Have you wondered if it’s a good idea to use treats when Training your dog?  Do you feel guilty for doing so?  I assure you, you’re not alone.  It’s something that can be quite confusing to a lot of people but it is a powerful thing to understand and master.

I am going to explain to you how to train your dog with treats and even though what I am about to tell you may seem to contradict what you have heard before, I hope it will make sense and help you and your dog to have a better understanding of each other.

Should I Use Treats?

First off, let’s examine the notion that you should never use treats to train your dog because then he will only obey you if you have a treat in hand.  This is absolutely not true!  In fact, you can and should begin training by using Food.  The key is to train your dog to respond to your commands without thinking about it and gradually phase the treats out over time.

Phasing food rewards out is the most important part of this training.  Another term for it is “random rewards.”  What you do is start giving the dog a treat from inside of your hand (closed fist) so that they don’t see it.  Slowly over time you begin to give the dog a reward only every second or third time they obey your command.  Continue to phase out the treats until they become truly random rewards.

My plan for this blog is to focus on training tips every Monday, so in a followup post I will explain how you can boost your results even more using the random rewards technique which will leave your dog completely focused and awaiting your next command.  So look for part 2 next week.

Shouldn’t My Dog Just Be Happy to Please Me?

You may have also heard or believe that dogs should simply be happy to work for you without any reward.  Of course, that was probably said by people who haven’t had much experience training dogs, or else they use force, aggression and instill fear through their training…the old school notion that dogs should simply obey or else.

But stop and think about it — how long would you want to work for nothing?  I’ll bet that wouldn’t last for too long now, would it?  Your dog sees it in much the same way.  He will get bored and frustrated if he has to keep working so hard and getting nothing in return.

Granted, there may be some dogs who simply want to please their owners and don’t need food rewards.  They may be happy with some pets, cuddles and praise.  But if your dog isn’t one of those rare animals, and he prefers to bounce around the yard playing and not paying attention to your commands, then some tactical food training could be very beneficial.

A key component to training a dog using food treats is that you understand how to phase out the food treats in the right way.  Soon your dog will be responding to you faster every time if done properly.

So the next time you are out with your dog feel free to use food rewards whenever he does something good and don’t worry if others tell you not to.  Just remember to start phasing out the treats over a long period of time.  There is no right or wrong time table in the phasing out process, in fact, it will probably take several months to get it right.  But eventually you should reach a point where your dog is only getting a food reward every fifth time, then every 20th time, and so on….

I have used this technique with my Schnauzer, Cash, and it has worked beautifully.  He responds well to commands because he just never knows when there might be a treat involved.

Too Much Food?

If you are worried about feeding your dog too much you can simply deduct it out of their dinner so that the total amount of food they are eating during the day remains the same.

When I was first working with Cash the trainer suggested I cut up a hot dog into tiny bits and use that for training treats.  Believe me, if you cut up a hot dog into quarter-inch cubes, you can get a huge amount of treats out of one hot dog and your dog will love it. The trainer taught me to microwave the bits of hot dog on a paper towel until they were crisp.  This eliminates a lot of the fat and makes the treats crunchy. Of course if you have a large dog, you may need to make the pieces a bit larger.

There are also great training treats on the market that come in tiny bits, so that your dog isn’t eating too much at one time.

If you are looking for a complete dog training solution, there is no better place than Doggy Dan’s website where you can find hundreds of videos and for only $1 you can have 3 days of complete access to all of his online training.

Stay tuned next week for part two….How to Maximize the Use of Food Treats