Dog Obedience Training Blog
Keeping Your Dog OFF Your Counter Tops
*** Question From A Reader ***
Good Morning [Chet],
Your information has been so helpful. I have a six month old, 50+ pound female German Shepherd and she has recently started a really bad habit. In the morning before I leave for work I gate her to the kitchen. Once gated I like to give her a Happy Hips treat. She is very much aware of the routine and from where and when I get her little treat.
Typically I take it out and set it on the table or counter while I close up the container and prepare to gate her in. Recently she has decided that she’s going to help herself to the treat that is on the table or counter. Additionally, I keep her lead on the Bombay Chest near the front door.
When I reach for it she jumps up on the chest with anticipation to go outside. Once given the “sit” command, she patiently waits for me to prepare her for going outside but I don’t like that she jumps up on things the way that she does. What can I do to deter this behavior?
Irritated with the behavior!
Veronica D. Greene
p.s. this dog has been diagnosed with Hip Dysplasia so her jumping is detrimental to her well being.
>>> My Comments:
Glad to hear my information has been helpful Veronica, and I’d be glad to address your issue of unwanted jumping on counter tops.
In my Hands Off dog training program I show a training video of how I got an 11 week old puppy to stop lunging for food I dropped on the floor within a matter of minutes.
And I show you exactly how to teach a dog to have what I call “urge-control” and be able to resist things he really wants — life food on the floor or on counter tops.
And it’s NOT done by punishing or telling the dog “No”… at least that’s not how I did it.
Here’s what you need to understand…
The reason a dog will lunge for food dropped on the floor, or jump up onto the counter to get a treat is because the act of misbehaving is IMMEDIATELY rewarded by food.
And when you reinforce a behavior, even accidentally, you increase the likelihood that the behavior will increase in frequency.
So how do you tackle this problem?
First you have to STOP the behavior from being self reinforcing in the first place. Meaning you need to make it so even if he jumps up on the counter another 100 times over the next few weeks, not ONCE will he find a treat or anything rewarding.
It sounds like you’re TRYING to do that by telling your dog to sit, but the problem with your dog only behaving when you TELL him to is that the dog tends to always want to misbehave first, and you always have to reprimand him.
In Leslie McDevitt’s great book, Conrol Unleashed she talks about a great approach to fixing this problem that she calls “Environmental Cues”… or cues that your dog recognizes in his environment instead of ones you have to verbally say.
For example, if you have a dog who likes to run out the front door when it opens, she talks about how you can train a dog to not walk through ANY open door… because dogs are capable of learning that an OPEN door is actually a cue to stay.
Well the same goes for food left out on the ground or on counter tops.
You can teach your dog that the environmental cue of open access to food, means he’s supposed to do a behavior (aka. sit and look you in the eyes).
And you do this by first BLOCKING access to the dogs reward, and then secondly waiting for the dog to “Self Correct” himself and do ANY other behavior then trying to get at the food.
In your case, if it was my dog jumping onto the counter, I would place the treat on the counter where I knew my dog would try to jump up and get it.
When he got ready to jump up, I’d quickly take my hand and cover up the treat so the dog couldn’t get it.
He might try to lick at my hand or dig under it to get the treat, but I’d just continue to block the dogs access to the reward until he gave up and got off the counter.
But here’s the KEY part…
Many people would advice you to click the second the dog jumped off the counter, but I would suggest waiting ’til the dog got down AND…
Looks you in the eye!
That way you, you can then click your training clicker and reward your dog with a treat for having all four feet on the floor and looking you in the eye when he wants a treat.
It works GREAT!
And here’s another thing…
I would recommend rewarding your dog with a food item that’s BETTER then the one he’s trying to get at.
This will help him learn that if he constantly resists his urges to get at food, no matter where it is, he’ll very often earn a SUPER reward for his good behavior.
If you’d like to see a video of me teaching this to my own puppy, read this:
http://thedogtrainingsecret.com/tips
Hopefully that helps!
-Chet
I think I will try to train it out of my dogs other than not allow them in the house, that is why I appreciate the advice. My husband is at his wits end and wants to ban them from the house but I want to give them a chance.
[Reply]
@ November 9th, 2009 at 19:10it sure doesn’t hurt to give it a try before you banish them
[Reply]
@ November 9th, 2009 at 23:16