I'm here with Kelsey and Juno. Juno you can see she's a little unsure. Uh,
she can be very fearful in new situations or around people.
She's about a year old, just over. Uh, she's a mixed breed.
You can let me know in the comments if you can guess what breeds she's a mix of.
We're gonna work with Juno today to show you how you can build your dog's
confidence in themselves,
but also their trust that you've got their back.
One of my mottoes is slow is fast.
We as people always wanna hit that end result quickly.
Now you've probably heard of human parkour,
but there's also a version of dog parkour.
Dogs interacting efficiently with the environment. In fact,
we've just kicked off a course,
which is really exciting and that's what we're gonna be doing today.
We're gonna have Juno start to interact with the environment,
but we're gonna take it slow. That means not rushing through to get
end behaviors, but it also means knowing when enough is enough.
And we're gonna read Juno's body language and energy level and any signs of
stress to know when enough is enough. So Juno will be calling those shots.
If she checks it out, we're gonna reward.
I might even just drop it in the box and then I might encourage her out.
She goes back to it again. Do you wanna try that Juno?
And then we're gonna see if she offers more,
cuz it's a little easier behavior than climbing on something.
So I'm just gonna stare at the box. Yes, good girl.
And I might even give her a couple. Oh yes, good girl.
And I'm not trying to lure her at all. Good girl.
And then once she leaves it and then looks again. Yes.
Good girl. Good work.
Yeah, good girl. Excellent. Good work.
I wanted to learn that it's inter Yes.
Interacting with that is what gives that treat.
Now I'm going to take a little more boring treat and throw it away.
Go get that one. See, does she come back again? Again, my body's, you know,
inviting this box. I'm trying to throw the same direction.
I'm just gonna stare at this. I could get in lower,
but I think that might intimidate Juno a little bit. But I, yeah, good.
So she looked, I'm gonna reward that
now for a lot of dogs too. In her home environment,
the throwing of the treat is gonna get the dogs a little more exuberant.
So they start to lose their inhibition a little bit. Yes.
So they often come back a little more energetic and before you,
they even know it. They're stepping into that box. Good work.
Find another boring one. Find another boring one to throw away. Yes.
Get that one.
Yes. So she says that's, that's good. Yes.
Good work. Good work. Excellent. Now I'm gonna throw away.
Now I could have thrown away there,
but she wasn't looking like she was gonna freak and back away herself.
That would've been a little bit of a loss. So I'm just gonna see,
does she offer that foot this time?
I'm just gonna stare at that box
again. I might bend just a little bit. Oh good. Girly. I'm just gonna see,
just check it out a little bit. So she's a little weary of Oh yes,
I'm gonna reward that one. Even though it's about the same as it was.
I just want, um, let me get that girly.
I just wanna reward that cuz she was a little timid there.
And I'm gonna switch around with Kelsey now when she's busy doing it.
It's interesting. Oh yes. When she's busy doing it,
she's not thinking about me. But when she stops that motion,
that's where that motion, that throwing away can help. Uh,
because it gets them a little more exuberant.
So you're gonna throw away the same spot I was. Good.
And then come back towards the box so that you're sort of inviting her back in
there. Yes. Good.
And then you're gonna throw another one away.
And then see this time before your reward,
if she throws a foot in there again and move a little closer to that box,
just move her outta that sit. Just say, okay, she's being obedient.
She's saying, oh, if I sit I might get a treat.
Yes. Good. Girly good.
And then throw one away again. And you can see her energy.
Now she's saying it's fun to get into that box. It's rewarding.
So what have we seen so far?
We've seen her confidence grow as we've moved the box she wasn't sure about at
the beginning. And now I'm seeing two things. One,
she's coming back with a bit of energy. Two, the,
the one time when there's distraction, she's walking in it. You know, again,
a nervous dog is so aware of what they're doing.
She's not worried about that box at all.
I'm not interested in getting my end result.
I'm interested in building those steps.
But we might just see we're gonna reward Juno in the box and then we're not
gonna throw away or reward again.
And I wanna see if Juno puts a third or fourth foot in that box. If she does,
Kelsey's gonna say yes and drop down a handful of treats and then keep your
treats down by her nose and see. Yes.
You can even kneel down and yes. So reward a whole handful in there.
And I'm gonna throw some chicken wiener in there. Oh good girl. Oh that one.
And it bounced out. So that's okay if she comes out, that's fine. Cause again,
there's no wait, there's no stay. There's this. Yes. What a good girl.
Good girl, good.
And then just hold your treats and see if she offers those last two feet. Again.
I'd be even happy with three feet. But she's offering all.
Oh lovely. Yes. Lots of, whoops. That one keeps he your head buddy.
Good girl. Excellent. And then you're gonna tell her,
okay and walk her outta there.
Now at one point in the video I talked to Kelsey about getting those treats out
fast. Cuz if the dog turns and we're reaching for treats,
they're not focused on that obstacle.
So it's important you have treats that you can get to very,
very quickly to help this process. If you'd like a bait pouch like this,
check out McCannDogs.store.
What's my next step with that object is I'm actually gonna teach her.
There's criteria. The reward's only gonna happen when you get four in there.
When I come out the next day, I'm going to work the same sort of thing.
Build up to that. But over time, that's gonna become the behavior.
Juno's more comfortable in this environment now cuz she's had a task to do.
She's feeling pretty confident. Now. Quick talk about the treats. Initially,
remember I'm sort of throwing away. If you've got a nervous dog,
you've likely seen them approach something and back away from it.
And the last thing I want my do dog to do is rehearse. Backing away from
anything because then they're rehearsing the fear behavior.
Same thing here I'm gonna throw away. So you know,
when people come up wanna give your dog a cookie,
they think that the dog's gonna realize, oh, these are good interactions.
But if the dog just keeps, uh, rehearsing, I'm afraid, woo,
I got that treat this time. But they're not rehearsing, being confident.
So I'm throwing away so that I don't get that back away.
So that I'm doing that initially.
Then we drop some in the box so we could build that confidence.
But in order to get the four feet in, I ask Kelsey just to hold the treats.
And yes. And now you can see Juno offered more.
So we've rewarded the behavior. It's almost like a pop machine.
We put our money in, we press the button, the pop comes out.
What do you do when that pop doesn't come out? Oh,
I'm willing to bet you press that button more times and I'm willing to bet you
press it harder. And that's exactly what Juno did.
When she didn't get the treats, she tried a little harder. So that last piece,
I'm just holding my treats, not rewarding, waiting to see.
Now if I see my dog starting to get nervous,
then I'm just gonna throw away and know that they're not ready to give more that
day. But Juno absolutely was. Again, I would've been thrilled with three feet.
She offered four, we rewarded all the progressions.
But ultimately I'll only be rewarding four feet in and my dog's gonna
understand. Getting four feet in an object is rewarding.
And as the challenge goes up, that's where my dog's confidence is gonna go up.
It did. Today as we get a taller box, uh,
something that's a little slippery, uh, something smaller,
the dog's gonna get more and more confident and their trust in us asking 'em to
do something goes way up. But notice us asking 'em to do something never had
us actually asking. Just rewarding.
So Juno definitely has value for being in something now. You know,
even the fact she was willing to curl up in there, and I bet in no time at all,
a couple of days, she'll wanna climb me in everything. If we do this process,
you know, a couple of times a day for just a few minutes,
being in something is gonna be fun.
Now we've seen a huge shift or transformation in Juno.
She was not comfortable coming near me.
It wouldn't have mattered whether I had food or not. And even, oh,
I missed one there. Girly. There we go. And even, I bet if we run into food,
she's not backing away. She's still comfortable being in this proximity to me.
The camera's pretty close, she could care less.
So we're seeing that confidence build as we're giving her a job to do.
And she's gained confidence in herself,
sort of overcoming that nervousness to get in something or on something.
Now we were working primarily on confidence with Juno side,
but look at the focus we got as well.
If you'd like to have more focus from your dog in a distracting outdoor
environment, check out this video. On that note, I'm instructor Carol.
This is Kelsey. That's Juno Happy training.