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Beyond Fetch: Games To Play With Your Dog

A game is a great way to exercise your dog’s body and mind, and spend a little quality time together. What’s in your repertoire? Here’s a selection of games you can play indoors or outside: Homegrown agility. If your house is big enough, create a makeshift obstacle course for your dog from rolled-up towels, cardboard boxes, blankets hung between chairs, etc. Or, if the weather is good and you have a yard, build your course outside. Hide-and-seek. Grab a handful of yummy treats or your dog’s favorite toy. Ask your dog to sit and stay, then you go hide in another room. Call your dog and when he finds you, reward him with a treat or a play session with his toy. Repeat until you have had enough—your dog likely won’t get bored anytime soon.  The name game. Get two of your dog’s favorite toys and remove all other toys

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Jen Chapman March 3, 2015 No Comments

Treibball

Pronounced “try ball,” this fun new dog sport was born in Germany in the mid-2000s when a Dutch hunting and herding dog trainer, Jan Nijboer, wondered if he could teach high-energy dogs to play soccer. The game boils down to getting your dog (or a team of dogs) to push large exercise balls across a field into a goal. While herding-type dogs and dogs who love chase games are natural Treibball contenders, dogs of any age and breed can take part. As with all dog sports, some foundational skills are important. For Treibball, it’s an advantage if your dog knows sit, down, left, right, and object targeting. Playing the game is simple. Arrange eight exercise balls (some play with fewer) in a triangle in the center of your field and set up kid-sized soccer goals or mark the goal zone with orange traffic cones. The dogs—with handlers using commands like

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Jen Chapman November 28, 2014 No Comments

Canine Evolution, How It Effects Your Dogs Behavior – Part 2

I feel many times we take for granted that our 4 legged friends are animals that have been domesticated and integrated into our lives over the past 130,000 years.  (Evolution of the Dog, 2001)  We take for granted that these once wild animals are now cuddling in our laps or assisting us in our daily lives.  We at times, get upset when our cuddly friend exhibits behaviors such as nipping or barking even though that is what they are hardwired to do, it’s instinct. When taking a look at the evolution of dogs Darwin speculated that the reason we have such diversity among dogs was due to breeding amongst a variety of wild dogs.  Through DNA testing it was found that Darwinwas wrong.  Dogs, are direct descendants of the gray wolf.   The reason we have such a diverse population of dogs, is due to intense and purposeful interbreeding. The key

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Jen Chapman November 7, 2013 No Comments

Canine Evolution, Recommended Reading

Dogs A New Understanding Of Canine Origin, Behavior, and Evolution By Raymond and Lorna Coppinger Domestic Dog, It’s Evolution, Behavior,  and Interactions With People by James Serpell Evolution of Canine Social Behavior, 2nd Edition by Roger Abrantes Dog Behavior, Evolution and Cognition by Adam Miklosi Wolves- Behavior, Ecology, and Conservation by L. David Mech & Luigi Boitani, Editors

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Jen Chapman November 7, 2013 No Comments

Put Your Toys Away

Put Your Toys Away Criteria– Your dog fetches their toys and puts them away. Verbal Que- ‘Put your toys away’ Visual Que- Point to their toy Steps  Teach your dog to fetch Stand behind their toy box or the desired object you want them to learn to put their toys in. Toss the toy for your dog, as they are coming back with their toy say ‘put your toy away’. When your dog comes to you trade them a treat for dropping the toy in the toy box Repeat above steps 10 times.  When your dog succeeds with the above steps 10 times in a row move to step 6. Place a toy 2 feet away from the toy box.  Stand behind the toy box. Point to the toy and say ‘put your toy away’.  Reward your dog for putting the toy in the toy box. Repeat step 7, slowly

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Jen Chapman September 2, 2013 No Comments

‘Look’

Attention  Purpose– teaching this exercise will train your dog that it is more reinforcing to pay attention to you than the distractions around him. Criteria– your dog should look at you. Visual Que– Point to your eyes.  Verbal Que– ‘Look’ Important to remember Your dog is familiar with his own environment.  There are fewer distractions at home as compared to a park.  Begin all training where there are minimum distractions.  As your dog becomes more reliable with certain behaviors, gradually work your way to a more distracting environment.  DO NOT expect your dog to respond to you as well as they would at home in this new environment. Behavior Pyramid Start in an area with no distractions Take a treat slowly wave it in front of your dogs nose and with your dog watching bring it to your eyes. Say ‘Look’ then ‘ok’ then give your dog the treat. The

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Jen Chapman July 6, 2013 No Comments

Games to play to STOP problem behaviors

Dogs and humans that play together stay together.  Believe it or not, “play” can actually be considered a trainable behavior with dogs. Teaching your fuzzy friend to play with you can help build your relationship, increase trainability, provide mental stimulation and exercise (for both of you), and help to eliminate behavior problems. My training philosophy is to ‘have fun and be consistent’.  I like to stress to my students, if you are not having fun your dog will know, and your training sessions will not be as effective. How many of you can tell if someone close to you is frustrated or upset just by their body language?  How does it make you feel when you walk into a room and you see someone with ridged body movements or sighing?  When I see someone exhibiting frustration or anger my body tenses up, I hold my breath for longer periods of

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Jen Chapman November 24, 2010 No Comments
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