Pikelet the spaniel with dog adhd (hyperkinesis)

[SpotTheCat]

Here is one video of Pikelet mat skills.

Before watching it you need to know

1. This is after working on this for a while (though I haven’t done much with her recently)
2. This is the best she has ever done while training before, after reducing exercise and having had her first season recently
3. There is nothing going on around
4. This isn’t a training session this is a video to show her behaviour

The major thing I am looking at is the fast movements flipping through doing different things and the fact that I can not stress enough about how long I have tried to teach her things indoors! I have not seen a dog behave like this when distracted and it doesn’t take long for them to start to understand sitting on the mat!

 

[LaFleche]

I recently watched an episode of RSPCA where a rescued Springer Spaniel puppy soon turned into a fantastic police sniffer dog.
It was amazing to see the little guy using his nose and brain so eagerly. And he was running and wiggling all the time, its just what Springer Spaniels do.
The police officers mentioned that Springer Spaniels often make excellent sniffer dogs (drugs, explosives etc.) but one has to get accustomed to their jittery and lively personality which is not for everyone.

 

[LaFleche]

Here is one video of Pikelet mat skills.

Before watching it you need to know

1. This is after working on this for a while (though I haven’t done much with her recently)
2. This is the best she has ever done while training before, after reducing exercise and having had her first season recently
3. There is nothing going on around
4. This isn’t a training session this is a video to show her behaviour

The major thing I am looking at is the fast movements flipping through doing different things and the fact that I can not stress enough about how long I have tried to teach her things indoors! I have not seen a dog behave like this when distracted and it doesn’t take long for them to start to understand sitting on the mat!

She is so eager to do what you ask her to do!

But I did not hear you praise her for sitting on the mat as requested or acknowledge her doing the right thing?

 

[SpotTheCat]

She is so eager to do what you ask her to do!

She is!

But I did not hear you praise her for sitting on the mat as requested or acknowledge her doing the right thing?

I didn’t because I wanted the video to show her behaviour, if I praised her or rewarded her it would be harder to see the behaviour I am talking about

 

[LaFleche]

I need to edit and upload the videos but before that I want to list info again

Symptoms

Lack of focus and hyperactivity is only 2 of the symptoms not all!

She
-didn’t not sleep during the day and would very rarely relax when out of her crate
-toileting indoors when touched (she still does it except not to me most of the time)
-suddenly getting scared of things she sees everyday (not a fear period)
-lots of saliva (could be a normal amount)
-lack of focus. She will flip between different things extremely quickly, not just not focusing on me while training
-pacing and frantic movements constantly (much better after starting restricting her exercise)
-rescue remedy helped her be less tense and frustrated, did nothing else
-no improvement after hours of training
-after all most 30m of exercise she started getting frantic and still couldn’t rest indoors (this is not normal behaviour for any dog!)


I have a working line giant schnauzer cross lab and a working line GSD both can settle on a mat and settle in busy environments. I am training both to be assistance dogs

Hyperkinesis can easily be mistaken for lack of training or normal adolescent behaviour. It is also very common for people to over exercise their dogs. dogs should not need hours of exercise before they can rest and dogs need to sleep during the day specially when young

I have experience training high excitement and drive dog. I think people would be very surprised with how high energy Fanta is

Most mental disorder/illnesses/etc whatever you want to call them are normal behaviour to an extreme that they cause issues. So yes Pikelet's behaviour might sound normal but its at an extreme it is hurting her health. Dogs normally only get diagnosed at 2y+ for hyperkinesis because thats when people finally know it definitely isn’t adolescences, by that point many dogs are actually aggressive due to it. I have been using my knowledge of psychology and info about hyperkinesis to do everything I can at the moment to help her, which is one of the reasons why she might seem a lot better then other dogs with the same condition

Was she already checked for thyroid issues?

One of our late females began to behave in strange ways already weeks before coming into heat. Things like absentmindedness and fearful reaction to normal objects, even a falling leaf from a tree.

A few weeks after she would return to be her normal self again.

 

[SpotTheCat]

Was she already checked for thyroid issues?

She has been checked by a vet that said she is healthy

One of our late females began to behave in strange ways already weeks before coming into heat. Things like absentmindedness and fearful reaction to normal objects, even a falling leaf from a tree.

A few weeks after she would return to be her normal self again.

She has had issues since we got her at 10weeks

 

[SpotTheCat]

Here she is running and playing a bit

What I am looking at
-where she is looking. At the start you can see she is focusing on the ball then she will suddenly look into the distance, there is nothing where she is looking. You can see how frequently her focus changes
-when she drops the ball for the second time she struggles to find it, most of the time she will give up quickly on looking for it
-its hard to see in the videos but when she is running around away she isn't sniffing or focused on anything. She will just continue to frantically run around with out any reason
-in the second video she accidentally flushes a bird , unfortunately you can’t see in the video that she was not aware the bird was there (no sniffing or searching for it) and did not react to the bird at all (no looking at it, chasing, etc)

 

[SpotTheCat]

Here is Twiggy’s first time learning to sit on the mat. She has learnt sit and to go on her bed but I haven’t worked on it or used it in months

Pepsi and Fanta
This is the first time getting them to go onto this specific mat or anything similar. Fanta was a bit confused because I normally use a similar platform for her to target with her back feet. And Pepsi was full of energy

 

[LaFleche]

Here she is running and playing a bit

What I am looking at
-where she is looking. At the start you can see she is focusing on the ball then she will suddenly look into the distance, there is nothing where she is looking. You can see how frequently her focus changes
-when she drops the ball for the second time she struggles to find it, most of the time she will give up quickly on looking for it
-its hard to see in the videos but when she is running around away she isn't sniffing or focused on anything. She will just continue to frantically run around with out any reason
-in the second video she accidentally flushes a bird , unfortunately you can’t see in the video that she was not aware the bird was there (no sniffing or searching for it) and did not react to the bird at all (no looking at it, chasing, etc)

All I am seeing is typical Springer Spaniel behaviour, doing its job as a flushing dog which is not supposed to chase after the prey but to continue flushing until told otherwise and regularly redirecting itself to the owner in case of being send to another direction.

 

[SpotTheCat]

All I am seeing is typical Springer Spaniel behaviour, doing its job as a flushing dog which is not supposed to chase after the prey but to continue flushing until told otherwise and regularly redirecting itself to the owner in case of being send to another direction.

It’s extremely hard to see what I mean with out actually living and working with her

She can’t work with directions from me because she cannot keep her focus on me or anything long enough. They should be at least smelling the birds and aiming for them, she was not, she was just randomly running. It will look like typical behaviour because a lot of it is typical behaviour

You can see she wants to work with me and she can focus but she just can’t concentrate for long or keep her focus on one thing

I have spent a long time on trying different things and working with her, nothing has made any progress I excepted at least to be able to get her to sit still on a mat indoors with no distractions for a minute but I can’t