Training & Behaviour Problems

with Emmaline Duffy-Fallon

Golden Retriever Begging

Question asked by Dave:
My Golden Retriever Quillan is a terrible beggar at meal times and puts both front paws up on my lap to see what I’m eating and to try and beg for some food. It’s a result of being soft with him when he was a small pup and now it’s a bad habit. He doesn’t do it as much to my fiancée who is probably the stricter of the two of us with him anyway. How can I stop him from jumping up on my lap while eating?

The answer from Emmaline:
Ah begging at tables, one of dogs most favourite pastimes I would say. Quillan (great name by the way) jumps up because it usually gets immediate results. Being a large dog, his jumping behaviour does not go unnoticed I would imagine.

When a dog wants something be it food from the table, food from counter tops or attention from an owner they will experiment with a variety of behaviours to see if any of them bear fruit. So if jumping up on owners yields a result they are likely to continue with that behaviour in the future. They do it because it works.

I will fathom a guess here that when he jumps up you look at him, tell him to ‘get down’ and then gently push him off. Here’s the think – if this is in fact your reaction to his jumping on your lap you are actually rewarding him, three times to be precise – looking at him (making eye contact), talking to him (‘get down’) and touching him (pushing him off).

If we are looking to extinguish this behaviour the first rule of thumb is to stop rewarding it. That means no talking, looking or touching young Quillan when he jumps up in any context. Easier said than done I understand especially when you are hungry and want to eat, so here are your training and management options.

1. Management
This one is easy to apply.
(a) When you are eating, manage Quillan’s proximity to you by tethering him. This means attach a lead to his collar and then attach the loop end of the lead to an object (heavy piece of furniture, or lead closed in the door jamb).
(b) Provide Quillan with an extra large or King Kong sized Kong toy. Inside this Kong toy put a generous portion of his own dinner. If you are feeding him dry kibble you can add water to it so it becomes soft and this allows you to spoon the mixture into the Kong. My preference, however, is to mix some type of premium wet dog food to the dry food so it binds it together therefore making it sticky so it can be stuffed inside the toy. I like ‘Berties Natures Harvest’ or ‘James Well Beloved’ brands. Maybe an addition of say 1 heaped tablespoon of wet food to every cup of dry food you are feeding him.
(c) Place his dog bed or his blanket on the ground where he will be tethered. He should be able to have the full length of the lead so he can easily move around on his bed and get comfortable.

I would rehearse this scenario at every dinner for about a week before moving on to the next step of having him unleashed but situated on his bed/blanket when you are eating.

The pros of this management set up are many, you can eat your dinner in peace, Quillan is occupied and happy on his bed extracting some of his dinner from an interactive toy, he is not pestering you for food and you as an owner don’t have to reprimand him for jumping up. Everyone wins with this arrangement. With this option the behaviour might very well stop as now you have given him something to occupy himself with instead of him occupying the space next to you when you are tucking into let’s say, an Indian curry.

2. Training
There is a bit more legwork to this one. I would advise to teach rock solid down stay on his blanket or bed while you are eating dinner.

What we are hoping to achieve here is to train an alternative behaviour to jumping up and begging for food. The fringe benefit of this training is that you get a nice solid stay behaviour too for your effort.

To begin I would set up a scenario that appears to the retriever that you are sitting down to dinner but in fact you are creating a training opportunity. For the first few sessions, manage your dog so that he cannot practice the bad behaviour when you are hungry and just want to eat. Maybe put him in another room or outside. When you are finished your dinner, bring him inside and have it appear to your dog that you are in fact having din dins.

Instruct him to lay down on his bed/blanket. If he does not respond to a down command your first priority is to teach him. I use the lure and reward method to teach this behaviour. Once he is lying down, take a couple of steps away from him, pause for a second and then go back up to him and reward him with a tasty treat from your hand.

Gradually based on his success at staying put, move farther away till you can comfortably sit at the table and reward him with a treat (tossed to him so it lands on his bed or better yet in his mouth if you have a good aim).

If you want more of the good behaviour reward it. If you move too quickly with your progress he will continue to move off the bed. Early on in training, plan on building a solid history of Quillan being rewarded for staying on his bed (high rate of food reinforcement initially for each short stay) then change your criteria setting. More work for less money approach. Longer pauses between food delivery.

I’d recommend that you catch any attempt by Quillan to leave the bed by using a no-reward mark (Ah!, Ah!). The tone in which you say it is important, it should be uttered in your normal talking voice not bellowed at the dog so he cowers at your raised voice. If he breaks the stay, simply go back over and ask him to lay down again, move away and then reward him for getting it right once you are seated.

Next start rewarding solid stays at unpredictable but frequent intervals. Make him into a gambler so he will continue to work not knowing when the next jackpot will happen.

Keep your sessions brief (maybe 5 minutes maximum). Start to gradually stretch the amount of time he needs to stay rooted in his position on his bed in order to earn the tasty morsel. After about a week (or less depending on how much training you do) you should find that Quillan will stay on his bed for the duration of your meal for his treat at the end.