4/6/2024 0 Comments Hand signals for dog trainingAll I have to do is give her a fist pump (her “good dog” sign) and she happily keeps right on going. It has improved her attentiveness, because she looks at me often to check in and make sure that she is doing what I want. Of course, I am largely to blame, and I really feel stupid about it, because it took me over a year to figure out why: I had never taught her a visual cue/sign for affirmation!!!!! She could no longer hear me telling her that she was a good dog, or giving her any other form of verbal praise, and she soooo much needed that!!! This has made such a difference. It seemed very hard for her to focus, and she rapidly became ring sour. My current situation is quite different, however, because the dog involved became deaf very suddenly, and the poor girl was terribly confused at agility trials. Several of my dogs have gradually lost their hearing late in life, of course, and typically would go through a few weeks to a few months during which time they seemed to come to understand that the problem was with their hearing, and not due to the fact that I was no longer speaking to them! Since they are all trained with visual as well as auditory cues in obedience, and were beyond the age of competing in agility, this really didn’t pose many problems. I am a 69-yr-old retired veterinarian who has been training dogs for 60 years and competed with many of them in obedience and agility. This episode was recommended to me by someone on your staff when I asked about training a dog who had become deaf at a relatively young age (4 yrs).
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