Lessons from Shedd: Whistle While You Work

At Paws Abilities, we use clickers in our training program. Whether working with a new puppy, an experienced competitive obedience dog, or a dog-aggressive and anxious pooch, we find that the clicker serves to clarify and speed up our training program. The trainers at Shedd and other zoos and aquariums worldwide agree.

A trainer at Shedd holds his whistle in his mouth, ready to mark this Beluga whale for performing the “elevator” behavior on cue. Photo by John Kroll.

Clickers and other marker signals are referred to as bridges in the animal training community. This is because the click sound “bridges” the time between when the animal performs a correct behavior and when the trainer is able to deliver the reward.

Any signal can be used as a bridge. We use clickers in dog training because they are cheap, easy to use, and distinct. Many marine mammal and pinniped trainers use whistles, as the sound carries through the water and leaves their hands free to handle training tools or deliver fish. Advanced animals can be transitioned to a verbal bridge such as “yes” or “good” for known behaviors. Verbal markers aren’t recommended for novice trainers or animals as they are less distinct and precise than a mechanical signal, but can be helpful for more advanced teams in certain situations.

Bridges do not have to be auditory. I use a “thumbs up” signal for my dogs, and we oftentimes use this same signal for deaf dogs in our program. A flash of light or the vibration of a collar could also serve the same purpose. Many of the animals at Shedd were conditioned to a tactile bridge, where the trainer would pat the sea lion or dolphin on their side in a specific way to mark the behavior they liked.

Whatever bridging stimulus you decide to use, Ken emphasized that it’s important for it to be distinct and easy to replicate. It should serve no other purpose in the animal’s environment.

So, why use a marker signal at all? What makes the clicker or whistle so powerful?

Marker signals allow trainers to be accurate and precise. By clicking or whistling at the exact moment your animal performs the correct behavior, you can help him to learn more quickly exactly what it is you like. It’s often difficult or even impossible to deliver a food reward or secondary reinforcer to the animal at the precise instant he does what you want, but by using a marker we can still communicate to him exactly what earned that reward.

Furthermore, the bridge can be transferred from trainer to trainer easily, allowing a wider variety of trainers to work with one animal. When an animal understands to listen, watch, or feel for the bridging stimulus, he concentrates more fully on the task at hand instead of focusing on the food or other reward.

Novice trainers often worry that they will need to carry a clicker with them for the rest of their dog’s life. Nonsense! The clicker allows us to teach your dog more quickly and easily. It’s simply another teaching tool. Once your dog understands the behavior, it’s easy to fade the clicker.

What bridging signals do you use to train your dog? Do you use different signals in different environments? Please share your experiences in the comments section below!

How Learning About Dolphin Training Can Make You a Better Dog Trainer

Last week, I spent 9-12 hours a day at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, Illinois. Over the course of 5 days, the class I was in covered the contents of a 500-page animal training textbook and observed training sessions with many different species of animals, including penguins, sea lions, sea otters, dolphins, hawks, owls, a black and white tegu, an aracari, and beluga whales.

Dolphin trainers at Shedd interact with the mother and baby in a husbandry training session.

About half of my class of 25 students was comprised of professional dog trainers, with the other half being exotic animal trainers from various zoos across the country. We also had some international students from Germany, Australia, and Canada. The classmate on my left, Tracy, worked right at Shedd and the classmate on my right, Allison, worked with large carnivores (tigers, African painted dogs, lions, etc), gibbons, and baboons.

It makes sense that zoo trainers would attend this course. However, why were so many dog trainers present? The fact is, learning how to train dolphins, sharks, komodo dragons, and monkeys can make you a better dog trainer.

We’ve said it before: the laws of learning are just that, laws. They apply to every species, dogs and humans included. The proper application of positive reinforcement is just as likely not to work as gravity.

Zoo animals are trained nearly exclusively with positive reinforcement. It would be stupid and dangerous (not to mention potentially life-threatening) to attempt to train a sea lion with collar corrections. Zoo trainers don’t even say no to their animals, as doing so may lead to frustration and frustration could be deadly if taken out on the trainer. These are large, powerful wild animals, and the trainers who work with them respect that.

In spite of keeping their training usage confined nearly entirely to one quadrant of the operant conditioning grid, zoo trainers are able to shape remarkable behaviors in their animals. Animals are trained for such behaviors as voluntary blood sampling, where the animal offers a leg, neck, or flipper on cue, then holds still while the veterinarian inserts a needle to draw blood. This behavior is done with no restraint, and the animal is free to leave at any time. We saw hawks hold still for talon trims and sea lions open their mouths to get their teeth brushed.

In addition to useful husbandry behaviors, these animals learn many other things. Fun and crowd-pleasing tricks such as porpoising (jumping in and out of the water while swimming), waving hello, and dance moves are taught to the animals for mental enrichment. They also learn to target, so that trainers can move them from one area to another without the use of force or baiting. Large groups of animals can be worked together by having each animal go to his or her own individual target, preventing aggression in a highly-charged feeding situation.

The relationship the trainers build with the animals is every bit as important to their success as their skilled use of training principles. Our instructor, Director of Training and Behavior Ken Ramirez, emphasized time and again that good animal training is a combination of relationship and technical skill. Both are important, and while training is still possible without a relationship, it may take longer and be less effective than if the trainer has taken the time to get to know his or her subject.

The trainers at Shedd spend time playing with and just observing the animals, getting to know their likes and dislikes. A new baby dolphin was present for several of our training sessions. At only 90 days old, this baby was still nursing and not yet ready to eat fish, meaning that he was still too little to formally train. However, he was still assigned a trainer at every training session, who played with and observed him, getting to know him and letting him begin to build a bond with his trainers right from the start. He will already have a great foundation of trust when he is ready to begin formal training.

All of these principles apply to our pet dogs just as much as they apply to elephants and wallabies. There is no need to ever frighten or hurt your dog in the name of training. Complex, reliable behaviors can be trained quickly and easily using positive reinforcement and environmental manipulation. The more you can get to know and respect your dog as an individual, the more he will learn to trust you and look to you for guidance. Just because we can get away with harsh techniques with our domestic dogs doesn’t make this okay. The proof that your dog can be trained for any behavior using just a clicker and treats is out there.

In the following weeks, we’ll discuss more of the basic and advanced training principles covered during this course, as well as the practical applications of these techniques.

Calming Aids: Dog Appeasing Pheromone

We’ve written about the importance of recognizing your dog’s stress level and how to institute a cortisol vacation for chronically stressed dogs. However, lifelong avoidance is neither practical nor helpful. So, what are some things you can do to lower your dog’s overall stress level?

Today we’ll begin discussing some helpful calming aids that may make a difference in your dog’s ability to relax. Understand that these tools are simply that, tools, and will not fix any behavior problems in and of themselves. Training and behavior modification are still necessary, but may be more effective when paired with these remedies. Remember that every dog is different, and what helps one dog may not work for another.

One of the most innocuous calming remedies available is Dog Appeasing Pheromone, or Comfort Zone, a synthetic version of a pheromone released by mother dogs when puppies are nursing. Pheromones are chemicals that influence one’s emotional state, and are processed through the olfactory lobe. D.A.P. appears to help comfort and reassure some dogs.

One thing that I like about the company is the fact that their product has been studied in clinical trials. Many over-the-counter calming remedies have no scientific evidence as to their efficacy, and are in truth the canine equivalent of snake oil. D.A.P. has been found to reduce barking and increase resting behavior in shelter dogs, promote relaxed behaviors during vet exams, and reduce signs of thunderstorm phobia, among other things.  More research into the product is needed before we can say with complete certainty that it does what the company claims, but anecdotal evidence seems to support these claims.

Several forms are available, including a collar, spray, and diffuser. I recommend the diffuser for most of my clients. Many clients report little to no observable change when they begin using D.A.P., but then report that when the diffuser runs out they realize that it has indeed made a difference. There are no reported side effects to this remedy: it either helps, or it doesn’t, but it’s not going to hurt anything to try. The diffuser covers a 650-square-foot area and usually lasts about four weeks. I use one for my own dogs when introducing a new foster into my home, and believe it to be helpful.

As with any successful product, there are now several knock-off versions of D.A.P. available on the market. In general, clients have not reported success with these products, and at this time I recommend sticking with the name brand.

Have you tried Comfort Zone with your dog(s)? What did you think? Please share your experiences in the comments section below!

Chronic Stress in Dogs

Just like people, most dogs have both a variety of coping strategies and a relatively normal nervous system. These things allow them to deal with the many small stresses of day-to-day life, as well as occasional larger stressors.

However, also like people, not every dog deals with stress the same way, and some may struggle more than others. Whether due to chemical issues in the brain (such as a deficit or inbalance of certain neurotransmitters contributing to an anxiety disorder), the absence of a supportive environment in which to learn adequate coping strategies, or a personality that just doesn’t mesh with the lifestyle of their owners, some dogs simply aren’t equipped to deal with the life they lead.

Photo by Derek Ortiz

It’s a sad state of affairs when a dog suffers from chronic stress, and as we mentioned before it can also be dangerous. Chronic stress is hard on the entire body.  It can hasten the aging process, delay wound healing, contribute to depression or anxiety, decrease cognitive function, and increase the risk of illness from bacteria or viruses. Many chronically stressed dogs suffer from immune issues such as allergies or gastrointestinal problems. This is serious stuff.

Remember that stressors cause a chain of physical reactions in the body, which lead to heightened levels of stress hormones. While the first jolt of adrenaline released during a stressful event will begin to subside within the first fifteen minutes or so, the glucocorticoids that follow may take two to six days to return to baseline levels provided no other stressors follow during that time period.

At some point, a stressed dog is likely to reach his or her threshold. The threshold is the point at which the dog shows obvious signs of stress (whether by stressing up or down). Dogs have various thresholds – points at which they exhibit stress, points at which they may act out, even points at which they snap or bite.

Let’s say that your dog has a stressful event (perhaps a frightening thunderstorm or a really intense play session with the neighbor’s new dog). His stress level will spike, and you may see some signs of this in his inability to settle easily. If he has plenty of time to recover from that event, he’ll return to normal with no real concerns. This is what’s happening in the graph below.

In an ideal world, we would always give our dogs plenty of time to recover after events that pushed them over their threshold (and caused visible stress responses). However, this isn’t an ideal world, and sometimes stressors will stack up, coming in quick succession without time in between for the dog to recover. This happens in our lives too, sometimes, and provided we can acknowledge that this is happening and work to move beyond it, it’s not typically a big deal.

For some dogs, however, this becomes very important because they are never able to recover. Stressors continue stacking, so that the dog winds up beyond their threshold constantly. I often see this with the fearful or reactive dogs I work with. These dogs are chronically stressed, set off by every little things and constantly on edge. Their charts might look more like this:

Later this week, we’ll discuss how to help a dog who’s gotten stuck past his or her threshold. What sort of things cause a visible stress reaction in your dog, and how have you helped your pup to develop coping skills? Please share your stories in the comments below!