After owning and training one overgreedy terv with food, I'd never do that again. I want the dog to work for me, not for food or toy. Luckily I had an expert to advice me how to do it and now also Nelli works for me, not for a pack of kibble.
Nice pup!
J
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Coffee and love are something you just can't warm up again.
NICE JOB!? I believe I saw her not too long ago on your site as a young pup!? Very nice pup!? Keep up the good work.? This is all a part of reaching for higher levels of competition.?
Keep doing what you're doing!? It looks like you are imprinting her for IPO...in that case...you are on the right track!? And her desire and motivation should tell you this!? You both make a very 'nice picture'!
B
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"Desire is the key to motivation, but it's the determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal - a commitment to excellence - that will enable you to attain the success you seek."
I am interested to know how one gets a dog to work for them, not using a motivator like food or a toy. This seems to be the great hurdle of training. getting a dog to do something for a reward to getting them to do it because they must. while preserving the dogs drive and spirit. I have always been under the impression drive for food and toys to a good thing. the more the better.
I am not good explaining it, but I try. Dog is in a leash and I move giving the dog feedback every time it takes the contact to me. If it starts to go somewhere without paying attention to me, I make a quick turn and dog kinda makes the correction by itself. On the moment it turns to me I praise it. I've now managed to do it to 3 tervs, 2 working mals, sheltie, 2 rottweilers, beauceron and one god darn stubborn adult giant schnauzer male. It is kind of a giving the dog a chance to choose. Also I play a lot with dogs, touch them, but all of that outside the rehearsal. My own dog, Nelli, was the hardest piece of cake. Dog so used to food, that eventhought I was sure she was working for me, all went, when food went. Opposite to showtervs usual are, she doesn't have that big will to please me. Also because of various reasons she grew up pretty independent and bitchy. We had a huge gap in our relationship. I had to start with very small steps to make myself interesting again. Now our whole relationship is like new, she trusts me, is fast in movements, has a good contact and attitude, and she is also working for me now. And even more important, now we are team, not anymore dog and handler, but team, working together and being happy about that. And I used no prong, no e-collar, not even choke, just her normal collar. The same is with other breeds mentioned above. Understanding my pile of mistakes was the hardest part. After that and forgiving myself, it started to work. I've seen Theo teach 6 mts old terv to heel with perfect contact in 3 minutes with my own eyes, so I know it is possible. Yesterday it took him 15 minutes to make extremely scared and shy young gsd to trust him and start working for him. Every time I see it, makes me amazed. But I know it is possible, and the fact that I myself as the highest reward, am always there for my dog.
And undersdtanding that now, that was basically the same with Nelli's sire. He worked for me only. In obedience he didn't ate at all and overheated with toys. Only praise was enough. And I am pretty satisfied with our obediencelevel, also at work, where it was really needed.
J
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Coffee and love are something you just can't warm up again.
Yes, the old Koehler Method. I thought something was familiar. Food works well, you need to wean them off of it by start ing to randomly treat correct behavior getting farther and farther apart.
Yes I thought so too Jeff...Thankfully we've evolved from the K method....and the 'key' is in the transition between motivators and none....
B
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"Desire is the key to motivation, but it's the determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal - a commitment to excellence - that will enable you to attain the success you seek."
Sometimes old tricks seem to be better than a bag of new ? And I am always happy to evolve out of things between me and my dog.
Food works well also, but when your dog is so greedy, that on the track rewarding it eats the food, the grass underneath and half a litre soil at the same time, it works a bit too well... ? And a toy makes dog look like ? ? There is not much choice... With the other dogs the problems were pretty much the same, and this seems to make permanent cure. Well with that riesen the problem was utmost disrespect, and that was restored at the same time, so...
Hmmm... Koehler, I've heard, but never read. Someone said that is the hard way-method. With Silky I saw not a one single hard move, so what method is that then? Well, never mind what method is called, as long as it works.
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Coffee and love are something you just can't warm up again.
Oh, now I've read about Koehler-method. I can assure you that this has nothing to do with it. Yesterdays GSD or 6 mts old soft Silky-terv would have never survived it, so maybe that Koehler stuff could be put aside in here?
J
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Coffee and love are something you just can't warm up again.
This could make for a very good discussion!? I am NOT judging YOU!? Not at all... OK?
But it would be interesting to see the different 'angles' that people on this forum are coming from...
Dogs IMO are 'opportunistic' animals....NO?
Having said this... ______________________________________________________________
What makes you think that your dog is working FOR YOU?
Is he/she working because they WANT/DESIRE to; or because they HAVE TO (ie., avoidance of negative consequences)?
What makes you think that the Terv that you had, which was CRAZY about food and NUTS about the toy...didn't succeed because perhaps the motivator wasn't being used correctly for him/her?
Just out of curiosity...when a sheepherder leaves his dog on the field to protect OR to herd/keep/drive his sheep all day (obviously without any motivators such as food or toys)...Do you think the dog is doing this for the owner?
B
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"Desire is the key to motivation, but it's the determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal - a commitment to excellence - that will enable you to attain the success you seek."
With Nelli I made so many mistakes, that it disgusts me even now. So she is not the best example in this one. Except that with the method of rewarding her attention with my attention cured my mistakes and my relationship with her, there was nothing in between anymore.
Hmmm... I am not the best one describe this...
But for instance that one GSD day before yesterday. Owner brought it at our training, because she wondered if the dog was scared, shy, holding back or aggressive, and what to do with it. 4-year old male GSD din't allow any stranger come near to him. Girl rewarded the dog with play and dog seemed to like it. But any approach from others, dog growled and stepped back, not like scared as yesterdays youngster, but like "thanks, but no thanks" We heard that he had always managed to chase people away with that behaviour. Ok. T asked girl let the leash go. Dog was still playing with the tug. T called the dog. Dog was like T just walked away, called the dog again. Dog took few steps to Theo, and T just said calmly "Good boy, come on now" Dog was really curious and started to follow T in a distance. Dog tried to drop the tug and barked to T like asking T to take it. T ignored it and said to the dog "sit" Dog was and sat. T started to walk again, called the dog and dog came with the toy, dropped it and demended T to take it. T ignored, walked further and called the dog. Now dog tried to take the tug. T said "no". Dog was , left the tug, made a glimpse at the owner, who was and followed T. T said "here". Dog went slowly closer and sat in front of him. T praised the dog again, and now dog was really curious. After few minutes dog started to heel T, with contact and obeying. Without leash. Without toy-which was just lying there on the snow. Without any corrections, over the toy, passing the owner without even looking at her. And made "here" thru the wall of people to T, straight in front.
At this point owner was gasping, almost crying and said that dog doesn't even go away from the yard with her husband, if she is on the yard...
After that training we could walk to that dog him sitting there calmly by the owner.
In my opinion, with right relationship, and communication with your dog, the dog desires something to do with you and only you.
Because I don't know too much about herding, just seen it couple of times, my answer is just guessing. The real work happens so that dog gets reward from its job. But in teaching, I've understood, they use another dog, older, experienced one. In herding the dog basically works always with the owner, but protecting dogs (like caucasian) is (what I've understood) raised amongst the sheep. But their motivation to do it - I have no idea and at least no real experience but to wonder their work.
J
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Coffee and love are something you just can't warm up again.
I will be the first to say that we have progressed past Koehler, but the man could train a dog. He had about 5000 dogs under his belt in an era where dog training amongst the public was almost exclusively show people. He also trained dogs for the movies, Swiss family robinson, big red, It's a dogs life. He also trained dogs for the military in ww2.
I used his methods for training dogs for many years. They work quite well, and the exersize you were describing is something right out of his book. I still use it for "pet" dog training when the dog is completely out of hand. You can do far worse than to study Koehler.
The method initially described by Jenni is what I teach to people in obedience when I am teaching beginners (which I don't do often anymore). I personally don't reward my dog by giving him food and occasionally reward him with a toy. But most of the time I praise him because I don't want to overdo it on the toys because I want him to work for me and not for something I have in my pocket.
Currently I teach competition obedience and I regret to say that nowadays people use too much food to train their dogs. I think half of my class of beginners cannot do heel excersises (not even on a lead) with their dog without using food (which is not allowed during competition). If you take the food away it is horrible. Even more of my beginners have attention problems. Rather than having to train them purely on competition obedience I have to start all over again in retraining their dogs and since we always train in groups of 8 to 10 at the time (also in the lower groups) that is not easy.
Saskia
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He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
I know we all have our ways to rome. I do you use food and toys. but i am very interested in the koehler method. I think one part of my psychology is that i find i way i like, makes me feel intellgent and then i take the additude everyone else is wrong. I have found this to be my biggest hurdle in training. so, Finding out about this koehler method is just another way for me to research more in depth about dogs. maybe giving me one more communication route with the dog. slowly i am evolving the "gunny method". as i am sure we have the "ohlsen method" saskia method" and yada yada. these are all great but what do the people who really are going places with dogs....what are they doing? ivan, bert aerts...so on. what are these trainers doing that is bringing the dog home to a world title. I have seen some video of both of the above trainers training. and I am blown away. I would say i am being taught by some people that have put an emmence amount of energy into thinking, researching, training, and experimenting with thier dogs. I am talking complex strategies, to simple but effective, sleepless nights, long days of work trying to train a dog worthy of standing on a podium at the big show. and still the dogs are well trained but thier not going to the worlds.
Author
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And I am always happy to evolve out of things between me and my dog.
? ?
There is not much choice... With the other dogs the problems were pretty much the same, and this seems to make permanent cure. Well with that riesen the problem was utmost disrespect, and that was restored at the same time, so... 
and followed T. T said "here". Dog went slowly closer and sat in front of him. T praised the dog again, and now dog was really curious. After few minutes dog started to heel T, with contact and obeying. Without leash. Without toy-which was just lying there on the snow. Without any corrections, over the toy, passing the owner without even looking at her. And made "here" thru the wall of people to T, straight in front.
