바쁜 삶 속에서 반려견 훈련 시간을 찾는 팁: 나탈리아 니즈커와의 대화 #210 #팟캐스트

find time to play those games? Um, so what helped me personally is doing a little bit of homework the night before. I would watch the, um, video. I would read the PDF, kind of do my little homework the night before. So I know what I'm doing the next day. And, um, in the morning, I tried to structure the games that I play around, um, contingent times. Like for example, in the morning, when I'm waiting for my tea to boil, you know, to make coffee, we play a few games in the kitchen. Um, you know, it's your choice is always on the go. It's 24 seven, you know, working at door manners, uh, hot zone. It's ongoing. Then when I came back from work, I would also, um, have a quickie, you know, going upstairs. Uh, when I go change, you know, we do a quickie upstairs and they know, they know by now that when mom is home, they're waiting on the staircase, ready to, right. I took a picture the other day. They're ready to go looking at me. Like, are you coming? Are you coming? Yeah. So just, yeah, try to drag around something that I do on a regular basis. So it's, it's more of a routine for me and I know, okay, it's, it's quick. We get it done. We can, you know, we get the day moving. And, and what was the, what would you say would be the, the most difficult challenge between the two dogs, like either one of the dogs that when you were working through this, that you, you hit this wall and you went, okay, this is not going the way I thought it would go. Well, even initially bringing Kina home, um, I didn't know how Tabby would react. And, um, it did not go pretty. It was not pretty at all. And was she in a rescue? How did you like, because I know you work in a rescue. Is that where you found her? Yeah. Yeah. Kina is a rescue where I volunteer with and they were having a festival, um, and they had dogs for adoption. They're just kind of, um, I helped walk her and I just fell in love. I'm like, this is it, but we need to make sure she, she, um, she meshes with the other dog and I didn't want to put her tabby through stress. You know, obviously I didn't want to make her miserable. So that first day, um, in my, in the back of my mind, I'm like, it's not going to work. It's, it's, it's terrible. It's not going to work. The next day we work, thank goodness for muscle training, you know, and thank goodness for conditioning, all those great tools that we have, the color grab, the muzzle, you know, she was familiar with it. Um, so we worked through, um, taking them outside and a little bit more, you know, open space and getting them familiarized with themselves. So long story short,

I think also Kina's demeanor and kind of attitude helped as well. The type of dog she is, um, helped kind of neutralize some of tabby's insecurities and, um, thank goodness, thank goodness. It's, you know, happy ending. And was she a typical malligator? When you got her, was there a lot of biting still? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. She, she was very unpredictable. Like the look in her face, just, I was like, Hmm, I can't even tell what you're thinking. What you, Hmm. She was very, yeah. I was a little bit even kind of unsure myself. Like I couldn't read her, you know? Right. So, but definitely in a German shepherd. Yeah. Yeah. Very different. Very, yeah. Very driven, but introducing the games, you really see the, you really see the change, the, the sparks in their eyes, you see the, the joy, you see the connection and it all just works beautifully from there. It's magical, magical. That's brilliant. That's brilliant. So now when did you start, like you teach tricks to all your dogs, right? Yes, ma'am. And so, so that is also part of that connection, right? So when, when did you start introducing tricks to her? And when did you say, I see her now do what she's doing saying, when are we training, let's go, I want to do this? So originally I started with tricks, um, with, uh, tabby with the German shepherd, um, as a way to help her gain some confidence as well, besides, you know, working on loose leash walking and obedience that really helped her come out of her kind of insecurities and come out of her. I don't know how to say it, but that helped her become a little more confident dog and build connection with me. And I really didn't know what I was doing at first, to be honest. I just kind of, you know, tried this, tried that. Then I started researching, I started reading books. I obviously, you know, followed your podcast, learned about shaping. And, uh, we worked at first without the clicker, just, you know, marker words and whatever I knew. Uh, but then as I kind of, you know, got a little bit more knowledge and experience, um, when I brought Canada in, uh, you know, we started combining, uh, recallers games with trick training and it just became a model for training because you, in order to teach a trick, which to me, any behavior we teach is a trick. You go through those layers, you build it in small, gradual foundations. So the dog gets it and the dog feels successful. So you have opportunity to reward and they love it. Uh, it's fun. It's fun for both of you. So it doesn't become a mundane kind of, Oh, I got to train the dog. It becomes a game. It becomes

an experience for both of you and you both look forward to it. This is a good question for you. What game is your go-to in a stressful environment? Huh? That's a good one. I guess it depends on the dog for me. Um, that's a good question. A good answer. Yeah. It depends on the situation and the dog, you know, with, um, Keena, the melon wash, she's very quick and she's very driven, you know, hand targets is our go-to, a search game is our go-to just to get her. Those are where actually my, my favorites also when we were working through, um, her insecurities with golf carts, she could not stand them. When I got her, she wanted to chase and cars too, but cars kind of faded out quickly with golf carts. It was, it took us quite some time to work through it. She was so over threshold. I couldn't even hand feed her. She was, you know, grabbing. She was, I was afraid she'll take my finger off. I think in one of your recolor videos, um, your year end video, you showed her, didn't you not chasing, but watching in a distance. I don't know if it was the deer. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. It was. Yeah. So I tried to learn, you know, I wish I found you guys sooner with when we got tabby. So I tried to learn from all my mistakes that I made earlier and kind of build again, those foundations early on, as soon as I got, um, you know, you know, working through all those types of scenarios that I knew, you know, if I expose her and I show her what good choices are, we can solidify that. And, uh, you know, instead of training the knots, we can train the do live and do land. Yes. So you got her at five months old. When, at what point did people say, wow, this is a really cool dog instead of, oh my gosh, what, what's wrong with your dog? I mean, she, she's brilliant from the start, you know, we've got, we've got to have that belief and attitude. I, yeah. Um, even if, you know, when not perfect, it's not perfection, it's progress we're looking for, but, um, yeah, so it's, it's just working daily, just sharing, you know, what I know, what I've learned, um, trying to pour that into her and sharing my joy with community of, you know, trick trainers of people in recallers. I think that's, that's my kind of main thing to try to spread the joy of training the dog with game-based positive reinforcement tricks to make it fun, to make it engage and make silly videos. Definitely. She is a, uh, like a role model that you mean you turned around this, uh, rescue dog who, yes, she was sweet. You had that going for you, but she still was a Malinois who had all those Malinois. Maligators.

Yes, she was. So, um, you know, you've done a brilliant job and I wanted people to, to see how somebody who was a school teacher, who was a volunteer, who's a mother of three kids still can just, you just swinged in the layers. Yeah. Baby steps. It's, it's really possible. It does require effort. It does require some planning, right? And, uh, dedication, patience, but it is very doable because you guys provide all the, all the answers and you, the community and the family and the support. Yeah. Let's give a shout out for the coaches because yeah, they are, they don't, they're the unsung heroes. Yeah. They, they do not leave a stone unturned. So thank you, Natalia for being on and sharing your story and inspiring so many others for listening to you. And congratulations again on the 200th podcast. So exciting. Oh, thank you so much. Thank you. And swagger says thank you as well. Yeah. Thank you.