Force free training - Otis the service dog in training

[Boxergirl]

I thought some of you would enjoy this, having seen Otis as an 8 week old pup. This is one of the videos from my daughter's page for training her service dog. There are so many people that don't think that you can train without using force. Otis is trained with force free methods. You can see that he's super excited to work and his focus on her is phenomenal. I think he's doing great for having just turned one in December and being a boxer, lol. Their brains don't get delivered until they're about three. I also wanted to say that this kind of training works for ALL dogs, regardless of breed. It works for everything, actually. They've trained bees using R+, which is pretty darn amazing to me.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=319863105173823

 

[Nik]

This is awesome! Thank you for sharing. I wish I wasn't so terrible with the clicker. I never could get the knack or timing right on my end. My dogs are totally capable of learning with it... The same can not be said of myself. But, the verbal cues (yes) seems to work well for us. Also yes very impressive that he is doing so well at just one year.

 

[DennasMom]

Great video!! Very smart puppy!

Denna and I had a BLAST training with the clicker - and we'd mix it up between using the 'clicker' or just a cue word, either 'good' or 'yes'... anything that was followed with a tasty treat kept Denna thinking.
I found the clicker method of training also made ME think more about how to really communicate what I wanted to the dog... in a way the dog could understand. No more "do it because I said so" or physical hands-on putting dog in the position you want... you have to manipulate/lure the dog into doing what you want WITHOUT touching them. I found some things a very fun challenge to teach.

 

[CeeCee]

Great video!! Very smart puppy!

Denna and I had a BLAST training with the clicker - and we'd mix it up between using the 'clicker' or just a cue word, either 'good' or 'yes'... anything that was followed with a tasty treat kept Denna thinking.
I found the clicker method of training also made ME think more about how to really communicate what I wanted to the dog... in a way the dog could understand. No more "do it because I said so" or physical hands-on putting dog in the position you want... you have to manipulate/lure the dog into doing what you want WITHOUT touching them. I found some things a very fun challenge to teach.

Maybe this is what you're talking about, but have you every tried Shaping with Denna? It it so much fun and you and your pup are exhausted from all the problem solving.

For those that might not be familiar with Shaping, here's a break down on it by WDJ. https://www.whole-dog-journal.com/issues/9_3/features/Training-Your-Dog-Using-Shaping_15792-1.html