Positively | Victoria Stilwell | Forum

I am a member of a fairly new rescue, training, and education group called the Dog Saving Network. We have recently begun training for the second run of Life's Ruff, our positive reinforcement-based educational stage show, and we could use all the help we can get. Our main fundraising tool at the mo...

When the weather is nice I'll hang food-filled items (treat balls, ladles, cups, etc.) from the tree in our backyard, just above dog head-height. That way the pups have to figure out how to manipulate the object, as well as how to keep it from swinging away from them. I'm also trying lengths of clea...

I use a short blast on a dog whistle instead of a clicker, as I like to keep my hands free, and I've found that my timing is more precise with the whistle. Once my dogs know a behavior, I'll also use a vocal "good!" I have started training my mutt with a clicker, with the eventual goal of ...

You could use a hand signal as a bridge. I know many animal trainers that use a crisp, enthusiastic point at the animal, but any gesture that your dog can easily discriminate would work. For close-up behaviors you could also use a tactile, such as a double tap on his hip, shoulder, or paw.

Since most of my training knowledge came from wild animal trainers and keepers, I'm always interested in hearing how pet owners train their critters. How often do you work your dog/s in a formal training session? How long do your sessions usually last? If you have multiple dogs, do you work them tog...

You dog may have related the wrong behaviour to what you wanted him to do because you were slow with the clicker, but it didn't do any harm unlike other training methods. It did mean that you had to trainer again for what you wanted but to your dog, that means even more of mummy's attention. :lol: ...

it won't do any harm even if your timing is wrong and most dogs enjoy this. I've found that in some situations, poor timing can confuse and frustrate both dog and trainer, especially if the dog is easily discouraged. While training my husky to target, I accidentally bridged her as she was pulling a...

I'm Joanna, I live in a suburb of Chicago, Illinois, and I'm currently working towards my B.S. in biology. I have had and loved dogs all my life, but my first real entry into the world of training came when I developed an interest in marine mammals. Most of what I know about training and animal beha...

Wow, I would love to see any true behaviorist, VS, KP, Ian Dunbar, Jean Donaldson, Ken Ramirez, any of these people or dozens of others, do a show detailing the fallacies of dominance based training. It's not a TV show, but Ken Ramirez and the marine mammal department at the Shedd Aquarium in Chica...