Dog Training How To's - To Treat Or Not to Treat

Two days ago I was training a couple dogs with a good friend of mine. We were working on the basic stuff, you know, sit, down, come when called, when he asked me a question about treats.

He asked, "Jason, why do you give the dog so many rewards?" My answer is simple. Because if you pay the dog well, they do better work for you, pay them poorly or not at all and you get lack luster work.

Think of it like this, if your paycheck came every 6 months instead of every week or two, would you be a hard worker or would you tend to cut corners? Be honest. I know I would tend to start off great but as bills piled up I would become frustrated with the fact that I was only get paid twice a year for hard work I am doing every day.

Your dog doesn't see this any differently. They love you. They want to work for you. They deserve to be paid well. Now I am not saying go out, buy a box of Milkbones and just start tossing them to your dog for no reason. Quite the opposite. First, I dislike Milkbones. Second, the dog has to do something for the paycheck.

When I am starting a dog in obedience the dog is paid extremely well. You could say that I treat them like a rich kid who gets anything she wants. That is until the dog learns what we are working on. The pay does not get worse, it just happens less often. At this point the dog is motivated for the paycheck and really doesn't care that it only comes every 3rd or 4th time instead of every single time.

I use tug toys and balls to reward as well. Again, the rewards come often and are so much fun for both myself and the dog. Why would I not want to have fun training right?

Whatever paycheck you give your dog, tug toy, ball, squeaky squirrel, chicken liver, or a simple pat under the chin, it makes since to reward them for a job well done. I am not a fan of completely getting rid of the reward either. It stays, forever, why? Because my dog's happiness means a lot to me. Why would I want to take the fun out of training. It's silly and even the most competitively trained dog out there can be rewarded at all times. Just ask any narcotics search team. Do they reward the dog every time they find drugs? Yup. Do they say, "good job dog here is a milk bone?" Nope. They play the dogs favorite game and show them how proud they are of the work they did.

Whatever you believe, to treat or not to treat, I'll leave you with this to think about, why not?

Jason Mann ACBDT, CPDT-KA is the owner of Top Dog K9 Training Solutions based in Lexington, Kentucky and has been training dogs for 10 years. For more dog training information Visit Jason online at http://www.TopDogTrainingSolutions.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jason_Mann