Joined
·
1,273 Posts
The Tricks of the Month for April will be to teach your dog to bark on command and to close an open door.
The "beginner" trick will be speak. The idea is pretty simple - teach your dog to bark or whine on command. One way to teach this would be to capture the behaviour - get your dog excited to the point of vocalization, and every time the dog barks, give it a treat! While you don't want to create bad habits, it has also been shown that a good way to break a dog of barking at inappropriate times is to put the barking on cue. If you teach the dog to bark on command, you can also teach it to stop barking.
Here is a youtube video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=It4XiBagzps
The "advanced" trick will be to teach your dog how to close an open door. First, your dog will need to learn how to target an object with its paw or nose, whichever comes easier for your dog. Encourage your dog to target your hand, and then place a post-it note in your palm and have the dog target that. Slowly transition the post-it note to a light, easy to move door such as a cupboard or closet, and encourage the dog for each movement.
I tried to find youtube videos for this, but they were all really poorly done.
As with the previous months, questions, videos, comments, and alternate methods of accomplishing the tricks are encouraged! Have fun with it, and it doesn't matter if you end up with a well-polished trick at the end of the month or not! As long as you and your dog are having fun, that's all that matters!
The "beginner" trick will be speak. The idea is pretty simple - teach your dog to bark or whine on command. One way to teach this would be to capture the behaviour - get your dog excited to the point of vocalization, and every time the dog barks, give it a treat! While you don't want to create bad habits, it has also been shown that a good way to break a dog of barking at inappropriate times is to put the barking on cue. If you teach the dog to bark on command, you can also teach it to stop barking.
Here is a youtube video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=It4XiBagzps
The "advanced" trick will be to teach your dog how to close an open door. First, your dog will need to learn how to target an object with its paw or nose, whichever comes easier for your dog. Encourage your dog to target your hand, and then place a post-it note in your palm and have the dog target that. Slowly transition the post-it note to a light, easy to move door such as a cupboard or closet, and encourage the dog for each movement.
I tried to find youtube videos for this, but they were all really poorly done.
As with the previous months, questions, videos, comments, and alternate methods of accomplishing the tricks are encouraged! Have fun with it, and it doesn't matter if you end up with a well-polished trick at the end of the month or not! As long as you and your dog are having fun, that's all that matters!
