December 30, 2024 • 52 mins
In this highly anticipated second part of our conversation with Craig Ogilvie, renowned dog trainer and behavior consultant, we continue to dive deep into the world of interactive play. Craig, who operates the successful Ogilvie Dogs training center and authored The Interactive Play Guide, shares invaluable insights into how play can revolutionize dog training by meeting the biological needs of dogs, while also creating powerful reinforcement tools.
In this episode, Craig dissects the science behind play, exploring its origins in the predatory motor pattern, and how it serves both the physical and social development of dogs. From toy play to interpersonal play, Craig emphasizes the importance of creating structured yet engaging play experiences that not only enhance the dog’s ability to learn but also strengthen the bond between dogs and their caregivers. Craig also discusses the underutilized potential of play in addressing behavioral issues, showing how trainers can use play to increase responsiveness and reduce problematic behaviors, even in highly aroused states.
Listeners will come away with a deeper understanding of how to incorporate play as a key training strategy and hear Craig’s expert advice on adapting play styles to individual dogs for the most rewarding results.
What You’ll Discover in This Episode:
- How play taps into dogs’ predatory motor patterns for learning and behavior development.
- Techniques to tailor play styles to meet each dog’s unique needs and motivations.
- The role of play in behavior modification and managing arousal levels.
- Practical tips on using play as a reinforcer in both pet and sport dog training settings.
Why This Episode is a Must-Listen: Craig Ogilvie’s passion for play-based training and his wealth of experience make this episode a valuable resource for trainers and dog owners alike. Whether you’re working with reactivity, recall, or general engagement issues, Craig’s insights will inspire you to rethink how play can become a cornerstone of your training toolbox.
Engage With Us: If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, share with fellow trainers, and join our online community to explore more about ethical and science-based training practices.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:03):
Welcome to the Animal Training Academy podcast show.
I'm your host, Ryan Carledge, and I'm passionate
about helping you master your animal training skills
using the most positive and least intrusive approaches.
Here at ATA, we understand that navigating the
vast challenges you encounter in training requires a
(00:27):
comprehensive base of knowledge and experience.
It's common to face obstacles and rough patches
on your journey that can leave you feeling
overwhelmed and stressed.
Therefore, since 2015, we have been on a
mission to empower animal training geeks worldwide.
We've aided thousands in developing their skills, expanding
(00:51):
their knowledge, boosting their confidence, and maximizing their
positive impact on all the animal and human
learners they work with.
We are excited to do the same for
you.
Simply visit www.atamember.com, join our vibrant
(01:11):
community, and geek out with us.
And of course, in the meantime, enjoy this
free podcast episode as we explore new ways
to help you supercharge your training skills, grow
your knowledge, and build your confidence so that
you can craft a life that positively impacts
(01:32):
every learner you encounter.
But we will start today's episode where I'm
thrilled to welcome back to the show the
awesome Craig Ogilvie.
Craig is a highly respected dog trainer and
mentor based in the UK.
He owns and operates Ogilvie Dogs, a premium
(01:54):
dog training center designed to cater to all
dog sport disciplines, including agility, obedience, HTM, flyball,
and more.
In addition to his training center, Craig runs
Big Bark Media, a media agency focused on
supporting dog-related businesses.
He also offers mentorship to dog business owners
(02:14):
internationally, sharing his wealth of knowledge and experience.
Craig is also an author, having written the
Interactive Play Guide, where he outlines his successful
techniques for creating positive reinforcement strategies using interactive
play.
His dedication to the dog world has made
him a sought-after figure for both training
(02:36):
and business mentorship.
Craig, thanks so much for coming back to
hang out with us again on the Animal
Training Academy podcast show.
My pleasure.
Craig, recently in our members-only community, we've
had a surge of members sharing about the
training they're doing using toys and play as
(02:57):
reinforcers.
After they shared videos and their excitement over
exploring this new area for their training, I
received requests to find the best person to
join us on the ATA podcast to talk
about this topic and the role of play.
I immediately thought of you, and one of
our members specifically requested you.
(03:19):
As it happens, listeners of this show, I
even found myself at your training facility in
Bourne, UK a few months ago for the
PPG British Isles Summit, where I was attending
as a participant.
Unfortunately, our paths didn't cross, as you were
off doing amazing things with dogs in another
country, but I was reminded of you once
again.
(03:40):
On this recent trip, though, I was thrilled
to connect in person with Chirag Patel, and
in our conversations, he gave you a glowing
endorsement.
So I love it when we bring guests
onto our show, and it just feels like
the timing is perfect, like all the stars
are aligned.
So here we are, ready for part two
of this episode, where we're going to dive
into your expertise on play.
(04:02):
Now, if you're a regular listener of this
show, you're probably sick of me saying, hey,
guest, tell us the five most important things
about plays.
You know that I like my lists, and
I like to be super organized.
We're not for this episode.
We're just going to see where the conversation
takes us.
But I thought if we're going to be
talking about play, Craig, the best place to
(04:23):
start would be with a definition.
When we're talking about play with dogs specifically,
but feel free to expand beyond dogs if
you'd like.
When you talk about play, how do you
define that word?
Absolutely.
So do you mean toy play or interpersonal
play?
You're talking about toy play, like interactive play,
(04:44):
like I would do.
I didn't know that you were going to
offer me options.
So let's go with both.
If you think about interpersonal play, I try
to split into two very basic groups as
a starting point.
It would be interpersonal play, which is basically
interaction with dog in absence of toy, manipulating
(05:05):
your behavior to encourage play derived behaviors from
your dog to the point that it doesn't
escalate to mouth contact, skin, teeth to skin,
or escalations that could potentially present a problem,
which is something that people with dogs that
have got like quite a strong tie back
to the predatory motor pattern tend to struggle
(05:25):
with.
The version of play that I tend to
spend a great deal of my training focus
on is interactive play or interactive toy play,
as I term it.
And that is a capitalization of the predatory
motor pattern, particularly up until the grab bite,
and then leading into manipulating the process for
the dog so that you've got all of
(05:45):
the aspects of your interpersonal play and developing
a unique experience for the dog, which involves
them biting, tugging, pushing, mouthing, whatever their preference
is with a toy.
So it's really a little bit of a
bridge between the two.
But what you're basically doing is facilitating the
dog's need and want to bite onto something
during play, as well as giving them an
(06:06):
outlet for those steps of the predatory motor
pattern.
Does that make sense?
I couldn't say it back to you, but
I think it makes sense.
I'd love to be able to say it
back to you, but I don't think we
have time to dive into me trying to
learn that.
You talked about the predatory motor pattern and
put on a couple of different hats for
us here.
So let's put on our ethological hat and
(06:30):
think about play from how that serves this
animal in the wild.
Is play a term that you find in
ethology?
Yeah, 100%.
So it's like if you think back to
like your ethological hat, you're going to find
that typically the predatory motor pattern is going
(06:52):
to relate to the dog orientating, chasing, etc.,
etc.
towards prey creatures and basically like the hunting
aspect of what they would be doing.
If we think about the way that we
are giving domesticated dogs an outlet for that,
I am wanting to capitalize on the outlets
(07:12):
all of the way up to the grab
bite to make sure that we fulfill the
dog's requirements or needs, giving them a sustainable
outlet for that process.
If you think about the other version that
would happen with play from an ethological standpoint,
it would be the development of predatory motor
skills in a litter of puppies and developing
(07:33):
their ability and learning.
And that happens, you know, across mammalians or
predatory mammalians anyway.
Like if you look at a pack of
wolves, you will notice when they are playing,
they are replicating predatory motor patterns slash fighting
skills as babies, all that help them later
on in their life when they develop on
to hunting.
What we're looking to do here is basically
(07:54):
facilitate that need for a domestic dog to
make sure that they've got all of their
outlets and no animals are harmed in the
making.
Let's stay there for a second.
So when I was thinking about this episode
today, this completely unrelated story came to mind
where I was doing education in a zoo
(08:15):
context and we were training birds to free
fly and we used to work with eagles.
The particular species of eagle that I'm thinking
about with regards to the story we're about
to tell was a wedge-tailed eagle in
Australia.
And these birds have been observed in the
wild to pick up sticks and fly really
high up into the sky, drop these sticks,
(08:38):
and then swoop down and catch them.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
And some observers commented that this appeared to
have no function that was understandable other than
the word play.
And so I would repeat these observations in
(08:59):
my talk talking about, I can't remember how
I slotted it in, but I did, and
suggest that I was told by someone that
came in, no, that's not right.
You have to stop saying that.
They were my new manager in this organization.
Because animals in the wild do not have
enough time to play.
Okay.
(09:20):
I wish you could all see Craig's face
when I said that.
Is play, therefore, from an ethological level of
analysis, is it based on, when we're talking
about predators anyway, which we are because we're
talking about dogs predominantly right now, or wedge
-tailed eagles in my case, is it focused
(09:41):
on that predatory motor pattern?
Is it focused on the parts of that
chain, do you think?
But also like adaptive learning and the ability
to develop social skills inside the group.
Because if you think about the format of
play, and if you watch two puppies or
three puppies engage with each other, you'll notice,
for example, if one is excessive with force
and hasn't developed the understanding of bite inhibition
(10:04):
and another puppy squirrels, typically you'll have a
break in the social interaction.
So as well as it tying back to
the predatory motor pattern, which it certainly does,
it also ties back to the development of
dog social skills and how to interact within
their social group and how that would be
responded or received by the other members of
(10:27):
that social group.
Because otherwise what you would end up with
is a load of puppies with absolutely no
bite inhibition, absolutely no ability to interact in
any type of social manner.
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
So its function in terms of how it
serves its species, it being a dog, or
(10:48):
for the purposes of this conversation, a predator,
is to learn the skills required to hunt
effectively.
And am I understanding from what you've just
said, there are social reinforcers there in terms
of shaping that behavior?
Yes, absolutely, because they're developing social skills through
(11:09):
the premise of play.
And if you watch like a group of
like, so, for example, when I was younger,
I used to spend hours with the litters
of Malinois puppies.
And you would watch as they develop all
of their motor skills and motor patterns, play
and engagement starts to pick up.
And you get, you know, along with play
and engagement, you get competition over resources.
(11:30):
You get chasing, you get but you get
all of these parts of, you know, the
predatory motor pattern, so to speak.
But you get the dogs developing a way
of interacting with each other in a reinforcing
manner rather than there being consistent conflict.
And, you know, seven out of 10 times
you see the group develop those skills by
themselves for good social interaction.
(11:50):
And that follows suit onto the mum, you
know, like they're interacting with the mum as
they start to get older.
They become a real pain in the mum's
bottom, so to speak, as they start to
get a little bit older because it becomes
too intense for mum.
But you can really see not only the
time back to the predatory motor pattern, which
is one aspect, but also the development of
social skills within the group and the ability
to interact socially from a play context with
(12:12):
inside of the social group.
Does that make sense?
It does.
And then thinking to now, let's take off
our ufology hat, put on our applied behaviour
analysis hat and think about the average dog
you're working with.
I'm sure there's outliers.
Is the reinforcer tied to, help me understand
(12:34):
this, the reinforcers are meeting the biological needs?
What are the reinforcers?
Absolutely.
What you're looking to do is to fulfil
the dog's biological needs in a means that
you can control so that they then don't
tie back to hunting, chasing, killing deers, chasing
(12:55):
cyclists, chasing other dogs whilst they're out biting
humans.
Like if you think about, we talked a
little bit earlier in the previous podcast about
the amount of bull breeds that I've seen
that have been often what the people have
termed as like agonistic biting in different sets
of circumstances.
When from my perspective, looking at the behaviour,
(13:15):
it absolutely isn't.
The dog is missing the outlet of biting
and playing with things.
Mum or dad have come home with a
big fluffy jacket on.
They've jumped up the caregiver.
They've tried to push the dog away to
try to stop them because they don't know
any better.
And the dog's gone, oh, wow, look, this
is an amazing game.
And this person's got this big swinging puffy
jacket around.
(13:35):
That looks like a great addition to the
game.
And they bite onto the puffy jacket.
And of course, as they do so, the
mum or dad starts to wave and scream
around like a big interactive play toy.
And then the dog's having like the best
time whilst also tearing their mum or dad's
jacket to pieces.
So it like it fulfils a biological need,
depending on the genetic influence on behaviour of
(13:56):
the individual.
If you've got a Basset hound, the ability
to play and the desire or the time
back to that predatory motor pattern in the
context of chase and bite may be varied
in comparison to what it would be with
a Malinois.
So it's like the genetic or the lineage
of the animal is going to have a
great bearing on how you manipulate the game
(14:17):
to suit them as an individual.
But yes, what you're saying is correct.
And so with the example of the dog
biting onto the jacket and thinking about the
conversation we've just had about play in young
adolescent juvenile predatory animals and the way that
(14:41):
that behaviour serves those animals in the wild
as they get to learn the skills, they
get to learn the social etiquette around specific
individual behaviours that we're labelling as play.
Our animals that live in our house, our
dogs, they're not learning those skills at a
(15:04):
young age.
Yeah, they are.
Yeah.
OK.
So if you think about like a group
of puppies, I sit with a group of
Malinois puppies and I watch them.
They are developing all of the social skills
within the nest or the litter of the
group of puppies.
What they're not doing is getting the predatory
outlets that a group of young wolf cubs,
to use the comparison, would do as they
(15:26):
start to develop further and further.
Well, they will do.
You'll see them stalk and you'll see them
hunt and pounce on each other.
But it's replicating the predatory motor pattern that
there is obviously a great deal of sociality
or social development involved in that.
As we're obviously when these puppies come out
of the nest, very quickly they start to
develop the ability to hunt in their social
(15:46):
structure, which is the outlet that I'm looking
to facilitate as we progress on with the
dogs that we're working with domestically.
But their social skills are certainly developed within
the nest.
And then they continue to develop depending on
the setting that they're in at home.
So like we got a puppy called Chacha
a year ago now.
So she's just over a year old.
(16:07):
So when she comes into our household of
now six dogs, at that point five dogs,
she's developing her social ability with all of
the dogs at home.
And what she's learning is social boundaries, different
interaction styles, calming signals, all of those things
that occur as part of social interactions.
What she's not getting in that setting is
(16:28):
her ability or any outlet for the predatory
motor pattern in the sense of hunting.
And that is manipulated by the training that
we're doing and the outlet of reinforcement that
we give her.
So that ultimately when she was to see
a rabbit, the reinforcement that we're offering in
that sort of context would overrise out of
the rabbit just due to reinforcement history and
having more access to what we give in
(16:49):
comparison to what the rabbit would give.
Does that make sense?
Yes.
And for most dogs that don't end up
living in Craig's house, they're learning the skills
with their littermates.
And then they're moving into a different context,
which is the house of whatever human family
(17:11):
that they end up living with.
But they're not learning the skills to, in
that context, effectively access those reinforcements.
Exactly.
And what they're then having is two different
styles of learning, because if they're with like
a new set of caregivers that have never
had a dog before, they're going to be
developing a great deal of their social skills
(17:33):
and social ability off of their caregivers.
And if their caregivers don't understand where biting
their sleeve goes or the road that that
could possibly go down from a reinforcement contingency
during the course of interactions, that behavior could
quickly build in reinforcement history and very quickly
become a problem behavior.
As where when they're in a group of
(17:54):
dogs, they're learning social skills from the group
of dogs that they're with, but they're also
learning social skills with the humans that they're
with.
So, for example, for the large proportion of
my adult life, I've had and trained Malinois
and working bred German Shepherds.
When they're babies, Ryan, all they want to
do is to bite you.
Like it's the process all of the time.
(18:15):
So if puppies are having some interpersonal play
and they haven't got like an alternative and
they bite skin, my process has always been
lamppost.
So just go completely dead like a lamppost.
And very quickly, the puppy goes, what's going
on?
He's not playing with me anymore.
The behavior ceases and there's no active reinforcement
behind it.
Unfortunately, the puppy's teeth are very sharp.
(18:35):
And what most people do is go and
offer resistance.
And then as the puppy bites the finger,
this is an amazing game.
And then what they've got to try to
do is pick the puppy up and put
it somewhere or to separate it.
As where if you can roll with a
consistent reinforcement history from a social level of
like biting or making skin contact with the
human, producing no reinforcement.
(18:55):
It gives you like for my big dog,
Zen, we can play and have like interpersonal
play and his mouth will snort like a
pig and roll over.
And what he won't do is actively go,
I'm going to put my arm, your arm
in my mouth.
Because since he's been a baby, baby, the
parties always stop when that's occurred.
So there's nice consistency with him.
But he has all of the outlets for
(19:17):
biting stuff like he plays every day.
We obviously have lots of working training.
So he gets to buy a costume on
a relatively regular basis.
So is that why play is so interesting
to you?
Or is it because of what because the
need to teach people and put people to
learn about it?
Or is it because of your experience?
(19:38):
It's very interesting to me for a multitude
of different reasons.
That's one aspect.
And in fact, it's one of the aspects
that a lot of people overlook, actually.
So I'm really pleased that you've asked all
of the questions on it.
The reason that it usually fulfills such a
great need for people is basically the differentiation
in reinforcement that the dogs used to.
So, you know, most people, when they go
(19:59):
into a training setting, they're thinking about food
as like their primary source of reinforcement.
You know, people, as they get further along
the line, they start to understand like pre
-med principles and such, and they start to
give some variation.
Or if they understand toy play, they think
it's throwing a ball for the dog and
just the dog going to retrieve, which is
obviously part of the process, but not great
(20:20):
for your dog over like time under tension
or a long period of time.
As well, like the best thing for me
is watching the dog develop this style of
play and engagement with a handler that then
allows them to come completely out of their
box that they're used to with regards to
the interaction that you get.
Because, you know, a lot of people biting
(20:43):
anything is almost like a chastisable behavior.
If you think about like a conventional pet
caregiver setting, if a dog bites something, it's
not something that they're supposed to be doing,
which is completely misconstrued with their understanding.
As where once you give the dog an
outlet to do that in the correct manner
and put all of the parameters in place,
you then see the dog's reinforcement structure change.
(21:05):
And then all of the things that the
person wants the dog to do get performed
at such a higher level because the dog
is really, really interested in the reinforcer in
that set of circumstances.
So, yes, it gives them an outlet.
But what it also does is changes the
relationship or the dynamic between the caregiver and
the dog, because now the caregiver has got
an additional reinforcer that the dog is really,
(21:27):
really interested in.
And it allows them to develop that skill
set.
Does that make sense?
It makes sense.
What you're getting from it is, I mean,
give me a ballpark figure.
How many dogs do you think you've worked
with?
Now, I want to frame the question like
how many dogs have you worked with in
a relationship to play?
(21:47):
But I think it's potentially the same question.
Thousands, Ryan, at this point.
If you think I'm 37 now, I've been
training dogs to bite things my whole adult
life.
So that's 20 years of working through processes
like this.
So it's thousands of dogs at this point.
If you think on an average play workshop
day, it's 18 dogs over the course of
(22:07):
like three mini workshops.
And I don't know how many hundreds and
hundreds of those I've done.
And I'm still not bored of it.
Ryan, I still get lots of requests.
I can't teach as much now because I'm
so busy with everything else that I do.
But I still enjoy it so much because
it's different for the vast majority.
If you're working with a sports dog handler,
you can start to work through technicalities, reward
(22:29):
specific markers, reward placement, variation to the way
the play is adapted.
If you're working with a fresh out of
the box caregiver that's struggling with their dog
chasing squirrels down the park and they're trying
to call it back for a crusty bit
of kibble and you introduce like a roadkill
extensions or a fluffy chaser toy to them
(22:50):
in the correct manner and the dog is
now chasing it super enthusiastically and their recall
performance goes up by like 200 percent because
the dog is so engaged by the reinforcer.
Both of them, for me, they're the same
process, but different outcomes.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, it would make sense if you've worked
with thousands and thousands of dogs that for
(23:13):
you to be able to leverage your knowledge
and your skill to bring about that amount
of kind of change in an individual dog
and therefore and also the owner and therefore
the relationship.
Yeah, that completely makes sense, 100 percent.
And it makes sense based on what we've
talked about thus far as to why this
(23:35):
is so important.
And because, Craig, you said in part one,
you traveled around the world, you've written a
book.
There is a huge demand for knowledge and
skill development when it comes to play.
Am I wrong?
Yes.
Yes.
And it's still I still get so many
(23:55):
requests for it.
And it's still for me like a little
bit of an untapped subject, because one of
the other things that we haven't talked about
yet is obviously the correlation with escalating arousal
during the course of using a reinforcer such
as this, which is another thing that I
think is really understood.
You know, when I do seminars on communication,
(24:16):
arousal and problematic behavior, I always talk through
the concept of making friends with the little
devil on your dog's shoulder.
And like a lot of the time in,
you know, particularly in a behavior setting, I
find that arousal is almost like, oh, we've
got to be really, really careful with what
we do, because what we don't want the
dog to do is to get too aroused,
because that could potentially present a problem.
(24:37):
And what I always talk to people about
is, you know, gauging neuroplasticity, so to speak,
and looking to increase the dog's ability to
communicate in escalating states of arousal in a
controllable setting and ultimately stretch the elastic band
out so that the dog has got plentiful
experience communicating, engaging, responding to cues in an
(24:59):
escalated state of arousal, rather than as so
many people do, I find is I usually
always use the comparison, trying to teach a
dog to shoot in a gunfight, which means,
you know, trying to adopt a high level
set of skills in a very stressful environment.
So the dog's seeing the squirrel and they're
trying to get the dog to regal back
to them and engage.
The dog is super aroused during the course
of a training session.
(25:20):
And, you know, they're trying to get them
to follow instruction with no previous experience.
Well, I love that making friends with the
devil on your dog's shoulder.
I heard you say that in another podcast
and I was going to bring that up
today.
And I was thinking, I think I'm real
smart because I'm saying something that you beat
me to it.
(25:40):
But making friends with the devil on your
dog's shoulder is saying.
The little devil on the dog's shoulder is
trying to find an outlet for those aroused
interactions that tie both back to the predatory
motor pattern and the dog's genetic influence on
behavior.
So if somebody says to me, you know,
(26:01):
which isn't the right terminology, but they say
to me, oh, God, my dog's really naughty.
You know, this is a pet caregiver.
They're doing this, this and this.
And I always say to them, the little
devil on the dog's shoulder is finding his
own work.
Like he's finding things to do to give
him an outlet for that as well.
What I want to do is make friends
with the little devil, give him all of
the outlets that he needs, and then use
that little devil to better the relationship and
(26:22):
the training process between the dog and the
caregiver, because they're not then stop fighting against
it.
And I find so often the barrier and
the understanding of what arousal looks like in
a training setting and how it can be
really well functionally used for the benefit of
both the dog and the caregiver is usually
misconstrued.
(26:43):
And it's misconstrued because it hasn't been intentionally
addressed in terms of.
Yeah, if you think right, and how many
times have you heard somebody say, I want
to keep the dog calm, I want the
dog to be calm, I want the dog
to be calm all of the time.
And if you think about like a Malinois,
like Zen will sleep on the sofa in
(27:05):
the office whilst I sit on Zoom calls
for three hours back to back, no problems
whatsoever.
But his needs are completely met.
He has an outlet for all of these
things.
And during the course of training, he is
as far removed from calm as is possible.
But it's all concise and controlled because we've
got so much time under tension and practice
with giving him aroused outlets, practicing his ability
(27:27):
to follow instruction based on cues and environmental
arrangements, etc, etc.
During training, when he is aroused, that his
ability to communicate when he's really, really aroused
is great.
And his sweet spot for training is actually
when he's in quite an aroused state, that
he's still able to do everything that we've
mapped out through the course of the training
session.
And that's because practice.
(27:48):
But what I'm not doing is exposing him
to things that he can't deal with and
then expecting him to be like, oh, yeah,
I can do that.
That's no problem because I can do it
in a calmer setting.
So I often think that there's not enough
sort of developed understanding or working with dogs
that need that type of outlet.
And that's something that play also adds into
and really gives the person the ability to
(28:10):
build a better relationship, particularly during the course
of a training in a domestic setting.
All right.
So the listeners of the show, Craig, mostly
professional dog trainers or animal trainers.
A lot of you, no disrespect, I know
a lot of you don't work with dogs,
but professional trainers.
(28:31):
And you mentioned earlier, it's a little bit
of an untapped resource.
So you're listening to this podcast and you've
got your successful dog training business and you're
dealing with reactivity and jumping up on visitors
when they reach the house and counter surfing
or whatever.
Or dogs barking excessively at home and in
(28:55):
various parts of the house or garden.
And you're hearing Craig talk about these exciting
things and you hear him say it's a
little bit of an untapped resource.
What does that person do with this information?
How do they take the next step?
Use it from a practical standpoint.
So first of all, I'm very big behind
developing or adapting the play process to suit
(29:18):
the individual.
So the first thing that we need to
do is to look at the dogs that
we're working with and think, is this part,
is this concept being used as part of
the dog's fulfillment protocol?
So are we using some version of play?
And does the dog's behavior profile suit some
version of play?
Which for the majority of dogs, with a
(29:39):
few outliers, you're going to find that it's
going to be the case that it certainly
does fit.
But the adaptability of the process is going
to be dependent on the individual.
Then what we need to think about is
like structuring the process and how are we
going to establish the reinforcer?
I'm very big behind establishing a reinforcer before
we go and use it in a training
setting.
So the stepping stones I would follow to
do that is, first of all, what is
(30:01):
the dog's interest in toys, biting, grabbing or
chasing things?
If the caregiver says, oh, God, you know,
the dog's really interested in play.
He's got toys at home.
He picks them up and plays with them
on a regular basis.
What I'm basically looking for is the dog's
favorite items to bite.
That is one aspect.
The next one is the dog doesn't play.
He's not interested whatsoever.
That's typically because the process hasn't been adapted
(30:23):
to suit the dog.
And the person has tried wiggling the toy
in the dog's face.
The dog doesn't bite onto it.
And they go, oh, God, this dog isn't
interested in play.
So the questions I would then ask is
looking outside of the box a little bit.
Does the dog ever bite or destroy anything?
Does the dog ever chase anything, pick anything
up in its mouth?
In the UK, we've got I'm sure you've
got in New Zealand as well.
But we've got like this bedding substrate called
(30:45):
vet bed, which is basically like a woolly.
It's often used in veterinary settings, strangely enough,
by the name.
But it's like a woolly fluffy chaser toy
bed, basically.
And a lot of people have lots of
issues with the dog sort of tearing those
to pieces when they're babies, which means that
they're quickly removed and replaced with something that
is a little bit more durable.
So they may say, you know, they've destroyed
(31:06):
vet bed when they're a baby.
They may say that, you know, they pick
up my fluffy slipper and run around the
house.
They steal tea towels, whatever it would be.
What I'm looking for is a collation of
material that would be similar to the things
that they like to bite onto.
If they've got no interest in anything whatsoever,
what we would then do is go about
what I call the choice to chase test,
which is a process that you can follow
(31:27):
in any low distraction environment.
That could be a living room, a garden,
obviously, depending on the dog's environmental awareness.
So if you were to do it in
a living room, you'd get a couple of
the items that the client that the caregiver
had mentioned.
Or alternatively, you would select a range of
smaller material toys like a roadkill toy, you
(31:49):
know, like one of the squeaky squirrel type
toys.
Those work really well.
The squeak works fantastically for those.
You could also use a tennis ball or
a tennis ball type material.
And then you could go with something that
would be exuberantly fluffy, like a fluffy chaser
toy, as an example.
And what we'd basically be looking to do
is to have the dog in an open
space, make sure that their behavior markers are
(32:11):
loose and fluid and they're completely comfortable with
the environment.
At which point, what I would then do
is make a very gentle, low level novel
stimulus noise.
What I usually use is, which is like
a little bird whistle.
And then the dog goes, oh, what's going
on over there?
As they head check me, I'm then going
to throw the item in the opposite direction.
What that gives me is a completely free
(32:32):
flowing ability for the dog to make the
decision to orientate towards the toy with absolutely
no inadvertent pressure from the caregiver whatsoever.
Heads up on the first repetition, the dog
might do absolutely nothing with it.
They might go over to it, sniff it.
You might even see some behavior markers that
suggest conflict on approach.
But what we're not going to do then
is to go, OK, that one isn't a
(32:53):
winner.
We're going to pick the toy up.
We're going to orientate away from the dog.
And we're going to make sure, again, we
repeat the process and throw in the opposite
direction, dependent on the dog's behavior markers.
I've had so many dogs in that type
of setting, whereas they've gone the first repetition.
Everybody goes, oh, they're definitely not interested in
that.
By the third repetition, the dog picked it
up, head shook it and started to run
around the training school with it.
(33:14):
Which means ultimately we found the reinforcer to
suit them.
So then what I would do is just
automate between the items and see which one
we get the dog's most preference with.
So once we've got that preference, what I'm
then looking for is to establish or build
into the dog being able to chase that
item with an extension.
So I always think of toys in the
form of laws and extensions.
(33:35):
So we've got this law, which is a
smaller toy that the dogs chased and showed
some interest in.
Then what we're looking to do is to
build up a sustainable amount of reinforcement history.
So the dog's happily chasing it, picking it
up, head shaking it.
If they're happy to bring it to you,
you can start to eke into a little
bit of a tug, which we'll talk about
in more of a structured manner in a
moment.
So once the dog's got really good reinforcement
(33:55):
history of that singular item, then I'm going
to attach a bit of cord, which would
be no less than three millimeters in diameter
to make sure if the dog was to
bite it, it's not going to hook in
between their teeth or damage their mouth.
And it needs to be approximately 1.5
to 2 meters long.
What we're then going to do, just being
mindful that when you attach an extension to
like that, it can become a complete novel
(34:17):
stimulus for the dog, even though they've just
been biting the toy two or three times
back to back.
So I would always wrap a little bit
of rope up in my hand with the
toy visually hanging from the hand.
Throw the toy and the bit of string
together, making sure that you throw it low
and not overhead, because what you don't want
the string to do is to extend over
the dog's head, because with dogs that are
(34:38):
potentially a little bit more sensitive, what you
might find is that cause again conflict and
may inhibit their ability to chase after the
toy.
What I'm looking for at that process is
the dog's ability to then move over and
bite onto the toy in the same manner.
As they start to do that, what I'm
then going to do is to work my
way towards holding the bit of string and
throwing the toy so that it's hitting the
ground with me holding the extension.
(35:00):
Once we've got that and the dog's orientating
towards it, what we're going to start to
do is to move in a circular motion
so that the toy starts to trail along
the floor with the replication of the movement
of a prey creature.
So when you're moving it, you want to
try to make sure that your wrist is
wriggling and that portrays the end part of
the toy, not the rope, so that you've
got a little bit of wiggle in motion.
The type of movement that you need here
(35:22):
is challenging but achievable.
So as it's moving along the ground, it
mustn't go super slowly and it mustn't just
move like a pencil case being dragged along
the floor with no movement.
There needs to be that wiggle or that
predatory, that prey creature movement pattern.
So what you're then going to find is
the dog starts to move towards it.
Usually they do what I call the Snow
Fox Pounce, which is basically orientation with the
(35:44):
front paws to try to stop it.
What we're going to start to do is
to build towards the dog, incrementally chasing the
item, which will then lead into the grab
bite on the move.
We want the dog, from a reinforcement contingency
standpoint, to believe that their action on trying
to bite the toy on the move is
the one that catches the toy, not you
pausing the toy and waiting for them to
(36:05):
bite it, because otherwise what they'll start to
do very quickly as part of the process
is herd the toy as it's moving, wait
for it to pause and then bite onto
it to move, which can be beneficial for
dogs that are very strongly tied back to
herding, such as Border Collies, etc.
But for the process, if we can get
them chasing and biting, that tends to work
quite well.
So dog bites onto the toy, our attachment
(36:26):
point is 1.5 to 2 metres away
from the dog.
What most people do at this point is
they go into an overzealous manner of tugging.
They pull in at their elbows and jerk
up and down.
We do not want to do that.
What we want to do instead is to
hold the toy with a nice straight arm.
You're going to move two steps left so
that you've got a nice, what I call
it is like tactical tension.
You want enough tension on the toy so
(36:48):
that it's creating resistance, but not so much
that you're pulling it out of the dog's
mouth.
So you take two steps left and two
steps right so that you've got like a
nice swaying motion of the toy having just
enough tension for the dog to start to
create resistance.
As the dog starts to create resistance, they're
going to do one of three things.
They're either going to tug and resist back,
which is perfect.
(37:08):
They're going to hold strong and start to
sort of double down on the toy, or
they're going to start to move towards you.
What we're aiming for is to manipulate the
play style to suit the dog.
The movement during the game tends to be
beneficial for the tugging process.
So by keeping that lateral motion of two
steps left, two steps right, what we're going
to encourage is a little bit more movement
(37:29):
during the course of the tug.
And typically, as the dogs start to feel
the pushback producing reinforcement, which is them tugging
the toy with you, the pullback of the
toy starts to become a more and more
prominent part of the process.
So as we're doing these steps left to
right, you're going to switch hands as you're
doing so.
But what I want then the person to
do is typically sort of overhand grab the
(37:49):
rope so that they're getting incrementally closer to
the dog's contact point as they're tugging.
Typically, somewhere around about four to 600 millimeters
away from where the dog is biting is
a good starting point for you to be
holding where the dog is tugging.
And what we're looking to do then is
as they start to resist back, we want
to give the dog the inclination that they
(38:11):
are winning on a regular basis.
What does a win look like?
For me, it's a drop in tension in
pairing with a behavior action from the dog.
So if the dog has got a really
solid grip or is pulling back, you've got
a long extension.
You can let the toy go dead and
then start the game again, which usually causes
more intensity in the actions that are occurring
at that point in time.
(38:31):
What we would want that to build towards
is letting the dog win the toy completely
and returning, which depending on the dog and
their reinforcement history, there's multiple ways to do.
We may have to shape it at the
beginning and then sort of merge it into
the play process, which I can talk through.
But for most people, the fundamental mistake that
they make with the win is that the
(38:51):
dog is at six o'clock, they're at
12 o'clock.
As they let the dog win, they stutter
or shuffle forward, which usually causes reflective action
from the dog's perspective.
And they say, mom, dad, chase me and
sort of run off across the training center
or the room away from them.
And of course, the handler then goes, oh,
god, I need to get to the dog.
And that becomes the game.
As where on so many occasions with people
(39:13):
that have retrieving issues, I've said to them,
let go of the toy at six o
'clock and run to 12.
And all of a sudden the dog goes,
this is a completely different contingency.
I need to get off the mom or
dad.
And then they chase after and you're able
to catch the toy.
You can add, as I do with everybody
that I work with, clinicality to the retrieve,
because I think it's an important part of
the game to make sure that everything flows
and the person basically doesn't get into conflict
(39:35):
with training.
When we start to develop the tug and
the dog is offering a good amount of
resistance, the bit that is like magical for
me, so to speak, is they're manipulating the
tug to suit the dog as an individual.
So what I always say to people is
the toy is just an extension to the
experience that you create.
So you're creating an experience with your dog.
The toy is just a bridge to creating
(39:57):
that experience.
And what we want to try to do
now is to consider all of the sort
of interpersonal play aspects that you carry out
with your dog.
So if you think about everybody, regardless of
what they say, when we're alone with our
dogs, like we do things that are goofy
and stupid, we make stupid noises, we blow
raspberries, we run around, we share tactile affection
in a particular way.
(40:18):
Adding those bits into the game are the
bit that makes the game special for you
and your dog because you're adapting the process
in a way that nobody else can do.
I've got a massive amount of experience in
teaching dogs to bite stuff, and I'm very,
very fortunate to have that experience.
But if I've got somebody that's been playing
with their dog every two days for the
(40:38):
last two years, they've got an immense amount
of time under tension playing with this dog
as an individual, and they understand what makes
their dog tick.
And that's where sort of the speciality comes
into place for me because you can really
adapt the play process to suit the dog
as an individual.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I like your phrasing of it.
It's challenging but achievable.
(40:59):
I mean, it all makes sense.
And for the listeners of the show and
for myself and for people wanting to implement
this, obviously, you're going to have to put
that into practice and get some repetitions under
your belt to build that skill set.
Now, then I'm assuming once you have that
tug and you have that play, then you
(41:20):
can use it as a reinforcer to shape
behaviors and so you're contributing that.
This is what I'm taking away.
So to feedback to me if I'm missing
anything and build on what I'm saying and
so you're meeting those needs of the dog.
So therefore that's going to flow over if
(41:41):
you're working with your clients into whatever behavior
challenges they're calling you up about because having
met your dog's needs in this way is
going to create happiness as we talked about
in part one.
Absolutely.
But if we dig in like a tiny
little bit deeper, if you think about the
(42:01):
– we've established play as a reinforcer.
What I'm looking for is sustainability with the
dog's response in an average of five sessions.
So if we were to go into the
garden where we'd set the session up and
we were to follow the antecedent that would
suggest toy play is going to be available
and we get the same response, same engagement
back-to-back, that's indicative to me that
(42:22):
in this setting, in this learning environment, the
dog is quite happy with play as a
reinforcer.
Now if we was thinking about from an
outlet perspective, a dog that was potentially struggling
with mouthing, et cetera, at home, what we
would start to do then is manipulate the
reinforcer into some parameters that give the dog
clarity with their availability of biting the object
(42:45):
and the limited availability of biting the person.
So that may be stop games as I
call them.
So one of the things that I'll do
as a foundation game is I'll have a
little bit of food in hand.
I'll start off with a low-level food
follow.
I'll move off, pause with dynamic movement, which
body language markers suggest to the dog that
I want them to stop.
They stop and I mark and reward them
(43:06):
with food.
And then I would elevate the process of
doing the same thing with toy play.
The only difference being is as the dog
offers a dead-fix stand or a sit
or whatever behaviour we're working on, then the
toy becomes accessible.
So you're developing almost what I would call
an unreasonable set of circumstances if somebody was
looking.
They'd say, well, you're running from the dog
(43:27):
with a toy in your hand.
It's inevitable that they're going to bite you.
It's not if you follow the steps leading
up to the dog going.
The contingency here is keeping paws on floor.
When mum or dad freezes, I offer X
behaviour, which produces the reinforcer that I want,
which then gives you so much benefit of
being able to, again, develop the dog's ability
to think when they're in a slightly more
(43:48):
aroused state, which again, I've done this with
so many different dogs for rescue settings, behaviour
clients, et cetera, et cetera.
And it works really, really well, as long
as you adjust the process to suit the
individual.
So you're giving them an outlet.
But what you're also doing, Ryan, is helping
them develop the ability to think when they're
a little bit more aroused or when they
get into these aroused states, so that then
you've got like the two peaks of the
(44:10):
mountain coming together, which ultimately, as long as
applied correctly, give the dog a sustainable outlet
for their needs, but also help them develop
the ability to think when they're a little
bit more aroused, which is beneficial for everything
that we do.
And then looking at the time, we don't
have time for too much more, even though
I feel like we're just scratching the surface.
(44:30):
But share with everyone before we finish, we'll
make sure to mention your book and places
where they can go to if they have
liked what they've heard today, learn more from
you, Craig.
So this is, my question was, this is
beneficial for all the dogs, right?
Because all of the dogs are dogs.
(44:52):
And so they have that predatory motor sequence.
Yep.
And so it's going to be beneficial for
all the dogs or?
So I gave the example of the dog
that we were meeting their need with regards
to play.
And then we've obviously got like the sporting
(45:13):
aspect that I just talked through, whereas you
would establish the reinforcer without being elongated, because
we've not got lots of time.
But what you would then start to do
is to use that as a reinforcer for
previously trained behaviors, typically, or you could use
the toy as part of the shaping process,
which is a long conversation, which we can,
I'm sure, talk for another time.
(45:33):
But ultimately, it is beneficial for the large
majority of dogs in some aspect.
But the way that a particular genetic group
will play in comparison to the other, there
will be some similarities.
But it's very, very important to adapt the
process for the individual.
Example, I've worked with lots of dogs that
have come from like foreign rescue dogs that
(45:55):
have come from different countries.
And they've landed themselves in a house in
the UK somewhere.
And the person contacts me and says, oh,
you know, really struggling with this doggy that
we've got.
He's been hidden under the kitchen table for
the last however long.
And we go ahead with the behavior mod
plan, which starts to work fantastically.
And then what it also introduces a version
of play.
Now, for that dog, Ryan, in that setting,
(46:17):
introducing conventional toy play, as we've just talked
through.
Typically, the dog isn't in a stable or
comfortable enough state as their baseline, which we
work on developing to get there immediately.
So what I'll introduce is a food-derived
toy.
And follow a variation of the same steps
that we've just talked through, but you're basically
forming or making the toy a secondary reinforcer
(46:39):
because of the correlation with food.
And you watch these little dogs like come
out of their box over the case of
a short session.
They start off with just simple targeting where
they're sort of still and they reach their
neck to get a little bit of food
out of there.
And then by the end of the session,
they're pouncing across the living room and opening
up the fluffy ball to get the food
out, which then later on leads to food.
Because there is a process that we're following,
(47:03):
but we're not like, if I was training
a leased dog, for example, I need the
dogs to do things in a very particular
way in a very particular sequence.
I'm looking for clinicality all of the time.
This is literally establishment of reinforcement.
So the way that the dog does it
is only important that the dog is reinforced
by it.
So if the dog chases it, does a
roly-poly and opens it, laying on its
(47:24):
back on the side to do it, it
doesn't matter to start with because the dog
is seeking reinforcement from the activity, which again
is one of the other magic parts of
it.
Magic is science, but it works really well.
Nice.
I think that's a good place to end.
But for those listening, they have been inspired
today.
They want to learn more.
(47:46):
They can see you in some random country
around the world, Switzerland or Australia, potentially.
Already you have done those by the time
this is released, but they can read your
book.
Where else can they go?
What are their opportunities to learn more from
you specifically about this topic?
If anybody's got any questions whatsoever, it's Craig
(48:08):
Ogilvie Dogs on Instagram.
That's the best place to reach out and
contact me.
I'll happily have conversations and sort of chop
it up with people if they want to
message me on there.
The website is OgilvieDogs.com, and my handle
is Craig Ogilvie Dogs on all of the
platforms.
So feel free to drop me a message
anywhere.
And, Craig, moving forward, we do ask this
of everyone.
(48:29):
And I forgot to mention that to you
earlier.
Sorry.
But what do you want to see happen
with regards to this?
Because you said it's an untapped – I
can't remember the words you used.
I wrote it down somewhere.
An untapped resource, I think, was what you
said earlier.
And that aligns with the excitement, I would
say, shared by members of our community when
(48:53):
they're coming into our community areas within our
membership and sharing their newfound love for using
toys and play as reinforcers.
What do you want to see happen over
the next five to ten years in terms
of play?
But if you want to answer for the
broader animal training, dog training world as well,
(49:14):
where do you want to see this go?
From a play perspective.
I've been, again, doing this for a really
good period of time.
And in a sports and working setting, play
is something that is very, very prominent.
I think in the wider expanse of the
animal training community, I'd just like to see
it spread.
I'd like to see dogs being able to
(49:35):
express the outlets that are needed to fulfill
their needs and it to be used as
a positive rather than oh-so-often.
The downside is people see the side effects
as a negative because the people aren't having
those needs met.
And again, it's so super popular as an
outlet.
Even 20 years ago, Brian, like play was
(49:55):
used regularly during the course of training working
dogs, certainly in the circles that I've mixed
in and had exposure to.
But it's just if we could see that
expand and people develop as much of an
open mind with regards to using it.
And also, because I think the correlation with
arousal is the thing that often puts a
lot of people off.
And developing an understanding of diagnostically where a
(50:18):
dog's baseline is, the point that they're able
to bridge to and still communicate effectively, how
to bring them back down, how to work
through a session using play and increased reinforcement.
It will do for the better for the
animal training community and animal caregivers or pet
dog caregivers over the world.
Amazing.
Well, thank you for all that you do
(50:38):
to share that information and to build our
capacity and skill and knowledge in this area.
And you listeners are probably excited like me,
realizing how much there is to learn when
it comes to animal training and behavior and
that never stops.
Craig, we will link to everything we've mentioned
social media wise that Craig mentioned earlier in
(51:00):
books, et cetera, in the show notes for
that.
For this episode, we will officially now wrap
up part two, though.
This has been a ton of fun, Craig.
So from myself and everyone listening, thank you
so much for making time for us.
Thank you very much for having me, my
man.
It's been an absolute pleasure.
And thank you, everybody, for listening.
(51:21):
And thank you so much for listening as
well.
This is your host, Ryan Cartlidge, signing off
from this episode of the Animal Training Academy
podcast show.
We hope today's conversation inspired you and equipped
you with new tools for your trainer's toolbox.
Remember, every challenge in training is an opportunity
(51:43):
to learn and sharpen your animal training geekery.
Embrace the rough patches, learn from them, and
keep improving.
And don't forget, the path to growing your
skills and expanding your knowledge continues beyond this
episode.
Visit www.atamember.com to join our supportive
(52:07):
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trainers just like you.
Together, we're making a huge positive difference in
the lives of animal and human learners worldwide.
Until next time, keep honing your skills, stay
awesome, and remember, every interaction with an animal
(52:29):
or human learner is your opportunity to create
ripples.
We're here, cheering you on every step of
the way.
See you at the next episode.
Welcome to the Animal Training Academy podcast show.
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And of course, in the meantime, enjoy this
free podcast episode as we explore new ways
to help you supercharge your training skills, grow
your knowledge, and build your confidence so that
you can craft a life that positively impacts
(01:32):
every learner you encounter.
But we will start today's episode where I'm
thrilled to welcome back to the show the
awesome Craig Ogilvie.
Craig is a highly respected dog trainer and
mentor based in the UK.
He owns and operates Ogilvie Dogs, a premium
(01:54):
dog training center designed to cater to all
dog sport disciplines, including agility, obedience, HTM, flyball,
and more.
In addition to his training center, Craig runs
Big Bark Media, a media agency focused on
supporting dog-related businesses.
He also offers mentorship to dog business owners
(02:14):
internationally, sharing his wealth of knowledge and experience.
Craig is also an author, having written the
Interactive Play Guide, where he outlines his successful
techniques for creating positive reinforcement strategies using interactive
play.
His dedication to the dog world has made
him a sought-after figure for both training
(02:36):
and business mentorship.
Craig, thanks so much for coming back to
hang out with us again on the Animal
Training Academy podcast show.
My pleasure.
Craig, recently in our members-only community, we've
had a surge of members sharing about the
training they're doing using toys and play as
(02:57):
reinforcers.
After they shared videos and their excitement over
exploring this new area for their training, I
received requests to find the best person to
join us on the ATA podcast to talk
about this topic and the role of play.
I immediately thought of you, and one of
our members specifically requested you.
(03:19):
As it happens, listeners of this show, I
even found myself at your training facility in
Bourne, UK a few months ago for the
PPG British Isles Summit, where I was attending
as a participant.
Unfortunately, our paths didn't cross, as you were
off doing amazing things with dogs in another
country, but I was reminded of you once
again.
(03:40):
On this recent trip, though, I was thrilled
to connect in person with Chirag Patel, and
in our conversations, he gave you a glowing
endorsement.
So I love it when we bring guests
onto our show, and it just feels like
the timing is perfect, like all the stars
are aligned.
So here we are, ready for part two
of this episode, where we're going to dive
into your expertise on play.
(04:02):
Now, if you're a regular listener of this
show, you're probably sick of me saying, hey,
guest, tell us the five most important things
about plays.
You know that I like my lists, and
I like to be super organized.
We're not for this episode.
We're just going to see where the conversation
takes us.
But I thought if we're going to be
talking about play, Craig, the best place to
(04:23):
start would be with a definition.
When we're talking about play with dogs specifically,
but feel free to expand beyond dogs if
you'd like.
When you talk about play, how do you
define that word?
Absolutely.
So do you mean toy play or interpersonal
play?
You're talking about toy play, like interactive play,
(04:44):
like I would do.
I didn't know that you were going to
offer me options.
So let's go with both.
If you think about interpersonal play, I try
to split into two very basic groups as
a starting point.
It would be interpersonal play, which is basically
interaction with dog in absence of toy, manipulating
(05:05):
your behavior to encourage play derived behaviors from
your dog to the point that it doesn't
escalate to mouth contact, skin, teeth to skin,
or escalations that could potentially present a problem,
which is something that people with dogs that
have got like quite a strong tie back
to the predatory motor pattern tend to struggle
(05:25):
with.
The version of play that I tend to
spend a great deal of my training focus
on is interactive play or interactive toy play,
as I term it.
And that is a capitalization of the predatory
motor pattern, particularly up until the grab bite,
and then leading into manipulating the process for
the dog so that you've got all of
(05:45):
the aspects of your interpersonal play and developing
a unique experience for the dog, which involves
them biting, tugging, pushing, mouthing, whatever their preference
is with a toy.
So it's really a little bit of a
bridge between the two.
But what you're basically doing is facilitating the
dog's need and want to bite onto something
during play, as well as giving them an
(06:06):
outlet for those steps of the predatory motor
pattern.
Does that make sense?
I couldn't say it back to you, but
I think it makes sense.
I'd love to be able to say it
back to you, but I don't think we
have time to dive into me trying to
learn that.
You talked about the predatory motor pattern and
put on a couple of different hats for
us here.
So let's put on our ethological hat and
(06:30):
think about play from how that serves this
animal in the wild.
Is play a term that you find in
ethology?
Yeah, 100%.
So it's like if you think back to
like your ethological hat, you're going to find
that typically the predatory motor pattern is going
(06:52):
to relate to the dog orientating, chasing, etc.,
etc.
towards prey creatures and basically like the hunting
aspect of what they would be doing.
If we think about the way that we
are giving domesticated dogs an outlet for that,
I am wanting to capitalize on the outlets
(07:12):
all of the way up to the grab
bite to make sure that we fulfill the
dog's requirements or needs, giving them a sustainable
outlet for that process.
If you think about the other version that
would happen with play from an ethological standpoint,
it would be the development of predatory motor
skills in a litter of puppies and developing
(07:33):
their ability and learning.
And that happens, you know, across mammalians or
predatory mammalians anyway.
Like if you look at a pack of
wolves, you will notice when they are playing,
they are replicating predatory motor patterns slash fighting
skills as babies, all that help them later
on in their life when they develop on
to hunting.
What we're looking to do here is basically
(07:54):
facilitate that need for a domestic dog to
make sure that they've got all of their
outlets and no animals are harmed in the
making.
Let's stay there for a second.
So when I was thinking about this episode
today, this completely unrelated story came to mind
where I was doing education in a zoo
(08:15):
context and we were training birds to free
fly and we used to work with eagles.
The particular species of eagle that I'm thinking
about with regards to the story we're about
to tell was a wedge-tailed eagle in
Australia.
And these birds have been observed in the
wild to pick up sticks and fly really
high up into the sky, drop these sticks,
(08:38):
and then swoop down and catch them.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
And some observers commented that this appeared to
have no function that was understandable other than
the word play.
And so I would repeat these observations in
(08:59):
my talk talking about, I can't remember how
I slotted it in, but I did, and
suggest that I was told by someone that
came in, no, that's not right.
You have to stop saying that.
They were my new manager in this organization.
Because animals in the wild do not have
enough time to play.
Okay.
(09:20):
I wish you could all see Craig's face
when I said that.
Is play, therefore, from an ethological level of
analysis, is it based on, when we're talking
about predators anyway, which we are because we're
talking about dogs predominantly right now, or wedge
-tailed eagles in my case, is it focused
(09:41):
on that predatory motor pattern?
Is it focused on the parts of that
chain, do you think?
But also like adaptive learning and the ability
to develop social skills inside the group.
Because if you think about the format of
play, and if you watch two puppies or
three puppies engage with each other, you'll notice,
for example, if one is excessive with force
and hasn't developed the understanding of bite inhibition
(10:04):
and another puppy squirrels, typically you'll have a
break in the social interaction.
So as well as it tying back to
the predatory motor pattern, which it certainly does,
it also ties back to the development of
dog social skills and how to interact within
their social group and how that would be
responded or received by the other members of
(10:27):
that social group.
Because otherwise what you would end up with
is a load of puppies with absolutely no
bite inhibition, absolutely no ability to interact in
any type of social manner.
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
So its function in terms of how it
serves its species, it being a dog, or
(10:48):
for the purposes of this conversation, a predator,
is to learn the skills required to hunt
effectively.
And am I understanding from what you've just
said, there are social reinforcers there in terms
of shaping that behavior?
Yes, absolutely, because they're developing social skills through
(11:09):
the premise of play.
And if you watch like a group of
like, so, for example, when I was younger,
I used to spend hours with the litters
of Malinois puppies.
And you would watch as they develop all
of their motor skills and motor patterns, play
and engagement starts to pick up.
And you get, you know, along with play
and engagement, you get competition over resources.
(11:30):
You get chasing, you get but you get
all of these parts of, you know, the
predatory motor pattern, so to speak.
But you get the dogs developing a way
of interacting with each other in a reinforcing
manner rather than there being consistent conflict.
And, you know, seven out of 10 times
you see the group develop those skills by
themselves for good social interaction.
(11:50):
And that follows suit onto the mum, you
know, like they're interacting with the mum as
they start to get older.
They become a real pain in the mum's
bottom, so to speak, as they start to
get a little bit older because it becomes
too intense for mum.
But you can really see not only the
time back to the predatory motor pattern, which
is one aspect, but also the development of
social skills within the group and the ability
to interact socially from a play context with
(12:12):
inside of the social group.
Does that make sense?
It does.
And then thinking to now, let's take off
our ufology hat, put on our applied behaviour
analysis hat and think about the average dog
you're working with.
I'm sure there's outliers.
Is the reinforcer tied to, help me understand
(12:34):
this, the reinforcers are meeting the biological needs?
What are the reinforcers?
Absolutely.
What you're looking to do is to fulfil
the dog's biological needs in a means that
you can control so that they then don't
tie back to hunting, chasing, killing deers, chasing
(12:55):
cyclists, chasing other dogs whilst they're out biting
humans.
Like if you think about, we talked a
little bit earlier in the previous podcast about
the amount of bull breeds that I've seen
that have been often what the people have
termed as like agonistic biting in different sets
of circumstances.
When from my perspective, looking at the behaviour,
(13:15):
it absolutely isn't.
The dog is missing the outlet of biting
and playing with things.
Mum or dad have come home with a
big fluffy jacket on.
They've jumped up the caregiver.
They've tried to push the dog away to
try to stop them because they don't know
any better.
And the dog's gone, oh, wow, look, this
is an amazing game.
And this person's got this big swinging puffy
jacket around.
(13:35):
That looks like a great addition to the
game.
And they bite onto the puffy jacket.
And of course, as they do so, the
mum or dad starts to wave and scream
around like a big interactive play toy.
And then the dog's having like the best
time whilst also tearing their mum or dad's
jacket to pieces.
So it like it fulfils a biological need,
depending on the genetic influence on behaviour of
(13:56):
the individual.
If you've got a Basset hound, the ability
to play and the desire or the time
back to that predatory motor pattern in the
context of chase and bite may be varied
in comparison to what it would be with
a Malinois.
So it's like the genetic or the lineage
of the animal is going to have a
great bearing on how you manipulate the game
(14:17):
to suit them as an individual.
But yes, what you're saying is correct.
And so with the example of the dog
biting onto the jacket and thinking about the
conversation we've just had about play in young
adolescent juvenile predatory animals and the way that
(14:41):
that behaviour serves those animals in the wild
as they get to learn the skills, they
get to learn the social etiquette around specific
individual behaviours that we're labelling as play.
Our animals that live in our house, our
dogs, they're not learning those skills at a
(15:04):
young age.
Yeah, they are.
Yeah.
OK.
So if you think about like a group
of puppies, I sit with a group of
Malinois puppies and I watch them.
They are developing all of the social skills
within the nest or the litter of the
group of puppies.
What they're not doing is getting the predatory
outlets that a group of young wolf cubs,
to use the comparison, would do as they
(15:26):
start to develop further and further.
Well, they will do.
You'll see them stalk and you'll see them
hunt and pounce on each other.
But it's replicating the predatory motor pattern that
there is obviously a great deal of sociality
or social development involved in that.
As we're obviously when these puppies come out
of the nest, very quickly they start to
develop the ability to hunt in their social
(15:46):
structure, which is the outlet that I'm looking
to facilitate as we progress on with the
dogs that we're working with domestically.
But their social skills are certainly developed within
the nest.
And then they continue to develop depending on
the setting that they're in at home.
So like we got a puppy called Chacha
a year ago now.
So she's just over a year old.
(16:07):
So when she comes into our household of
now six dogs, at that point five dogs,
she's developing her social ability with all of
the dogs at home.
And what she's learning is social boundaries, different
interaction styles, calming signals, all of those things
that occur as part of social interactions.
What she's not getting in that setting is
(16:28):
her ability or any outlet for the predatory
motor pattern in the sense of hunting.
And that is manipulated by the training that
we're doing and the outlet of reinforcement that
we give her.
So that ultimately when she was to see
a rabbit, the reinforcement that we're offering in
that sort of context would overrise out of
the rabbit just due to reinforcement history and
having more access to what we give in
(16:49):
comparison to what the rabbit would give.
Does that make sense?
Yes.
And for most dogs that don't end up
living in Craig's house, they're learning the skills
with their littermates.
And then they're moving into a different context,
which is the house of whatever human family
(17:11):
that they end up living with.
But they're not learning the skills to, in
that context, effectively access those reinforcements.
Exactly.
And what they're then having is two different
styles of learning, because if they're with like
a new set of caregivers that have never
had a dog before, they're going to be
developing a great deal of their social skills
(17:33):
and social ability off of their caregivers.
And if their caregivers don't understand where biting
their sleeve goes or the road that that
could possibly go down from a reinforcement contingency
during the course of interactions, that behavior could
quickly build in reinforcement history and very quickly
become a problem behavior.
As where when they're in a group of
(17:54):
dogs, they're learning social skills from the group
of dogs that they're with, but they're also
learning social skills with the humans that they're
with.
So, for example, for the large proportion of
my adult life, I've had and trained Malinois
and working bred German Shepherds.
When they're babies, Ryan, all they want to
do is to bite you.
Like it's the process all of the time.
(18:15):
So if puppies are having some interpersonal play
and they haven't got like an alternative and
they bite skin, my process has always been
lamppost.
So just go completely dead like a lamppost.
And very quickly, the puppy goes, what's going
on?
He's not playing with me anymore.
The behavior ceases and there's no active reinforcement
behind it.
Unfortunately, the puppy's teeth are very sharp.
(18:35):
And what most people do is go and
offer resistance.
And then as the puppy bites the finger,
this is an amazing game.
And then what they've got to try to
do is pick the puppy up and put
it somewhere or to separate it.
As where if you can roll with a
consistent reinforcement history from a social level of
like biting or making skin contact with the
human, producing no reinforcement.
(18:55):
It gives you like for my big dog,
Zen, we can play and have like interpersonal
play and his mouth will snort like a
pig and roll over.
And what he won't do is actively go,
I'm going to put my arm, your arm
in my mouth.
Because since he's been a baby, baby, the
parties always stop when that's occurred.
So there's nice consistency with him.
But he has all of the outlets for
(19:17):
biting stuff like he plays every day.
We obviously have lots of working training.
So he gets to buy a costume on
a relatively regular basis.
So is that why play is so interesting
to you?
Or is it because of what because the
need to teach people and put people to
learn about it?
Or is it because of your experience?
(19:38):
It's very interesting to me for a multitude
of different reasons.
That's one aspect.
And in fact, it's one of the aspects
that a lot of people overlook, actually.
So I'm really pleased that you've asked all
of the questions on it.
The reason that it usually fulfills such a
great need for people is basically the differentiation
in reinforcement that the dogs used to.
So, you know, most people, when they go
(19:59):
into a training setting, they're thinking about food
as like their primary source of reinforcement.
You know, people, as they get further along
the line, they start to understand like pre
-med principles and such, and they start to
give some variation.
Or if they understand toy play, they think
it's throwing a ball for the dog and
just the dog going to retrieve, which is
obviously part of the process, but not great
(20:20):
for your dog over like time under tension
or a long period of time.
As well, like the best thing for me
is watching the dog develop this style of
play and engagement with a handler that then
allows them to come completely out of their
box that they're used to with regards to
the interaction that you get.
Because, you know, a lot of people biting
(20:43):
anything is almost like a chastisable behavior.
If you think about like a conventional pet
caregiver setting, if a dog bites something, it's
not something that they're supposed to be doing,
which is completely misconstrued with their understanding.
As where once you give the dog an
outlet to do that in the correct manner
and put all of the parameters in place,
you then see the dog's reinforcement structure change.
(21:05):
And then all of the things that the
person wants the dog to do get performed
at such a higher level because the dog
is really, really interested in the reinforcer in
that set of circumstances.
So, yes, it gives them an outlet.
But what it also does is changes the
relationship or the dynamic between the caregiver and
the dog, because now the caregiver has got
an additional reinforcer that the dog is really,
(21:27):
really interested in.
And it allows them to develop that skill
set.
Does that make sense?
It makes sense.
What you're getting from it is, I mean,
give me a ballpark figure.
How many dogs do you think you've worked
with?
Now, I want to frame the question like
how many dogs have you worked with in
a relationship to play?
(21:47):
But I think it's potentially the same question.
Thousands, Ryan, at this point.
If you think I'm 37 now, I've been
training dogs to bite things my whole adult
life.
So that's 20 years of working through processes
like this.
So it's thousands of dogs at this point.
If you think on an average play workshop
day, it's 18 dogs over the course of
(22:07):
like three mini workshops.
And I don't know how many hundreds and
hundreds of those I've done.
And I'm still not bored of it.
Ryan, I still get lots of requests.
I can't teach as much now because I'm
so busy with everything else that I do.
But I still enjoy it so much because
it's different for the vast majority.
If you're working with a sports dog handler,
you can start to work through technicalities, reward
(22:29):
specific markers, reward placement, variation to the way
the play is adapted.
If you're working with a fresh out of
the box caregiver that's struggling with their dog
chasing squirrels down the park and they're trying
to call it back for a crusty bit
of kibble and you introduce like a roadkill
extensions or a fluffy chaser toy to them
(22:50):
in the correct manner and the dog is
now chasing it super enthusiastically and their recall
performance goes up by like 200 percent because
the dog is so engaged by the reinforcer.
Both of them, for me, they're the same
process, but different outcomes.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, it would make sense if you've worked
with thousands and thousands of dogs that for
(23:13):
you to be able to leverage your knowledge
and your skill to bring about that amount
of kind of change in an individual dog
and therefore and also the owner and therefore
the relationship.
Yeah, that completely makes sense, 100 percent.
And it makes sense based on what we've
talked about thus far as to why this
(23:35):
is so important.
And because, Craig, you said in part one,
you traveled around the world, you've written a
book.
There is a huge demand for knowledge and
skill development when it comes to play.
Am I wrong?
Yes.
Yes.
And it's still I still get so many
(23:55):
requests for it.
And it's still for me like a little
bit of an untapped subject, because one of
the other things that we haven't talked about
yet is obviously the correlation with escalating arousal
during the course of using a reinforcer such
as this, which is another thing that I
think is really understood.
You know, when I do seminars on communication,
(24:16):
arousal and problematic behavior, I always talk through
the concept of making friends with the little
devil on your dog's shoulder.
And like a lot of the time in,
you know, particularly in a behavior setting, I
find that arousal is almost like, oh, we've
got to be really, really careful with what
we do, because what we don't want the
dog to do is to get too aroused,
because that could potentially present a problem.
(24:37):
And what I always talk to people about
is, you know, gauging neuroplasticity, so to speak,
and looking to increase the dog's ability to
communicate in escalating states of arousal in a
controllable setting and ultimately stretch the elastic band
out so that the dog has got plentiful
experience communicating, engaging, responding to cues in an
(24:59):
escalated state of arousal, rather than as so
many people do, I find is I usually
always use the comparison, trying to teach a
dog to shoot in a gunfight, which means,
you know, trying to adopt a high level
set of skills in a very stressful environment.
So the dog's seeing the squirrel and they're
trying to get the dog to regal back
to them and engage.
The dog is super aroused during the course
of a training session.
(25:20):
And, you know, they're trying to get them
to follow instruction with no previous experience.
Well, I love that making friends with the
devil on your dog's shoulder.
I heard you say that in another podcast
and I was going to bring that up
today.
And I was thinking, I think I'm real
smart because I'm saying something that you beat
me to it.
(25:40):
But making friends with the devil on your
dog's shoulder is saying.
The little devil on the dog's shoulder is
trying to find an outlet for those aroused
interactions that tie both back to the predatory
motor pattern and the dog's genetic influence on
behavior.
So if somebody says to me, you know,
(26:01):
which isn't the right terminology, but they say
to me, oh, God, my dog's really naughty.
You know, this is a pet caregiver.
They're doing this, this and this.
And I always say to them, the little
devil on the dog's shoulder is finding his
own work.
Like he's finding things to do to give
him an outlet for that as well.
What I want to do is make friends
with the little devil, give him all of
the outlets that he needs, and then use
that little devil to better the relationship and
(26:22):
the training process between the dog and the
caregiver, because they're not then stop fighting against
it.
And I find so often the barrier and
the understanding of what arousal looks like in
a training setting and how it can be
really well functionally used for the benefit of
both the dog and the caregiver is usually
misconstrued.
(26:43):
And it's misconstrued because it hasn't been intentionally
addressed in terms of.
Yeah, if you think right, and how many
times have you heard somebody say, I want
to keep the dog calm, I want the
dog to be calm, I want the dog
to be calm all of the time.
And if you think about like a Malinois,
like Zen will sleep on the sofa in
(27:05):
the office whilst I sit on Zoom calls
for three hours back to back, no problems
whatsoever.
But his needs are completely met.
He has an outlet for all of these
things.
And during the course of training, he is
as far removed from calm as is possible.
But it's all concise and controlled because we've
got so much time under tension and practice
with giving him aroused outlets, practicing his ability
(27:27):
to follow instruction based on cues and environmental
arrangements, etc, etc.
During training, when he is aroused, that his
ability to communicate when he's really, really aroused
is great.
And his sweet spot for training is actually
when he's in quite an aroused state, that
he's still able to do everything that we've
mapped out through the course of the training
session.
And that's because practice.
(27:48):
But what I'm not doing is exposing him
to things that he can't deal with and
then expecting him to be like, oh, yeah,
I can do that.
That's no problem because I can do it
in a calmer setting.
So I often think that there's not enough
sort of developed understanding or working with dogs
that need that type of outlet.
And that's something that play also adds into
and really gives the person the ability to
(28:10):
build a better relationship, particularly during the course
of a training in a domestic setting.
All right.
So the listeners of the show, Craig, mostly
professional dog trainers or animal trainers.
A lot of you, no disrespect, I know
a lot of you don't work with dogs,
but professional trainers.
(28:31):
And you mentioned earlier, it's a little bit
of an untapped resource.
So you're listening to this podcast and you've
got your successful dog training business and you're
dealing with reactivity and jumping up on visitors
when they reach the house and counter surfing
or whatever.
Or dogs barking excessively at home and in
(28:55):
various parts of the house or garden.
And you're hearing Craig talk about these exciting
things and you hear him say it's a
little bit of an untapped resource.
What does that person do with this information?
How do they take the next step?
Use it from a practical standpoint.
So first of all, I'm very big behind
developing or adapting the play process to suit
(29:18):
the individual.
So the first thing that we need to
do is to look at the dogs that
we're working with and think, is this part,
is this concept being used as part of
the dog's fulfillment protocol?
So are we using some version of play?
And does the dog's behavior profile suit some
version of play?
Which for the majority of dogs, with a
(29:39):
few outliers, you're going to find that it's
going to be the case that it certainly
does fit.
But the adaptability of the process is going
to be dependent on the individual.
Then what we need to think about is
like structuring the process and how are we
going to establish the reinforcer?
I'm very big behind establishing a reinforcer before
we go and use it in a training
setting.
So the stepping stones I would follow to
do that is, first of all, what is
(30:01):
the dog's interest in toys, biting, grabbing or
chasing things?
If the caregiver says, oh, God, you know,
the dog's really interested in play.
He's got toys at home.
He picks them up and plays with them
on a regular basis.
What I'm basically looking for is the dog's
favorite items to bite.
That is one aspect.
The next one is the dog doesn't play.
He's not interested whatsoever.
That's typically because the process hasn't been adapted
(30:23):
to suit the dog.
And the person has tried wiggling the toy
in the dog's face.
The dog doesn't bite onto it.
And they go, oh, God, this dog isn't
interested in play.
So the questions I would then ask is
looking outside of the box a little bit.
Does the dog ever bite or destroy anything?
Does the dog ever chase anything, pick anything
up in its mouth?
In the UK, we've got I'm sure you've
got in New Zealand as well.
But we've got like this bedding substrate called
(30:45):
vet bed, which is basically like a woolly.
It's often used in veterinary settings, strangely enough,
by the name.
But it's like a woolly fluffy chaser toy
bed, basically.
And a lot of people have lots of
issues with the dog sort of tearing those
to pieces when they're babies, which means that
they're quickly removed and replaced with something that
is a little bit more durable.
So they may say, you know, they've destroyed
(31:06):
vet bed when they're a baby.
They may say that, you know, they pick
up my fluffy slipper and run around the
house.
They steal tea towels, whatever it would be.
What I'm looking for is a collation of
material that would be similar to the things
that they like to bite onto.
If they've got no interest in anything whatsoever,
what we would then do is go about
what I call the choice to chase test,
which is a process that you can follow
(31:27):
in any low distraction environment.
That could be a living room, a garden,
obviously, depending on the dog's environmental awareness.
So if you were to do it in
a living room, you'd get a couple of
the items that the client that the caregiver
had mentioned.
Or alternatively, you would select a range of
smaller material toys like a roadkill toy, you
(31:49):
know, like one of the squeaky squirrel type
toys.
Those work really well.
The squeak works fantastically for those.
You could also use a tennis ball or
a tennis ball type material.
And then you could go with something that
would be exuberantly fluffy, like a fluffy chaser
toy, as an example.
And what we'd basically be looking to do
is to have the dog in an open
space, make sure that their behavior markers are
(32:11):
loose and fluid and they're completely comfortable with
the environment.
At which point, what I would then do
is make a very gentle, low level novel
stimulus noise.
What I usually use is, which is like
a little bird whistle.
And then the dog goes, oh, what's going
on over there?
As they head check me, I'm then going
to throw the item in the opposite direction.
What that gives me is a completely free
(32:32):
flowing ability for the dog to make the
decision to orientate towards the toy with absolutely
no inadvertent pressure from the caregiver whatsoever.
Heads up on the first repetition, the dog
might do absolutely nothing with it.
They might go over to it, sniff it.
You might even see some behavior markers that
suggest conflict on approach.
But what we're not going to do then
is to go, OK, that one isn't a
(32:53):
winner.
We're going to pick the toy up.
We're going to orientate away from the dog.
And we're going to make sure, again, we
repeat the process and throw in the opposite
direction, dependent on the dog's behavior markers.
I've had so many dogs in that type
of setting, whereas they've gone the first repetition.
Everybody goes, oh, they're definitely not interested in
that.
By the third repetition, the dog picked it
up, head shook it and started to run
around the training school with it.
(33:14):
Which means ultimately we found the reinforcer to
suit them.
So then what I would do is just
automate between the items and see which one
we get the dog's most preference with.
So once we've got that preference, what I'm
then looking for is to establish or build
into the dog being able to chase that
item with an extension.
So I always think of toys in the
form of laws and extensions.
(33:35):
So we've got this law, which is a
smaller toy that the dogs chased and showed
some interest in.
Then what we're looking to do is to
build up a sustainable amount of reinforcement history.
So the dog's happily chasing it, picking it
up, head shaking it.
If they're happy to bring it to you,
you can start to eke into a little
bit of a tug, which we'll talk about
in more of a structured manner in a
moment.
So once the dog's got really good reinforcement
(33:55):
history of that singular item, then I'm going
to attach a bit of cord, which would
be no less than three millimeters in diameter
to make sure if the dog was to
bite it, it's not going to hook in
between their teeth or damage their mouth.
And it needs to be approximately 1.5
to 2 meters long.
What we're then going to do, just being
mindful that when you attach an extension to
like that, it can become a complete novel
(34:17):
stimulus for the dog, even though they've just
been biting the toy two or three times
back to back.
So I would always wrap a little bit
of rope up in my hand with the
toy visually hanging from the hand.
Throw the toy and the bit of string
together, making sure that you throw it low
and not overhead, because what you don't want
the string to do is to extend over
the dog's head, because with dogs that are
(34:38):
potentially a little bit more sensitive, what you
might find is that cause again conflict and
may inhibit their ability to chase after the
toy.
What I'm looking for at that process is
the dog's ability to then move over and
bite onto the toy in the same manner.
As they start to do that, what I'm
then going to do is to work my
way towards holding the bit of string and
throwing the toy so that it's hitting the
ground with me holding the extension.
(35:00):
Once we've got that and the dog's orientating
towards it, what we're going to start to
do is to move in a circular motion
so that the toy starts to trail along
the floor with the replication of the movement
of a prey creature.
So when you're moving it, you want to
try to make sure that your wrist is
wriggling and that portrays the end part of
the toy, not the rope, so that you've
got a little bit of wiggle in motion.
The type of movement that you need here
(35:22):
is challenging but achievable.
So as it's moving along the ground, it
mustn't go super slowly and it mustn't just
move like a pencil case being dragged along
the floor with no movement.
There needs to be that wiggle or that
predatory, that prey creature movement pattern.
So what you're then going to find is
the dog starts to move towards it.
Usually they do what I call the Snow
Fox Pounce, which is basically orientation with the
(35:44):
front paws to try to stop it.
What we're going to start to do is
to build towards the dog, incrementally chasing the
item, which will then lead into the grab
bite on the move.
We want the dog, from a reinforcement contingency
standpoint, to believe that their action on trying
to bite the toy on the move is
the one that catches the toy, not you
pausing the toy and waiting for them to
(36:05):
bite it, because otherwise what they'll start to
do very quickly as part of the process
is herd the toy as it's moving, wait
for it to pause and then bite onto
it to move, which can be beneficial for
dogs that are very strongly tied back to
herding, such as Border Collies, etc.
But for the process, if we can get
them chasing and biting, that tends to work
quite well.
So dog bites onto the toy, our attachment
(36:26):
point is 1.5 to 2 metres away
from the dog.
What most people do at this point is
they go into an overzealous manner of tugging.
They pull in at their elbows and jerk
up and down.
We do not want to do that.
What we want to do instead is to
hold the toy with a nice straight arm.
You're going to move two steps left so
that you've got a nice, what I call
it is like tactical tension.
You want enough tension on the toy so
(36:48):
that it's creating resistance, but not so much
that you're pulling it out of the dog's
mouth.
So you take two steps left and two
steps right so that you've got like a
nice swaying motion of the toy having just
enough tension for the dog to start to
create resistance.
As the dog starts to create resistance, they're
going to do one of three things.
They're either going to tug and resist back,
which is perfect.
(37:08):
They're going to hold strong and start to
sort of double down on the toy, or
they're going to start to move towards you.
What we're aiming for is to manipulate the
play style to suit the dog.
The movement during the game tends to be
beneficial for the tugging process.
So by keeping that lateral motion of two
steps left, two steps right, what we're going
to encourage is a little bit more movement
(37:29):
during the course of the tug.
And typically, as the dogs start to feel
the pushback producing reinforcement, which is them tugging
the toy with you, the pullback of the
toy starts to become a more and more
prominent part of the process.
So as we're doing these steps left to
right, you're going to switch hands as you're
doing so.
But what I want then the person to
do is typically sort of overhand grab the
(37:49):
rope so that they're getting incrementally closer to
the dog's contact point as they're tugging.
Typically, somewhere around about four to 600 millimeters
away from where the dog is biting is
a good starting point for you to be
holding where the dog is tugging.
And what we're looking to do then is
as they start to resist back, we want
to give the dog the inclination that they
(38:11):
are winning on a regular basis.
What does a win look like?
For me, it's a drop in tension in
pairing with a behavior action from the dog.
So if the dog has got a really
solid grip or is pulling back, you've got
a long extension.
You can let the toy go dead and
then start the game again, which usually causes
more intensity in the actions that are occurring
at that point in time.
(38:31):
What we would want that to build towards
is letting the dog win the toy completely
and returning, which depending on the dog and
their reinforcement history, there's multiple ways to do.
We may have to shape it at the
beginning and then sort of merge it into
the play process, which I can talk through.
But for most people, the fundamental mistake that
they make with the win is that the
(38:51):
dog is at six o'clock, they're at
12 o'clock.
As they let the dog win, they stutter
or shuffle forward, which usually causes reflective action
from the dog's perspective.
And they say, mom, dad, chase me and
sort of run off across the training center
or the room away from them.
And of course, the handler then goes, oh,
god, I need to get to the dog.
And that becomes the game.
As where on so many occasions with people
(39:13):
that have retrieving issues, I've said to them,
let go of the toy at six o
'clock and run to 12.
And all of a sudden the dog goes,
this is a completely different contingency.
I need to get off the mom or
dad.
And then they chase after and you're able
to catch the toy.
You can add, as I do with everybody
that I work with, clinicality to the retrieve,
because I think it's an important part of
the game to make sure that everything flows
and the person basically doesn't get into conflict
(39:35):
with training.
When we start to develop the tug and
the dog is offering a good amount of
resistance, the bit that is like magical for
me, so to speak, is they're manipulating the
tug to suit the dog as an individual.
So what I always say to people is
the toy is just an extension to the
experience that you create.
So you're creating an experience with your dog.
The toy is just a bridge to creating
(39:57):
that experience.
And what we want to try to do
now is to consider all of the sort
of interpersonal play aspects that you carry out
with your dog.
So if you think about everybody, regardless of
what they say, when we're alone with our
dogs, like we do things that are goofy
and stupid, we make stupid noises, we blow
raspberries, we run around, we share tactile affection
in a particular way.
(40:18):
Adding those bits into the game are the
bit that makes the game special for you
and your dog because you're adapting the process
in a way that nobody else can do.
I've got a massive amount of experience in
teaching dogs to bite stuff, and I'm very,
very fortunate to have that experience.
But if I've got somebody that's been playing
with their dog every two days for the
(40:38):
last two years, they've got an immense amount
of time under tension playing with this dog
as an individual, and they understand what makes
their dog tick.
And that's where sort of the speciality comes
into place for me because you can really
adapt the play process to suit the dog
as an individual.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I like your phrasing of it.
It's challenging but achievable.
(40:59):
I mean, it all makes sense.
And for the listeners of the show and
for myself and for people wanting to implement
this, obviously, you're going to have to put
that into practice and get some repetitions under
your belt to build that skill set.
Now, then I'm assuming once you have that
tug and you have that play, then you
(41:20):
can use it as a reinforcer to shape
behaviors and so you're contributing that.
This is what I'm taking away.
So to feedback to me if I'm missing
anything and build on what I'm saying and
so you're meeting those needs of the dog.
So therefore that's going to flow over if
(41:41):
you're working with your clients into whatever behavior
challenges they're calling you up about because having
met your dog's needs in this way is
going to create happiness as we talked about
in part one.
Absolutely.
But if we dig in like a tiny
little bit deeper, if you think about the
(42:01):
– we've established play as a reinforcer.
What I'm looking for is sustainability with the
dog's response in an average of five sessions.
So if we were to go into the
garden where we'd set the session up and
we were to follow the antecedent that would
suggest toy play is going to be available
and we get the same response, same engagement
back-to-back, that's indicative to me that
(42:22):
in this setting, in this learning environment, the
dog is quite happy with play as a
reinforcer.
Now if we was thinking about from an
outlet perspective, a dog that was potentially struggling
with mouthing, et cetera, at home, what we
would start to do then is manipulate the
reinforcer into some parameters that give the dog
clarity with their availability of biting the object
(42:45):
and the limited availability of biting the person.
So that may be stop games as I
call them.
So one of the things that I'll do
as a foundation game is I'll have a
little bit of food in hand.
I'll start off with a low-level food
follow.
I'll move off, pause with dynamic movement, which
body language markers suggest to the dog that
I want them to stop.
They stop and I mark and reward them
(43:06):
with food.
And then I would elevate the process of
doing the same thing with toy play.
The only difference being is as the dog
offers a dead-fix stand or a sit
or whatever behaviour we're working on, then the
toy becomes accessible.
So you're developing almost what I would call
an unreasonable set of circumstances if somebody was
looking.
They'd say, well, you're running from the dog
(43:27):
with a toy in your hand.
It's inevitable that they're going to bite you.
It's not if you follow the steps leading
up to the dog going.
The contingency here is keeping paws on floor.
When mum or dad freezes, I offer X
behaviour, which produces the reinforcer that I want,
which then gives you so much benefit of
being able to, again, develop the dog's ability
to think when they're in a slightly more
(43:48):
aroused state, which again, I've done this with
so many different dogs for rescue settings, behaviour
clients, et cetera, et cetera.
And it works really, really well, as long
as you adjust the process to suit the
individual.
So you're giving them an outlet.
But what you're also doing, Ryan, is helping
them develop the ability to think when they're
a little bit more aroused or when they
get into these aroused states, so that then
you've got like the two peaks of the
(44:10):
mountain coming together, which ultimately, as long as
applied correctly, give the dog a sustainable outlet
for their needs, but also help them develop
the ability to think when they're a little
bit more aroused, which is beneficial for everything
that we do.
And then looking at the time, we don't
have time for too much more, even though
I feel like we're just scratching the surface.
(44:30):
But share with everyone before we finish, we'll
make sure to mention your book and places
where they can go to if they have
liked what they've heard today, learn more from
you, Craig.
So this is, my question was, this is
beneficial for all the dogs, right?
Because all of the dogs are dogs.
(44:52):
And so they have that predatory motor sequence.
Yep.
And so it's going to be beneficial for
all the dogs or?
So I gave the example of the dog
that we were meeting their need with regards
to play.
And then we've obviously got like the sporting
(45:13):
aspect that I just talked through, whereas you
would establish the reinforcer without being elongated, because
we've not got lots of time.
But what you would then start to do
is to use that as a reinforcer for
previously trained behaviors, typically, or you could use
the toy as part of the shaping process,
which is a long conversation, which we can,
I'm sure, talk for another time.
(45:33):
But ultimately, it is beneficial for the large
majority of dogs in some aspect.
But the way that a particular genetic group
will play in comparison to the other, there
will be some similarities.
But it's very, very important to adapt the
process for the individual.
Example, I've worked with lots of dogs that
have come from like foreign rescue dogs that
(45:55):
have come from different countries.
And they've landed themselves in a house in
the UK somewhere.
And the person contacts me and says, oh,
you know, really struggling with this doggy that
we've got.
He's been hidden under the kitchen table for
the last however long.
And we go ahead with the behavior mod
plan, which starts to work fantastically.
And then what it also introduces a version
of play.
Now, for that dog, Ryan, in that setting,
(46:17):
introducing conventional toy play, as we've just talked
through.
Typically, the dog isn't in a stable or
comfortable enough state as their baseline, which we
work on developing to get there immediately.
So what I'll introduce is a food-derived
toy.
And follow a variation of the same steps
that we've just talked through, but you're basically
forming or making the toy a secondary reinforcer
(46:39):
because of the correlation with food.
And you watch these little dogs like come
out of their box over the case of
a short session.
They start off with just simple targeting where
they're sort of still and they reach their
neck to get a little bit of food
out of there.
And then by the end of the session,
they're pouncing across the living room and opening
up the fluffy ball to get the food
out, which then later on leads to food.
Because there is a process that we're following,
(47:03):
but we're not like, if I was training
a leased dog, for example, I need the
dogs to do things in a very particular
way in a very particular sequence.
I'm looking for clinicality all of the time.
This is literally establishment of reinforcement.
So the way that the dog does it
is only important that the dog is reinforced
by it.
So if the dog chases it, does a
roly-poly and opens it, laying on its
(47:24):
back on the side to do it, it
doesn't matter to start with because the dog
is seeking reinforcement from the activity, which again
is one of the other magic parts of
it.
Magic is science, but it works really well.
Nice.
I think that's a good place to end.
But for those listening, they have been inspired
today.
They want to learn more.
(47:46):
They can see you in some random country
around the world, Switzerland or Australia, potentially.
Already you have done those by the time
this is released, but they can read your
book.
Where else can they go?
What are their opportunities to learn more from
you specifically about this topic?
If anybody's got any questions whatsoever, it's Craig
(48:08):
Ogilvie Dogs on Instagram.
That's the best place to reach out and
contact me.
I'll happily have conversations and sort of chop
it up with people if they want to
message me on there.
The website is OgilvieDogs.com, and my handle
is Craig Ogilvie Dogs on all of the
platforms.
So feel free to drop me a message
anywhere.
And, Craig, moving forward, we do ask this
of everyone.
(48:29):
And I forgot to mention that to you
earlier.
Sorry.
But what do you want to see happen
with regards to this?
Because you said it's an untapped – I
can't remember the words you used.
I wrote it down somewhere.
An untapped resource, I think, was what you
said earlier.
And that aligns with the excitement, I would
say, shared by members of our community when
(48:53):
they're coming into our community areas within our
membership and sharing their newfound love for using
toys and play as reinforcers.
What do you want to see happen over
the next five to ten years in terms
of play?
But if you want to answer for the
broader animal training, dog training world as well,
(49:14):
where do you want to see this go?
From a play perspective.
I've been, again, doing this for a really
good period of time.
And in a sports and working setting, play
is something that is very, very prominent.
I think in the wider expanse of the
animal training community, I'd just like to see
it spread.
I'd like to see dogs being able to
(49:35):
express the outlets that are needed to fulfill
their needs and it to be used as
a positive rather than oh-so-often.
The downside is people see the side effects
as a negative because the people aren't having
those needs met.
And again, it's so super popular as an
outlet.
Even 20 years ago, Brian, like play was
(49:55):
used regularly during the course of training working
dogs, certainly in the circles that I've mixed
in and had exposure to.
But it's just if we could see that
expand and people develop as much of an
open mind with regards to using it.
And also, because I think the correlation with
arousal is the thing that often puts a
lot of people off.
And developing an understanding of diagnostically where a
(50:18):
dog's baseline is, the point that they're able
to bridge to and still communicate effectively, how
to bring them back down, how to work
through a session using play and increased reinforcement.
It will do for the better for the
animal training community and animal caregivers or pet
dog caregivers over the world.
Amazing.
Well, thank you for all that you do
(50:38):
to share that information and to build our
capacity and skill and knowledge in this area.
And you listeners are probably excited like me,
realizing how much there is to learn when
it comes to animal training and behavior and
that never stops.
Craig, we will link to everything we've mentioned
social media wise that Craig mentioned earlier in
(51:00):
books, et cetera, in the show notes for
that.
For this episode, we will officially now wrap
up part two, though.
This has been a ton of fun, Craig.
So from myself and everyone listening, thank you
so much for making time for us.
Thank you very much for having me, my
man.
It's been an absolute pleasure.
And thank you, everybody, for listening.
(51:21):
And thank you so much for listening as
well.
This is your host, Ryan Cartlidge, signing off
from this episode of the Animal Training Academy
podcast show.
We hope today's conversation inspired you and equipped
you with new tools for your trainer's toolbox.
Remember, every challenge in training is an opportunity
(51:43):
to learn and sharpen your animal training geekery.
Embrace the rough patches, learn from them, and
keep improving.
And don't forget, the path to growing your
skills and expanding your knowledge continues beyond this
episode.
Visit www.atamember.com to join our supportive
(52:07):
membership, where you will find a community of
trainers just like you.
Together, we're making a huge positive difference in
the lives of animal and human learners worldwide.
Until next time, keep honing your skills, stay
awesome, and remember, every interaction with an animal
(52:29):
or human learner is your opportunity to create
ripples.
We're here, cheering you on every step of
the way.
See you at the next episode.
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