have been involved in puppy raising for almost sixteen years now and over those years I have been able to watch the evolution of dog training. When I first started raising, it was for Guide Dogs for the Blind, and only the “difficult” puppies were put on a food reward protocol. Now all their puppies are being raised with positive reinforcement. The last baby puppy we raised for them was in 2013, and their protocols were that food rewards were used for every puppy for only certain commands and then used for other things on an individual basis. I never really got help learning the ins and outs of positive reinforcement training. I had some idea from working with one of my first puppy raising leaders on the side, and from learning how to shape certain behaviors for our GDB puppies, but nothing formal. So when I took on Penny and Brigadoon’s protocol of positive reinforcement and clicker training, I knew it would be a learning experience.
My only experience working with clicker training a dog was teaching our career-changed dog Eli fun tricks like wave, roll over, high five, crawl, spin. He loved the clicker and learned things really fast with it. But even though I had successfully taught him with a clicker, I was still very much a novice at training Penny with it. I understood the basic concepts of how to do things, but I still had so much more to learn. That brings me to our latest adventure with Penny, when Matt and I attended the Karen Pryor Clicker Expo recently.
I knew that I needed more training with clicker, and unfortunately we are too far away from Brigadoon Service Dogs to get regular assistance in person from the trainers there. I knew about the Clicker Expo because some of my former puppy raising leaders have gone and Denise from Brigadoon had told us about it as well. I felt like Matt and I would really benefit and should go this year. I needed some more clarification and training and Matt really needed a better introduction to clicker training in general. Everything he knew about it was from me, and I probably wasn’t really ready to teach anyone on this subject. So off to the Expo we went, and boy, am I glad we did!
We decided to only go for two out of the three days of the expo. I knew from attending veterinary conferences that at these events a lot of information is given to you in a very short amount of time. I wanted to make sure we didn’t get information overload and we could retain what we learned. I also debated whether or not to bring Penny along with us—after all having a puppy with you can be very distracting and her needs always come first.
After going back and forth about bringing Penny, I decided that she should come. Just before she started her heat cycle last month, Penny started being fearful of people that she didn’t know very well and even people she does know. Even though that has gotten better since her cycle has finished, she is still wary and not comfortable with some people. The only time Penny has been away from us was back in September when she spent a couple of days at Brigadoon and since then she has grown very attached to me and more wary of people that she doesn’t know. I knew that I couldn’t just leave her with anyone, she needed to be with someone who would understand that she was still having some nervous tendencies and who would be able to handle her. Most of the people I was comfortable asking to watch her would be attending the expo as well. I still feel like this fearfulness is partially hormonal and hope it lessens as her hormone levels continue to change.
Bringing Penny along was actually helpful for her. This is the first time she has had multiple days with us, just one-on-one, without really having interactions with other dogs. Yes, there were a lot of other dogs at the expo, but she didn’t interact with them. She had a lot of firsts on this trip.
This was her first time staying in a large hotel where she couldn’t just walk out the door and have a convenient potty spot. Our room was at the end of a long hallway on the third floor, so she had to walk down the hallway, wait for an elevator, ride the elevator, walk through the lobby, and then out the door to the designated dog relieving spot set up by the hotel. It doesn’t sound like much, but when your body has been accustomed to just hold it in the morning for a short walk down the stairs and outside, it can be really hard to hold it that long.
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