what do you use for treats?

[John V]

I've had my border collie for about a month (longer version here). I've been training him, for simple obedience and a few "tricks", with praise and treats. At the beginning, I did give him some treats that I thought were pretty unhealthy, because I had them already and he liked them, but I intended to try to start making it healthier. For a while, he was very happy getting pieces of dry dog food that I had from a dog I had been fostering, but he suddenly seems to have lost interest in that food. I have some Milk Bones that he likes, but those are pretty junky, and also way too big, I think. (I'd give him one piece of food at a time, while he liked the food.)

 

I've been reading some books and articles on the web where people talk about cooking treats for your dog, but I really don't even cook for myself. Then again, his standards may be lower, so I could try.

 

What do you all use for treats? How many treats would you say you give your dog in a typical day?

[SincereArtisan]

First off...Is your dog very food motivated, or do they need something a little extra that makes them want to work for it??

 

IF your dog is VERY food motivated, this is easy. Use their own kibble. This prevents them from being overloaded with rich extra tidbits, and you can portion out a bit every day from their regular feedings so that they are not being overfed.

 

If your dog isn't very food motivated, or needs something extra/different for them to work for treats...try cheerios. Its light, a good handful of them can be broken up and last you a real long time.

[ShoresDog]

(1) Natural Balance lamb roll -- this is dog food that comes in a sausage-shaped roll and can be cut up into tiny soft bits. Good for training because they are easy to gulp down and can be cut up really tiny.

 

(2) The cat's Science Diet Oral Care kibble. The cat loves it. The dogs love it. Awfully convenient!

[Tassie]

For obedience and agility - I use small pieces of soft stuff - mostly human food. I want the dog to be able to eat the treat very quickly and keep their mind on the job ready for the next thing. So I usually have a mixture of low-fat tasty cheddar cheese, microwaved small pieces of skinless hot dogs, chicken loaf (I buy from the deli - get them to slice it about 1.2 inch thick), small cubes of a kind of sausage we call Devon - used in slices for sandwiches - maybe it's called Baloney there - like Strasbourg sausage only not so fatty. These are all not too greasy. ANd you can make a bulk supply and freeze

 

Friends use liver - buy a lamb's liver from the butcher and then cook it (not sure how, but it's smelly), then cube it.

 

For difficult things - roast chicken is usually a favourite - it's a pain though, becuase it crumbles too easily - bits drop everywhere.

[Jack & Co.]

Lots of discussion on this previously so a search can give you lots more information. Here is an older thread that I found to be helpful.

[Guest echoica]

If you want to get the best results and keep motivation high you should go all out on the treats and make the thought of them even being a possibility during training the highlight of the day - but don't use them as a bribe - but as intermittent reinforcement. The easiest treats I would suggest - if you don't cook (like me) - is cutting up small pieces of cheese. You can also cut up a tube of "Roll Over" - they sell it at pet food supply store as stuffing for bones. If you are short on $$ and time...use cat treats like Purina Luvs. Keep in mind the best treats are small, smelly and soft. If you use kibble, large milk bones or hard treats they take longer to chew and are not so novel so it can actually slow down or hurt the effectiveness of training.

[Root Beer]

At home I use Taste of the Wild kibble unless I am working on something with one of the dogs that requires something of higher value. At classes I use hot dogs for Dean and Cheese for Speedy and Maddie. I cut the pieces up really tiny. They only need a smidge most of the time.

 

I have used liverwurst rolled between two pieces of bread and sliced into cubes. I've used home made liver treats. I've used boiled chicken. I've also used Natural Balance rolls.

 

Sometimes when we have something really good left over in the fridge like ham or something I'll use that.

 

Hope that helps!

[juliepoudrier]

If I have larger treats on hand (like Milkbones), I simply break them into smaller bits that the dog can eat in one bite. It makes them last a lot longer too.

 

My dogs' favorites have always been turkey dogs that I've sliced, then cut the slices into quarters, and microwaved until crispy (actually you microwave them for a period of time and then they crisp up after being removed from the microwave). They LOVE them. I don't make them but once in a blue moon, but then I don't use a lot of treats for training. String cheese cut into pieces or just bits pinched off works well too.

 

J.

[sandyleew]

I like to use Three Dog Bakery Jump n Sit Bits. They are just the right size and my dogs love them so they make a good reward. I tried using their food and they weren't motivated enough.

[JohnLloydJones]

For general use, I make my own. Senneca gets an alergic reaction (itchy paws) to commercial wheat products, so I use a sourdough rye base and add things like sweet potatoes or carrots and maybe some grated cheese. Senneca and Rhys get these for training and just for being a good dog. The total daily quantity is kept pretty low.

 

For high-value treats for agility, I have used the Natural Balance roll, but even that wasn't yummy enough, so after cutting it up into small pieces, I added a little liver paste and mixed together so all the cut pieces were smeared in it. It's messy, but even a dog with low food motivation can't resist it. Occasionally I have also used cheese -- that works with most dogs too.

 

BTW: Your culinary disaster is your dog's windfall, so don't be afraid of cooking your own treats.

[Lokisaab]

I pretty much use all the same treats as everyone has listed. For beef liver and chicken livers, hearts, and gizzards, I'll give them a quick boil (it stinks!) then freeze and slice em up.

 

I've also used sardines in the past, but those are so gross and smelly it has to be an extra special reward for sure.

 

peanut butter cookies are quick and easy to bake too. there are tons of recipes you can google.

[John V]

First off...Is your dog very food motivated, or do they need something a little extra that makes them want to work for it??

 

He's very food motivated, if it's the right food.

 

IF your dog is VERY food motivated, this is easy. Use their own kibble.

 

Yeah, see, this didn't work. He's actually turned up his nose at his own kibble (which is Beneful, btw.) He sees I have something, and becomes very attentive and obedient, and then when I try to give him the Beneful, he sniffs it and gets all disappointed and refuses it. (Actually, he doesn't seem to like Beneful much at all. That's the food the former owners were giving him. Maybe I'll try a switch at some point.)

[Root Beer]

He's very food motivated, if it's the right food.

 

Yeah, see, this didn't work. He's actually turned up his nose at his own kibble (which is Beneful, btw.) He sees I have something, and becomes very attentive and obedient, and then when I try to give him the Beneful, he sniffs it and gets all disappointed and refuses it. (Actually, he doesn't seem to like Beneful much at all. That's the food the former owners were giving him. Maybe I'll try a switch at some point.)

 

For a kibble training treat, you might try Taste of the Wild. I've yet to meet a dog who didn't think it was a fantastic treat.

 

For a dog who is more picky about treats, variety is the key. Change it up to keep him interested. After you've done a good bit of training with food, you won't need to do this so much, but at first it's important.

[JohnLloydJones]

Yeah, see, this didn't work. He's actually turned up his nose at his own kibble ...

I have one dog who gets excited at absolutely anything you give him and one is a picky eater and wants a treat to be just that -- something special. I have tried using free sample bags of fancy kibbles like Solid Gold and they are accepted, but her daily kibble, not so much. Boring.

[juliepoudrier]

Hi John,

I'd recommend changing his food from Beneful to something a little better in the ingredients department (i.e., something you'd buy at a pet food store and not the grocery store). You don't have to pay the high prices of the super-premium foods, but there are some mid-level foods that are much better formulated, and you might find that he quite enjoys kibble when you get him off the cheap stuff. Look for foods that have meat (with animal and type of meat named) as the first ingredient(s) and that have limited grains (most grocery store foods will list corn as one of the first ingredients, that is, the main source of protein). I have a bunch of dogs, so understand the expense of feeding, but I think you'll find it better for Jack's overall health if you switch him to a better food. If you do a search here in the general section and in the Health and Genetics section, you will find numerous threads about good foods. (And you can usually feed less of a better quality kibble.) Sorry for the slight hijack, but you might find that kibbles would be a suitable treat if you had a good kibble that Jack likes.

 

Here's a website that will help you make dog food decisions: Dog Food Project

 

J.

[border_collie_crazy]

I use kibble, but my dogs are on a raw diet..they only eat kibble as a meal when they have to eat while at work with me, so to them a kibble IS a cookie lol

 

and I agree about the beneful lol, doesnt suprise me that he would turn up his nose at that stuff, that stuff smells like a bag of chemicals to me..cant imagine what it must smell like to a dog! it doesnt have to be real high end, but your dog might be more exited about a food that actually contains real meat

[Guest echoica]

I like to use Three Dog Bakery Jump n Sit Bits. They are just the right size and my dogs love them so they make a good reward. I tried using their food and they weren't motivated enough.

 

OH my dogs LOVE those too! I swear they put doggy crack in them

[BustopherJones]

For cookies, I use Avoderm Potato & Duck biscuits (broken in half); these seem to be the easiest for her to digest, and she loves the flavor. For training treats, I use either small sections of all-natural bologna or Old Mother Hubbard Assorted Bitz.

[Ms.DaisyDuke]

Typically, I use the Natural Balance Lamb food roll as well. Sometimes I switch the flavour, but lamb seems to be a big hit. I cut it up into tiny little pieces, about the size of my pinky nail. We frequently go to training classes etc., so I always have a baggie of this cut up in my fridge. Plus I always seem to have a foster dog, so there is always learning going on in my house. There is a Roll Over food roll too, but I prefer the Natural Balance... for what it is, I think it's healthier. If I have a particularly fearful foster or I am taking a new class that my own dog might be a little overwhelmed with (she's also fearful) I will cook chicken or beef livers or chicken hearts, cut them up and portion them in little baggies to use as needed. Organ meat smells really bad when it's cooking though, so that might not be an option for the feint of heart....

If we do a lot of training one day, I cut back her portion of kibble to reflect, but the pieces are so small, that I usually don't have to do that too much. Daisy will not "work" for kibble either, don't feel too bad about that one!

[mbc1963]

I switched my dog to grain free Taste of the Wild because he was scratching a lot, and I thought it might be grain allergies. So, giving him lots of treats made of random ingredients seemed like it might be making him itch, too - now I just use the ToTW kibble for "everyday" treats. He loves them. For training classes and such, I'd buy tiny chunked cheese.

 

Mary

[in2adventure]

"Turkey butts" I've been helping a friend out in his new deli/bakery and have access to all sorts of good meats. They roast their own turkey breasts and I keep the "butts" after slicing it up for lunches. My guys think they have died and gone to heaven. Even Grady, who is WAY not food motivated, thinks it's the bomb.

[Donald McCaig]

Dear Sheepdoggers,

 

Do many on this list routinely feed treats?

 

Once or twice a year when I butcher a deer, I feed the raw bones to the dogs. After someone comes over for dinner, sometimes I'll set a plate on the floor and invite each dog, in order of rank to have a few licks before stepping aside for the next lower. Some Saturday nights I give each dog a milk bone. Sometimes leftover rice and pasta goes in with their kibble. They love sheep fumets, lamb afterbirths and occasionally root out a mole, groundhog or squirrel.

 

Why treats?

 

Rural Hill SDT has an agility demo so I took June over to see what she'd do. The demonstrator told me to put her on a lead and get her through/over obstacles by offering her treats. When I asked "Why?" the demonstrator couldn't think of a reason so I asked unleashed untreated June to jump through the tire, which she did and asked her to scramble through the tunnel and over this thingy and along a high narrow walkway which she did. No, she didn't do it elegantly or immediately but she probably did it about as quickly as she would have with treats. Dunno, I didn't try them.

 

Derek Scrimageour has observed "These dogs have been bred for hundreds of years to work with humans." We've asked our dogs to do all sorts of difficult, dangerous, unappealing things and - by and large - they've done them.

 

I think of treats as "dog money". Why offer money to a priest?

 

A couple years ago I attended Wendy Vollhard's Trainer Camp. Wendy's a splendid pet dog trainer and a friend and like most who train all breeds to do things they were never genetically designed to do, she (and her students) train with treats and corrections. I grew accustomed to seeing dogs come through the agility tunnel hoovering up missed treats.

 

That evening, I was sitting outside talking to a dog trainer who asked me if it was all right if she gave June a treat.

 

"Sure," I said. "Why not."

 

She offered a doggy snack and June sniffed it and ate it and seemed to say, "So? What's the fuss about?"

 

 

Donald McCaig

[border_collie_crazy]

many people on this list clicker train their dogs which involves a lot of small treats, some use it just to train tricks or for training things like Freestyle and Agility, others use clicker training 100% of the time no matter what.

 

personally I usually use praise and play as opposed to treats..neither of my BCs really care about them anyway, both are quite pleased with a simple "thank you" lol and when that isn't enough they would rather play fetch! I however have 3 other dogs who are not BCs. my rough collie mix works like the BCs..praise and play prefered to treats. however my Terrier mix and my Retriever are a different story, and I dont get anywhere with them without little treats.

[lrayburn]

I think Donald McCaig was asking a rhetorical question

[Alchemist]

If you offer treats (and I'm not about to enter the debate as to "whether") - try to make sure they're nutritional as well as "attractive", without being too fattening or too full of additives that might trigger allergic reactions. On the other hand - don't offer treats so rich they'll have an adverse affect on a pup's digestive system. (Treats high in fats, like cheese or hot dogs or liver, could have this effect, unless you cut them up into minuscule bits and keep the total in close check).

 

My vet suggested Cheerios. They worked for a while for my pup. But they weren't alluring enough to reward him for "heeling". The trainer suggested we add lumps of freeze-dried liver to a baggie of Cheerios. The Cheerios would pick up some of the smell of the freeze-dried liver, making them more alluring).

 

A caveat: add the Cheerios to a baggie full of freeze-dried liver. Don't do the reverse, and add the freeze-dried liver to a box of Cheerios. Take it from me, any uninitiated member of your household will not be pleased to discover lumps of freeze-dried liver in their morning cereal.

 

We've found the safest bet is to grill extra chicken breasts. Save one or two and cut it up into tiny bites. Even one, when streched out over the course of a week, will offer powerful incentives that help in unpleasant assignments like "heeling" in the face of distraction.