I’ve been playing a lot lately with Sebastian, who is a cute and curious three year old red roan quarter horse. Sebastian has changed tremendously from a shy, unconfident youngster to a eager beaver who is interested in people and engaged during training. When I met Sebastian last spring he was a pretty shy guy who didn’t […]
Training Stories and Tips RSS feed for this section
Dogs, horses, and rats. Birds, goldfish, cats. Dolphins, raccoons, and elephants. What animals can’t we train? In this section you’ll find lots of great training stories and tips. You will also get to meet many of the wonderful animals that I get to train. I hope that you’ll enjoy reading about my adventures (and misadventures) and that these articles and tales can provide you with insight that will help you with your own animals.
Mountain Coatis and Training Mechanics
I played just a bit this afternoon with the Mountain Coati at the Heard Museum. Coatis, which are close relatives of the raccoon, are found in South America and some parts of South Texas. This coati was a gregarious, agreeable sort of fellow, similar to most raccoons that I’ve met. We mainly worked on a […]
Tootie Targets
Eighteen month old Tootie is super smart, but also a super mugger when it comes to treats. I stopped working with him last Spring because I didn’t really have the skills to keep up with him (or his teeth!). We recently had our first clicker session in months. I kept him behind a barrier so […]
Are You a Splitter or a Lumper?
Horse clicker trainer Alexandra Kurland often speaks of splitters and lumpers. These are funny words, but they refer to an often serious training problem! Most behaviors can be broken down into many smaller pieces and approximations. When we break our goal down into tiny chunks and build gradually to a target behavior, we’re being a […]
Training a 35 Pound Rodent? Oh My!
I’ve started volunteering at the Heard Museum with ORCA (a lab in UNT’s behavior analysis department that focuses on animal training). One of the species we worked with on my first trip to the Heard was the Patagonian cavy, a 35 pound South American rodent. I’ll admit, before going out there, I really had no […]
Building Duration With 300 Peck Pigeons
Want your rambunctious dog to be able to sit in a down-stay for 10 minutes or walk on a loose leash for a mile? How about teaching your young horse to let you hold his foot for an extended period of time of stand still for a 20 minute grooming session? Many people have trouble […]