Correct application of +R

Ha! Poor thing. That thread could take anyone down. It was started more or less as an extension of an already existing, heated debate.

I expect there are going to be varying interpretations of this because of the silly +R jargon that always bogs me down. But here's mine to start the ball rolling.

I understand the basis of +R to be rewarding a behaviour you like to encourage it to happen again. Rewards can come in all sorts of forms. Traditonally, it's treats, but it can also be things like play, praise or doing something the dog likes, like just going for a walk. The latest on the +R front is clicker training. The click is used to mark good behaviour, and then it's not so critical to get the reward to the dog instantaneously.

Which brings me to the most important part of +R, at least in my understanding of it. I believe the timing of the reward is tantamount. The reward usually needs to come as the dog is performing the desired behaviour. For instance, if you want to teach the dog to sit, you reward AS the dog starts to move into the sit position if you can. So if you're teaching something for the first time, you reward anything that's close to that behaviour, then gradually raise your expectations in order to shape the behaviour into what you want. It doesn't matter if you reward the dog as it's going into a sit and it then stops short of going into the full sit to eat the treat instead. You can gradually hold off the treat until you see something closer to the sit position you want. This is where teaching stays can get difficult. It's tough to reward while the dog is actually doing the stay when you need to move away for it to actually be a stay. This is one of the chief reasons why I'm finding the clicker an attractive tool at the moment. You can click the stay and not need to be at the dog's side giving out treats. However, that's not to say it won't work without a clicker. You just start stepping away so you can still reach the dog and then gradually increase the distance, rewarding when you get back as long as the dog is still in the stay.

I know all this stuff is really basic, it just seemed sensible to go over it from my perspective in case we weren't all on the same page. And it's sometimes helpful to reiterate the fundamentals of the method for better understanding.

As for more complex things, there are a variety of things you can use. Leave it can be taught by offering things that are better than what the dog is interested in. That's tough, so you have to start small with things that are only mildly interesting so you won't have to compete too hard for the dog's attention, then again, work up to more tempting things.

Jean Donaldson has a good method for teaching infallible recalls covered in her book "Culture Clash". It's especially good if your dog loves to fetch and play. She turns the recall into a game, getting the dog to come back to her and chase another toy/ball thrown through her legs. She then changes the game a little so that sometimes she tosses the toy through her legs and sometimes she stands up and lobs the toy to the dog. Anyway, it's a little on the complicated side and you'd do better reading it.

As for long stays, I've never taught those, but I believe it's a matter of slowly building the dog up to it with longer and longer stays. It's helpful if you've got someone else to spy on the dog and put it back in position if it breaks it while you're away.

I think clicker training is the way to go with teaching complex things. I can just really see it's potential in shaping behaviour. For example, you could use it to get the dogs in the pool by starting out clicking them if they walk towards the pool, then clicking if they show interest in the water, then clicking if they lift a foot towards the water.... You might need something really tempting to coax them into the water, though. Dogs often get leery of jumping into water when they can't touch the bottom. My corgi loves to swim as well. She won't go into a pool on her own, but loves to swim with her people. I've lifted her and gently placed her in the water before, like a little boat. She used to be terrified of the water, but I live on the shores of the largest lake in the country, so I persisted with trying to get her in and eventually got her swimming by wading around in the water myself. It took her quite a long time to get up the courage to follow me in, but now you can't keep her out of it and she's the only dog I know that swims for the sake of swimming, puttering around in little circles. Are the dogs tall enough to stand on one of the pool steps with their head above water? If so, maybe you could convince them that they can get in safely that way.

Also, the principles for clicker training are the same as the principles for +R, really. You can use other cues to tell the dog it's done the right thing. It's also recommended that you use a no-reward cue to tell the dog it's not on the right track. Like "Uh oh" or "too bad". Makes it a little faster.

Hope that was some help?

If you want to learn about the full theory in clear languge, get Karen Pryor's Dont Shoot the Dog.  If you want to learn about clicker training specifically, I like Lana Mitchell's books  and websites by Gary Wilkes and Shirley Chong.  If you want some ideas in a broader approach related to the whole relationship, try Shelia Booth's Purely Positive.   Morgan Specter has done a nice book on clicker training for obedience competition.
 
What you are asking for: step by step, do this, stop that, add this,  Lana Mitchell's books do that best in my opinion.  All the books can be found via a search engine.  I use the dog book website, dogwise.com.
 

I would add that if you want a reliable recall, Leslie Nelson's DVD, "Really Reliable Recall" presents an excellent application.  I've done it with many dogs, and have thus to use it and not get the recall I sought)

[linkhttp://forum.dog.com/asp/m.asp?m=161388&mpage=2&key=times]http://forum.dog.com/asp/m.asp?m=161388&mpage=2&key=times[/link]
 
here is a previous post with a few specifics, it will give you an idea.

ORIGINAL: corvus

This is where teaching stays can get difficult. It's tough to reward while the dog is actually doing the stay when you need to move away for it to actually be a stay. This is one of the chief reasons why I'm finding the clicker an attractive tool at the moment. You can click the stay and not need to be at the dog's side giving out treats. However, that's not to say it won't work without a clicker. You just start stepping away so you can still reach the dog and then gradually increase the distance, rewarding when you get back as long as the dog is still in the stay.

 
I taught my dog to stay without a clicker.  It really does require baby steps, but these baby steps can be accomplished over the course of only a few short training sessions.  First, before you even move away, increase the amount of time between telling the dog to stay and offering the treat.  The dog stands up, go right back to square one, "eh, eh, sit" pause, "stay", pause, reward.  It helps to start on a leash, so the dog can't just wander away from you.  Then you start taking small steps back, and by the time you can reach the end of a 6 ft leash, you can start doing it off leash.  This only took me about a week, practicing for 10 minutes a day. Once your dog gets the general concept, you can enforce the behavior by requiring it in situations that the dog finds tempting, and replacing treats as the reward by allowing the dog access to said temptation.  For example, once the dog knows stay, at feeding time place the dog's food bowl a few feet away, and do not allow the dog to eat until you give the OK.  Same goes for entering the living room, getting on the sofa, chewing on a bone, going outside.  Adding in a little bit of NILIF (dog gets nothing it wants without a sit and stay) has made "stay" Scout's most reliable command (I can put her food bowl down in front of her, leave the room, come back, and she's still sitting there looking at it).
 
Also, once you're dog knows stay, you can use it to assist in recall training by playing "hide and seek".  Put your dog in a sit and stay, and move somewhere where the dog can't see you but can hear you.  Call the dog to "come", and reward.  You can gradually increase the time you wait to call, and the distance you move away.  Too bad both my house and yard are too small too do anything really impressive with this!!

Thanks y'all.
I'll check out the resources given, I guess I was searching in accurately before. I am glad to hear that I have been training with this technique in the correct manner. Both my dogs learned the stay with this, now we are just moving into the loooooong stay.

I learned with a trainer who is very good at dealing with behavioral problems and aggression with +R. Because she's into whole-life behaviors and not necessarily tricks, she is good at talking about withholding access to what the dog desires until it does what you want (technically this is -P). If you wanted to sum up her view of +R in a sentence, it would basically be:

I Am The Keeper Of Everything My Dog Desires (including access to prey or a whiff of that nasty pee soaked tree) And So My Dog Will Look To Me For Access To Everything It Wants.

Of course, accomplishing this is a matter of figuring out exactly what your dog desires and making sure you control his access to it. It does work like nothing I've ever seen. It also takes quite a bit of watching your dog.

Hey Wyoming, I don't have anything to add but I live in Cheyenne and I'm curious to know where you're at.  I'll understand if you don't want to give out that kind of information but like I said I'm just curious.

Have a great day!