MULTI-DOG TRAINING
by Deborah Jones, Ph.D.
Whenever I give clicker training seminars, the
question of whether it is possible to train multiple dogs at the
same time always comes up. At first I was surprised by this question.
Now I expect it. People seem very curious as to whether clicker
techniques will allow them to train multiple dogs in the same
session. I guess this would be a product of our multi-tasking
mindset. Doing a single thing at a time is seemingly not enough
for people these days. But in dog training, concentration on a
single thing is essential. Therefore, my short answer to this
question is “No”.
In my mind, you can only train one dog at a
time and you need to concentrate totally on that specific animal.
When using a clicker as a behavioral marker it would be very confusing
for the dog to determine if the click was for him or for another
dog. Imagine this scenario, you are training your three dogs to
pay attention to you. When you click, Dog A is staring at you
adoringly, Dog B is sniffing the floor, and Dog C is cleaning
himself. All three dogs may think that the click is for them,
and all three may increase the behavior they were performing when
they heard the click. This is definitely not an effective way
to train.
However, in thinking about it I realized that
I do often train all three (now four!) dogs in a single session.
In these sessions I may concentrate on the working dog while the
others are holding sit or down stays a short distance away. When
the working dog gets clicked and treated for a behavior the dogs
doing stays also get a treat (as long as they’re holding
their stays). Then I can switch working dogs and staying dogs.
If one of the dogs breaks the stay the dog that is performing
correctly gets a treat and the ‘offender’ is simply
asked to stay again. Missing out on the treat is a serious enough
consequence for my ravenous retrievers (and the greedy little
Papillons too)!
When working on attention with all the dogs
I look at the dog I’m reinforcing, give a verbal marker,
and give that dog a treat. I think this makes it clear that the
specific dog is the one I’m working with at that moment.
As long as each dog maintains attention they get their turn at
reinforcement. If they look away, ‘oops!’ no treat.
Sometimes I’ll simply wait until one gets distracted and
looks away, then reinforce the others who are still paying attention.
This really seems to make the one who looked away more convinced
than ever that focusing on me is important.
When working on stays for competition obedience
we will have the person playing judge walk down the line of staying
dogs and quickly pop a small soft treat into the mouth of each
dog holding a stay. We teach the dogs to take a treat while remaining
still first. A dog that moves or changes position gets passed
by. This has been an incredibly effect, non-punitive technique
for teaching strong, reliable stays.
I will often give a verbal cue to all my dogs
for a behavior they know well such as sit or down. The first one
to take the position gets a verbal marker and the treat. The others
are told they are good dogs for responding, but they didn’t
win the reinforcement that time. This can really help build speedy
responses! Even the 5-month-old puppy has figured this game out
and, being so quick and low to the ground, often wins the fastest
down contest.
When my dogs are out in the back yard and I
call them to come in the first one inside gets the treat. Again,
the others are told they are good dogs, but didn’t win the
prize that time. My old Lab figured out that to win she needed
to stay on the patio and wait for me to call. She had several
housetraining accidents before I figured out that she wasn’t
doing her business because she was hovering by the door waiting
to get called back inside!
One of my favorite multi-dog behaviors is the
‘synchronized spin’. The three older dogs all know
how to spin both left and right, with different verbal cues for
each direction. A spin to the left is ‘spin’ (really
creative, huh?) and a spin to the right is ‘zoom’.
When I give the verbal cue the dogs that respond and spin in the
correct direction get reinforced. The one who went the wrong way,
or did something else altogether, or didn’t respond at all,
is ignored. After a few repetitions, they get really good at responding
at the same time and remind me a bit of the dolphins at Sea World.
My kids are highly amused by this trick!
I learned a really cool idea for dogs that beg
while you eat from my friend, Ken McCort (a therapy dog trainer).
Ignore the dogs that are closest to you while you are eating and
toss bits of your food, or treats, to the dog that is the furthest
away. In my household, only Copper (Papillon) was able to figure
this out. He will sit across the room whenever I eat. It might
be that the retrievers understand the requirement, but can’t
quite bring themselves to move away from the food source. That
seems to go against their basic nature.
My favorite multi-dog game is ‘find it!’
This game is actually a precursor to scent discrimination as well
as just plain fun for everyone involved. I take a Kong toy, put
a treat inside, scent it with my hands, let each dog sniff it,
then ask the dogs to sit and stay while I go hide the toy. When
I return I release them to “go find it!” They race
around the house, air scenting, trying desperately to be the first
to find the toy and get the goodie (don’t do this with food
or toy possessive dogs!) At first I hide the toy in plain sight,
then just around a corner, increasing difficulty as they get the
idea. As they start to understand the concept I make it harder
and harder to find the toy. Some good hiding places include the
bathtub, under your pillow, and on a dining room chair. Also,
once they get the concept I stop putting a treat in the Kong and
simply scent it with my hands. This is a great activity for a
rainy or snowy day when everyone needs some exercise.
So, even though I tell people that you
can’t clicker train more than one dog at a time, that doesn’t
mean that you can’t do lots of training activities that
involve multiple dogs. One of the side effects of clicker training
is that the dogs all want to be involved. Bring out the clicker
and they all compete for attention. Not a bad side effect for
a training method to have! However, most multi-dog activities
involve individual training first, then working with the group.
Most dogs don’t care what you do with them as long as you
do something fun! Be creative and invent with your own multi-dog
games and activities.
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