Home › Forums › Recreational Truffle Dog Training 101 › Matt and Cheyenne (access until March 15, 2014) › Reply To: Matt and Cheyenne (access until March 15, 2014)
First off- Great starting cue of “let’s go hunting’- she responds to that even before you, Matt, start moving, which is great. It is good to have a starting cue for your hunt sequences. It is also excellent to see she is checking all of the containers, as this will provide a really nice foundation for transitioning outdoors as it will provide her a guide for visual identification in slightly more distracting and complex scenarios.
Your timing on marking the correct container looks great. You are allowing her enough to pause at the container.
Has she started to offer anymore significant alert behaviors? It appears as she pauses slightly, but that was about all I could tell from the video. We can shape something, or manufacture an alert, but did you notice anything you think you can shape, or in the event she doesn’t offer much, do you have a desired alert you would like from her?
Sounds like she got a chip? (by the crunching…) 🙂
When she finds the correct container, you could even engage her slightly more- draw out the reward sequence- give her a couple of smaller chips, one after another while maintaining communication and praise- and aim to reward (give the treat) at the source of the odor (right over the cup/box). We want to encourage her to stay near the location of the odor during the reward. This will be important later, so it is good to practice now and build that into the behavior chain and reward sequence.