Today I was building up the distance Kizzy runs to a stationary toy and as suggested by Bernadette did this in the hallway for some extra length. She was doing really well but suddenly spotted our wrought iron collie door stop and had her first spook! She wasn't terrified by any means but she didn't much care for it and kept running backwards barking at it. I guess it's understandable as it's much the same size as her!
Anyway, I thought the best way to deal with this would be to use the clicker so I put a trail of chicken leading to the door stop and clicked her as she moved towards the door stop to get the chicken, then I placed a piece of chicken on the base and she took that so I clicked as she took it. That rapidly turned into her touching the door stop to get clicked and treated. Once we were doing that happily I shaped the behaviour so that she actually touched her nose to the door stop's nose!
This evening Andy incorporated the door stop into his clicker training session and you can see the results. Clicker training is such a wonderful thing!
Cleaver girl - it's in the genes you know! Obviously an Obay :)
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