Do you like your Manners minder?

I have a Manners Minder, but like everything else, Bailey has outsmarted it. I bought it to teach her to lay on her bed when my neighbors are in the hallway. When I hear them, I send Bailey to her bed and then dispense treats. The problem is Bailey will run and bark at the door first, then go lay down on her bed, put her paw on the MM and expect a treat :rolleyes2:.

The other issue is in order to train her this, I have to keep it on all the time because I never know when my neighbors are going to be out. When Bailey knows the MM is on, she won't leave her bed and will stay there almost the whole night.

For vacuuming and things like that it's very good. I've never played any games with it.
 
I love my Manners Minder and I've used it for tons of stuff (mainly agility at the moment).

There are lots of treats that are small enough - Zukes minis, Best Buddy Bites (a current favourite), Little Stars, and kibble works well too.
 
how dry treats should be to use them and not get stuck? I am thinking about microwave meat, like beef heart to drier stage. Generally I use moist treats so that is going to be some change added.
 
take4roll10 said:
I have a Manners Minder, but like everything else, Bailey has outsmarted it. I bought it to teach her to lay on her bed when my neighbors are in the hallway. When I hear them, I send Bailey to her bed and then dispense treats. The problem is Bailey will run and bark at the door first, then go lay down on her bed, put her paw on the MM and expect a treat :rolleyes2:.
For vacuuming and things like that it's very good. I've never played any games with it.
Click to expand...
Something tells me that you are not rewarding but luring to the bed i.e. neighbors out equals release the treat. I would try following- release the treat ONLY when she goes to bed without going to the door, from what I understand there is sound you can set up and also you can modify to jack pot, right?
I would see the behavior first and then jack pot correct one...
The best training happens when you reward at the choicepoint moment...
 
SheltieChe said:
Something tells me that you are not rewarding but luring to the bed i.e. neighbors out equals release the treat. I would try following- release the treat ONLY when she goes to bed without going to the door, from what I understand there is sound you can set up and also you can modify to jack pot, right?
I would see the behavior first and then jack pot correct one...
The best training happens when you reward at the choicepoint moment...
Click to expand...

Definitely not luring her. I don't dispense treats to get her to run to the bed. She only gets treats after she lays down on the bed. The second she does that I release treats. And she never gets treats for running to the door first. Trust me I watched the horrible quality video that came with the DVD (most of it. It was too awful to watch the whole thing). Besides shaping, it's a similar concept to clicker training, which we already do.

Yes, whenever you click the remote, it beeps before it dispenses.
 
ok, then can you stage it? Ask your friend to be a "neighbor", increase response cost of going to the door, i.e. put some barriers there and reward/ jack pot only when she beelines for the bed?
 
Yup, I've had friends and my BF go in the hallway and make noise, open doors, etc, but for whatever reason, Bailey knows when it's actually my neighbors or someone she knows.
When I get off the elevator and bang on the door or pull the doorknob, she doesn't bark. Don't know how she does it, but she seems to know when I or someone she knows is in hallway or if it's a stranger or neighbor.

When I get some extra money, I am going to buy an xpen and gate off the front door, so she can't go charging to it. It's been my plan for a while.

As far as the Manners Minder goes. It can be a really useful tool for training, but unfortunately, it hasn't helped our issue. I will research some games we can play with it. That might be fun.
 
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