like. You mark it. So I if I'm just hanging out around the house. I use a word. I use the word yes, I say it in the same way every single time. It sounds like Yes. And Daisy is looking at me. Because she just heard her marker will Arcor word. And when Daisy hears that, that word said in that tone, she knows that, oh, I'm going to be rewarded for what I just did. This could look like in your everyday life, if your dog is relaxing in her bed, while you are cooking food in the kitchen, rather than she's hanging out underfoot, she's doing what you want relaxing in her bed. You want to mark and reward. And because reinforcement drives behavior, definitely go back and listen to part one, we talked a little bit more about that, the dog will learn that what she is being reinforced for is behavior that she wants to repeat.
Emily 6:06
It makes great sense to me. Yeah, we we can sometimes call that like, almost like the easy way to train a dog or like the lazy way. Because they're offering behaviors all the time, they're doing all the tax roll occurring behaviors that are actually really wonderful. Like sitting or laying on the bed, that was a great example. And we tend to ignore those behaviors. And we know that ignoring behaviors will actually have those behaviors show up less frequently. So we ignore the great behaviors. And then we tend to be like my dogs jumping on the counter, I'm going to like, interact with my dog to do something. So that is not jumping on my counter. No, I love your example of you're cooking dinner daisies in her bed, and you're rewarding or reinforcing the behavior of her being in the bed. Even if you go over, you know, you mark it, you go over and you feed her and she gets up, you've still like basically put like a nail in a two by four, framing of a foundation of the behavior. I think we should talk a little bit about this whole marking concept. Because definitely, yeah, I just one thing I did not understand. Like, I think that food and training gets a bad rap. Because people don't know the actual little mechanics of it. And I think marking is such a crucial piece. Because if you see Daisy in the bed, you walk over and go to give her the food without marking it and she gets up and then you're like, I got the food and what do I do. So you give her the food, she doesn't know what she got the food for. Not really building a behavior. So the but in the moment, like you can't be like the like the food immediately gets into her mouth, you know, unless you had one of those treat and trains. The marker makes almost a snapshot of the behavior that she will then get paid for. So as that happens over and over the behavior gets stronger and stronger.
Libby 8:11
Exactly. And for listeners who have heard of clicker training, the clicker is a marker, the event marker. And it tells the dog that reinforcement for the behavior you just offered is available.
Emily 8:29
I love the clicker. But I do love using a yes is when I also do. And what's nice is you you can do both. So your clicker training session. Like I'll do that, like I'll have three minutes and I'll grab a couple of hot dogs do a little clicker training session. And then on my walks, I don't bring a clicker with my own dog because it's just like okay, now I have my tree pouch and my clicker and my leash like, but yes works almost as well. And you've almost always have your lips and your tongue with you.
Libby 8:58
Unless you happen to leave them at home that day. No, I agree with you. I use I use clicker training. But I use the clicker more often when we're doing something like, okay, we're doing a five minute trick training session or something like that. But if we're on a walk, or if we're around the house, I don't carry a clicker on my person at all times. But my voice is usually available.
Emily 9:26
And a lot of these people are probably thinking do I have to do this for 10 or 12 years? Like no once the behavior is learned, you can ditch the clicker and even on walks now sometimes, especially if it's like cold out and I have my you know hoodie up, I'll just reward her for being next to me. You know, and as time goes by if your dog is really doing great, you can reward with other things. We're not saying like only use food you can start like especially Daisy loves the ball. You know, other things can be reinforcing any behavior They offer you should reward in some way.
Libby 10:04
One of the reasons we love using food and training and we love using it this way with a marker with an event marker is because it tells the dog what to do, what not to do. Because your dog doesn't know what the word no means.
Emily 10:29
We were saying no is not a behavior, let's give them clear instructions is like what do we want you to do? And what would be reinforced?
Libby 10:38
Exactly. So that is where using food as reinforcement comes in, it's teaching them to do something not not to do something.
Emily 10:49
So a good example of this is my peonies, she's 90 pounds. And I had her a couple of months. And she decided that jumping on people who came in was really great, especially because it was the pandemic and she was really lonely, you know, like, not that many people came over. So I taught her how to get up on a little platform. And it's so cute. I had a few people over yesterday, she just kept going back up standing on the platform being like, on the platform, everybody come over and pet me. So when people come in, she knows that's a cue to get on the platform. And she can't jump on people because she's on the platform. And I feed her on the platform, I tell people you can pet her. As long as she's standing on the platform, it takes that like energy at the door away. And she knows this is basically my reward spot. And whenever we say reinforcement, just think reward. Like really, that's all it means is it's a paycheck.
Libby 11:43
So let's talk about that rate of reinforcement and reinforcement history real quick. So Emily, can you define for listeners, what is a rate of reinforcement?
Emily 11:55
Okay, so that when I go see private clients, because I'm actually a trainer in my real life, it's probably the number one thing that people don't comprehend, which I don't blame them. It's not what they do, I don't understand what my dentist does. They shouldn't understand what I do until I teach it to them. But we tend to be extremely stingy with our traits, like people walk with like five treats in their pocket and give a treat for like one little behavior that they like on a walk. So when when you're training a new behavior, the rate of reinforcement, which means like how many treats you're doling out, should be somewhere in the 10 to 15 per minute, no, your training sessions should only be like five minutes long. So you know, it's a lot of food and three to five minutes. But you know, you're really you want to keep the dog engaged. So back in the olden days, when I, when I first went to dog training, we were taught to push a dog's butt to the ground, and then maybe be like, good dog and give it a treat. So many reasons not to do that. Like, just, you don't even need to get into why just not a great plan. And, you know, your dog sits naturally. So you're sitting there and watching your dog, your dog sits, say yes, give them a treat. So that's capturing. And then shaping is where you basically this is more complicated. And we'll have to link to some videos on shaping, but it's kind of a cool concept. It's how they get the dolphins to jump through the hoops. And it's how dogs learn all sorts of behaviors. Okay, so when you're shaping, you want that high rate of reinforcement, and what we know is that animals learn faster with a higher rate of reinforcement. So, you know, if you just dole out one treat every three minutes, they're not going to learn as well as if you're like, really fast. I think a lot of this will just link to some really great trainers that we follow on YouTube like Sarah Walsh Kikopup shaping is really fun.
Libby 14:08
It's so fun. It's a great way to build a relationship with your dog, too. Okay, so Emily, one more question for you on some of the mechanics of this, what if my dog isn't offering any behaviors that I want? So let's say we are to use your door greeting example. Someone comes to the door and she's just spinning circles. She's barking, she's jumping up and there's nothing here that is, is desirable. Nothing that I want to mark and reward, is it? She's just so worked up like what do I do?
Emily 14:48
There's two things there. One is we always used to say, you don't train during the Olympics, you don't train during the recital at Carnegie Hall. So if you're, you know, Your dog has a problem jumping up, people put in some sort of management or put the dog away, and then bring it out on a leash and do all the training, not in that high energy moment. Or even, like have, you know, hardest on your dog and slip your fingers in between the harness. And yes, it's I guess, technically it's forced, but I would just like, gently, like, keep them from jumping up. So you're not like pinning them down or anything, you're just, you're like, okay, like pet, you can pet my dog, but all four feet have to be on the floor right now. And I would have treats and be rewarding. So it's like, here's how we greet dogs. Ideally, though, your dog will be managed away from the door, so you're not even in that situation.
Libby 15:41
Okay, so make it easier for her until she's able to handle the Olympics.
Emily 15:48
Exactly. So you get your behavior really solid. And then you might always need to have some sort of management. And then there's also just other things that you can do, which we can get into how like, but like scatter, feeding, you know, if your dog's nose is on the ground, eating, they're not jumping up, you can also ask them for a sit and like, high rate of reinforcement, you know, feed the CIT, I'm always a fan of management. If you think that your dog can't handle it, put up a gate, put them on a tether, and tell the people you cannot greet the dog. If the dog is, you know, jumping and leaping to get to you. Yeah, because jumping on the person is very rewarding. Anyway, it's a pro social behavior. Now, when I see clients post pandemic, I'm like, You should be grateful that your dog is jumping on people, because there's so many dogs that you walk in, and they're like, you know, because they're under socialized. So we can work on jumping, but let's keep your dog social.
Libby 16:49
I feel like we could we could do an entire training Basics episode just on door manners and door greeting.
Emily 16:55
We maybe could
Libby 16:56
actually should. Okay, listeners, stay tuned for that. Yeah. So is there anything else we need to cover about us about the how of using food and training?
Emily 17:07
I guess the most important thing is that I think why food in training gets a bad rap is because a lot of people consider it a bribe, which is kind of lorring your dog, you know what lorring is one of the ways you can use food, which sometimes, you know, if you're in a sketchy situation, like, feel free to put that treat right near his nose and lower him out of there. Yeah, you know, if if your dog is thinking about jumping up at someone at the door, you can lower them away with a high value reinforcer. But I wouldn't rely on lorring as your main way of training a dog because then it's that show me the money concept, which I did for years before I knew about trading, like, I have my tree come I have the tree, I rattle the treat bag and your dog comes like, then you don't have your treat bag and the dog doesn't come. So really the treat bag is a cue that reinforcement is available. So really, it's like you need to teach the dog like touch my hand at when I say touch and reinforcement will be available. So you don't you know, your body, your cue tells them Come on back, and then you reward it. And if you reword it, you know, 1000 times and the one time you don't have your food with you, you still have a dog that listens. Hmm, that's so important. It's so important. I had dogs were without that little shaky bag, they wouldn't listen to me.
Libby 18:32
Yeah, and you know what I think sometimes in our society, we have this moralistic standpoint about using food as a reward. And it has, I don't know where it comes from. Using food is morally neutral, there's not, it doesn't make you a better or worse person to reward your dog with food, or to lure them into the car to go to the vet with food. Right? It's just we don't have to attach a morality to it. It's how mammals learn. So don't be afraid to try it.
Emily 19:08
Yeah, this is real behavioral science. This isn't just something that like we came up with, because we love dogs.
Libby 19:14
I mean, we do love dogs.
Emily 19:18
You know, I was just talking to someone recently, and I believe in positive reinforcement and force free training for so many reasons. And, you know, it's also scientifically proven to be a great way to train However, I also was saying, like, why would we rescue dogs and bring them in our house? Only then to turn around and hurt them? Yeah, like anyone who's getting a dog and rescuing a dog obviously has a huge heart. So let's just not hurt them once. Yeah, bring home
Libby 19:51
make their life better every step of the way.
Emily 19:55
Berg Reyes
Libby 20:00
Thanks for tuning in. If you liked this episode, don't forget to rate and review. It helps other folks like you find the show. To find out more about our programming and adoptable rescue dogs, you can visit summit dog rescue.org thanks to Mike pesci for the original music and to Alex Lee Ammons and for the love media for graphics, production and editing. See you soon on pod to the rescue.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai