How do I motivate my dog?

[1duster]

Hello everyone! This is my first post so I wanted to include a couple pictures of my dog Kaiser. We got kaiser from petsmart, and they told us he was a brindle border collie mix(no clue as to what with). He is now 9 months old, 50 pounds, and I absolutely love him! He loves to go with us everywhere, loves to play with other dogs, and he seems to be very smart. However, I am having plenty of trouble trying to motivate him to chase ANYTHING, especially a Frisbee which is what i really want him to learn. He will usually chase a ball or stuffed animal in the house for a couple minutes, but outside he seems to not be interested. When it comes to responding to commands he seems to always take his time, and seldom hurries to come to us to the point of us laughing and calling him lazy. We actually had him shaved for the summer because we thought maybe he was too hot to move faster. When trying to train him with treats he seems fairly unmotivated, and will sometimes simply stare at the food, and even walk away from it. I am reading the idiots guide to dog training as this is the first dog I have trained on my own, but I still need more ideas as I just cant seem to get him interested in learning or doing anything. I'm sure I'm the real problem here so can what can I do differently?

thanks!

Geoff

 

this second one is a video of him hearding a dog at the park today

[sluj]

Hi, and welcome! I'd start off just acting really excited about the toys/treats myself. (It helps if the treats are something like string cheese that you'd be willing to eat yourself.) Throw the ball to yourself, bat it around, pounce on it, and I bet he'll start showing an interest. For faster response to commands I'd ordinarily say start selectively rewarding only for the fastest responses, but if he's not food or toy motivated, you may have to get creative in your definition of reward. Check out the other end of the leash blog (the book is fantastic, too) - a recent article discusses just that. It could also be that he gets bored, and he may be more enthusiastic if you give him harder tricks or sequences of commands to work on.

 

Good luck!

[Mariji]

It's simple really. You just need to find something that motivates your dog. I know you know that but think outside the square. Use things from your dinner, steak, chicken, anything that he seems to love. If he likes his dinner use that! Work on playing with him just by himself first inside then outside. Just spend specified time each day playing together, it will help strengthen your relationship with him too. I am currently using pigs ears/ snouts to motivate speed in my dog at competitions. She had drive to work at home but at competitions just doesn't have the speed I know she is capable of. So I use pigs ears/snouts. It may not be feasible everyday but there will be point where you won't need to use those expensive training treats as there will be enough value in training itself or enough value in playing with you. That means finding a toy he absolutely loves. I am in Australia and I had to buy a real racoon tail from Clean Run to get my puppy to play. Now she will play with anything, you just need to find the starting point and amke sure any brain work you do is REGULARLY broken up by fun and games. Good luck I love training a new dog it's so much fun.

[muttlycrew]

Welcome to the boards! I love the coloring on your boy -- so handsome!

 

I agree with everyone else. Find something that *really* motivates your dog. My golden girl isn't overly food motivated, is "ho hum" about toys, and while she knows tons of obedience she is slower to respond. A few things that worked for me:

 

1) In agility, she would drive a lot faster on the contact obstacles if she knew there was a box of pulled pork or pulled chicken (yes, BBQ w/o the sauce). And I wouldn't just give her one little piece! It would be in a Tupperware box (closed) and when she would do it super fast, I would open it and let her take a mouthful or two. JACKPOT! Her contacts are now super fast (for a golden )

 

2) Tricks! My girl loves her tricks. She will 'sit pretty', 'wave', 'back through' my legs, or 'close the door' faster than she will 'sit' or 'down'. So I do these tricks in between the basic obedience to spice it up a bit and this has gotten most of her commands a lot quicker.

 

3) Making a big deal out of a toy and playing with it myself did nothing for her. She would give me a look like "OK...you can have that one". What worked for her was putting her in a down/stay or in her crate while I played with the squeaky tennis ball right in front of her with the OTHER dogs. She would get so antsy watching us all have fun that when I let her out and put the others up, she is a fetching demon!....inside. Outside she rarely plays with toys, especially in this heat.

 

Now for dock diving, she will retrieve any toy numerous times, hurl herself off the dock at great speed, and will go on forever. At home, she refuses to get in the kiddie pool and hates going out to potty if the grass is wet from morning dew. You just can't win them all I suppose!

 

Good luck!

[MrSnappy]

I'd suggest enrolling in a fun obedience class with him. It will help you to learn how to motivate it him, and also how to read his body language - in your video, your dog is pestily poking his nose in another dog's nether regions, and the other dog is not totally chuffed about the experience. He's not herding anything at all (dogs don't "herd" other dogs), but just acting like a regular dog, and maybe you simply misread his actions, which would translate to your inability to work with him effectively. Sometimes a trainer can help you see things that all the book learning in the world cannot.

 

Also, not all dogs fetch or need to fetch. Of my 5 dogs, three are avid ball players, one will do it sometimes (and even then, prefers a soft frisbee or kong to a ball), and one is not at all interested. The latter one was probably never played with before I acquired him, but his brother - who is a fair-weather fetcher - has been a victim of my build-drive program for years, and from puppyhood. He's just not that into it. He'd prefer to hunt rabbits. I let it go because frankly, why make him engage in a recreational activity he's not that fond of? We go to the beach and play ball with the three collies, and The WooTWoo hunts for crabs.

 

That way everyone is happy

 

Just don't get too hung up on trying make the dog something he is not. If he's a better hiking buddy than he is a fetcher, so be it!

 

RDM

[Shetlander]

Just don't get too hung up on trying make the dog something he is not. If he's a better hiking buddy than he is a fetcher, so be it!

 

Excellent point. I'd give it the old college try with trying to motivate him to play but some dogs just don't want to fetch. I spent a year of solid effort with two different instructors offering suggestions to get my Lhasa to retrieve a dumbbell for obedience. He learned to love that specific task but refuses to retrieve anything else. It just goes against his principles, I guess.

[Blackdawgs]

My Border Collie had zero toy drive. I was able to shape a retrieve of sorts using a clicker and food. Initially, play the shaping games for very short periods of time. it is important to stop before the dog losses interest. Start in a low distraction environment in the house and then work your way to the backyard.

[SecretBC]

Oh my goodness, that crab picture is FANTASTIC!

 

To the OP -- I will tell you what many people have told me -- Your dog is young, give it time. Many dogs do not come out of the womb with instant toy drive. Instead, it's something that is developed over time. I have been told that it is very common for many Border Collies to not really develop much drive at all until they hit a year or more.

 

My girl, Secret, is 10 months old now and only recently has she started to show glimmers of true drive starting to develop. I have worked TIRELESSLY with her since I adopted her in December. As it happens, her mom isn't toy driven at all and her littermates are also mostly food motivated. Myself and the adopter of Secret's brother have both been working to improve toy drive and thankfully, we are both starting to finally see results.

 

You cannot force it. You must be genuine. If you are not 100% into the game, the dog will know and get turned off. My play sessions with Secret started VERY short. At first I was lucky if I could get her to chase one ball or rolling frisbee, and forget having her bring it back. With multiple short daily sessions, I did see slight improvements from week to week. You should see her with the frisbee now -- She'll chase rollers for quite some time (although she stops bringing them back when she gets tired) and she's even started to catch the occasional disc out of the air. From where we started, this is a HUGE advancement. Even better, I've recently had great success in incorporating toys into her agility training, which has helped to build her drive over (low) jumps. I use toys until she starts to get distracted, then I switch to food to end the session. All of this helps to build positive association.

 

Someone suggested that I follow Susan Garrett's "Ruff Love" program with Secret to build up her drive and intensity. I bought & read the book, but ultimately I couldn't commit to the program. I did take pieces of it and I do feel that it helped our relationship. I have no doubt that following the program will give you the type of dog you seek, but it's a huge commitment. The parts I took into practice were to remove free access to toys in the house (believe me, there were a ton and doing this also helped clean up the house a bit! lol), I started to hand-feed at least one meal a day with her, and I started to put her in her crate when I took my other dogs outside to work/play. I also made it a practice to put her back in her crate if she shut down on me outside. After a 10 minute "time out" or so, we'd go back outside and try again. If she interacted with me just once in the desired fashion, I threw a huge party and brought the other dogs outside for her to play with (her ultimate reward).

 

It might not hurt to have him checked by a veterinarian to make sure there is no underlying cause for his lack of energy.

[Frogs & Dogs]

I just have a couple of things to add:

 

For disc (aka frisbee), try "rollers", which means a disc thrown so that it rolls on the ground along its edge. This movement along the ground is a lot more likely to excite prey drive in a dog, because prey usually runs along the ground. Dogs didn't evolve to catch their prey out of the air and it takes a LOT of drive to do that.

 

From the video, I'm going to take a stab at why he might be lacking stamina. His chest looks rather small, which translates to small lungs that don't hold a lot of air. An underdeveloped chest is something I deal with in my dog, as well. Basically, she gets winded sooner than she should. There may be some exercises that can help, like swimming, for example. He may also develop a larger chest with age and by pushing the limits of his capacity on a semi-regular basis.

[sjuguy]

Motivation for my bc:

1. Other dogs, moving animals

2. Food

3. Toys

 

He will play with toys of the others are not present. I got him at 4 months, he is now 6 months and his toy drive has increased a little. What really works for him is tying a toy to a short rope and dragging it. This seems to engage his prey drive (#1), and has increased his interest.

[geonni banner]

I'd get one of those treat/kibble-dispensing toys and let him smell it and shake a couple of treats out of it. Give 'em to him. Praise enthusiastically. Roll it around for him. Waggle it in front of his nose and make inciting motions and sound. This will accomplish two things. He will learn that objects = yummy stuff. And playing with objects = yummy stuff. Then later the idea that objects can be fun by themselves will start to sink in.

 

If he is uninspired by dog kibble try cat kibble. Or Pounce cat treats. I never had a dog that wouldn't kill for a Pounce. And they're tiny so you can get lots of individual rewards without stuffing him.

 

Stuffed Kongs are good for building good associations with toys. I pour kibble in 'em and then add a little chicken broth. The kibble swells up as it soaks up the broth, and stays in the Kong. But it's easy for him to root out with his tongue. Some people use peanut butter or cheese.

 

"Roller" Frisbees, as someone pointed out can be enticing. Try putting his food in a Frisbee at mealtime. He will soon get excited about seeing it.

 

My dog went batty for a Wubba. Still her favorite toy. Waggle those Wubba tails and make inciting sounds. Toss it a little way. If he doesn't pounce on it, pounce on it your self. Act like you have something wonderful. Cackle, giggle, wave it around and toss it again.