Tuesday Tip Day Training with Food Treats

Food or Treats are a fantastic motivator for dog training! However,

    Many people are weary when it comes to training with treats. As far as I understand they believe a few different things when using this type of reward/motivator for training. One of the reasons is because they dont want their dog to "get fat". Here is the thing, when you are training your dog with treats or food then you need to proportion their meals to how many treats they received during that day of training, in other words, just feed them less food at their meal time, this prevents the excess calories and weight gain. 
    The second reason, to my understanding, is that some people feel as if their dog is only responding to your cues to receive that tasty treat your holding. Let me get into the dogs learning theory real quick. Dogs learn by association, when a dog responds to a cue or lure using a treat or piece of food then they are rewarded with the treat for doing as they were asked. Since dogs love food using them for rewards during training makes training become a more enjoyable experience! The more you practice certain cues your dog will be conditioned to understand what you are asking without having to use a food reward every time. Let me say this again, Yes, you start by training a dog with treats but when done properly, and overtime, you will wean your dog off responding to cues solely for treats and he will start responding to you because he understands that this is something good and that it is something you had asked of him. Should I say it one more time?

Treats are ONLY TEMPORARY.

   Lets look at two different motivators to train loose leash walking. Now these are only two examples to put both sides into perspective for you and you can decide which way of training is right for your own use. First is positive reinforcement which instills a good correlation into training and the second is positive punishment which instills avoidance and fear into training. There are many variations to train loose leash walking, again, these are just two examples.
   Positive Reinforcement with food treats - Start in your house or in your backyard with limited distractions, then move to the front of your house and repeat session gradually increasing distractions. When you start training you will have your hand or pocket full of treats. Start with your dog next to you and give him a treat. Then start walking forward, say "good" or click and give your dog a treat as he is keeping slack in the leash. If he gets to the end of his lead as you see the leash is about to get tight you should stop walking. As soon as he walks towards you again and lets slack back in the leash continue walking and give your marker cue "good" or click and reward with a treat as long as he is keeping slack in the leash.
    Positive Punishment with prong collar and no treats - First make sure your prong collar is properly situated and sized before starting any training. You can start training session in backyard or in house with limited distractions. Start by having your dog besides you. Walk forward, if your dog is walking besides you perfectly say "good" and move to an area of increased distractions. If your dog gets to the end of the leash and starts to tug give the dog a sharp quick yank on the leash which applies a hard pinch on the neck, this correction should be strong enough for your dog to realize that it had just did something inappropriate. Limit the corrections to two in a training session, if you have applied two corrections and had no results then you may have to try a different technique for training.

In the first scenario you are training your dog that keeping the leash loose means that something good will happen. The second scenario implies to your dog that if he doesnt listen to your cue he will receive a correction and will loose leash walk solely to avoid receiving a correction. My preference and goal is to keep dog training fun and exciting for both you and the dog and that is why I  avoid positive punishment techniques such as choke or prong collars.
There are also problems with training tools such as prong or choke collars, some times they produce instantaneous results, however, when not used properly your dog can actually desensitize itself to the corrections. If you dont use them correctly, and for training right from the start, they can get used to the tightening around the neck which renders them useless for training purposes. I will say this a thousand times, I avoid the use of these training methods unless we have exhausted every other training option with no results.

Using food treats keeps your dog involved and interested in training.

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homemade peanut butter
and pumpkin treats

You can use a variety of different food treats in your training and use them as a "grade system" for how well they did! Your dog will decide which treat he values the most so test out a few different treats to see what gets him the most excited and use that one for perfectly completed cues!
If your dog has  a sensitive stomach or cant eat "people food" you can look for grain free treats in your local store and also just use a variety of dog food such as the food they normally eat for breakfast or dinner. You can also mix in wet food as a high value reward and let them get a lick of it every time the do a perfect cue.
Other items such as baby food meats, shredded chicken, and homemade treats are all great options for training and things that your dogs may go crazy for!
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Wet food in a bottle for
easy yummy reward

Pro Tip: My  personal preference is to use things that have a potent smell to them such as salmon or beef based treats, they usually work well as high value rewards. You can find these in wet food variations also and can use a tube or small container to let them get a lick from every time they complete a perfect cue. In my experience using a tube or container where they can only get one lick from keeps them intrigued and wanting more so when you use them as high value rewards there will be a greater chance your dog will repeat the cue to receive that as a reward.

Training your dog, no matter what the situation, takes time, consistency and commitment, results are not instantaneous although you may see some changes instantly. You need to continue to work with your dog daily improving on cues learned until they can perform that said cue 10 out of 10 times. Even after they know the cue you will need to maintain it for the rest of their life, this is easier than it sounds since you can accomplish that by learning how to adapt training into your daily routines.

Once again, after your dog knows what you are asking of him you can completely take away food based rewards and your dog will learn to respond to you solely because you asked him to.

Food is not the only motivator for dogs but its usually at the top of the success charts. You can also use toys however using them can some times get complicated especially when your dog does not know a proper "drop" cue. Petting and affection can be used as a reward also but only if your dog enjoys affection, which a lot of dogs do, however it is usually not as rewarding to them as a piece of food. I personally like starting training with food, then once my dog has a cue almost understood we switch to toys as a reward. I will then give my dog a series of cues  followed by throwing a ball, rope or Frisbee. This type of play maintains cues that the dog has learned while also having fun and getting out some excess energy!

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