impulse control

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Shalista
Posts: 1363
Joined: Tue Feb 17, 2015 10:04 pm

impulse control

Post by Shalista »

Bax's impulse control has been wanting lately. he's been pulling on the leash alot when he finds something he wants (dogs or people) which is def something i can work on on our walks but I'm looking for something i can do in the home.

Bax has done it's yer choice literally a million times and i think now he just knows the rules more than it really helping with his impulse control. anyone have any "its yer choice" LIKE game? or variants i could try to keep things fresh?
Baxter (AKA Bax, Chuckles, Chuckster) Rat Terrier, born 01/16/13
JudyN
Posts: 7018
Joined: Tue Jul 26, 2011 1:20 pm
Location: Dorset, UK
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Re: impulse control

Post by JudyN »

With Jasper I got a couple of carpet tiles and taught him to stand on each one (front paws only otherwise the tiles would have had to resemble hall carpets :lol: ). Then I'd move the back tile in front of him, got him to move to it, and so on as we traversed from one end of the room to the other.

Then I would put a treat at the far end of the room and 'walk' him down the room using the carpet tiles as above till he could reach it.

Balancing treats on his nose or top of his head is another we sometimes do. I never tried to teach him to chuck them in the air and grab them when I released him because apparently you train that by grabbing the treat if it hits the floor. I could see that going badly - and anyway, it's not fair on the poor dog to take the treat away when he's earned it!
Jasper, lurcher, born December 2009
Erica
Posts: 2697
Joined: Fri Aug 05, 2011 9:35 pm
Location: North Carolina

Re: impulse control

Post by Erica »

We play a variant of stay we call "find it" -- Delta sits and stays (or stand-stays, or down-stays) and I hide a treat. Easy places at first and then more tricky/further away. He stays until I walk back to him then release and tell him to find it. One hidden treat per stay, so he doesn't look for a thousand hidden cookies, but I may pretend to hide it in twenty different spots so he has to actually use his nose and look.

Stays with distractions and higher level leave-its are good ways to increase impulse control. Also working on getting him excited and have him settle down again. Flirt pole style toys, if you aren't afraid of wakening his Terrier side, are a good way to get him excited or work on leave its and stays.
Delta, standard poodle, born 6/30/14
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