The first time it caught me completely by surprise and I didn't even have time to react. I called him quickly from the porch and he ignored me and continued to sniff the neighbor's grass. I knew chasing him would cause him to run so I grabbed a hot dog out of the fridge and before I was halfway out the door I called his name and he was happy to come running back. I gave him to whole hot dog, though I seriously contemplated flogging him to death with it!
The second time was later that same day and he didn't even make it to the door because I was still on edge from the first attempt.
The third time was two or three days ago. Now, I don't generally use corrections at all with Frodo. He's quite a soft dog and corrections would get us nowhere. Well, the other day when I was heading out the door to work with phone and lunch in my hands, he decided to try this newfound trick again. I was quick enough to pin him against the doorframe with my leg and bellow a furious "NO!" at him. He flew backwards and hasn't tried door darting since. I'm hoping that sudden correction scared him out of trying again. I really do, because right outside of my front door is a road that can be quite busy and people drive fast, so it's as much a matter of safety as it is a bad habit.
There's now a rule that he must sit and wait for me to walk through the door, in or out, before he is allowed to go through. I know this is general manners in most houses, but he's not had an issue like this in YEARS, so I've never had a problem with him going before me when he's attached to his leash.
In other news, we are now moving on to a new set of tricks for Week Three of the Positive Clicks 2010 blog.
This week the tricks are:
1. Spin (either a left or right full circle)
2. Catch (a toy/treat in air)
3. Place (dog circles around to get into heel position on left side)
4. Kisses (on lips/face... or lips/face of another person)
2. Catch (a toy/treat in air)
3. Place (dog circles around to get into heel position on left side)
4. Kisses (on lips/face... or lips/face of another person)
1. I am luring spin because although I think it would be a good way to work on shaping, there is enough tricks this week that I need to move at a decent pace and Frodo and I aren't the best pair at shaping. I would also like to teach him both a left and a right circle.
2. He can already catch, so I don't have to do anything for that except tape it.
3. This I would like to spend the most time on and shape the behavior. I want to use the method that I have seen many videos on recently, where the dog puts it's paws on some type of circular container placed at the front position, and is shaped to pivot to a heel position. We shall see how this progresses.
4. Frodo doesn't do this on his own, but I bet with the help of some peanut butter we can get this one down quickly!
I would really really like to, for the first week, get all the tricks taped and up on the blog. I still need to backtrack and do some work for weeks 1 and 2, both teaching and taping. It is stressing me out that I am not caught up. This is just like college!
good luck on the door bolting thing! I don't care if my dogs go out before me, but I do make them wait sometimes. At the front door and at our backyard gate it's an automatic wait (no verbal cue) 100% of the time. My hope is that since I don't use a verbal cue at these places that if the gate were to be left open the dogs would still not cross if I weren't there. At other doors I randomly ask for a wait.