20 JanEpisode 113 | Dog Training Q and A! 1/14/2021: On why it can be useful to teach a dog to go in a bag
This is a bonus episode: A recording of a live Q and A.
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Here, Annie answers two questions, and offers a similar suggestion to help deal with both issues: Train a dog to go in a bag!
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Mentioned in this episode:
LL Bean Boat and Tote bag, also on Amazon
Dog Appeasing Pheromone products: Adaptil DAP Collar, Adaptil DAP Diffuser, DAP Spray
Episode 4 | Let’s talk about dog food with Hanna Mandelbaum of Evermore Petfood
Transcript:
Annie:
Thank you for joining me folks. I have two questions here that were submitted. As always, you can join me for these Q and A sessions live in two places, either in the new School for the Dogs app, which is free and you can get there by looking up School for the Dogs community in the app store or play store, or going to schoolforthedogs.com/community. Or you can join me in webinar format schoolforthedogs.com/QandA. And you can submit a question in advance as some people have done here at anniegrossman.com/ask.
So two questions this week and they have a common thread in my answers. First one is regarding Wilson who's currently a School for the Dogs puppy student, and is very excited for prep school at School for the Dogs which is starting next month after graduating from puppy kindergarten. He's very rarely had an accident in our apartment, but given that he was still getting used to going downstairs, upstairs not being a problem, we've always carried him outside to eliminate. We thought we were golden saying, okay, once we made it outside and treating right after he eliminated.
Wilson's much more confident walking down stairs now, however. We're in a fourth floor, walk-up in New York City. On foot, he's having about a 50-50 success rate holding his bladder until we get all the way downstairs and out the two front doors. Any tips for how we can help him out because he is getting heavy? They also note that he is eating puppy kibble and and treats. His high value treats are freeze dried duck and boiled chicken.
So I think a 50, 50% rate and nearly a hundred percent success rate of getting this puppy to pee and poop outside is actually pretty good. So thumbs up to you guys. Zach and Molly, Wilson's people.
So this is behavior that [inaudible] anything else can be shaking him down 90% of the way, and then letting him walk the last 10% of the way. And if you can have success with that, without him going during that last 10% of the way outside then start carrying him down 85% of the way. And let him walk the last 15% of the way.
Two other tips, you know, he's still a puppy. His bladder is gonna get stronger, he's still developing. So, it's possible that the excitement of going out combined with his puppy-ish young bladder isn't quite ready to handle being able to go all the way down. But again, you can help him build this behavior, the behavior of holding it, little by little.
And certainly if you get outside and he has not peed or pooped, you would, should reward that behavior. I mean, being outside might be a reward in and of itself, but sure. Why not also give it a treat, give him a treat.
But a couple other tips. One, if he is a fan of peanut butter or anything else that you can put in a liquid treat dispenser, which we do have at storeforthedogs.com and in our shop, maybe you already have one Zach and Molly. You can put anything licky, anything lickable and the treat dispenser green cheese, cheese whiz, liverwurst, but peanut butter is a good option.
I would kind of like as soon as you put him down, give him a squeeze of peanut butter and you can even kind of lead him out the door with some peanut butter. Because if he's focused on a mouthful of peanut butter, he is going to be less likely to focus on emptying his bladder. Just like just like humans, hard to eat peanut butter and pee or poop at the same time. [laughs]
You know, it doesn't even have to be peanut butter. Like they have to work on it in their mouth a little bit. And he doesn't have to stop to chew and swallow it. You can just kind of squeeze, lead him out, have him follow the tube as you go out.
My second tip would be to get him very used to being in a bag. For a slightly larger dog you know, 30 ish pounds, I would suggest either using like a boat and tote bag. I think it’s LL Bean or Lands End that makes boat and totes. They're not specifically made for dogs, but they're really nice sturdy canvas bags that you can put over your shoulder. And he could go in.
Or you could use a canine sport stack which is a dog backpack that has a cool design. They're designed so the dogs from paws kind of sit on your shoulders, and they make one. There are lots of different models of K9 sports sack. We also do carry the K9 sports sack at our East Village shop and online. The Trainer is a really nice one to start with. Cause it's the least expensive one. You can use it to get him used to being in a bag, make sure it's the right size. They make these blocks, kind of like foam yoga blocks that you can put in the bottom of them to help ensure it is a good fit.
But you know, rather than carrying him outside, just in your arms which I'm imagining you're probably doing, you could use that opportunity to get him used to being in one of these bags. I for one am a really big fan of putting dogs in bags whenever possible. I think it can help them. It can help you just spend more time with your dog, because if you have a dog who is comfortable in a bag you can bring your dog more places with you. And that means that you guys can hang out more together.
So those are the two kinds of bags that I would suggest you look at. And it's a nice opportunity whenever you're going out to for him to practice getting used to just existing in the bag. And again, you don't have to carry them down the entire way in the bag. You could stop, you know, at the end of the third flight of stairs.
Lastly, of course you can teach him that there is an okay place to go inside. With my dog, my new dog, Poppy, I've been using like a little grass patch with her inside. I've also been using weewee pads sometimes. Partially, because she seems like she really doesn't like the cold and I want her to be really comfortable outside.
And when it's really cold out, even if I bundle her up, she seems sort of unhappy and I don't want to force her out in the cold weather just yet. I want to sort of acclimate her to her new life, to New York City, to just being comfortable in the world. Before I ask her to do this, do her her pee and poop business outside.
So for that reason I've been using a potty patch, a doggy lawn. I think this is the one I have. actually there's a coupon section in the app and there's a coupon for the doggy lawn in there. If you go there. You could also use a weewee pad. You can teach a dog that they can go on the weewee pad when the weewee pad is down, but not other times. And that's also an option.
I think it's okay to teach a dog, especially if you live in a building where it's going to take 20 minutes — I'm exaggerating, but it could take you 10 minutes to get out of your building. If you live on a high story, for example, and you have to wait for the elevator, or if you live up four or five, six flights of stairs, as many people do in New York City, having that indoor option can be a good idea. But don't worry too much. He's still a really young pup and I think you're doing pretty well and his bladder is going to get stronger.
Oh, my last suggestion was going to be to maybe try switching up his food. Puppies do need puppy food. So you could keep giving him that puppy kibble for like one meal. But maybe for the other meal, try a less processed frozen or fresh food. In my experience, the closer you go to giving your dog whole foods, foods that are closer to what they originally were, less processed foods, the better it runs through their body, the less waste it produce,s and the less pee and poop it produces.
So usually dry food or even canned food in my experience makes dogs pee and poop more than fresh or high quality frozen or even dehydrated or freeze dried food. We love evermore at School for the Dogs. That's the only brand of food that we carry. It's a frozen food, actually do have a podcast episode that I did with Hannah. One of my good friends and she's the owner of Evermore. It's what I have fed my dogs for years.
But there are other good brands too. Nom nom now, or I think it's just called nom nom now is one I've used. Farmer's dog is one that's out there. Yeah, so there's plenty of brands of food now that are good options. And really, if you go to the frozen section of the pet store you'll find Stella and Chewy's, Instinct, all of those foods I'm going to guess are going to make your dog pee and poop less.
All right. Our second question comes from Angela who actually lives in Scotland. Hello, Angela. Over the ocean. She has a Romanian rescue mix, perhaps Macaulay in her. Small to medium size. Angela writes:
I've recently adopted a Romanian rescue. She's five months old and absolutely petrified of the world. Inside the house, she's really good, seems very relaxed, however is still trying to get used to the cat, which is a whole other stress for me. (If it’s a stress for you, Angela. It's probably a stress for her too)
However outside every little noise frightens her. Going out in the garden to do her business is three seconds long. She doesn't enjoy it unless it's the middle of the night, when all is quiet and walks are painful to both of us. She whines to turn back for about half the journey and is so frightened of every car person or anything really that we come across.
She has learned some commands quite quickly, but anything she's learned goes out the window when we go outside. I know it will take some time for her to get used to everything with her being in kennels for such a young age, but I want to make sure I do everything correctly by her. Can you help? Thank you.
So there's a lot here. It's possible that your environment, the environment you live in might be too much for her to deal with. I don't know exactly the background she came from. Unfortunately, some dogs — and I don't, I also don't know exactly where you live — but I know I've seen many dogs who are just from a young age showing that they're unable to deal with all the anxieties of living in a big city.
Now I'm going to suggest some things that you can do, but I just want to make clear that I don't think there's a magic bullet solution here. There are definitely some things you can try, but some dogs, whether it's because of their very early months on this earth and how they were treated or how they lived during that time. Or like the things that they were or weren't exposed to. Or because of just the cocktail of chemicals they were born with. Or because of epigenetics. There are genes that can turn on and off because of stressors, even stressors that could have happened to the mother while the mother was pregnant.
I mean, there's any number of reasons why the dog might be highly anxious and a highly anxious dog might be triggered by things that you can't necessarily control. And it's possible that training might not help. However, there are certainly some things that you can try before you resort to, for example talking to a veterinary behaviorist about medications, or finding a home that's in a environment that will be less stressful for the dog.
First of all, I would again suggest a bag, getting a good bag that you can get this dog comfortable in. Because I'm guessing that if you can get her comfortable being in a bag outside physically being close to you, being close enough to you, where you can easily be giving a steady stream of treats or something like peanut butter, I'm guessing that's going to help her learn to feel more comfortable outside. It's going to help her feel less like I'm at the mercy of all things outside.
I think being tethered outside, you know, on a leash with a collar, like for a lot of dogs, easy to imagine that being on a leash and collar is a stressful enough thing. And being on a leash and collar outside on the crazy streets can be asking a lot. So she might feel safer if she is just very physically close to you.
What you can do is bring her to a park bench and just sit on a park bench and feed, feed, feed. I would give her as many of her meals as possible in that way. Now it's possible that she's going to be so terrified outside that she won't be able to eat. That's good information for you. I mean, that might point to some of the things I was saying before that, you know, rehoming might be the answer or medication might be the answer.
But before you consider those things, and if she is really too terrified to eat outside, then try going out at three in the morning, try going out at like going to like the least crazy place you could possibly think of and build up from that. But the more meals and the more treats you can give her outside at this point, the better.
And I wouldn't even focus too much on getting her to pee and poop outside because we first just want to have her feel comfortable existing outside. And if you can get her to do her other business in your yard for the moment — although it sounds like that's a little bit of a struggle too, but that's probably less stressful for her than being outside on the street. If being outside on the street is too much, you could, of course also feed her meals in the yard.
Now, there are remedies or, you know, sort of things that you can do from the outside in, in order to try and help her. You might've heard of the Thundershirt which is something that can reduce anxiety in some dogs. It's a very tightly fitting shirt. Thundershirt is a brand name, but you could probably also just use a small child shirt. I've even seen people wrap their dogs with ACE bandages. For whatever reason that kind of pressure all over a dog's body can be very soothing to some dogs. So it could help.
There's also dog appeasing pheromone, often called DAP. Adaptil is a brand. We also do carry that in our online store, in our shop in Manhattan. They make a spray that you can put on like a bandana and put it around your dog's neck. They also make a collar. They make room diffusers. DAP is a pheromone that resembles the pheromone in dog mother's milk. And it can be very soothing to some dogs. So that is certainly something else that you can try.
Lavender collars as well. There's a company called Calming Collars, I think it's called, that makes lavender filled collars. Lavender also can be very soothing. So these are things that, you know, these are things that you could try might not make a difference, but it could. Rescue Remedy is also like a homeopathic drops that some people give their dogs. So all things worth giving a go.
Worst case scenario, you try them all at once and then you're not sure which one works and you can work backwards from there. Best case scenario it's clear right away which thing works, if any.
But again we always want to make sure we're focusing on how a dog is feeling, especially a dog who's fearful before we start focusing on teaching them specific behaviors. If she's already feeling and seeming comfortable inside, then inside, I would definitely work on teaching her some basic cues, and even maybe work on teaching just some fun stuff.
Do some clicker training, teach her tricks and silly things as much as possible. Because that's going to both build her confidence and it's going to help her feel good about being with you. It's going to help her, like both feel like she has some kind of control over her environment, right?
Clicker training is all about operant conditioning, and it's called operant conditioning because our subject is operating on the environment to produce change. It's also called instrumental conditioning because the animal is instrumental in producing change in their environment. And if you can produce change, not just like a victim of your surroundings, that certainly can build confidence.
And it's also, I mean, if you did nothing but just feed her treats inside and you're not teaching her specific behaviors with cues, et cetera, et cetera, at the very least she's still going to be learning that you're a source of good things. That you keep her safe and that when you're outside with her then that can — I always think of it like a teabag, like you can become the teabag of good things that is infusing whatever environment you are in with your dog with goodness, feelings of safety, et cetera, et cetera.
Likewise I'm not sure what you're feeding Ava, but I also would suggest going towards a fresh food. Something, whatever you can find that is as least processed as possible as that might also affect her behavior. Just as with people, more processed foods don't always produce the best brain states and the best emotional states. Whole foods could help her just kind of be a little bit more comfortable in the world.
But again, as I said in the beginning, not every environment is going to be right for every dog. Before I became a dog trainer, I thought training can solve any issue. There's no issue that a dog can't be trained to handle, et cetera, et cetera. I don't feel like that any longer. Now I do think that sometimes the kindest thing to do to a dog is to find an environment that is going to be a better fit for them. And that's a kindness that we can provide.
And, you know, given that we don't know what her life was like before we're coming to you. Her behavior could be based on things she experienced or didn't experience during that time. It could be it could be just like a baked in chemistry. We don't know. So I hope you'll try these things. I hope you'll let me know if you have any success and yeah, just remember classical conditioning first. Always trying to think about the dog's emotions and helping the dog feel the way we want them to feel before we focus on getting them to do all the things we want them to do.
If you haven't checked it out already, I do suggest checking out my master class, Angela, which you can find at Anniegrossman.com/masterclass. It goes over the different kinds of learning a little bit, and I think might be helpful. All right. Thank you everyone for joining me and I will see you next Thursday.
