If your dog may bite someone and you’re not sure what training to do, learn more about BAT. Behavior Adjustment Training can make your muzzle obsolete.

Definitely follow his sage advice to put the muzzle on at times that are pleasant to the dog, or you will end up undoing all of your work to get the dog to like the muzzle. Dogs are great at making assocations.

Click here the full information on this Friday’s seminar.

Click here to see our whole list of upcoming seminars in Seattle (BAT in June and Sept, Kathy Sdao in July, Patricia McConnell in September).

Click here to see our list of upcoming BAT seminars around the country.

I just heard back from a trainer who started BAT with a really over-the-top freaked out foster dog on April 11th. The dog is so much better and just went home with her new family!! and I think there may be footage to use in my seminar.

And my dog, Sagan, played with a client dog. Yes, played! Both were doing BAT at the session. Play started about half an hour in. This was Sagan’s 11th BAT set-up. We left Sagan’s muzzle on, just in case. We’ll be doing another session next weekend.

That one was filmed and will definitely be in my upcoming seminars.

Any Seattle folks have a dog or child that could help me socialize Sagan and Peanut? (dogs for S, kids for P). The trade-off is that you would learn how to do BAT. I’m also fine buying a meal for families who will eat outside a restaurant so Peanut can join you!

Not necessarily. Here are some other reasons:

1. Not walking away after the marker signal + “let’s go” may just may mean that the magnet is too strong. You can sort of think of a magnetic pull between your dog and the trigger. If they get too close, they need to charge in and make the scary thing go away. If they are just a little too close, they may be stuck, wanting to go, but afraid that if they turn their back, the other dog will bite them in the rear. So you either just wait until the magnet weakens, or you abort the trial (call your dog away) and then do the next trial at a better distance, maybe 5 or 10 feet further away from the trigger.
2. Your dog may not be “done” yet. By that, I mean that they are still gathering information, and walking away is not what they want at that exact moment. We need to teach them to gather info quickly and make good decisions, so it’s critical that we let them sniff and look when they do it. Not being able to go without getting info is really common with dogs who are not fearful, but rather protective or in some other way wanting the other dog or person to go away, rather than just fearing for their own lives. So they need more information before they can safely go away. Signs to look for: body relaxes, head turns away (toward handler, away, toward the ground, whatever).

Here’s a video clip of what “done” looks like. You’ll see this trial twice. So first, the German Shepherd (Panzer) will turn his head a little, and also give a lip-lick. This is great to reward, but he is NOT necessarily done at this point. If you are just getting your dog started on BAT, then you can and should reward small head turns – but only if they will come away with you. If they won’t then just praise and wait for the dog to be done (and possibly work farther away to decrease the power of the magnet). Panzer’s second head turn is when he’s really Done with the interaction. You can see a decision has been made. The first run-through of the clip is at regular speed, the second is slow motion.

When I first did BAT with my dog, Sagan, getting her to go away when I said “Yes! Let’s go” was really hard. We were more successful with doing her retreats at an angle, so she could keep an eye on the dog as she retreated, but then my timing got better on the walk-aways and now we can easily do a direct retreat. I began to just praise her for the little stuff and reward only when she was done. After all, it’s not a Functional Reward if the dog doesn’t want it! If they aren’t ready to go yet, they aren’t ready to go. I also threw in the occasional bonus reward (treat) for walking away, to help increase the value of going away with me.

Now, even when the dogs aren’t “done,” they do actually seem to have a decrease in stress if we call them away. But it’s just not as rewarding as a full functional reward. So at times when I want to reward her for something and I know that if I just wait her out, it could go badly (like a close-up greeting) then I will call her away using my recall cue (Come) and give her a treat as a bonus reward.

Comments? Questions? Click here for more info on BAT.

• Kathy Sdao is a behaviorist and a scientist with decades of experience, but you wouldn’t know it by the energy she puts into all of her talks.  She has a great way of explaining difficult concepts so that we all understand.  Kathy is doing a relatively new kind of workshop in Seattle this summer, which we’re calling “Kathy Sdao Unplugged” – it’s a place for trainers and advanced folks to bring their dogs, get practice, and solve those tricky challenges with your own dogs. We have working and auditing spots.  You can get more info or register now for the July 15-16 workshop.
• In September, we have a whole weekend devoted to fear, aggression, and play in dogs. I’ll be starting out the weekend with a 1-day presentation on Behavior Adjustment Training, or BAT.  It’s a technique I developed that has had some really fabulous results with client dogs and my own dogs, too.  People around the world are trying it and giving great feedback on their dog’s new-found ability to function like a regular dog!  On the second day, Patricia McConnell will fly into Seattle and rock our world with her great info on dog play and aggression. I’m absolutely thrilled to have Dr. McConnell, author of countless dog books, come to Seattle. She’s one of my all-time favorite dog behavior heroes. Can you tell?  You can get more info or register now for the September 11-12 workshop.

Tawzer Dog Videos filmed my 90-minute Behavior Adjustment Training seminar in Novato last month, and it’s now available for sale in our online store (click here). We ship orders out on Fridays only, so if you’re looking to get it as soon as possible, then get it from the Tawzer website, when it becomes available.

Here are some clips from the intro of that seminar:

(if that doesn’t work for you, you can view it on YouTube).

We should get copies on Thursday, February 11th, so orders placed this week will *probably* go out on Friday.

I could use a lot of volunteers in Seattle. Are you interested? Here’s what I need:

1. Dog-human teams that can be decoys in a set-up for BAT with a dog-aggressive dog. The goal is to have the student dog remain calm and happy around the decoy, so it shouldn’t be very stressful on your dog. Decoy dogs should not be aggressive or fearful, and should be over 2 years old. I can usually keep the sessions aggression-free, but there is a risk that your dog will be barked at. When we work up close, there is always a fence between the dogs or the dog is muzzled (when I’m feeling very confident), so there is no risk of a bite. We start very far away and move closer as time goes on. Volunteers can opt out at any time.

2. Child-adult teams that can be decoys in a set-up for a dog that is afraid of children. The dog barks but has no history of biting or snapping at any humans. Again, all attempts will be made to keep the session happy and bark-free and we will set up barriers so that there is no risk of a bite. Sessions can take place wherever you’d like. One good location is an outdoor cafe in Ravenna where you and your child just have lunch as we walk back and forth. I’ll treat you for the meal! (This is my dog, Peanut. He’s actually a therapy dog for an assisted living facility, but we haven’t done enough training with children.) Kids 0-13 would be best, since he’s fine with people over about 4’6″.

One benefit of doing this is that your child can learn more about dog safety.

3. A puppy that is afraid of people.

4. People to serve as decoys for the puppy. I’d love to have a vet’s office willing to help me with this, so if you work at a vet office and could do the set-up there, please let me know!

5. Someone interested in running the camera would also be great!

A description of the technique and some videos of what it looks like are on the Ahimsa website: http://doggiezen.com/blog/bat-posts

Benefits to participants: Information on how to use BAT plus a week of free drop-ins to our Dream Dog program. Info on the Dream Dog program is at http://ahimsadogtraining.com/dreamdog

Session times vary, but usually they are something like 15 minutes (if that’s all the child can do) to an hour.

Let me know if you’re interested in any of these volunteer spots. Thank you in advance!!!

At some point, I will be doing a research study on BAT, and I will ask for participants with human-aggressive dogs. That will probably be Fall, 2010.

I figured it would help to give students a chance to see progress, so I have created an overview sheet for set-ups. Clients will make progress if they do set-ups correctly and consistently.  It’s not enough just to do one set-up, for any method. With BAT, expect the sessions to decrease in length and increase in quality of interaction.  I did about 20 set-ups for Peanut with adults, and he went from not being touchable by strangers to enjoying working as a therapy dog in an assisted living facility.  The initial sessions were long and the sessions at the end were short, only a few minutes. 20 may seem like a lot of set-ups, but it only took a month of Saturdays.

Click here for the BAT session Overview sheet. There is a blank form and the second page is a filled-out sample. You might not use the same decoy 4 times, but it allows for that. I usually use decoys 2-3 times max, because the dog starts to remember them. Print a new sheet for each decoy. When you print out multiple copies, you’ll need to set your computer to just print page 1. Fill out whichever rows you think are most important, and do this for each session.

Dog trainers and behaviorists: you can print this out to use with your clients, but please leave the contact info on there. If you are posting it on a website, please use a link instead of putting the file on your domain.

Let me know if you use this, either by email or using the comments section below!

Through Sunday, I’ll be discussing BAT for fear and aggression and there have been a lot of great questions! You can read the forum without being a member, but you’ll need to join (quick and free) if you want to post a question or comment. Check it out!

I just made a handout that you can use with your own dog or that dog trainers can print out for clients. The one requirement is that you leave my contact information on there and do not post it electronically to websites, etc., but you can link to it. Just right-click the link below to copy the URL for your own website.

You can download the Behavior Adjustment Training Handout here.

These clips are from the last 10 minutes of the session. But even during that time, you can see how his body relaxes and his confidence grows.

It was a blast to work with these three and I hope I get another chance, soon! In many ways, it was easier than training a dog. You can see all kinds of motions in a horse body from a distance!

In many of the clips, you’ll see Laura stop, Levi stop, and Levi back up. This isn’t a fear behavior, but rather, a behavior Laura has trained Levi to do. If you’re a horse person, you’re probably familiar with that, but it was news to me! I just thought maybe we were working too close.

We also have an exciting visit from Patricia McConnell planned for September 12, 2010.

For more information, visit our trainer workshop page.

Want to talk about having a BAT seminar near you, up to 2 days long? Just contact me!

Here are some highlights of that video:

• At 0:27, he actually does a nice look away and retreats, and I didn’t notice, because I was fussing with the camera. I called him back and we ‘started’ our session, even though he was already starting without me. That’s the cool part about this method, that the dog can train himself after a while!
• 0:36, 0:37, 0:39 he sees the triggers and we push on because we’re not quite at his threshold – we’re working on head turns and this is still a very easy distance.
• 0:39, 0:46 I stop and he looks at me after only a tiny glance at the triggers (kids). I decide that’s not close enough, that he can handle more.
• 0:49 Looks away from trigger, 0:50 big nose lick. I miss this. Another casualty of filming and walking at the same time.  This would’ve been a good place to stop.
• 0:55, solid engagement with the kids, has enough time to look and see what they are up to, then turns to look at me. I mark with Good! and reward him by walking the other way with him, away from the kids. Note how fast he walks in that direction.
• 1:10 – some calming touch. Not necessary, but it’s what Peanut and I do.
• More aware of the kids now. I return to our same spot and do two more trials. During the walk-away on the 2nd trial, the kids follow us, and you’ll see him look back. I like trials 2 and 3 better than trial 1, because it seemed more directed at the environment, rather than an escape into mom’s eyes. I’m more than happy to be his anchor, I’m just glad when he doesn’t need it.

The second video is the use of the Premack Principle to practice heeling. Remember, BAT is not just for aggression & fear, but also for other problem behaviors maintained by the environment, like pulling. The point is to set the dog up to succeed, then reward with what they most want in the moment.

The Premack Principle states that the opportunity to perform a high probability behavior will reinforce the performance of a low-probability behavior. One way to think of that is that if your dog gets freedom to act like a dog as a reward for listening to you, you’ll get a better-trained dog (it’s broader than that, but it’s a good way to think of it). In the video, I have Peanut heel and he can chew his stick as a reward. I do this because he used to pull whenever he had a toy in is mouth, because he’d want to go enjoy it. Now he’ll trot along, waiting for permission to go chew.

This is now already a trained behavior, so I had him come with me and walk. But visualize smaller steps, like just coming with me as a rewardable behavior. In our real life, he can go quite a ways before I release him to go chew.

One thing I should mention is that the other dog is kitty-corner across the street, about 40-50 feet away from our first approach distance, maybe a bit more.

After a long break, we are doing her third session today, so stay tuned for video!

Click here to join FunctionalRewards, a discussion group and creative space for people interested in BAT and related methods for aggression, fear, and other dog issues.

There are lots of different ways to do BAT, but the main idea is to use what the dog is already working for to pay for a new behavior.

In this case, the dog would bark/lunge at other dogs she doesn’t know in order to increase the distance between her and the other dog. So we do the session far enough away that she can be calmer* and we use ‘permission to walk away’ as the treat for soft eyes, blinks, head turns, etc. We mostly focus on head turns for this session, as that is a nice default behavior.

When you are doing BAT for fear or aggression, you can either change the stimulus (how close is the other dog, what are they doing, etc.) or you can change your behavioral criteria (what the dog needs to do before you reward).

If you are at the edge of your dog’s comfort zone, don’t make both of those harder at the same time. For this session, we pretty much took the same behavior each time (on the continuum of looking away) and changed only the stimulus (approached closer and closer to the other dog, had other dog move or not move).

We will still need to work toward variety in another session, so that if Cassie does a head turn and it doesn’t make the other dog go away, she will have other tricks up her doggie sleeve.

*Keep in mind, some dogs need to start really far away, so that the other dog is just a speck on the horizon. Starting too far and quickly moving the approach line forward is better than starting out too close.

*************

Session Transcript

Set-up is that the decoy dog is kitty-corner on public street (across the street, opposite corner, 50+ feet away from the ‘client’ dog. There are two handlers (Lori Stevens and Adriane Villanueva) and a camera person (Grisha Stewart). All three are professional dog trainers. Lori and Cassie are the ‘clients’ and Adriane is handling her dog, Penny, as the decoy.

The session was about 35 minutes. This is an edited version of the session. I no longer have the raw footage, so I will just call these trials 1-20 rather than what they really are, a sample of 15 of the the 60 (or so) trials.

In the initial set-up, Cassie had a double-ended leash attached to a harness in the rear and a Gentle Leader in the front. We changed this after it began to feel like the head collar was not giving Cassie enough freedom of movement (and it was distracting her).

The primary alternative behavior we rewarded during this session was a head turn, and most of them were toward the handler. In session 2, we began pushing for different behaviors, but we were working on getting one solid behavior down first, so we didn’t ignore head turns in an attempt to get variety during this session.

Both dogs approaching mark, Cassie leaving as reward. When leaving, Cassie was cued verbally to walk away, sometimes guided by the leash. The ideal is that the retreat is verbally/visually cued.

Trial 1: Alternate behavior rewarded: head turn away from decoy toward handler (0:13). She also opted for a sit when Lori stopped. Slight prompting from Lori as she leaned away from Cassie after they stopped.

Trial 2: Alternate behavior: head turn toward Lori, offered after long look at Penny while walking toward mark (0:32). Just before the head turn toward the handler, at 0:31, there was also a look away to the other side. That could have been rewarded instead.

Trial 3: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (0:49). On this trial, Lori waited until we were back at the mark, just praising some other good head turns without retreating. If we always took the first rewardable behavior, we’d never make it to the mark! Not rewarding every acceptable alternative behavior also helps make this good behavior harder to extinguish later.

(We started making the break between trials a little longer. Cassie likes to move and is a hard worker, so if we wanted a longer break, we could also do something during those, like tricks or other training.)

Trial 4: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (1:24). Tail was a bit higher for this trial. Head turn was prompted by Lori very lightly touching her finger to the leash, just a tiny flutter to help keep Cassie from ‘going limbic’.

(We took a slightly longer break and decided not to go as far forward the next round, to make success more likely. We were just getting started, so that mark was probably too close to the decoy).

Trial 5: Half-way to old mark. Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (2:02). By the time they left, Cassie’s head had turned back, so she did feel the Gentle Leader guiding her away. Ideally she wouldn’t feel any leash on the retreat, but that was just a little timing issue.

Trial 6: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy (2:34). On the approach, there was also ground sniffing that we could have rewarded

Trial 7: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (2:57).

(time gap and then decoy was moved to same side of street, across the intersection)

Trial 8: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy (3:03)

Trial 9: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy (3;17)

(Time gap – more trials and gear was switched to harness only with both front and rear attachment)

Trial 10: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (3:33)

Trial 11: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (3:51)

(time gap – Penny moved to same side of street, no longer moving)

Trial 12: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (4:04). Penny barked an Aussie hello at Cassie and she barked back. She was not super-aroused, so Lori waited for an acceptable behavior before leaving.

(We got another bark after a few more trials, so we mixed things up by adding click/treat plus retreat. The barking seemed like frustration rather than aggression. The click/treat/retreat bit was much easier and more familiar to Cassie. We could also just have increased our distance again, or worked in between trials. We clicked, retreated, then treated on the retreat. That way, the retreat stood out.

Trial 13: Alternate behavior: ground sniff on approach (4:41).

(time gap)

Trial 14: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (4:54). As they retreated, Cassie began to bark at Penny, but handler correctly continued retreating. (Penny had just seen a cat and was stiff during that trial.)

Trial 13: Half-way to mark. Alternate behavior: ground sniff on approach (5:06)

Trial 14: Alternate behavior: head turn away from decoy toward handler (5:20)

Trial 15: Alternate behavior: several head turns away from decoy toward handler (5:44). Actual click ended up being a look at the decoy, better would’ve been for a look away.

If you pay attention, you can figure it out anyway. Those things that you call ‘distractions’ are actually powerful training rewards. Here are some things your dog may already be doing:

He works to get to the squirrel in the tree ahead. (by pulling on leash)

• He works to chase the mailman off. (by barking)
• He works to get away from those scary people. (by lunging at them)
• He works to get to those people he loves. (more pulling)
• He works to get you to notice him. (by jumping up)

Your dog isn’t dumb. He knows what he wants and he knows how to get it. He wouldn’t do it for long, if it didn’t work. Unfortunately, the ways that are working for him right now are annoying to you.

Enter BAT – Behavior Adjustment Training. I think we can all agree that if our dogs suddenly adjusted their behavior in the above scenerios, we’d be thrilled. For example:

• He works to get to the squirrel in the tree ahead. (by looking adoringly up at you and trotting along on a loose leash)
• He works to chase the mailman off. (by going to lie down on his bed)
• He works to get away from those scary people. (by turning his back on them)
• He works to get to those people he loves. (more lovely walking)
• He works to get you to notice him. (by sitting at your feet)

Awesome, huh?

At some point in his life, he tried a whole variety of things to get what he wanted, and he stuck with the behaviors that worked the best.

To adjust the behavior, to replace it with something better, we can’t just put him in the full-blown scenario of having the mailman arrive. He knows barking should work to get rid of the intruder, and he will try it until he exhausts himself. That is stressful and a waste of time.

Let’s call the situation that sets your dog off a ‘trigger.’ A fancier word is an ‘antecedent.’ In the above set of behaviors, possible triggers would be:

• Dog sees or smells a squirrel
• Dog hears mailman on the porch
• Unknown person approaches, looking at the dog
• Known person approaches, looking at the dog (funny how that’s almost the same as the above, right?)
• You turn the key

So let’s go back to the scenario of greeting a stranger. We can’t just have the stranger come over to pet the dog. That trigger is too sensitive. So you set it up so they are 30 feet away, or 100, or whatever it takes for the dog to look and say, ‘no big deal, I can just turn my head and pretend they’re not there.’ The next more exciting trigger is the person from 25 feet away, or the person at 30 feet talking, or the person at 30 feet reaching toward the dog. Gradually, though, you morph the trigger into the real deal. You never want to push the dog into being overly stressed, and if you see it starting to happen, distract your dog and get out of there. Don’t give a leash correction or yell at your dog. This is your mistake.

If we could adjust the behavior to whatever you wanted, what would it look like? Be specific, not just ‘I want a good dog,’ but behaviors, like sniffing the ground, turning his head, leaning in for a scratch, blinking calmly, etc.

Now it’s simply a matter of:

1. Giving the dog a small version of the trigger
2. (Stopping and rethinking if your dog messes up)
3. Waiting for a good response
4. Giving the dog what he wants.

In our example above, that could look like:

1. Owner and dog walk 15 feet toward a cooperative ‘stranger’.
2. (calling the dog and going 30 feet away if you get barking).
3. Dog blinks, sniffs the ground, or otherwise relaxes or looks friendly.
4. Walk back to where you started, or have the stranger walk away.

In this case creating distance between themselves and the Scary Monster is the reward.

With a squirrel and a pulling dog, it might be:

1. Mom stands with a stuffed toy at the end of the block.
2. (Stop or turn the dog away from the toy if she pulls hard).
3. Dog looks at you or remains close enough to you to not pull.
4. You walk toward Mom and the stuffed toy.

Eventually, you can do this with a bouncing tennis ball or a squirrel in a tree, but start smaller so that your dog has a higher chance of success. More successes = more learning, because dogs learn more from success than failure. Staying well below you dog’s Freakout Threshold is extremely critical if you are using BAT for aggression and/or fear. When in doubt, happily distract your dog and walk away to regroup.

The greatest part of all of this is that it’s easy to maintain the training once you’re done. With the mailman, in fact, you don’t have to lift a finger, because the mailman always leaves. Your dog never has to learn that it’s not his calm behavior that’s making him go!

We’re constantly asking dogs to do what we want them to do, and expect them to work for whatever we give them, like attention, petting, food, or toys. Those things are great, and I use them all the time, especially in classes. They are also great for pre-training the dog on the skills they need before you switch to doing BAT, or even together with BAT.

But to permanently stop your dog from being annoying or scary, notice what they get out of doing it, and use the reward they are already working for to pay for good behavior.< \strong> otherwise, we are just using second-rate rewards. If they scratch your back, it’s only fair if you scratch theirs.

Click here for a dog-geeker description of BAT.