Katie Conquered The Stairs!

[philospher77]

Hi!

 

I've got Katie signed up for some training classes with my favorite trainer, and my only concern was that the training location for these classes is upstairs. And Katie does not do well with inside stairs (outside, she has no problems with them), and I live in a single-story house, so there is no handy way to practice them. Well, I knew that my trainer will actually rent out the facility, for 10/hour, but for some reason it never occurred to me to do that. I thought... parties, sure, people who want to get some extra practice before a meet, sure, but just to get Katie a chance to acclimate to the facility? That's not the kind of thing that they would rent out the place for. But when my trainer mentioned doing it, I was like "doh!" It's a perfect chance to get her there in a no-stress, no distraction environment. So I rented it for this afternoon, took her there, baited the stairs liberally with her FAVORITE treat (a mix of powdered milk, cornflakes, honey, and peanut butter... really tasty), took her leash off at the bottom of the stairs, and after a false start or two, she made her way up to the top no problem! Treat treat treat at the top, for being such a bold and brave girl, and then we hung out up there for a while and she sniffed around a bit. Then we tried going down the stairs. That appears to be much harder on her. She does the front feet ok, but then like slides her back feet over the edge of the tread and down the riser to the next tread. It's slow, cautious, almost painful to watch, but she did manage to make it all the way down to the bottom, licking up every piece of peanut butter ball I baited the steps with! Back upstairs, with a lot more ease and confidence this time. She did get herself turned sideways at one point, but figured out how to get straightened back out and all the way up. Hung out at the top some more, and then packed everything up to go back home, brought it down to the bottom of the stairs, and went and baited Katie back down the stairs. That time she did good until about two-thirds down, where she seemed to get stuck for a bit. I had to go up and bring her hind feet down a step, and give her a nibble of a peanut butter ball, and then she was like "oh, right, good stuff!" and came down the rest of the way.

 

We will be repeating this next weekend, so does anyone have any advice for making coming down easier, or is this just one of those things that will get better with practice? I am going to see if I can keep the bait in my hand, since I'm thinking that trying to get her nose down to the tread is putting her off-balance, and if I can lead her to keep the nose up, it might make it easier for her. And, as I suspected, Katie does seem to handle things like this best when I just make it worth her while to figure them out, and leave her to do it on her own.

 

Rebecca

[greysmom]

Down is definitely harder for long legged dogs, especially if they are more long than square. It just takes them a while to get the hang of coordinating feet moving. And it's weird for them to have to move their front feet independently of their back feet.

 

I think you're right about not putting bait on the step going down - it's just too far to reach and will unbalance her even more.

[Guest snowmo18]

I always would stand on the side of my fosters and gently hold their collar and just let them know that I was there kind of as a crutch (would even help place paws on the correct step if need be) and I always had better luck with going down next them then trying trying to coax them down at the bottom or staying at the top of the stairs. Right now our boy bounds up the stairs in a leap, but goes down every single step on the way down so fast Im always worried he will get ahead of himself, but he hasnt yet.

[Feisty49]

Whoo hoo for Katie. That's terrific. My Annie Bella also will do outside stairs and can do inside ones but hates 'em so much that she's climbed them willingly three times in almost five months, which is why she sleeps downstairs alone. She is not food motivated either.

[Guest BrianRke]

Katie.

[Guest mbfilby]

WTG Katie!

[BatterseaBrindl]

Katie!

 

We have 13 wooden stairs to get up to our bedrooms/office....

 

With Nixon, we did what you did for going up, but it still took him well over a week to figure going up all on his own.

For going down, we found that standing right beside him, hand on collar, and kind of leaning into him sideways...almost 'pushing' him up against the wall, helped to steady his body.

He was very cautious and it took him longer to master the going-down on his own.

 

Ruby, on the other hand, was up that big staircase on her own after 2 minutes in the house...she just sort of bounded up...then stood there at the top, looking down at us.

Of course I raced up and helped her down, using the same 'hold and lean' method as Nixon.

But, she is a clever girl and figured that out on her own in a few hours!

[philospher77]

I should clarify: when we go down the stairs, I am about 2 or three stairs ahead of her, so that I can monitor or help as needed. I've tried doing the paw placing thing, and gentle tugging, and just find that with Katie, that makes her shut down. So I am trying "close enough to catch and support her if she starts going crazy or really gets in trouble), but otherwise not touching her. She is on-leash, though, so she gets some feeling of connection from that.

[Guest Greyt_dog_lover]

I dont do the treat method of training stairs. I foster recovering broken leg hounds, and have 9 steps to get from the house to the back yard, so they have to learn stairs from the minute they step into my house.

 

For going down stairs, it is very similar to what others do, but here is where my method differs:

1) loop my hand through the collar and hold like a suitcase handle

2) cheery "lets go" and start down the stairs

3) typically they will lock their legs at the top of the stairs, this is where I simply keep their head tucked against my hip and walk down the first two stairs (gently, but firmly pulling them over the top edge of the first stair)

4) once they get over the initial fear of the fist stair, they will either lean into your leg, or think about jumping. I just keep control of their body (by keeping their head close to my hip) all the while walking at a nice slow pace down the stairs.

 

Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat. You will begin to notice they wont balk at the top of the stairs, and as the days progress you will be able to keep less pressure on the collar. They will understand they cant jump when they get 3 or 4 stairs from the bottom. While my method may seem less kind, it works much faster than the treat method. I have taught hundreds of hounds using this method and they are all able to do stairs by themselfs within a few days (anywhere from 4-10 tries).

 

Chad

Edited December 5, 2011 by Greyt_dog_lover