Counter-conditioning with touchy paws?

[Erica]

So my old dog, Onyx, is very touchy about his paws - that is, he doesn't want you touching them. I've seen some counter-conditioning videos, and I like the concept behind it. I want to make sure I've got it down in theory before I start actually trying it, though. His reaction is to try to pull away, and if you keep on grabbing, eventually growl - which we haven't ever discouraged him from doing. I'd rather a growling dog than a biting one! So he's not too bad about it, but he definitely doesn't enjoy it.

What I think I should do is gently take his paw, give him a treat, then release his paw - right? Or is it take/release/treat? All of this would be while he is lying down.

The reason I want to do this is mainly because he needs his nails clipped badly, and this is step one. Thanks for any help!

[emmabeth]

I would do this with clicker training as you need to be quite precise about what it is you are rewarding with some dogs.

First of all condition ot the clicker if you havent already done that and I think I would also do a few easy peasy t hings such as clicking for a sit or a down or some other behaviour he does a lot/finds easy just so he gets the idea that clicker really really IS fun.

Thhhheeeeeeen, what will he let you do - start there. So if you can touch a paw, just touch it with your finger briefly, start with that - touch, click WHILST you touch, reward (doesnt matter what happens after the click but because he is sensitive about his feet I would obviously remove the finger!)

Just remember that the clicker is almost like a camera, you are taking a photo with it of the exact behaviour you wanted - so if thats touch the paw, take a pic of touch the paw. If you want 'touch the paw for two seconds' then dont take the pic until you touched the paw for two seconds.

[Erica]

Alright, thanks for the advice! Luckily Onyx is very intelligent...he learned the normal sit/down/stay/speak/shake just by mimicing our old dog, and housetrained himself in about 12 hours. I'll start clicker-training him, then.