Did anyone watch Cesar the Dog Whisperer last night?

[bawkbawkbawk]

John Grogan, author of Marley & Me, was featured. Their new lab killed two of their chickens (one was a Polish named Liberace

)
and they called Cesar in to help with the dog's prey drive.

It was interesting to watch Cesar "condition" the dog by exposing her repeatedly to a chicken and making corrections when the dog keyed on it.

Very similar to the way I conditioned my cats to leave our cockatiel alone. Repeated exposure; negative reinforcement when they went after the bird; positive reinforcement when they didn't. Even the most persistent of the cats now ignores the bird, who sits outside of its cage throughout the day with no threat from the cats.

I hope this same approach will work for my dogs when we get our chickens

Has it worked for you?

 

[scbatz33]

Caesar is our hero! When we got our Daisy, we had just started watching his program. He has great tips/ideas. When she is bad I tell my hubby "Gonna have to get all Caesar on her!" She doesn't bumrush the door anymore and Jeff can be wrestling with her full out but when he snaps his fingers she just stops and lays still.

If you could see how hyper-active this dog is you would know what an amazing accomplishment that was to do. Not that our other dogs were not trained before - they are - but his techniques make the training so much easier and faster for both the people and the dog. IMO.

 

[TcherDawn]

ooh, I love John Grogan and I love Cesar. I will have to find that episode. I have a Lab/Golden and will be getting 5 chickens on Saturday. I do use a correction collar for negative reinforcement and a clicker with treats for a positive reinforcement, and it has worked wonders for my dog. But live chickens are a different thing altogether. I hope I can train him to let them be.

 

[Beekissed]

Has it worked for you?

Yes! Wonderfully! And on a very, very high-prey driven Lab/BC cross pup.​

 

[bawkbawkbawk]

Cesar is our hero, too! Same thing with the door - a light bulb went on for us in one episode where he was working with an aggressive dog who charged the door and he pointed out to the owners that THEY owned the door, not their dog.

The only men for whom I would leave DH are Cesar and Hugh Laurie. He's given me permission should either of them call

Really good to hear that this approach does work, as I would hate to lose my chickens that way. As Grogan's wife said "You don't look at your dog quite the same way after it has killed another pet."

 

[Karrie13]

I wish I would have seen that episode; I am going to have to find it. It seems like Cesar can do anything with dogs and fast! My husband’s miniature schnauzer killed 7 of my 13 chicks yesterday afternoon. My daughter opened the gate (they are in a giant dog crate as a brooder) to check the temp and forgot to latch the gate when she was done.

 

[Rockpile99]

Love Ceasar!

I've seen that one before and like all of his methods, was impressed with the results.

I've been watching his show for a while now and have used his techniques for introducing our new chicks to my easy going Saint and very stubborn, prey driven Jack Russell.

As I thought, the Saint just sniffed the chicks to death, then didn't care one way or the other about them. The Jack though, needed a little more work...

We took the chicks out with the Jack - Saint was in another room (she thinks she always needs to be the center of attention). And even while in full control of the Jack she managed to get a chick in her mouth a couple times. No harm done, but she was reprimand per Ceasar methods and I sat with her in the same small area with the chicks, keeping a hold of her. We did that for about 30-60 min a day for the first week and I couldn't be happier with the results. I think toward the end of the first day and into the third day the Jack would actually look away and try to avoid the chicks for fear of getting herself into trouble. We have a pic where she actually looks scared of the chicks - It's hilarious. By the second week I could have her in the room with the chicks, she would lie down and is always interested but would allow them to come over and would even just sit there as they pecked at the freckles on her nose.

Fast forward 5 weeks, the chicks are outside now and we are still working on the run - it's very temporary at the moment, and sit's just outside of the dog run, The coop blocks the field of vision from the dogs to the chicken run. We allowed the dogs out yesterday while we were working on the permanent tractor run. The Saint still shows very little interest in the chickens. The Jack, she loves running up to the run and looking at them. Then she gets down as if trying to entice them to play with her. The chickens run up to it from their side and make a great show of 'playing chicken' They'll chase the Jack as far as they can within their run. So far it all looks like play to me. As soon as perm run quarters are finished we will try some very supervised interaction in the great outdoors. I would like to think that if the chickens ever got out and ended up in the dog run that all they would find there is a four and three footed play mate. I know, it may be wishful thinking but it's worth a try.

ETA - Karrie13 so sorry to hear about your loss.

 

[Bridget399]

I've SEEN that episode, and it was a good one. My Chesapeake may be a problem once we get our chicks outside and you reminded me of that very episode!
Ceasar is amazing!

 

[bawkbawkbawk]

Karrie; so sorry for your loss but maybe this episode will give you hope.

Rockpile - that's an incredible accomplishment! Jack Russell's are soooo prey driven and soooo fast - amazing that you conditioned him away from the chickens. That "looking away" thing is exactly what Cesar got the lab to do.

I don't worry about my little dog - she'll be afraid of even the baby chicks, but I know my Golden will want to get her mouth on the chickens, so we may have some work in store for us with her.

 

[swtamour]

I have a mini dachshund and I trained her to avoid the 3 chickens I have. After 2 weeks of butt slapping and using the choke collar (I don't tug on it hard) she learned to avoid them and stopped chasing them. Only goes to smell them and the chickens are not too scared of her anymore as well. But I still keep an eye on her when she's in the backyard and the chickens are out. She does bark at them at times because the chickens now team up against her

They block her way to go back into the house or the whole walkway on the side of the house and she's stuck not being able to go passed them. Who said chickens were dumb?