How many treats to give in short training session?

[Tebeaux]

My almost 10 week old pup is doing great IMO with basic commands so far. He can sit, down, and shake and gets it right most of the time. A lot of times he'll do all 3 at once
I do have a quick question, during our little 3-5 minute training sessions I try and keep his treats on the small size and give them very frequently when he does what I ask. I've been using lunch meat, and I'll give him a pinky nail size piece each time, so I'll probably go through maybe a quarter to a half of a piece of deli meat.
I've recently been working on getting him to be OK on his leash, he absolutely HATES when I pull the leash out. I've introduced it slowly, worked with treats, etc. He does do OK and seems to be making progress when I have treats, but as soon as I run out, he starts bucking and trying to wiggle out of his collar.
Would it be real bad to up the amount of treats to keep him focused for a while longer? Would a whole piece of deli meat a couple of times a day be too much?

 

[Tebeaux]

And I'm sure the more advanced the commands get the more treats will be needed to accomplish the goal. I'm just worried about overdoing the treats.

 

[Doberman Gang]

My almost 10 week old pup is doing great IMO with basic commands so far. He can sit, down, and shake and gets it right most of the time. A lot of times he'll do all 3 at once
I do have a quick question, during our little 3-5 minute training sessions I try and keep his treats on the small size and give them very frequently when he does what I ask. I've been using lunch meat, and I'll give him a pinky nail size piece each time, so I'll probably go through maybe a quarter to a half of a piece of deli meat.
I've recently been working on getting him to be OK on his leash, he absolutely HATES when I pull the leash out. I've introduced it slowly, worked with treats, etc. He does do OK and seems to be making progress when I have treats, but as soon as I run out, he starts bucking and trying to wiggle out of his collar.
Would it be real bad to up the amount of treats to keep him focused for a while longer? Would a whole piece of deli meat a couple of times a day be too much?

When my dogs are puppies I just use feeding Time as a short training session. Train with their kibble. So if you are feeding say, 2 cups of food, I put the bowl up on the table, grab a hand full of kibble and start training. What I don’t use I just put down as a jackpot at the end of training. Just make it fun, have them chase the food in your hand occasionally, throw a piece and let them chase it immediately call them and reward for coming back to you.

 

[LifeofRubie]

If we're just working on some stuff at home, I won't worry too much about the amount of treats the pups get (we use Fresh Pet broken up into halves of quarters).

When we take Moose, our lab puppy, to formal training class, he will go through a LOT of treats so we actually count that as part of his meal for the day and he'll get less dinner (after training - you want them to go hungry!).

Also, make sure you're working on one command at a time. If you say "SIT," and he usually sits and immediately lays down, don't reward. Only reward the SIT. If you tell him DOWN and he sits, give him a chance to lay down and reward as soon as he does.

You might be able to put the leash on him at home and let him pull it around to get used to it? Luckily we've not had a pooch who doesn't like the leash so can't help you there!

 

[Doberman Gang]

Here is what I use for my classes, tracking and when I am training new behaviors with my dogs. It is just dog food so they can have as much as needed during training, I will then just adjust what they eat during mealtime. Sometimes I will skip their meal if I know we are training then training will be their meal.

 

[Kaiser2016]

Haha Kaiser hated the collar and leash so we just off leash walked him as a puppy I know right The beginning of many leash issues right there! Love the idea of letting him run around with the leash attached. But first, let him see and sniff his collar and leash. If he can see that they aren't scary, that should help get the ball rolling.

 

[Ingrid H]

I don't think I would give deli meat as a treat except for its motivational aspects. Deli meat is loaded with preservatives and salt. When I was training a lot I made my own treats by baking chicken breast and cutting it up into 1/4"-3/8" cubes after it was cooled. I had plenty of treats and chicken on hand for easy meals for me like chicken salad, a salad topper, quick stir fry or even an alfredo!
Have you read up on marker training? Marker training is so much fun!

 

[Tebeaux]

Thanks for all the great suggestions and comments. I've tried using his kibble as treats but he literally spits them out and looks at me like I'm crazy for trying to fool him. I hadn't thought about the lunch meat being high in preservatives and salt, I'll definitely stop using that as much. I did stop and grab some mini-treats from the pet store, they're little pea sized treats made of mainly chicken liver, and he loves them. That Hungry Howies stuff looks interesting, I'll have to look into that.
Also, I have gone back to the basics, working on just sit for a while. He's responding great to that. I think we tried to throw too much at him too early and ended up confusing him. He's a smart pup for sure, don't want him getting frustrated.
And, last night we managed to walk 4 houses down and back on the leash!! It wasn't perfect, but he's definitely making progress.

 

[Ddski5]

Ragnar was fine when he initially started on the leash. Then one day he started pulling like a bull and it was hard to stop.

DobermanGang taught me something a while back that would benefit you if you started now.

Leash pressure-
When you are walking yours on the leash and leash gets tight or right as it gets tight, call him back. When he comes back, treat him and have a party!!! Not only is this teaching him to not go to a tight leash but it’s also starting the foundation for a good recall. It is also teaching him to have attention/focus on you because at anytime you could be giving him his favorite thing- a treat.

 

[Kaiser2016]

Awesome progress with the walk! Agree on the salt in lunch meats.

You may want to be careful with liver based treats as well because too many can cause diarrhea, just watch out for that.

 

[Tebeaux]

Well dang, didn't know that about liver based treats. Just ordered some of that Happy Howies stuff from Amazon.

Leash pressure-
When you are walking yours on the leash and leash gets tight or right as it gets tight, call him back. When he comes back, treat him and have a party!!! Not only is this teaching him to not go to a tight leash but it’s also starting the foundation for a good recall. It is also teaching him to have attention/focus on you because at anytime you could be giving him his favorite thing- a treat.

That's kind of what I've been doing, he'll walk a few feet then get distracted and veer off and I'll call him back and when he comes he gets a treat. It's definitely a slow walk at this point but we'll keep working on it. I ran out of treats halfway back home and he actually did pretty well coming back without treats, so that's good.

 

[Kaiser2016]

We use our liver treats for high value commands like recall. You can still use them, I'd just limit them until you're sure he doesn't have poop issues because of it. Also, not all tummies are sensitive, so your pup might be fine. I like to limit all higher fat things as they seem the most likely to disturb Kaiser's gut. Coconut oil is the other thing I'm careful with. I use natural peanut butter, but still give small amounts.

 

[LifeofRubie]

Along with the leash pressure technique, we also work on feeding a portion of Mooses regular meals in the 'reward' zone. Basically, with them sitting in a 'heel' position, treat them from your hand with the side of your hand touching your leg. Since he's a puppy, you'll be bending over a long but it reinforces that that position is a good place to be. Our trainer suggests feeding 1/3 of his daily food allowance that way. I think we're working on that exercise in this photo even though Moose is a little further away than he probably should be. Feed from the palm your left hand and have your thumb touching your leg. Again, we're not walking in this exercise, just reinforcing the position right now.

Have you started any formal sort of training classes? I was talking to another puppy owner who said, "Why do I need to take my dog to a training class when I can teach them everything at home?" And my response was because it teaches your dog to focus on YOU with other stuff going around and that is a big part of 'socialization' that I think get's left off when people talk about it. Socializing your dog is introducing them to situations and having them look to you for direction; not meeting every Joe, Sally, and Fido along the way.

We're throwing a lot of information at you at once so don't feel overwhelmed! Try some stuff out and do what works for you guys!

 

[Tebeaux]

I'm loving all the info, this really is a great site.
I have him enrolled in training Starting Aug 4, the training facility doesn't start classes until the puppy is at least 12 weeks old.
And socialization is a big reason I'm doing the classes, that and I'm a rookie as far as training goes, never had a really well trained dog before so I need all the help I can get.