On Tuesday evening I took Muttley to a positive method training class, as
an observer. We were there early for the first class, which was perhaps
class #3 in a series. Muttley and I greeted the dogs and their owners as
they came in the door. There was a nice young rescued black pit bull, a
small bulldog, and a young GSD mix.

In general the dogs greeted each other properly with butt sniffs, but the
GSD tended to confront dogs face-to-face, which the trainer said was
"impolite", and often a precursor to a fight. The GSD would often start
barking and lunging toward the other dogs, who reacted in kind, and there
was a lot of tension. However, he seemed to be more OK with Muttley, who
did not really react very much, and he never barked at all. In fact, he
seemed to come back to me and Muttley for support in his intentions to
drive the other dogs away. Muttley looked at me as if saying "Who is this
brat?"

The class is based on positive motivation with treats and clicker training.
The idea, of course, is to associate the click with a desired behavior, and
variably reward the dog with a treat upon every click. But there were
rarely any periods of peace where all dogs were calm and focused, and the
handlers were clicking and doling out treats at a frantic rate. Muttley was
not too much motivated by the treats, although he crawled out on the floor
to scarf up a few that had been dropped.

The main focus of this class was loose leash walking, and the dogs seemed
to do fairly well, although we were in a fairly small room. Muttley and I
were at the other end of the room, and possibly provided a small
distraction, but mostly he just lay at my feet, and just sat up or stood
when the other dogs approached. He seemed very relaxed and unconcerned
about the other dogs, as I think he felt that he had greeted all of them
and they were OK and not a threat.

But it seemed like the handlers were clicking and treating their dogs far
too often, and in fact they soon ran out of treats. This may have been
because of the frequent disruptions when the GSD started a snarkfest, and
the owners were trying to reward every tiny bit of desired behavior. I
think at this point the philosophy was still continuous click&treat, rather
than variable rewards. The owner of the GSD tried to calm his dog by
standing between him and the other dogs who were distracting him and
causing him to react, but it had minimal effect. The instructor had the
owner of the pit bull take him to a different area at one time, and another
time had the GSD and his owners take him outside for a walk. She said that
sometimes pit bulls and bulldogs set off aggressive reactions in some dogs.

The class was an hour long, and the trainer said Muttley was the best
behaved dog in the class, and thought that her classes were possibly too
advanced for him. But perhaps we could learn something about clicker
training, and I think it is best done under professional supervision,
rather than just trying it on my own. I know my timing is not great, and
that is vital for this method.

Then, there was an introductory class that was for owners only, but the
instructor allowed me and Muttley to stay as long as we did not create a
distraction. Muttley was very good as about 8 people came in and sat in a
circle. He did go to each person to check them out and get a head scritch,
but then he was happy enough to sit at my feet or even lay down next to me.
He alerted when someone came in a little late, but only to stand up and
look intensely out the window, and then he greeted her nicely when she came
in the door. I also gave him a rawhide chew, which he played with for a
little while, and then finally chomped on it and devoured it in a few
minutes.

The instructor also offers "Doggie Socials", and she said they would be
very appropriate for Muttley. I think it is about an hour of supervised
indoor off-leash time for several dogs to greet each other and play. I am
still a bit uneasy about that, after my bad experience over two years ago,
but since then Muttley has gotten along very well with many new dogs, and
only one time have I noticed him act in a way that might be considered
aggressive. As I have heard it said, dogs never do things for no reason, so
I'm sure there was one in that case, and it might have been a reaction to
my holding the leash too tightly and expressing some fear of a problem.

So, that was our experience with this method of training. I think it was a
good social experience for Muttley and me, and maybe I will look into doing
more with rewards based training and using a clicker. But I'm quite happy
with Muttley's behavior in this circumstance, and I think all he really
needs is a bit more structure and consistency.

Paul and Muttley