Clicker Training at Home

I had tried to work with my entire pack simultaneously at home before, and found it virtually impossible to do so. I had even declared to my training class that it was so, and urged anyone in my class with multiple dogs to break down and separate them before attempting clicker training. Then about ten days ago, I took my crew out to the backyard deck anyway to see what I could do. As none of my dogs had come to me as puppies, it was probable (but by no means certain) that they had been exposed to some rudimentary training at some point in their lives.

The dogs gathered around me on the deck and I called upon them at random, addressing each one by name and giving a cue and a lure. Elliot is the only one with whom I'd taken a traditional obedience class, and indeed, the only one I could have claimed to have trained at all. Sitting on cue was easy. "Down" was a greater challenge, if only because some of the other dogs would also drop to the ground following my lure. I had to place the treat into his mouth, rather than drop it, or one of other dogs would steal it. Still, "sit" and "down" went surprisingly well amid the maelstrom. I was disappointed that Elliot did not seem to remember "stand," and that he required a tap on his belly to elicit one. Later Joel reminded me that it was my first dog, Lee, who had learned "stand" rather than Elliot.

Jesse was a particularly apt learner, and in her intrusiveness was quickly doing both "sit" and "down" with lures. Butter too, caught on quickly, despite joining the game late.

Little Boogie was out on the periphery and I had to lean over other dogs to reach him. He had never learned "down" before, but "sit" was easily achieved and reviewed. Because he is so close to the ground, even when he is standing at his full height, it was sometimes hard to tell whether he was holding his whole body flat for a "down" or just doing sort of a bow with his butt still elevated. Simcha, who occupies the lowest rung of the status hierarchy, would not push into the throng forcefully enough to get very close to me, so I didn't try to get a "down" from him, either. Nonetheless, he understood sitting for a treat, and appeared to enjoy the activity very much.

The second group clicker training session I attempted a week later. This time I worked on "leave it" and "take it." Amazingly to me, I was actually able to hold out a treat in my hand and get each dog to ignore it, if only briefly, long enough to receive another treat. This task would work much better alone with each dog, as I could then advance to dropping a treat onto the ground, saying "leave it" and covering it with my foot. Still, I was delighted that I could work the dogs together. The controlled mayhem of larger training classes is testing and increasing my competence.