Master Cat Training with These Simple Tips

Episode Transcript
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Dr. Sugerman (00:00):
Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode
of Vetsplanation.
I'm so excited for today'sepisode because we have a
special treat in store for allof you pet lovers out there.
So today we are joined by notone, but two fantastic trainers
from Cascade Canine.
So don't let the name bedeceiving.
Even though it's Cascade Canine,they actually do work with other

(00:21):
animals as well.
And then today we'll be divinginto the fascinating world of
animal training with aparticular focus on our feline
friends.
We'll discuss how to addresscommon issues like scratching
furniture, biting, and even howto train your cat to walk on a
leash.
So get ready for some expertinsights and practical tips that
you can apply at home.

(00:42):
Before we dive in, don't forget,if you like what we do to make
sure you like and subscribe andtell your friends about us.
All right, let's get started.
Hi, everybody.
Welcome back to another episodeof Vetsplanation.
I am so excited today because Ihave not one, but two trainers
on from Cascade Canine.
I am going to have you introduceyourselves.

(01:03):
If you don't mind starting, I'llhave you start Kay.

Kay Rutland (01:06):
Yeah, sure.
So I'm Kay Rutland.
I'm the co owner of CascadeCanine Training and Behavior.
I've been working with dogs andanimals in general since I
graduated in 2010.
I started working as a zookeeperat Point Defiance Zoo, then took
that on to, yeah, I then became,started my own business as pet

(01:29):
sitting and pet training.
And then the business kind ofevolved over time.
I became a parent and broughtPoppy on board and our business
has just grown ever since.
So that's kind of me in anutshell.
At home I have two kids, I haveone dog and two cats and a
leopard gecko.

Oh, I got a leopard gecko too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They're super fun.

Yeah.
And Poppy, how about you?

Poppy Foxheart (01:55):
I'm Poppy Foxheart, she/they, I don't have
a leopard gecko.
I'm, I'm sad to report.

I'm not sure if we can have you on after this, but
that's okay.
We'll, we'll, we'll let itslide.

I didn't know it was a leopard show.
I do have two cats and a dog,and the dog have some leopard
spots.
So maybe that could count.

We'll, we'll, we'll let it slide for now.
Yeah.

I have been a lifelong animal trainer of one
kind or another.
Even when I was a little kid, Iremember that my family dog was
going deaf.
And so I enjoyed trying to trainher to follow hand signals.
In retrospect, who knows howgood that was.
I was a kid, but I've always hadsome kind of work or volunteer
connection to animals, and atsome point I decided to make it

(02:39):
real.
I was tired of giving unpaid,quasi educated advice to
friends.
I still knew more than they did,but I thought let's make it
real.
And I went and pursuedcertification.
Kay and I both have the samecredential.
We're both Karen Pryor Academycertified training partners.

Can you tell me what that means?

Yeah.
So in the U.S., there is noregulation for pet trainers.
There isn't any kind ofcertifying body, unfortunately,
that is nationwide that everyoneagrees upon.
In other countries, you have totake an examination to even be
called a dog trainer.
But here, anyone can callthemselves an animal trainer
without any education, so itmakes it very hard for people to

(03:20):
help dig through everyone'sclaims and know who they should
trust to get information from.
However, within that there areeducational institutions, there
are guilds and memberships thatpeople can have that clarify not
only what kind of education youhave, but also what kinds of
ethical and practical agreementsyou've made for how you will be

(03:44):
training animals.

So meaning like positive training versus
negative training type thing,right?

Yeah, meaning I am a person, for example, both
Kay and I are positivereinforcement trainers.
I would definitely identifymyself as force free, even
though it's a complicatednotion.
But for me, what that means isthat when I have the opportunity
to train an animal and my job isbehavior change, I will always
be looking for, I will neverwant to intentionally use force
to create the behaviors I wantto see.

Got it.

Also different certifications might mean that
you have more education inbehavior modification versus,
trick training.
It might mean that you haveadditional education in
different ways.
And, oh, and also other speciesbecause you can get
certifications in other species.

Yeah.

The Karen Pryor Academy, the, the accreditation
that both Kay and I have is amulti species credential.
I'm from the San Francisco BayArea and I moved up here to
Tacoma about three and a halfyears ago.
And shortly after that met Kayand joined Cascade Canine.

Very nice.
So you primarily do dogs andcats, is that correct?
And then Kay, do you also doleopard gecko training?

That's the grand idea, right?
Is that we got the leopard geckoand I'm going to have some
really cute training videos ofhim learning how to touch his
nose to a target stick.
Yeah.
So like I, to go further on withwhat Poppy was saying too, is
that, with behavior inparticular, there's a lot of
certifications you can get, butthere's no governing body for
it.
I have a degree in animalbehavior psychology but there's

(05:25):
no real governing body sayingthat somebody else can't claim
the same thing.
We were talking about thisearlier, but Yeah,

That's pretty crazy.

And I'm sorry you asked me too if I train other
animals.
Yes, like I obviously have areally big background of working
with zoo animals.
I've recently been working withsome horses here and there and
then obviously cats and dogs.
So the thing that I thinkimportant to remember is that
animals all learn the same way,right?
So we can use the sameprinciples that we use with dog
training with any animal andwith humans.

(05:57):
So yeah, we can use it with anyanimal we want.

Nice.
That's good to know, especiallybecause today we decided to talk
about cats and is it evenpossible to train a cat?
What do you guys think?
Yeah?

Absolutely.

Okay.

Maybe, maybe not just possible, maybe critical.

Critical.
I do like that.
I think that is true as well.
So let's talk about some of thethings that people really want
to know about like how you trainyour cats.
So I think one of the very firstthings is can you train a cat to
stop scratching your furniture?

Yes.
Absolutely.
So I think when it comes toscratching furniture, scratching
is a biological and behavioralneed.
We don't want to take scratchingaway from cats.
It's a stress release.
It helps them shed the nailsheaths, so it's good for their
body, good for their brain.

(06:55):
We don't want them to stopscratching, but we do want to
direct what they're scratching.
There are a lot of options forhow we can train a cat to stop
scratching our furniture.
My personal favorite one is justget different furniture that you
don't mind your cat scratching.

That's a great idea.
Yeah.

To an extent that's not a terrible solution.
There are materials that cats,in general, don't really enjoy
scratching, and that's theoption that we've taken, is I've
bought a couch that's made outof microfiber.
That's a pet friendly material,and looks kind of like, like
velvety kind of material, andnone of the cats are interested

(07:32):
in scratching it.
And so no more cat scratching.
But we have to pay attention towhat kinds of, first of all, if
we're trying to get, we have toprovide an alternative.
We can't just ask them to stopscratching our furniture unless
we have another alternative forthem to scratch.
So that might be a scratchingpost, a scratching box.
There are floor scratchers.
There's diagonal ones, verticalones.

(07:55):
IKEA sells this thing.
I think it's very affordable andit's just a piece of sisal with
three Velcro..

Yeah.

Can turn the leg of your, of your dining room
table into a scratching post ifyou want to.

I've definitely seen the ones that they, you can
put on door handles and stufftoo, right?

Yeah.
Lots of options.
Just make sure that it's stable.
I don't love the ones that hookover like by a rope because
they're, when a cat goes toscratch, they're just going to
move.
But if you have something that'seither adhesive, like that
really strong adhesive withcommand hooks or nailed on,
that's awesome.
They make like climbers that goaround a door, which is great if

(08:34):
you're renting and you can't putstuff into the walls.
A great option for a cat to havesomething to get some vertical
space on.

Mm hmm.

You just want to pay attention to make sure that
you have something that.

No, no, go ahead.

Just making sure that you have something that's
tall enough for your cat.
That's at an angle that your catenjoys.
Some cats are horizontalscratchers, some cats are
vertical scratchers and thatit's made out of a material
that's appealing to your cats.
That's step one is giving themsomething that you want them to
scratch and that they willscratch something that, you
know, observe.
What did they scratch in yourhouse?
Are they scratching wood?

(09:07):
Are they scratching fabric?
Are they scratching the carpet?
Can we make something that'slike that?
And then step two would be, canwe entice them?
Can we positively reinforce themfor scratching the thing we want
them to scratch?
And there are a lot of reallygreat ideas about how we do that
too.

Nice.
I've even seen, so my cat reallylikes like a, a circle one too.

Oh yeah.
Oh yeah.
Like the tunnels.

Yeah.
So go ahead, Kay.

Yeah, just finding what the cat finds reinforcing
is the most important thingbecause behaviors only exist
when they're reinforced, and weknow that scratching is
naturally reinforcing for thecat, so just trying to punish
the cat for scratching an areayou don't like is simply not
going to work.
It is going to create scratchingin other places rather than that

(09:54):
spot.
And so it's going to seep out inplaces that you don't like.
So finding what the cat findsmost reinforcing to scratch on
and then providing thoseopportunities in areas that you
like is the really importantstep there.

Nice.
I, I think even too sometimesthat they just really like
scratching boxes.
Like super inexpensive, just abox, right?
Yeah.

Providing that kind of..

Love a box for every animal.

Super good.

Right.
What do you think about, so youhad talked about like positive
reinforcement for scratching thething you want them to scratch.
So let's dive into that.
What positive reinforcementthings can we provide to them?

Do you want to do like a popcorn tag team?
I'll say a thing, you say athing.
We could put something fragrantthat the cat likes on the
scratcher that we want them touse.
And that might be catnip.
It could be honeysuckle spray.
It could be paw pad pheromones,right?
There's pheromones in thoselittle feet.
So you could rub, rub a paw padwith a cloth and rub that onto

(10:53):
your desired scratching post.

Yeah, one of the things that I've noticed with my
own cats is that putting thosescratching pads in places where
they walk by a lot.
So scratching can be a form ofcommunication, right?
So if they're passing by aspecific spot in the hallway a
lot, putting a scratching postthere might entice them to
scratch in that spot becausethey're communicating with other
cats in the house.

That's really cool.
I didn't even realize that.
That's a, that's a great ideajust to have them in like a
general area where everybody is,right?

Yeah, or just like places where they tend to walk
by a lot.
So if you have a long hallwaythat leads to their litter box,
or then on the other side of thehallway is where their food is,
if they have that spot that theyfrequent a lot, that's a good
spot to put a scratching post.

Cool.
Was there anything else?
Any other popcorn?
Okay.

Oh yeah, yeah.
And then I

We can keep going.

There visual matters weirdly.
You could take a couple oflittle forks.
I know this is going to soundvery silly, but it works.
I learned this from another catbehavior consultant.
Take a couple of forks, go toyour scratching post.
And scratch it with your littlefake claws because cats see the
visual clue as well of a surfacethat's been scratched invites

(12:11):
more scratching.
That's why when your couch islooking pretty ratty, your cats
are still working on it becauseit looks like a scratchable
place and your cats willcontinue to scratch.
I also find that doing it givesmy cat, if the cat is watching,
they're like, wait, wait, whatare you doing over there?
Is that scratching?
Is that scratchable?
So demonstrating a little bit,making it look like it's a fun

(12:32):
thing to do.
And then what do you do when thecat does scratch?
What's the consequence?
When they scratch the thing youwant them to scratch, could a
little treat just land over bythe scratching post?
Even what Kay was saying,putting it in a place where the
cat is passing by a lot, andmaybe, maybe you put a couple
treats around it, just toinspire a little interest and

(12:52):
exploration.

Very cool.

I think with a lot of behaviors that we're trying
to reward, it's important tohave little jars of treats
sitting around the house so thatyou can easily grab something
and reward in the moment.
So maybe if you have thatscratching post, that's like a
pedestal and you can put alittle jar of treats on top that
you can quickly open and givethe cat after they've scratched
just to say, Hey.
You did the right spot.

I will ask, since you guys have dogs as well, how
do you get the cats the treatswithout the dogs getting the
treats?

Airtight containers.
Poppy has a lot of ideas here.

Oh, okay.
Oh, you meant, oh, you meantlike, how do you, do you mean
like when you're delivering

Yes, when you're delivering them.
My cat, exactly, when you'redelivering them, because if I
went to put a treat out for mycats, I would have three dogs on
it immediately.
Two dogs.
One of them she wouldn't care,but two dogs on them
immediately.

Probably sprinkling the treats is not a
great plan if you do have dogsaround, unless there's a gate
and the dogs don't have accessto it.
No, you probably would want towait until you catch your cat
scratching.
I love this concept that we talkabout all the time in Positive
Reinforcement, that you want tocatch your animal doing the
right thing, catch them in theact of being good.

(14:04):
So I think you can wait and, andperch nearby, and when you see
the cat doing it, you can, alittle treat goes bazings right
past them.

Nice.
Okay.
I like the idea.
Were there any other positivereinforcement things?

There is some kind of machine that I don't
have and I don't know the nameof, but there is some sort of
device that is a scratching postthat dispenses treats.

Oh, that's cool.

I can't remember the name of it.
I'm sure some really motivatedperson can find it on the
internet.

Yes.

The, the reason why I wouldn't like it is the
same reason why I don't like alot of robot things is that I
don't have a lot of choice aboutwhich thing comes with the
robot.
I like a lot of robot things,but this is the one that's what
if it's not the right height,material, angle, texture,
whatever, for my cat?
Then, it's the only one onoffer.

There is a really cool one.
Yeah, there is a really cool onecalled Pet Tutor that you can
use that you can use for dogs.
I wonder if you could still putthe same thing in for a cat
because it's like when they'requiet it'll do it or you can use
a button and it'll just drop it.

Mmhmm.
Yeah.
I have a similar type of robotthat is the treat and train,
which is the original.
It's a little bigger, but it hassome different functionality,
but same concept.
You could set it up on thecountertop right above your
scratching post or on a shelfabove your scratching post.
And when you see that scratchinghappening, you push your button

(15:30):
and whoop, treats go down.

Perfect.
Let's talk about biting.
Is there a way to train your catnot to bite you?

What an interesting question.

Yeah, I feel like what's important there is what
is causing the biting to beginwith, right?
Because cats aren't just goingaround saying, hey, I like to
bite.
It's not, just an ingrainedbehavior to aggress without
reason.
So looking at what's causing thebehavior to begin with?
So is the animal in pain and youare petting them in a place that

(16:06):
hurts?
Are they easily overstimulated?
And so they resort to bitingbecause they don't like that
touch.
Yeah.
Poppy, do you want to continue?

No, I think that's exactly what I would say
is I am a current, currentfamily of a four year old cat
who for the first two years ofher life, at least, was
definitely a biter and she wasjust overstimulated by petting
and I will say, I think this isa really good moment to put in
something that I think,otherwise, I, I wish I could
just, everything I'm about tosay, put it in a little capsule,

(16:38):
and then later on push a button,and everybody knows I'm
referring back to that capsuleof information, which is when
you are training an animal,especially a cat, since that's
what we're talking about.
Using punishment is not onlyineffective, but it will do the
opposite of what you're hopingit will do.
In this instance, if your catbites you and you go on the

(16:58):
internet and you look, what do Ido when my cat bites me?
I see it in all those catbehavior forums on Facebook.
Everybody wants to tell you thatyou should do something that
begins with an S.
You should spray them withwater.
You should hiss while that's anS.
But at the end, you should hissat them.
You should scruff them.
You should..

Shake a can?

You should shake a can.
You should swat them.
You should spank them.
Everybody has an idea about waysthat you firmly, you should
scold them.
You should firmly say no.
And I'm here to tell you thatnone of that is going to get
what you want.
All of those things, when wepunish, when we suppress a
behavior, it might stop in thatmoment.
But especially with cats, thatbehavior is going to go

(17:39):
somewhere else.
It's going to squirt out theedges.
And you're going to end upseeing stress related behaviors
that you didn't, that are evenworse than that initial
behavior, right?
You're going to end up seeinginappropriate elimination.
You're going to end up seeingconflict between the animals.
You might even see increasedaggression towards you.
And these are all things we wantless of.

(18:00):
So please, please, please putdown the spray bottle.
You don't have to spank yourcat.
You don't even need to talk tothem firmly.
I promise it gets better withpositive reinforcement.
An additional thing that you asa vet I'm sure can speak to is
that when we increase the stresslevel for our cats, we also put
them at risk of physicalconditions.

Oh yeah.
Yeah.
We get a lot of cats whospraying is a big one or, it's
an inappropriate elimination.
Then they end up having urinaryblockage because of it, because
they're so stressed out.
And then I start asking people,what, what is it that's changed
in the house?
Is it a diet change or is theresomething stressful that
happens?
Most of the time people say no,but definitely one of the main

(18:45):
things I see is that, they'relike I did notice that my cat's
been biting a lot more and soI've been, getting really angry
at him.
So obviously the biting hascaused all this in the first
place.
It's not quite how it works.
Your cat is stressed.
Yeah, absolutely.

They're having a hard time.

Yeah, exactly.
So how can we use like positivereinforcement then to help them
stop biting?

Kay, do you want to start that one?

Again, I'm just going to go back to what, what
can we do to reduce the catstress?
We have to listen to what thecat's trying to tell us when
they are biting.
So if what the cat's trying totell us is that they don't like
being petted that way, can wefind something else to do with
our cat?
Maybe it's the specific spotthat they don't like being

(19:29):
petted, or maybe it's just assimple as being overstimulated
by that touch.
So with positive reinforcement,you want to focus on what the
cat finds reinforcing, right?
So if the cat doesn't like to bepetted and that's why they're
biting you, let's find somethingelse we can do to make it so
that the cat enjoys interactingwith you and may also reduces

(19:52):
the stress.
So a lot of cats are superplayful.
Can we find a toy that the catenjoys chasing instead?
And that's how you interact withyour cat is by playing with a
flirt pole.
So yeah, poppy, do you want toexpand?

I can, I can, I obviously have clients I can
talk about, but I'm going tojust talk about my own cat, my,
my little biter.
Glimmer is her name.
She, She has a lot of, she had alot of petting aggression.
And when she was, even when shewas very young, she was a
singleton.
Her sibling died.
It was very sad for everyone,but she just was never a great.

(20:29):
She, she was a behavioral cat asthey sometimes say in the
shelter.

Good thing she got you.

If I tried to pet her, yes.
If I pet her, I couldn't getthrough one typical length pet
before her head would whiparound and sometimes make
contact.
And sometimes just as if she'sgoing to make contact.
And for a long time, we justfocused on anyone who came over.

(20:56):
We would say, don't touch theblack and white cat.
She's not for touching, but sheis for looking at.
So please look at her.
Please admire her.
Please remark on her beautifulbunny soft fur.
Look at her and tell her she'sglamorous.
Wow, you must be a kind of apredatory beast.
Like we encourage people, allthe feelings that you want to

(21:16):
put into touching her, use yourvoice instead.
Pet her with your voice, is whatwe said.
And I'm here, I'm here to tellyou that she's just recently
turned four.
And at this point, we no longereven have to give a warning to
anybody because we stayed withinher threshold.
We never, we would, we startedout, we said, okay, if one whole
pet is too much, I'm just goingto move my hand towards her and

(21:38):
then take it away.
I'm going to move my handtowards her, a treat falls, I'm
going to take it away.
And we gradually acclimated her.
The thing she needed was lessof, for her, it was just gradual
acclimation and knowing that wewere not going to push her
boundary.
When it got to the point thatyou could pet her five times
before she flipped her headaround to bite you, we pet her
three times and then stop.

(21:59):
And then we wait.
And sometimes she would go, we'dwait for her to go, why'd you
stop?
And then we'd say, okay, one,two, three.
And then I'm just going to wait.

I, I love that.
And one of the things I wouldexpand on that too, is choice
that the cat has the choicethere to continue being petted
or not.
And so this is something Iactually talk about with my kids
a lot, where I say, you need toask an animal if they want to be
petted before you just rush inwith your hands.
And so with like my own cats,what I offer is for them to come

(22:33):
to me first.
I don't rush over to them.
I'll offer a hand to them to letthem sniff because that's a huge
part of, of cats is they want tobe able to smell things.
And if they then knock theirhead against my hand, that's for
my animals is their way ofsaying, Hey, okay, you can pet
me now.
And then I can proceed topetting.
If the cat then walks away, I'mlike, Oh, okay.

(22:55):
Not today.

So it sounds like a lot of it is just, just
watching their body languagetoo, right?

Yes.
Yes.
I wish all cat owners had somekind of easy, mandatory course
you could take that was like 30minutes on the internet just
learning about cat bodylanguage.
And there are resources outthere about cat body language
that could help you understandwhat does it mean when their
whiskers do that, right?
What does it mean when theireyes look like that?

(23:22):
What does it mean?
The tail language, especially,right?
Oh, I think Kay might be, let'simagine she's getting a resource
about cat body language but whatis their tail doing?
Is it, is it like question marktail where the end is just going
or is the whole thing whippingback and forth?
Tails whipping.
Beware.

They have so many more expressions, I think, than
dogs do.
That it is more complicated to,to read what a cat wants than it
is a dog.
But I feel like we've beenaround them enough and like
really pay attention to it.
You can see those tiny little,subtle changes.
Alright.
Let's talk about cats oncounters.
Do you guys care, or Will youtrain cats to stay off of

(24:06):
counters?

I'm gonna let Poppy field this again.
I, I want to be fullytransparent, that

I feel..

I feel like Poppy is the cat behavior expert of
the two of us.
In her house, the way she doesthis is so amazing.
In our house, we really don'tcare.
We, when the cat gets on thecouch, honestly, my cats just
don't do it very often.
And when they do, I just don'tcare.
They tend to do it when we'renot in there.
And so I'm kind of like, meh,doesn't really bother me, but I

(24:35):
have seen what Poppy does andit's beautiful.
So go for it, Poppy.

Okay.

Oh, you.
I was curious too.
That's why I was like, yes,please answer this.
I actually know if Kay's catsare on her counters or not.
And I think, so I think chapterone is it's definitely up to the
individual.
I am never going to walk in andsay, you let your cats on your
counters.
They're dominating you.
That's not happening.
I, in my house, cats don't go onkitchen counters.

(25:03):
Where food prep happens, becausethat's the only thing that
happens on kitchen counters.
But they do go on the diningroom table, and I'm fine with
that.
They don't go on the dining roomtable when food appears.
So it's the same rule I have formy dog, except my dog isn't
quite agile enough to get ontothe the counter.
The rule in our house is when ahuman has food, the animals
belong on the floor.

(25:24):
And it's a very easy thing totrain.
If my animals could all belaying on the couch and if I
came over and sat on the couchwith a plate full of food,
everyone gets off the couchimmediately and sits in the
floor in front of me, because..

Wow.

That's what pays.

Yeah.

They're like, we're the best ones.
Look at me.
I'm sitting.
Oh, I'm the sittingest.

Yeah.

So in my house, I don't like cats on the
counters.
I don't judge anybody who doeshave cats on their counters.
It's a personal choice.
But it is, originally, it wasinteresting to me to teach it
more as an experiment because Ifeel like so many people,
especially on the internet,would say, Help! My cats are on
my counters! What do I do?

(26:04):
And everyone had so many answersfor them and almost every single
answer was punishment.
It was startling the cat,hurting the cat.
And I just couldn't, I thoughtthis can't be the only way.
So what I do is I have stationsfor my animals.
That are a desirable alternativeto being on the counter.

(26:24):
For a dog, that might be a mator a bed, a cot, something that
they go to.
For a cat, it could be a spot upon a tree or on a stool.
I have these little kind of stepaerobics steps with yoga mat on
top that are our platforms andthere are enough that there's
something for everyone to siton.

(26:44):
And I just pay heavily whenanimals are on those spots.
Pay, meaning feed, food.

Feed treats and, and cat foods, right?
Not, not your food.

Yeah.
And if I'm cook, you know, thebest part is when I'm making
their food, when I'm likeprepping a big batch of food,
everybody knows and they're all,I'm so on my spot.
I'm the most on my spot any cathas ever been on a spot.
And they'll sometimes take onestep forward and be like, see,
I'm on my spot just to show methey're getting on the spot.
And so everyone stays on theirspots, they're glued to their

(27:15):
spots, waiting and hoping thatsomething falls onto their spot,
which it does all the time.
Lots and lots of heavyreinforcement for being on those
spots.
So if you're on that spot,you're going to get affection,
you're going to get food.
It might be how we start a gametogether.
But when it comes to catsespecially, that spot is
something that will have abetter vantage point of what you
want to see in the kitchen thanbeing on the counter would.

(27:38):
So having a tree nearby can behelpful.
My cats have a couple differentstations.
They could be up high or theycould be down low.
Down low does mean they'recloser to food.
So it is desirable.
Lots and lots of reinforcementfor that.
And in the learning process.
You want to do two things,right?
You're training and you'remanaging and management is how
we prevent our learners, ourcats, our dogs, our leopard

(28:02):
geckos from making the choicesthat we don't love while we're
learning the new skill.
So, think about a baby, right?
Babies don't know how to climbup and downstairs safely.
Baby humans I mean.
They don't know how to climb upand downstairs..

Neither do baby puppies and kittens, I'm just
saying.

No, no, they don't, but for this case, I
think it's very relatable tounderstand how management works
for baby humans.
We put a gate at the top of thestairs because we don't want a
baby to fall down the stairsuntil they can safely walk down
them.
So there's a gate.
Now there's a learning processwhere the gate is up most of the
time, and then when parent iswalking baby down the stairs,

(28:38):
they might hold baby's hand,open the gate and walk down
together.
They're still learning.
They get some learning time in,but they're not left unattended
to just roll down the stairs.
And we do the same thing withanimals.

Yeah, hopefully

If you can block off the kitchen when you're not
there, if it's possible, if youcan't block off the kitchen, can
you block off the counter in away that doesn't make it
enticing for animals?
No food left on the counter,nothing that smelled yummy, not
even a crumb if you can avoid itwhile they're learning about how
great it is to be not on thecounter.

(29:12):
And concurrently, when they'rein the kitchen, they have your
attention because you aretraining them to stay on their
spot.

Okay.
I like that.
Yeah.
My, my cats definitely are catsthat go on the counter.
I'd say, I'd say only one ofthem, the rest of the other two
that wouldn't care.
But I also think that she'sactually a Labrador in a cat
suit.

We've talked about this, the"meowlinois".

The meowlinois, yeah, that's my cat.
She's a, she's a border catty.

Yeah.
That's your one that, that wasthe bitey one?

Yes.

Yeah.

The other one is the opposite.
The other one is only wild, sheonly turns into a wild animal
when vegetables are involved.

With vegetables?
I think that's definitely thefirst time I've seen that, heard
that with a cat with vegetables.

She's got a problem.

Yeah.

She's a, she's a green bean freak.

Nice.

Broccoli, anything, anything.
Zucchini.
Yeah.

Interesting.
Yeah.

If I handed her a piece of raw meat, she would
take it very politely.
But if I held out a green bean,she just savages it.
Grr! Ha ha!

Yeah, I think in our house too, like my cats
don't really want to go on thecounter all that much.
And I think it's because of justlike how our kitchen is set up
where it doesn't, like Poppysaid, provide much of a vantage
point.
So they have in our kitchen, wehave two of our walls have those
built in window type mantles,and they much prefer to sit and

(30:46):
watch from there rather thanactually get up on the counter.
So I think having a spot likethat where the cat gravitates to
a preferred station rather thanyour actual counters is best.
I shouldn't say best.
It's just an easy way to managethe problem to begin with.

Yeah.
I like that.
I can, I can definitely imaginelike that little window thing.
That's great.
So they're like up above theycan see everything.
Yeah.
Nice.
Do you give them treats up thereas well when you're cooking?

I haven't needed to because cats tend to naturally
want to be up high, right?
So they just naturallygravitated to that and I haven't
really needed to specificallyreinforce it.
It's just about setting up theenvironment to be conducive for
cats.

Nice.
Okay.
Let's talk about do either ofyou have cats that are leash
trained?
You do.

I would say, I would say that my two are leash
trained, I don't do it as oftenas I should to like keep the
behavior solid simply because Ihave dogs and two kids and I
just don't have a whole lot oftime to go out with a cat on a
leash.
But they were, and I did trainone of them from the get go from

(32:01):
a really, really young age wherewe got her really just
conditioned to doing it withpositive reinforcement.
And the other one is justlackadaisical and would probably
let me do whatever I wanted.
So she was really easy to, toget to do it.
And plus like the positivereinforcement issue part of it,
of just getting to go outsidewas a really big motivator in

(32:23):
itself.
So yes, they are at leasttrained.
I sadly can't get them out asoften as I wish I could, but
yeah.

Nice.
And Poppy?

Uhh, the bitey one..
She has a name.

Yeah.

Glimmer Glimmer is.
She, she doesn't like the partwhere you put the harness on.
That still irritates her, butonce it's on, she's fine.
And she's great outdoors and Ihave a long line for her.
So she mostly spends time out inthe garden.
For being such a bitey cat.
She's also a little bit of afraidy cat.
My younger cat is a year and ahalf now, and I wish I had done

(33:03):
a lot more training with herwhen she was a baby, but she had
a lot of medical needs, andthose really took a lot of our
energy.
Now that she's doing a lotbetter she is acclimated.
They both wear collars 24/7, sothey're both accustomed to
having something on.
And she's acclimated to theharness, but she hasn't spent a
lot of time outside on it.

(33:23):
I have good reason to believeshe might be our adventure cat.
She might be the one who's alittle more chill in public and
would enjoy going out onadventures.
We will probably start gettingher outside this summer, which
is great because it leads me tosomething else I want to say.
Which is if you only taught yourcat one thing, if you thought it

(33:46):
would be a fun idea to trytraining a cat something very
simple.
If you only trained the onething, it would be a recall.
I wish that everyone would tameeverybody's animals for recall.
Now, we can make it fancy.
Let's start with a very basicrecall.
What a recall means is you aregoing to say a word or make a
sound and your animal, no matterwhere they are, no matter what

(34:08):
they're doing, is going to turntail and run back to you.
That's a recall.
We can make it very fancy.
We can teach our animals thingslike when you hear the fire
alarm, you run into yourcarrier.
And then we're ready to beevacuated.
We can do that.
We can teach them all kinds ofthings like that.
But the main thing I would wantis a recall, because no animal

(34:30):
of mine goes outside onadventures unless they have some
kind of recall.
And for the cats who are madeout of liquid and can slide out
of harnesses, there is noperfectly escape proof harness
in the world.
And who, who, could be intriguedby a bird, or frightened by a
dog, or whatever, could, couldslip away.

(34:51):
I want to know that there's away for me to get them back
inside.
Especially since some cats aredoor dashers.
Once they've had a taste of theoutdoors, if you don't do it
right, they might decide thatthey just need to go, go out on
their own and I'd love to knowthat there's a way to call them
back.
So recall comes first beforeanything else and then
acclimating to the outfits thatyou might need to wear, a

(35:12):
walking vest or a harness andthen leash.

So with Glimmer, how did you get her trained to
the harness since she didn'treally like to be touched?

Oh, that's a great question.
I'm going to tell you right now,it's a whole other podcast.

Okay.

The biggest difference because we are
patient people.
I can wait, as I have years forher to want, it didn't take
years, but I can wait a year forher to want me to touch her, to
actively seek out touch and wantto be cuddled and held and
finessed.
I don't mind waiting for that.
But in the meantime, there areother things happening,
including nails are growing,right?

(35:53):
Animals need to be brushed.
She's a short hair, she can getaway with not too much brushing.
But the nails are not going tocut themselves.
And no one wants to cuddle a catwhose nails are like literally
destroying your clothing, justexisting and nails need to be
clipped.
And on a cat who doesn't want tobe touched, I can't, I'm not
just going to manhandle and holdher down and do it because the

(36:15):
next time I go to hold her, shehas that, that history of
knowing, Oh, she holds me.
She's going to pin me down anddo something terrible to me.
This is where there's twoconcepts.
There's cooperative care andpattern games.
And cooperative care is all ofthe amazing training that we can

(36:36):
do to help our animals opt in,consent to us doing things to
them, either a veterinarian, agroomer, us.
And there are a million thingsin life that we, unfortunately,
have to do to these creaturesthat we keep captive like nail
trims, medical exams, toothbrushing, grooming, giving them

(36:59):
their eye drops or ear drops,taking blood.
All these things have to happenif they're going to live in the
modern world with us.
And we have a lot of optionsabout how to do it.
And cooperative care is thiswhole world of can we spend some
of our training time trainingour animals to not only tolerate
these things.
Oh, yeah, I forgot acceptinginjections opting into

(37:21):
injections Taking a pillwillingly swallowing a pill that
tastes bad.

Exactly.

You can do that.
Those are real things that wecan train dogs to do and cats.

Yeah.
And it's so hard, especially forcat people.
Like I definitely have, I have,I ask every single person do you
think you'd be able to give yourcat a pill?
And I'd say 99% of them sayabsolutely not.
Yeah.

Really?
Oh my goodness.
Can you just give them my cardwhen they say that?

Yeah.
It's exactly, yes.
Yes.

I'll walk them through it.
Okay.
I've, I've, I've truly.
I have a small cat who's hadsome medical issues and needed
some pills and also someointments and it's a lot of
things have had to happen to herand I've never pilled her.
I've never like forcibly pilledher.
I just have a lot more creativeways of getting medication into
animals.
Cooperative care was one elementof how it worked.

(38:14):
Which means that she gets to saywhether or not I touch her paws,
she gets to say whether or not Ibrush her, and she has a way of
telling me, yes, continue to dothe job.
And pattern games, which arethis whole other thing that is,
they're like little, I feel likethis is way too deep of a
subject matter for right now,but the idea is that we create
little conversations.

(38:34):
It's a way of a conversationbetween the teacher and the
learner, between the handler andthe animal, where we ask our
animals, would you like to dothis thing?
And they say, I would like to dothis thing because I know it's
predictable.
I know what you're going to do.
It feels safe.
It's comforting.
It's calming.
It's something that an animalcan wrap their head around.

(38:55):
I know what you're going to do,you told me that you're about to
do the thing and I will tellyou, yes, please do the thing.
And I say, great, I will do thething now.
And we both keep our agreement.
So we both listen to each other.
And if at any point the animalsays, that's not the
conversation I want to haveanymore, then that's fine.
I learned something.
I learned what kind ofconversation my cat doesn't want
to have.
And it's my job next time tochange the conversation.

Nice.
It sounds like it was probably avery complicated process getting
Glimmer to do that.

I know it.
I really did complicate that.
It's a special skill I have.
It, it was, it was, it waseasier than you'd think.
It was basically just making avery, very simple pattern of a
marker sound, which is like aclick that I make with my mouth
and a treat, click, treat,click, treat.
She already knew that from ourother training, that if I make a

(39:48):
click, a treat is to follow.
And then I started adding thingsinto the pattern, do this,
click, treat.
And I had her essentially whatit looks like now as I hold the
brush in my hand and Glimmerlooks at the brush.
She just glances at the brushand that says you may brush me
once and then click treat and Iwait she looks again, you may

(40:08):
brush me and now it's not oncenow It's more like five times
and then I pause.
Yeah.

Is that how you did it with the harness then, too,
where you presented the harnessand she offers to put her head
through the loop or head intothe harness?

Like I said, she's not awesome at the harness
and I think it's because I didpush it a little bit too fast
previously but I would presentthe harness and any interaction
with the harness, any sniffingthe harness, looking at the
harness, I would mark that witha click and a treat and treat
away from the harness.
And she would go, Oh, is thislike a game of hot and cold?

(40:46):
Do you want me to be close tothe harness?
And I would say, click andtreat.
And she's Oh, this click treat.
So I just got her used to theharness itself.
Sometimes we say leaving theharness where your cat eats is
helpful to just acclimating themto the idea.

Positive association.

It's not a snake.
It's a cool thing.
And then, just checking forconsent.
Can I put this over your head?
Ooh, there's food involved.
Boop.
If I stick this over your head,Churu appears.
Squeeze that Churu.
And then it comes off again.

I think that's really great.

One of the hurdles I had with one of my cats was
the leash part of it.
She was, they were both okaywith the harness pretty easily.
It was the leash that scaredthem.
I don't know if it was like thedragging of it, if the sight of
it behind them, the feeling ofit.
And that was essentially what Idid too, where it was like, I
presented the leash, click,treat, present the leash, click,
treat.

(41:40):
And then you add more difficultyto it as they progress.
Where at first I present it andit's not moving, then you
present it and you move it alittle bit.
And eventually it became a bitof a toy.
So like the end of the leashbecame a fun little flirt pole
at one point.
And so they weren't scared of itanymore.
It's become a little bit of agame of tug sometimes.
But yeah, it helps them get overthe fear of it.

(42:04):
So..

I think that it would work really well too just
even with, so I have a lot ofcats that we have to do treat
for asthma.
And so I have this speciallittle mask that goes over their
face.
And that sounds like the perfectway to try to help treat them,
for something that they, is lifethreatening, they absolutely
need this to have happen, andunfortunately we need to have it
happen quickly, but just tryingto get them acclimated to it by

(42:25):
keeping it near their food bowland giving them treats like you
were saying, yeah.

Mmhmm.

Would you say, Dr.
Sugerman, that that's somethingthat you would hope that all
cats were trained to do.
If all cats were trained to puttheir head into a thing like
from a vet's perspective, Iguess my question is what's one
thing you wish all cats weretrained to do.

That absolutely is because let's say they're in
respiratory distress.
They're having a really hardtime breathing for some reason.
It may not be asthma.
It could be so many otherthings.
Heart failure, house fires, somany things.
And we have to put a mask overtheir face initially to try to
help do whatever we need.
Whether we need to get a weighton them, or we need to put an IV
catheter into them.
And that's scary, right?

(43:09):
To have something over theirface like that.
It's not quite like there arecat muzzles and stuff that block
their eyes, and this is notquite that.
They can see everything that'shappening.
And also we have this airblowing into their face at the
same time.
So it is very difficult.

Right, which a lot of cats don't like.

Exactly.
Most people don't like that,right?
Yeah, but we have to do thislife saving thing just to, it's
a temporary thing.
It's not like we have to holdthat mask on them for long
periods of time, but it's stillsomething that it's really
important to give them in orderto help them to get them into an
oxygen cage or somewhere that'sgonna be a little bit less
scary.

Yeah.

Can I one thing to what Kay was saying?
I just want to say one thingabout the leash stuff.
You can also trydesensitization, where you start
with something light, like apiece of string or a shoelace,
and you gradually work up towhatever your leash is, but also
use like a size appropriateleash, Right?

Don't use your Rottweiler's leash.

mm mm, mm mm, mm mm.

Yeah.

No,

Okay.
Great.

I did have an asthmatic cat, and so you,
training a cat to use that, theAeroKat pump thing is really
helpful.

Yeah, it is really helpful.
And it's a scary sound, even Itry to make sure to train people
that they do the pump away fromthe cat and then put it on.
But still the sound is scary.
The smell is scary.
It doesn't smell like them.
There's definitely lots of scarythings to it.
And like I said, we have to dothis pretty quickly because the
fact that we need them to havethis life saving thing
immediately.

(44:40):
It's not like I can be like,okay, I can train you in the
next four weeks.
So we have to do a lot of that.
Even just in the clinic, tryingto make sure that they are a
little desensitized to it eventhere.
We use a lot of Churu for that.

Oh yeah.
I buy it the big, the big tub.

Exactly.
What other things do you guyslike tend to see with your, with
your clients as to what theyneed help with, with their cats?

The biggest thing that you haven't mentioned
that, that people ask about whenit comes to training, two
things.
Probably cat/dog integration Uh,and, or cat/cat integration, but
because we're Cascade Canine, wevery often get cat/dog
integration stuff.

(45:28):
And the litter box issues.

Yeah.

I do feel like litter box issues are usually a
stress and medical thing.
Would you agree?

I would say that I usually am taking in a lot of
information when somebody isdoing a consultation with me.
I want to know everything aboutthose litter boxes.
I want to know how many cats,how many boxes, how big are the
boxes?
What are they shaped like?
What kind of litter?
How full is the litter?
How often are we scooping?
Where are the litter boxeslocated?
If I didn't already say that, Ihave a lot of questions, but

(46:02):
almost every time I also, unlessit's something very obvious Oh,
you can't have five cats andone..

Litter box?

Two square foot litter box.
With one kind of substrate thatis pretty known as like a not a
thing that most cats like.
So unless it's obvious, I reallydo send them to the vet first I
say please take your cat to thevet tell them you're
experiencing inappropriateelimination.
Check it out with your vet firstbecause they don't want you to
spend your money on a behaviorconsultant or on a trainer or

(46:35):
anybody like that until youfirst made sure that it's
something that that isn'tmedical.
So medical first.

Yeah.
And I would say that's true oflike almost everything that we
do, where we want to rule outmedical problems before we delve
into anything.
So whether you're reaching outwith a dog or a cat, if it's a
behavior problem, like bitinginappropriate elimination, all
of that.
It's, it's, it's, it warrants avet visit.

Because we all act strange when we're in pain.
And animals don't always presentit in a way that's easy for
humans to acknowledge orunderstand as pain.

Yeah, yeah and the number of times we've heard
people say things like, oh she'sjust really stubborn or she's
just a mean cat or dog.
And it's have you checked tomake sure they're not in pain?
Because it's a lot, a lot of thetime.
So that's the underlying cause.

Yeah.
I do find that most of the timewhen they bring their cats in, a
lot of times they say, oh, they,she was just eliminating on my
bed because she was angry at me.
I'm like, that's most likely notthe case.
Yeah.
Yes, Exactly.

I promise your cat's not spiteful.

Right.

It's not a thing that happens for cats.
They can have, they have a richinternal tapestry, they have a
complex emotional life and veryelaborate social world.
But none of it is, is spite orrevenge.
That's just, these are notthings that are happening inside
of a cat.

Yeah, those are very human feelings that most
animals cannot experience.
So let's stop labeling them asspiteful.

Yeah, yeah, I agree.

But when someone says that, when someone says, my
cat, oh my cat is peeing on mybed because she's mad at me.
She's peeing at me to getrevenge.
I think the next thing I want toknow is what do you think she's
getting revenge for?

Yes.

That you think that you think this is
happening?
And let's talk about it, right?
What do you, how do you thinkyour cat felt about this thing?
And I don't know if it's revengeso much as big fear, big stress,
big uncertainty, big anxiety.

Exactly.
I'd say like a good amount ofthem are usually like, I went on
vacation and I came back and shepeed on my bed.
I'm like it's usually an anxietyportion there then, right?
Not necessarily because I'mangry at you.
It's I'm really anxious that youwere gone.

Yes, I wish I could tell you the number of
times somebody says I got a newboyfriend and my cat is jealous,
so she started peeing on my bedcause she's jealous.
And I want to know what happenswhen you're not there between
the cat and the boyfriend.
I want to know, does the cat allof a sudden not get as much
attention?
Did we stop playing with thecat?
Are you sometimes not cominghome at night anymore?

(49:26):
There's a lot of things that arehappening, and I don't think the
cat is jealous.
I think the cat is strugglingbecause their routine has
changed.
New things are happening thatare frightening, or things that
used to be reliable sources ofcomfort and regulation and
stress relief are now not thereanymore.
And your cat needs some supportto cope.

It sounds like a lot of this is you will need to
figure out the background behindthem to try to figure out why
they're doing this inappropriateelimination, right?
Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh yeah always.

Yeah.

I was just going to say, I think like with all
behavior cases that we take,we're always looking for the
underlying cause because inorder to address the problem,
you have to first address thecause.
We can't just slap a bandaid onit and call it good.
So no matter what you're lookingfor the underlying cause and
working from there to fix thebehavior, not just let's stop

(50:17):
the behavior where it's at.

You had also mentioned like integrating them
together, dogs and catstogether, cats and cats
together.
What are some good techniques todo that?

That's a whole podcast episode, too.

I was gonna say, that's a huge one.

We could definitely do that on another
podcast episode.
Is there like a quick, quicktips?

Okay, quick quick tips is when new animal
comes home animals areseparated.
They can smell each other andhear each other but they don't
have to interact yet.
Everybody gets time to acclimateto that level of interaction.
Smells.
Sounds.
Before they ever have to meeteach other in person

Mhm.

Introductions happen slowly and you relate the
existence of the new familymember to something wonderful
like new family member is overthere and that's when you get
your bone.
Or if you're, if you're the catmember of that family, then see
that dog over there?
Yes.
Now there's Churu because thatdog exists.

(51:17):
We want to go slow and make sureeverybody's really comfortable.
And move through a stage wherethere is a barrier, definitely
barriers at first.

Protected contact.

Protected contact, yes.
Until both animals are showingthat it's not a big deal.
They can act regular even thoughthe other animal exists, and
then we slowly fade out thebarriers and we do things that
continue to improverelationships, like training
together.

Yes.

Yes.

Side by side fun activities with protected
contact.

And, and that's a really cool thing.
Somebody who I think is probablydefinitely a mentor of mine and
I'm certain a mentor of Kay'stoo, Ken Ramirez, he has this
protocol for helping any twoanimals live together safely.
And part of what I love about itis the cornerstone of this, this
protocol is having both animalstrain separately at a distance

(52:21):
and gradually training closer tocloser and closer together so
that they are experiencingsomething enjoyable, which is
positive reinforcement training.
They're doing cool moves andgetting snacks for it.
It feels great.
And it's in the proximity ofanother creature who's doing
this same thing.
I do this kind of thing almostevery night at my house, we have

(52:42):
training time where we'd set upa little platforms and everybody
gets..
It's also wonderful for teachingthem all impulse control and
waiting their turn and reducingresource guarding.
Yeah, it's great.
But everybody gets a little turnto do their thing.
Right now, the dog and one ofthe cats are learning to play
the piano.
We don't know what instrumentGlimmer's gonna play, but

(53:04):
Chiquette is a piano whiz.
She's ready.
And Sparrow's like the childwhose mom forced her to take
lessons.
But I think that Chiquette wouldprefer like a, a bass or
something.

I guess they some sort of like guitar or
something.
Yeah.

Yeah.
She could be a drummer.
She's just got an attitude.
She doesn't, she's she's toocool for that kind Piano, piano
is a nerd, nerd instrument toher.
The other two are nerds.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Cute.

The thing I like about that protocol you were
mentioning is that the twoanimals aren't becoming
necessarily magnetized to oneanother.
They're just learning that theycan do these activities side by
side and without having to focustoo hard on each other in that
moment, if that makes sense.
They just..

Distracted, you mean?

Yes, but they're still very aware that the other
animal is there.
They're just not beingreinforced for directly doing
something with that othercreature, which might create
some kind of magnetism that thetwo parties involved might not
necessarily want.
And yeah, having them do theirseparate activities, but in each
other's presence, I think is areally beautiful way to do it.

Nice.
Was there anything else that youguys wanted to share with us
just about cat training ingeneral?

I think Poppy, we were talking a little bit
earlier about this, about how wereally just wanted to mention
that with cats and with anycreature, the use of punishment
is not only not necessary, butit will often create side
effects that you don't want.
And it also really does notcreate a positive bond between
you and the creature.

(54:42):
And positive reinforcement iswhat will do that for you.
It can create a just reallysolid, strong bond between the
animal and the person.
And I think that's why we allhave pets, right?
It's because we want to havethat bond.
Do you want to expand more onthat?

Yeah, that's exactly the last thing I was
going to add is the reasons forpositive reinforcement training
of your cat, period.
But I will also add that who,like who should train their cat?
You don't have to have anespecially clever, training
savvy cat to train.
I trained my 18 year oldchronically ill cat.

(55:19):
She, she died last, not theFebruary, a year and a half ago.
But, but I trained her too.
And pretty much every being thatis alive is capable of being
trained.
Hello, Shiva.

Aww.

'Besides me.'

And that it's great for if it's an older cat,
it's a wonderful way of, ofdelaying cognitive decline.
And keeping our cats stimulatedand engaged and enriched.
It's great for buildingrelationship.
If it's a new cat or shy cat, itcan build confidence.
If you have a cat who's a bitmischievous, it's a great way to
channel that brain.

(55:57):
If you have one of those bordercatties.
Who needs a job, otherwise theydo destruction.
Then that's great, give them ajob.
Give them a job.
If you are really silly about itand it's fun for you, you can
get titles.
You can train your cats to dotricks and get titles for that.
There are people who do likecircus type tricks.
You could do agility.

(56:17):
You could do, there's sports youcan do with your cat these days.
But for me, I think that even ifyou were just gonna train a few
things, I would train a coupleof really simple foundational
behaviors because thosefoundational behaviors can then
turn into tricks if you want to,or they could turn into the
basis, the foundation forcooperative care, better

(56:39):
grooming and handling,medication administration,
easier vet visits.
Or they could be how you resolvebehavior issues.
I know that for me, the factthat my cats, my pets all have
certain skills means that when Ihave a problem, I have a lot, I,
I feel like I have these toolsin my tool pouch.

(57:04):
What even is the expression?
Tools in

Your wheelhouse.
In your wheelhouse, I think.

Wheelhouse.

Tool belt?
Wheelhouse?
No,

Tools in your wheelhouse.
Yeah.
Maybe.
I don't know.

Tools in my..

Tool box!

Tool box.
Sure.

My box.
This is, none of this is right.

You're saying it so strangely.

Okay.
I feel like I have all thesetools available to me that, that
a person might not haveotherwise.
So that when there's a problem,when my cat starts trying to
steal my wife's ice cream andgrabbing it with her foot just
give me that ice cream.
I have options, at, at first.
And I'm so sorry, I, it'spossible my wife never listens

(57:45):
to this, but sorry to blow youup here, sweetie.
But at first her method was topush the cat away.
And I'll tell you what.
You push that cat away and shecomes back for ice cream.
You push her away.
She comes.
Yeah.
Amazing.
She built a beautiful behaviorof basically cat shoving games,
right?
Where the cat push her off.
She comes back.
Did the cat change her behavior?

(58:06):
Did she stop climbing on top ofher for ice cream?
Absolutely not.
But, I said, wait a minute, waita minute, our cats know about
stationing.
What if you just put a stationon the floor in front of you and
then wait and see what happens?
And the cat jumps onto thestation and you're like, oh,
deserves little taste of icecream.

I'm gonna say as a veterinarian, I'm not gonna
recommend ice cream.
Maybe do a treat instead.

Okay.
Okay.
I'm talking literally like thefilm of milk on a fingertip, but
let's say treats.
I also have little jars oftreats on the couch.
So we'll pretend.
Erase that.
Delete that from the record.

Lots of people will do it, but yeah.

Okay.
I do have little treats thatare, and the treats, they're
just kibble.
So I, I, is that okay?

That's fine.
That's fine.
Your, your ice cream is okay.
I just usually, when people cometo me and they're like, my cat
is vomiting excessively and I'mlike, do you give them any
people food?
And somebody says no.
I'm like, what about that icecream?

And then they're like, milk.

Yes, when, when Poppy comes into the cat and I'm
like, do you give them peoplefood?
She says no.
And I'm like, what about thatice cream?

No, I will tell you.

Then I'll know.
Yeah.

Dr.
Sugerman, I give, I give my catpeople food in extremely tiny
portions, only cat food, onlypeople food that is okay and
safe for cats to eat.
So like a green bean.

Yeah.

she eats a green bean.

Yes.

Could have two grains of brown rice sometimes.

That's okay.
Yeah.

Also I know my cats do not have a sensitive
stomach and tend to toleratethings like veggies very well.
Not cucumbers we learned, butwhere are we going with all
this?
Let's rewind a few steps.

The ice cream, not pushing your cat away, creating
a station.
Yes.

that, Knowing that I have behaviors like
targeting, like stationing, andlike a recall, those are like my
Swiss Army Knife things.
I can use them to solve a lot ofproblems.
If your cat, let's pretend youdidn't teach your cat leave it.
But you see them running towardsa pill that you dropped on the
floor.
What if you just tried to, whatif they had a really strong

(01:00:10):
recall and you just said,Shotzi! Or whatever your recall
word is, and your cat turnstail, runs right back to you.
Marvelous.
You didn't need to train leaveit, drop it, and here, you just
needed one thing, which was arecall.
So if you just trained a coupleof simple behaviors, you can use
them in a lot of differentcontexts.

Dr. Sugerman (01:00:29):
Yeah.
I think that's great.
That's a, that's great advicefor them.
Cause I would think the samething, when you think about
training your dogs, like I needto try and train, sit, stay,
leave it, recall it, but youdon't really have to have all of
those things, right?
If you at least have at leastthe one simple thing of having
recall, just training, just acouple of basics first.

Kay Rutland (01:00:51):
Yes.

Poppy Foxheart (01:00:53):
Absolutely.

Was there anything else you guys wanted to share
with us?

Poppy's available for cat consults.

You don't do cat consults, Kay?

At the moment, not really.
I just, my schedule at themoment's really full to begin
with, so I'm not really addingmore things to it.
And I, again, like I have a widerepertoire of working with lots
of different animals, but I feellike Poppy is your cat person.
Like she's, she's the, she's theone I'm going to defer to.

How do we get a hold of you guys then?

We can be found at CascadeCanine.com and it's
canine spelled out C A N I N E.
So CascadeCanine.com.
And there you can, there's aform to reach out and get in
contact with us.
You can see some of the kinds oftraining packages we offer.
We do in home training and onlocation training.

(01:01:45):
We do not have a facility thatyou bring your dog into.
So we train pets where theylive, where they encounter the
world.
Whether that's in a park, on thesidewalk in their neighborhood,
or in their living room.

Do you do online consults at all?

Yeah.
Especially for cats, because alot of times they don't behave
the same when a stranger's inthe house.

Exactly.
I was gonna say, I feel like alot of them, if you tried to
train one of my cats, youwouldn't see her.

Yes.
Yes.
Yeah, we do online consults too.

Very nice.
Okay.
And then when you put in likeyour information on Cascade
Canine, does it, it'll go toboth of you.
Is that correct?

Yes.

Okay.
Perfect.
All right.
I really appreciate you guyscoming on.
Thank you so much.
I know that this is one of themost common things that people
ask about.
It's like, how can I train mycat?
So I'm really excited have sometools for it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Especially like the pillproblem.
The pill problem and the asthmaproblem.
I get that a lot.

Mm hmm.
That's a special thing that Ilove, so I love cooperative
care.

Nice.
We'll also link just aninformation on how to get a hold
of you guys on our podcast.
So again, I want to say thankyou so much you guys and I know
that we're gonna have you onagain soon to do another topic.

Thank you, Dr.
Sugerman, it's been a pleasure.

All right.

Yeah.
Thanks for having us.

Absolutely.
And to everybody else, thankyou.
Always make sure to keep yourpets happy, healthy, and safe.
Thank you guys.
And that brings us to the end ofanother episode of
Vetsplanation.
I hope you've enjoyed our deepdive into the world of animal
training with our amazing guestsfrom Cascade Canine.
We covered a lot today fromaddressing common cat behaviors

(01:03:24):
to tips on positivereinforcement and even training
techniques.
A huge thank you to our friendsKay and Poppy for sharing their
expertise and insights with us.
A great thank you to our friendShawn Hyberg for doing our
podcast for all the editing.
As always, we love hearing fromour listeners.
So if you have any questions ortopics you'd like us to cover in

(01:03:44):
future episodes, feel free toreach out.
Don't forget to subscribe, rate,and review our podcast if you
enjoyed today's episode.
Your support helps bring youmore great content, and helps us
to be able to help more pets.
As always, make sure to keepyour pets happy, healthy, and
safe, and we'll see you nextweek.

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