Coprophagia or Dogs Can Be Gross

I love River Boat, my two year old Black Labrador. He was born nine condos down from where I am now living here in Oregon with the Columbia River right out my back door…hence his name. 

True confession – River is a poop eater!

We moved from five acres to a condo with no yard, so now we are out with the dogs on leash when they do their business so we always pick it up right away. I had been working on managing River’s corprophagia, the eating of stools, with the goal of extinguishing the behavior for about six months before we moved. Here’s our story.

River did not eat his own stool but those of his two canine housemates, Buddy, Doxie/Yorkie mix 11 years old and Mellie, Golden Retriever 5 years old. River did not start eating stool until after he was sixteen months old. Yuck! 

So first, I went on-line [what else?] and made a list of possible solutions to this situation. I wanted to go down the list and try each idea for one month to give it time to work, trying avoid starting too many things at once and then not knowing which worked.

First, my husband Jerry, and I started managing how we let the dogs out. Letting Buddy and Mellie out together and then let River out and go with him to scoop immediately. Management works but sometimes we as humans relaxed our resolve and River would find a snack.

While we managed the outdoor time we also switched the dog’s foods to change the texture of the stool, and maybe then the stool would not be as desirable as the solid tootsie type are. This may have had some effect on desirability as he would sometimes now walk away from the stool. But it was not the solution.

Next I added enzymes to River’s diet maybe he was having trouble metabolizing his food properly. I could not tell if that was helpful, he still ate stools if we didn’t get to them quick enough.

Then I feed a coprophagia deterrent to Buddy and Mellie as directed by the label. Hard to tell again if our management was getting better or if these tablets really helped.

After about six months of working our way through the solutions we moved to Oregon and all bathroom outings are on leash, so the problem is solved. 

When I think of all the things we tried before we moved it seems that management and changing dog foods so their stools would be of a softer texture both had the effect of a stool consumption reduction. Since moving it is not even an option since we are taking the dogs out on leash and cleaning up immediately. Do I think the behavior is extinguished? We head back to Whidbey for a visit in a few days…we’ll see.

Blogging Again!

Here I am blogging again, I noticed my last blog was right about the time, my now husband, Jerry and I started dating. I won’t catch you up on all of that but one of the consequences has been my taking a two year sabbatical from teaching classes and moving from my home of 25 years on Whidbey Island to another beautiful place Hammond Oregon right outside Astoria. Jerry was a retired pastor when we got married last year but a two year interim pastor position became available in Astoria so he moved here in January; I stayed behind to wrap up my business and pack. It is not that easy to find a place to rent with two dogs, but we did eventually find a place eight doors down from my mom. Did I mention my mom and three brothers live here as well?

Moving was a bigger ordeal than I thought it would be. It wasn't until the first part of June that we were all settled in Hammond. Lots of adjustments! The one that is most appropriate for me to write about here is the change for our dogs, Mellie a 4.5 year old Golden Retriever and River a 2.5 year old Black Labrador. We moved from 5 acres on Whidbey to a condominium with no yard. Lots of walking on leash here. River is good on the leash and easy to walk, Mellie a bit more challenging. Since I got to know Jerry when he got his puppy Mellie I do feel somewhat responsible for Mellie’s poor leash habits because I was their coach! I’ll write more about the retraining process in another blog.

What is a dog trainer to do? Train her dogs? Really?! Well that is just what I have been doing. I do most of the dog walking since I am home with them and Jerry works outside our home. So I got out the rewards and started one at a time. As I mentioned River has always been pretty good on the leash. I walked him often on leash when he was young and I tried to make it fun. But here in Hammond it is not unusual to come across 30 elk while out and about. It was a perfect place to use “Look at That” from Control Unleashed by Leslie McDivett.

 When out walking Mellie or River on leash I prefer other dogs would not come to meet them. I feel it puts too much pressure on them and it doesn’t always turn out friendly. The greeting of other dogs promotes all the dogs involved pulling to go meet other dogs. This was addressed in the book 12 Terrible Dog Training Mistakes Owners Make That Ruin Their Dog's Behavior...And How To Avoid Them  by Suzanne Hetts PhD. I’m over 60 and quite a few people I see on walks are older than me with large dogs. I do not want them or me to be pulled over by our walking buddies.  I want my dogs to look at the other dogs and then come along with me, we are a team!

During this sabbatical and adventure in Oregon I am looking forward to training our dogs. Mellie has loved agility so I plan on looking for an agility class for us. My brothers are duck hunters and I am planning on training River to hunt with them. I read an article in the APDT Chronicle of the Dog, Trailblazing Into the Gun Dog World by Inga From, and we are going to be using force free methods. I’m also going to watch the Do as I Do Using Social Learning to Train Dogs  dvd from Claudia Fugazza and give that training method a try.  Lots to do here in Oregon, I’ll keep you posted!

Here’s Barking at You
       

There are a few things about dogs that are guaranteed and barking is one of them. Dogs also will consistently solicit our attention if we ignore them too long and barking is a great way to get a human’s attention. In fact this very situation has come to my attention a couple of times in the past few days with client’s young dogs having learned that when they bark their human will react. In one case the young handler was inadvertently looking at her dog right before she looked away, that was enough. What also was happening that sometimes when the handler would click a behavior like being quiet the dog would get in a bark at that same moment?  Doy, I hate that when that happens!

Attention is a attention whether it is disciplining your dog for barking or rewarding your dog for not barking. Attention is the name of the game and your dog is an expert at getting your attention.  He nudges your hand and you pet him, she brings her ball over to you and you throw it, she barks at you and you look at him and tell him to stop. Your attention has been gotten and in the case of barking you may be saying, “No bark!”  but your dog is thinking ‘Hooray, I got her attention, mission accomplished.’ Then the barking behavior gets stronger.

You must ignore the barking and remember to give your dog attention for being calm and relaxed. Ignoring means standing up and walking away, consistently. Ask yourself is your dog getting enough exercise?  Is there a nice variety of appropriate toys?  If you are steadfast in your approach you will notice your dog’s barking for attention diminish. Before the behavior is extinguished though there will be an extinction burst where your dog will try harder to get your attention. Stay the course and continue to ignore the barking and you will find success.

This link below is for a poster called Ain’t Misbehaving and it clearly shows the progression of how we humans reinforce barking by paying attention to it.

To look at the full sized version of this poster here is the web site:

http://www.yellowdog-australia.k9events.com/images/posters/7416163982_a0026ce0e1_o.jpg

The consequence that is affecting behavior in the situation of barking dogs is the attention they get from us. If you examine your barking situation I’m sure you will see how your own behavior is creating an exciting rewarding consequence [more barking] for your dog through the giving of your attention.  You are then able to modify your own behavior as you guide your dog to more appropriate behaviors like relaxing on their bed or chewing on their toys.

Communication Pitfalls

Communication Pitfalls

It often comes up in the dog training classes I teach that a dog is not responding to a command out of deviance because most certainly the puppy or dog ‘knows’ the word, such as “sit” or “come”.  There are many variables in communication especially when the communication is between different species. I’m considering the information shared between humans and dogs, and how easy it is for a ‘simple’ communication like asking a dog to sit can be complicated by misinformation, cause and effect of situations, and free will to react to a communication signal.

It is generally agreed that there is always a sender and receiver in any communication. In the Principles of Animal Communication by Jack Bradbury and Sandra Vehrencamp the process of communication is described as, “Involving two individuals, a sender and a receiver. The sender provides a signal which conveys information. The signal is transmitted through the environment and is detected by the receiver. The receiver uses the information to help make a decision about how it should respond. “ Signals are the vehicle the message arrives on. (3)  There are some choices to make, there can be true communication where both parties benefit, there is eavesdropping where information from another animal is used to their detriment such as a mouse rustling noise alerting an owl, or the sender may send misinformation.  A true and honest communication is always the best; it uses the least amount of energy and benefits both the sender and the receiver.

So we have the senders and receivers but there is another aspect of communication that should not be overlooked and that is cause and effect. In Animal Cognition, The Mental Lives of Animals by Clive D.L. Wynne he states that animals that have the ability to relate cause and effect into their lives will likely be more successful as they go through life. Success is relative to perception of any given situation. Let’s say your dog is digging a hole in the backyard and you call them to come to you, in the past when you have called the dog while in the backyard you have brought the dog into the house.  Digging the hole is fun! The signal of calling “come” by the sender means the fun is over to the receiver. The honest communication from the dog, now the sender, is to ignore to come and continued digging.  

Another example that came up recently in one of my classes is a dog that is leery of his dog door. When he people first got the dog, a young adult, he went through the dog door a few times; both times he bumped his shoulder, now he is leery of his people asking him to go through anything.  An honest signal from his people that the dog door is safe is now perceived as less than honest and generalized with fear of going through anything. Using the dog door for this dog has been affected by cause and effect.

How accurate are we humans at interpreting dog’s signals?  As it turns out not very good, this is shown over and over again by research ( O’Farrell, 1997; Schenkel, 1967…). We humans fall prey to giving our dogs human emotions and qualities such as defiance or stubbornness.  When we do this we take away from our canine friends by not appreciating who they really are; a species that excels in cooperation and faithfulness to humans. We must be keen observers of dogs and we can only do this by studying their communication style. This involves body language, facial expressions and vocal exchanges (Handbook of Applied Dog Behavior and Training, Volume One, Steven Lindsay).  Luckily there are many resources for us to tap into to better understand our dogs. Turid Rugaas changed the way I looked at dogs. I had read her book Calming Signals but it wasn't until I went to spend the weekend with her in Sequim WA [I sat next to her at dinner] at a seminar presented by Terry Ryan that I came home changed and more keenly aware of the importance of dogs and what their behavior means in regards to communication. The PBS series NOVA’s program Dogs Decoded is also very informative about the evolution of dogs.

So when your commands are not obeyed by your dog take a step back and look at the situation, observe your dog’s body language and appreciate how difficult it can be send and receive honest communications.

Threshold

I am a member of the Yahoo group Clicker Solutions and there was a recent post about a reactive dog. In one of the responses there was a link to a blog written by Patricia McConnell PhD,  http://www.patriciamcconnell.com/theotherendoftheleash/tag/constructional-aggression-treatment

Over threshold

So I went to the blog and found it very informative, it is always good to review the language of behavior modification. A term that comes up often in dog training today is threshold, your dog is either above, below or at threshold. But what exactly does that term mean. According to James O’Heare in The Canine Aggression Workbook, “The stress threshold is the upper limit point at which stress surpasses the dog’s stress tolerance.”  It goes onto say that each dog has different limits and that it is thought by some researchers to be an inherited trait with some individuals calmer at birth than others. The other side of that coin is the dogs that are guided by their fight or flight reflex which can inhibit previous learned impulse control, as O’Heare states, “it suspends rationality.”

Under threshold

Further research lead me to Handbook of Applied Dog behavior and Training Volume Two by Steven Lindsay, it seems that although threshold levels are inherited, threshold levels are also influenced by events. Traumatic or influencing events, also referred to as setting events, trigger the over threshold response that establishes a fight, flight or freeze reaction resulting in a predisposition to that reaction to similar events later on. This predisposition to over react can be varied however through training and behavior modification. If you looked at the above mentioned blog you will get a quick review of some of the options available to dog caretakers whose companions over react.

At threshold, seems like Buddy could go over threshold
in regards to his new toy.

That makes sense and I’m sure you have experienced your own dog going over threshold and not able to respond to you rather only able to respond to the event such as a rabbit, another dog or a person. My home is relatively peaceful and so my new dog Buddy is below threshold while we are here together but once the UPS truck pulls up all bets are off. Even though he is over threshold and does not respond to his name I do not feel threatened by him. But that is not true at toenail trimming time, put the trimmer to his toenail, and he will try to bite. He is five years old [I have had him for six weeks] and over the years his fear of toenail trimming has spiraled, he is quick to react with significant anger until the trimming has stopped. I’ll be working to desensitize his feelings about nail trimming to help reduce his stress threshold and manage his black nails.

Buddy is also a reactive barker, he is after all part dachshund. I am following the advice of Leslie McDevitt in the book Control Unleashed doing mat work with him, playing Whiplash Turn Around and practicing Leave it to name a few of the activities we are working on in our home and around the yard. This practice will help Buddy make more rational decisions when stressed and choose to react more calmly. Plus the fact he is adorable!  

Say "Cheese!"

SAY 'CHEESE!'

Taking pictures of your pets is a challenge! Dogs find the camera pointing right at them upsetting. This ‘line-up’ of our family’s dogs is the same proud group pictured in an earlier blog. The dogs look like they are in a line-up of some sort, not the same sharp group you see when the photo was taken outdoors. Location, location, location.

This was the first picture I saw of Buddy...
no wonder I fell in love!

As it turns out there is more to it than that. One thing that makes picture taking easier today than 20 years ago, when the pictures of my dogs were taken, is digital cameras.  Now a days you can take many, many pictures and delete the ones that don’t work out.  So that is one tip, take a lot of pictures. I interviewed our local animal shelter’s photographer, Mary Jo Adams, for picture taking tips. She takes all the wonderful pictures for the WAIF website, http://www.waifanimals.org/adopt/dogs/dog-search-results/page/2/  and WAIF's Facebook page. If you copy the link it will open to the page that has my new dog on it, he was Sonny while at the shelter, but I call him Buddy. Those pictures of him are just a few of the examples of her excellent dog and cat photographing skills. How does she make 35 black cats all look like individuals? So I asked Mary Jo how she does it.

This is WAIF resident Kyla...
what a great picture!
She's looking right at you isn't she?

First she advised the aforementioned taking lots of pictures. Secondly be patient, it is a waiting game. Third, get down to the level of your pet. Closer is better, although you can always crop if necessary.  Mary Jo made it sound easy. So I am planning a taking a very adorable picture of Buddy to post in this blog and also send into the WAIF Happy Endings page.  Well wouldn’t you know my battery needs to be charged.  So you will have to wait for the happy ending picture of myself and Buddy. Great that will give me some time to take my own advice given below.

 My tips for successful pictures is do some practice. Get your camera out and have the camera in one hand and a few treats in the other. When your dog looks at the camera in your hand, reward! As you play this game move the camera closer to your face and rewarding your dog anytime he or she looks at the camera. Continue this until the camera is in front of your face. Make the training session short and fun, end with your dog wanting to look at the camera some more.  Now your dog is ready for a picture! Keep the picture taking session or moment of snapshot relaxed and lighthearted.

I took one of these pictures of Honey and the other was taken by Mary Jo. No need to say any more is there? I'll keep practicing.

Do you have any funny pet picture taking experiences you would like to share? Post a picture and tell the story!

Perfect Play

Perfect Play

The players: Mellie and Honey

I once read that play is defined as when both/all parties involved have equal interactions. In dog play it is one dog chases for awhile, and then the other dog is the chaser for a bit. While wrestling one dog is on the bottom for a while then the other takes a turn. Honey is a one year old mixed breed from WAIF Animal shelter here on Whidbey Island and is a service dog in training that has been living with me for 4 months and Mellie is a 6 month old Golden Retriever staying with me for a week while her dad is on vacation. These two young dogs have a compatible play style that has a lot of give and take.

Relaxed equal play. Look at the c-curve on both dogs and
Mellie offering an off-balance posture by lifting her paw.

Honey is more agile than Mellie due to her age and body type so they started out with Honey running in front with a toy in her mouth. Mellie ran after her, Honey then slowed down and played some tug with the stick or other toy. Mellie ended up with the stick and then ran out in front of Honey. When Mellie stopped they both mouthed the stick and then Honey took a turn at racing around the house.

You can see below that the stick is forgotten as they roll in the
 grass some. Honey is about to do some time on her back.
Note the c-curved bodies again from both dogs.

 Watching dogs play gives us the opportunity to practice our canine observation skills. Dogs are much better at reading us than we are at understanding them. Are tails up and tight or relaxed and low? Are the dogs approaching head-on or curving? You might notice that dogs' bodies are often shaped in a c-curve when meeting or playing with other dogs.  You can see the c-curve in these pictures of Honey and Mellie romping, a sign that all is well.

Honey is tired of sharing the stick, her tight and curly tail,
c-curve gone as well as the look in her eye gives the clue to
Mellie to take a break.

To find out more about these subtle signals that dogs use in communication. Check out the web site of Turid Rugaas:
http://www.canis.no/rugaas/onearticle.php?artid=1
Turid is an internationally respected trainer and became best known for her description of the 'calming signals' dogs use to communicate with each other. Once we humans begin to learn the language of dogs we can enjoy our companions all the more!

Taking a break for a drink with a friend.
Great way to end a perfect play session with a friend.