Episode 14

Don't Antagonize the Dog! - Coaching Call

This week, Naomi takes us into a private office hours session with Kenna and Aaron, members. of the Cat and Dog Coexistence Club who are working on integrating Kenna's grumpy cat (Stella) with Aaron's dog (June) and two cats (Jack and Shanks). They discuss the different training projects each of the animals is working on, and how they will come together in the future.

Key Moments

[00:25] Introduction to the Cast of Characters and their history

[02:19] Progress with Stella

[04:46] Helping Stella learn to move away when stressed

[7:40] Brainstorming where Stella's safe place will be in the living room

[10:26] Coaching through "place" proofing with June (rep by rep)

[16:44] Ways to use treats with cats who snarf food

Key Links

Instagram

The Cat and Dog Coexistence Club

Transcript
Naomi:

Welcome to It's Training Cats and Dogs - the show for people with both

Naomi:

cats and dogs who want peace in their home and peace between their animals.

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I'm Naomi Rotenberg and today's episode is a peek into a private office hours

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session that I recently had with Kenna and Aaron, dedicated members

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of the cat and dog coexistence clip.

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Let's get started.

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Because this coaching call encompasses the different skills they're working

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on with each of their animals, let me give you a little backstory.

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Kenna and Erin recently moved in together and Kenna brought along

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her slightly grumpy cat, Stella.

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Aaron already had one dog, June who's, large and excitable, and

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two cats - Shanks who keeps himself and Jack who is extremely playful.

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When they first joined the club, Stella was constantly hissing at the closed

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door of her safe room whenever she senses Jack or June approaching and

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Jack and June were beside themselves with curiosity and over arousal.

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So to decrease everyone's stress level, we set up an airlock of two

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baby gates outside Stella's room so the other animals couldn't get too

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close to the door, but Stella could get used to them being outside.

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When the door was open, this setup has been working really

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well in terms of training.

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Here's what the animals have been working on.

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Stella is learning to calmly, move away from the open door of her safe room.

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If she's getting uncomfortable, instead of feeling the need to antagonize

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the visitor, June is learning to settle on her bed in the living room,

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in the face of lots of districts.

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To prep for later setups with Stella downstairs, Jack is working on hopping

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up to surfaces like his cat tree on cue to act as a control distraction

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during setups for both June and Stella.

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I know this is a lot of info, so I'll interject as we go through the call to

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give you more information as you need it.

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This call took place on zoom.

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So I really apologize for the fuzzy sound.

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I hope you get as much out of it as Kenna and.

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So tell me how things are going.

Kenna and Aaron:

Pretty good.

Kenna and Aaron:

I think, I don't know.

Kenna and Aaron:

I feel like we've made decent progress with June.

Kenna and Aaron:

How do you feel about Stella?

Kenna and Aaron:

Stella?

Kenna and Aaron:

She will.

Kenna and Aaron:

Respond well to training if she feels like doing traveling, but sometimes she quits.

Naomi:

How long are your sessions with her?

Kenna and Aaron:

Usually just like a minute,.

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We discussed a few different ways to start

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incorporating distractions for her.

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Do you feel like she's frustrated?

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Is she unsure of what you're asking for?

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Because sometimes that is a reason.

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You get an animal that quits.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah, it couldn't be, I think she's, she's been a little more

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jumpy when the other animals like nose up to the outer gate, but she's been

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basically okay with like Jack coming up.

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I say she like puffed up once when he was trying to appear in.

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I think she's a lot more comfortable with the two gate set up.

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If they're trying to nose around.

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But yeah, I think she's, she's probably easily distracted by it.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Naomi:

Yeah.

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So we might, depending on how often.

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The nosing is happening - and if you're in the office working, then

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we could add in basically a protocol where the other animals appearing

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means that cookies happen somewhere.

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Uh, way from the door so that she learns to see the other

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animals and then turn away.

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That might be a really easy thing to add in.

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You don't have to do that every time, obviously, if you don't catch it.

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But the good thing is that it can be combined with her name.

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So she sees another animal.

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You say her name and cookies appear somewhere else.

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So even if she doesn't respond to her name in that moment, the

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cookies appearing will help her.

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Get the hint of what she's supposed to do.

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And then hopefully she will start to respond to her name

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before the cookies appear.

Kenna and Aaron:

I think she actually does have a pretty

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good recognition of her name.

Kenna and Aaron:

It's just like, it depends.

Kenna and Aaron:

I do think that as you mentioned, if we close the door to the office

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of it, so she can't see all this.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Naomi:

I think what that indicates is that the potential threat to the

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other animals is the distraction.

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Not necessarily their presence, because I'm assuming they're

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not there all the time.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yes.

Kenna and Aaron:

Stella walks around too.

Kenna and Aaron:

If she's hears a noise she's at the door..

Naomi:

We've been doing two things with Stella.

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Planned training sessions, where we have worked on her, turning away from

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distractions in response to her name and trying to use that behavior in

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real life when she's triggered by the other animals, nosing at the baby gates

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in those real life scenarios, because Stella was having trouble disengaging

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from the door sometimes in response to her name, adding in the automatic

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appearance of treats in the location we want her to go to, instead of waiting

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for her to respond will help her remember the training she's been working on of

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turning away when she's feeling that stress, rather than getting stuck.

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Is she able to move around a little bit more?

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah, we did last night and she stayed out

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for a pretty good amount of time.

Naomi:

Has she attempted to go sniff June's crate or have you been

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able to redirect her from that?

Kenna and Aaron:

She actually hasn't been going that close to the crate lately.

Kenna and Aaron:

Um, I think the chair barrier, but also she thinks she just like knows for sure.

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June is there now.

Kenna and Aaron:

But yeah, and she, she looked at June makes a noise and she looks at it.

Kenna and Aaron:

We've been able to redirect her, which is good.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Naomi:

So you could do something similar in that scenario, right?

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Anytime she hears another animal doing something, you toss a

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cookie away on that thing.

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So that it's really a no-brainer for her.

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And so you're trying to connect that trigger with something that.

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But also because of the way you're delivering the treat, you're also teaching

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the behavior that you'd like her to do.

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What would be really interesting is if we started to think about where

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she could have an elevated place to hang out in that living room area, and

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that's where the cookies would appear.

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So we're doing sneaky introduction to her settle spot, or that's just, if she's in

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that room, that's where she can expect that there that's where they would be.

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I know she's not like the biggest up cat.

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She likes to be on the ground, but I want to make sure that she does have

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some place where June can't get to her.

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Stella has exploring time where June is put into her covered crate in the living.

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Jack hangs out with Shanks in the basement and Stella gets to move

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through the rest of the house.

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When we first did this, Stella would actively approach June's crate and hiss.

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Unlike most cats, she just goes straight for the offensive when

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stressed, instead of looking to flee.

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We want to help her realize that calmly retreating to an elevated safe

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area is usually a better choice than actively antagonizing a large dog.

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So we brainstormed a little bit to decide where her elevated space might be in the.

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And so do you guys have any ideas about what's either already in your

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living room or could be adjusted so that she could let's say jump up

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on the couch and then like onto a little shelf or something like that?

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Kenna and Aaron:

Actually we did just get a new cat tree.

Kenna and Aaron:

It's too tall for her, so Jack can get up there and he says he's tall, but it'd be

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a bit much for Stella, but maybe if we put like a step here, And then she could get

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on the step and then up here where the cat tree is now near June's kennel, which also

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has the other cat's food on top of it.

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So it might be a little high pressure for her to start right there.

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We might need to move it because if she's not going to feel safe there, even

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if she knows June's kenneled, It could be that that ends up being their tree.

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And we do something else for Stella.

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He likes this little weird front room space that we have when she comes down.

Kenna and Aaron:

So it might actually be great to put a treat there cause he could

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look out the window and she likes to.

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That would good..

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And then she would also feel safer because there's that gate there.

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Even if the other cats can jump it, that at least you've

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given her that little area.

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And since she prefers to go in there and they don't hang out in there

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that often that's not really part of their behavioral repertoire.

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So as long as we don't reinforce them for going in there and we

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reinforce the crap out of her for.

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That will end up being a spot that they might go in, but they might not.

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And that you have that little cat door in that gate already.

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So one thing that we could do, you know, in our setups down the line is to say,

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okay, Stella goes in there through the cat door, we close the cat door so that

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no one else can get in theoretically.

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And we can even put something up higher on top of that gate to make

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sure that the other cats don't jump it at least while we're working on the

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setup and then June can be out there.

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Stella can be in there and we can be reinforcing them

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with that barrier in between.

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I think that might be a really good mini milestones to work towards.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Naomi:

Great.

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Sounds like a good plan.

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So let's think about how we're going to get there.

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We then switched gears to concentrate on June since her being able to

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remain relaxed while Stella moves around the living room space is

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going to be key during future setups, because she has been making huge

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strides during her practice sessions.

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We increase the difficulty of the distractions and I coached

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Aaron through the training.

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Okay.

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So, June is there with you?

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I'm assuming.

Kenna and Aaron:

Yeah.

Naomi:

Okay.

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Let's do a little training with her.

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'cause we were talking last time about clarifying that going

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to her bed is go and lay down.

Kenna and Aaron:

We can walk away from her and everything and she's fine.

Kenna and Aaron:

I'll let go in the kitchen and get a drink or we'll go get her

Kenna and Aaron:

grading and stuff and she'll stay.

Naomi:

Holy shit.

Kenna and Aaron:

There was a couple of days ago, I was doing the thing in the,

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in the enrichment video where you said to start doing two of them at once.

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And so I was saying, do good.

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And then she would get a treat and then I had Jack on the new cat tree.

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And then would you Jack Good there?

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He would get the treat.

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So she's pretty good with staying there at this point.

Kenna and Aaron:

As long as there's no extremely enticing stimuli, like someone

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coming to the door or something.

Naomi:

Oh my gosh.

Kenna and Aaron:

She's pretty good at staying.

Naomi:

I'm so proud.

Naomi:

Okay.

Naomi:

Start proofing a little bit of movement of other things that are not, you let's take

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a neutral object, like a water bottle or something and just roll it on the ground.

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And then when you're rolling mark it good and then treat her.

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Okay.

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Yeah.

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So as it is rolling your

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marketing, it, she did.

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So that meant, she thought about it.

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That means it's a little hard.

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So I would just roll it a little bit.

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This next time.

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So what we're teaching her here is that thing happening does not mean get up.

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Yes, obviously this is totally real life and we are stopping here.

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This is the end.

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This is the final behavior, but yeah, what tends to be.

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Difficult for dogs who like to chase things is when the rolling happens

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across their visual or away from them.

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So you did the right thing, having it roll towards, but not hitting her.

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If you feel like she's solid, you could roll it across her vision.

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Beautiful.

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Make sure you're reinforcing every time you're marking that.

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So let's just try one where you're rolling it away from her

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and then we'll release her girl.

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Really good.

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Okay.

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Let's free that dog.

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Yes, that's beautiful.

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So that's one activity for proofing this particular behavior.

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You send her over there.

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Reinforced.

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And then you make things move and you mark and reward her for staying.

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The other side of it is whether she can go if something is happening.

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So let's say a cat comes down and we want her to, instead of going towards

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the cat, we want her to go to her bed.

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So we need to make sure that she can go no matter what's happening.

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So right now, what I want us to do is to start way back at the beginning.

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And just think about the position from which you are sending her.

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So if you always send her to her bed from where you are near the stairs,

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what happens if you're sitting on the couch, can you send her from there?

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Let's see.

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That was beautiful.

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Okay.

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And now let's release her.

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Great.

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So let's think of other things.

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Can you tell her to go if you're not looking at her?

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Beautiful.

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So we're making this a really sticky behavior in two separate ways

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that are both equally important.

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I'm ecstatic with how fluent the base behavior is.

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And so.

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I'm confident that whatever you guys throw at it, if it's not like huge

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increments of difficulty, you'll get a lot of really good reps in there.

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And the sky's the limit on creativity.

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So think a little bit about what situations might occur, where

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you would need to send her.

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If things are.

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Looking a little dicey and you can use Jack as a distraction as well.

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If she's like slightly interested in him or looking at him, can you send her?

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The concepts and skills are interchangeable depending on

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which animal you're working with.

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We're going really slowly with Stella because she's the one who

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is the most cautious, but your adventure animals downstairs.

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Are really into training for training sake.

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So you can steam ahead.

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Here's where we touched on Jack's current training.

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He currently is very good at moving to a platform when he

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can follow a hand gesture.

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But just like with Stella in the front room and June on her bed, we want to

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establish a default location for him to target when no hand signal is given.

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The one thing that I would recommend is add a verbal cue as well, because.

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If you're in one room and you need to tell multiple animals to go somewhere,

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you need that verbal really solid.

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The thing that I think would be really helpful is to have one really sticky

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spot in each room that you're going to be sending him most of the time.

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You could send him other places if you gesture to it.

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But if you said Jack home or whatever you choose, and you didn't gesture anywhere,

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he would go to wherever his sticky stuff.

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Because you've reinforced him much more heavily there proofing the behaviors is

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really thinking about where are those sticky spots for each animal going to

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be, and starting to set those up so that we can actively start using them

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in different training sessions before we start bringing Stella, because I want

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Jack and June to be so solid on these.

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That you can trust when Stella comes down and is a worried, anxious

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ball of whatever that they're okay.

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And you can focus on her and making sure that whatever her behavior is,

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we can adjust based on her rather than, than the other various.

Naomi:

As much as possible.

Kenna and Aaron:

Gotcha.

Naomi:

Great work guys.

Naomi:

I'm like a little bit proud mama over here.

Naomi:

That was beautiful.

Naomi:

And is there anything else that you wanted to talk about before we go in on the,

Naomi:

this progress train that we're making?

Kenna and Aaron:

Aaron was training Jack yesterday and Jack gets real

Kenna and Aaron:

excited and eats two paths and he likes.

Kenna and Aaron:

Because she was eating treats too fast.

Kenna and Aaron:

Is there an alternative we could give him that would be a cookie

Kenna and Aaron:

that was not quite as scrumptious to the point where he threw up.

Kenna and Aaron:

He has the ad.

Kenna and Aaron:

This is why he can't, we can't give them wet food.

Kenna and Aaron:

Cause they'll just eat it.

Kenna and Aaron:

And for a lab, he can't have nice things.

Naomi:

Okay.

Naomi:

There's.

Naomi:

Two pronged approach with this number one is to make sure that you are taking

Naomi:

a breath yourself in between reps.

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Because if he's frantic, you need to set the pace a little bit more for him.

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And this is outside of changing the reinforcer, which we'll

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talk about in a second.

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The other thing is making sure that you're not giving him more than

Naomi:

three to five treats at a time.

Naomi:

Okay.

Naomi:

Keep them real, real short.

Naomi:

So he can't Gorge himself.

Naomi:

Completely.

Naomi:

And what are you giving him?

Kenna and Aaron:

Little salmon things.

Kenna and Aaron:

They're kinda wet.

Kenna and Aaron:

You like cut those in half.

Naomi:

If they're, yeah, if they're a little slimy, you can usually

Naomi:

cut them a little bit and he's so motivated that he'll go to look for

Naomi:

it anyway, and it actually might be better if it's harder for him to

Naomi:

find, because that's going to put more time in between those reps as well.

Naomi:

You always have to adjust the levels depending on the cat.

Naomi:

Some of them.

Naomi:

You're like, here's this huge piece of whatever I'm going to put it

Naomi:

right here, usually right here.

Naomi:

But he's going to look for it no matter what.

Naomi:

Um, yeah.

Naomi:

Change those things first before we adjust the food.

Naomi:

So size, total number and space between reps and see if that.

Naomi:

Cool.

Naomi:

Woo.

Naomi:

We covered a lot of ground during the session.

Naomi:

How to help a scared cat who tends to lash out first to learn that moving away from

Naomi:

a stressful situation is a viable option in different locations in the house.

Naomi:

How to make a go to bed behavior strong in the face of distractions, not just once

Naomi:

the animal is on the bed, but also when the cue is given the importance of making

Naomi:

sure that go to bed is put on a verbal cue and heavily reinforced in practice so

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it's clear to each animal and can be used during real life, potentially stressful

Naomi:

scenarios in the future, and ways to troubleshoot the issues that come up of

Naomi:

using treats with really snarfy cats.

Naomi:

Hope that hearing the questions I asked and the advice I give during

Naomi:

these coaching calls is helpful for you to apply to your own animals.

Naomi:

If you have followup questions about anything we discussed during this

Naomi:

episode, please head over to the episode, post on my Instagram @praiseworthypets

Naomi:

to join in the conversation.

Naomi:

And if you're having trouble with the cat dog interactions in your home.

Naomi:

And you feel like this kind of support is what you've been

Naomi:

looking for, come join us.

Naomi:

In addition to being a member of an awesomely supportive community group,

Naomi:

coaching and training resources, you also get one private office

Naomi:

hour slot with me per month of membership in the cat and dog coexist.

Naomi:

You can find out more information at praiseworthypets.com/club.

Naomi:

That's all for now, you wonderful cat and dog people.

Naomi:

See you back here next week for another episode of It's Training Cats and Dogs.

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About the Podcast

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It's Training Cats and Dogs!
The podcast for cat-AND-dog people.

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About your host

Profile picture for Naomi Rotenberg

Naomi Rotenberg

MA, KPA-CTP
specializing in cat and dog integration

Hi! I'm Naomi, and I'm a "cat-and-dog person" 👋 My goal with this podcast is to speak to people with multi-species households who currently feel alone. There are lots of highs and lows when trying to manage the relationships between your animals. This podcast will give you clear, actionable information and guidance about the unique issues that come up between cats and dogs. And the monthly interviews with my fellow trainers who have cats and dogs will definitely help you realize that you aren't alone!

A bit about me: I'm a certified professional dog trainer (KPA-CTP) and have my MA in Animal Behavior and Conservation. I live in my own multi-species household in Philadelphia, PA with my husband, two human kids, Uri (a mini American Eskimo Dog), and Rio (a domestic shorthair cat). I also LOVE Twizzlers (the original kind, NOT pull-and-peel).

I look forward to getting to know you and your pets on your journey towards a more peaceful and safe coexistence!