training Tripawed "take and hold" challenge

[zoogal]

Just had to share this funny moment while I am training Tripawed for the challenge. Also thought it might help someone else that was getting stuck. First we had the problem of him just wanting to rub the object and not grab it....probably most dogs won't have that problem lol to solve that one I started clicking when he did a more open mouth rub until he was opening his mouth fairly big with each rub. My next problem was when he would finally bite the object it was at the edge so I had to back up and start clicking for his nose to touch the middle of the pen (could have saved some time if I had done that first) although he wasn't giving me much at the beg so I just went with what I could get. THen he started biting it but not grabbing it..the bites were quick and I found it very hard with timing when his mouth is closed as he just did it too fast so we couldn't progress.

Well today after a couple sessions of no improvement and him getting annoyed at me I decided to try something different by showing him what I wanted myself....so I leaned down to my hand and grabbed the pen myself very slowly and deliberately with exaggerated mouth opening, held it, then put it down. I did it two times and then what do you know?!?!?!?!? He GRABBED it!!!!!!!! He spit it on the ground immediately but this was the first time he actually grabbed it!!!!! I was so happy!!!!! So if anyone else is stuck, maybe you need to be silly for a bit and do it yourself lol.

 

[snooks]

Smart dog..smart you. Not all dogs are able to generalize that way, I'm impressed. :dogsmile: Hey you only need one thing that works for it to be a success right? Good job.