Training the human while muzzle training

Ready to work!

Now that I had the basic tutorial from our session with Lori (Starting muzzle training) it was time to practice at home.  It always looks so easy when we are watching but, executing can be a whole difference experience.

 

So here's our first try - you are going to see at least one training error. Again if you are training, video taping is a huge help in adjusting how we the humans train.

 

So what was the error?  Me! First off I'm not comfortable, you can see that by all my moving around - this is amping Catty up.  She's excited to work and me bouncing around is making it difficult for her to focus.  

 

Catty is able to work on placing her snout in the muzzle but, things would have gone smoother had I prepared the environment for myself.  Often times we are the ones slowing down the training process!  The goal of the above video was to have Catty just place her snout in the muzzle - no strapping on yet, just placing and holding her snout in the muzzle.  

 

We practiced this in about four 5 minute series through out a number of days.  Catty is so smart and quickly figured out this part of the game.  The length of working on this part was more for me working on clearly communicating to Catty.  Again clearly communicating what we are asking of the dog is extremely important in setting everyone up for success.

 

So we progressed to the next step: having Catty hold her muzzle in the basket and putting the strap over the back of her head. 

 

One thing with Catty is that she gets really excited when training so, I have to work hard to slow down my food delivery.  I also tend to use lower value treats in the beginning as a high value treat gets her too excited and she can't focus.  By slowing down, it slows her down and allows her to focus and work on impulse control.  You can also see the difference in Catty and myself between this video and the one above.  Slowing down, being less animated and being clear in communication make a huge difference. 

 

She's doing great!

 

  

However, I soon make another common mistake as you will see below and it's me wanting to progress to quickly.  I want Catty to walk in the muzzle and she's not ready for that.  So, when you see this happening always go back to the step that was working and keep practicing that. Once that's solid you can give the next step another try.   We the human need to remember to slow down and always be ready to adjust our expectations. 

 

We would never expect someone to learn a new skill as quickly as we often think dogs should learn things. And when a dog is struggling, again we need to look at what is going on - more often than not we are not being clear in our communication and/or pushing the dog to quickly.   We really need to do more of putting ourselves in their position and seeing the world through their eyes.

 

 

So, despite my errors - Catty still wants to work.  Thank goodness she's somewhat forgiving!   Stay tuned to see more of our muzzle work and this human gets better during the training...

 

Here's a great article and step by step protocol for  Muzzle training.