Use the Sit to Make Dog Dinnertime Calmer
Here’s a dog training tip that we’ve done with every dog we’ve ever owned. Of course, they know the sit. Well, as we prepare their dinner plates — or breakfast plates for that matter — they can get rather excited.
So at one point or another in the process, whoever is doing the feeding asks the dogs to sit.
LarryDog is almost 14 and sitting is getting a little harder for him on our tile floor, so we don’t usually ask him till just before the food is going on the floor.
I’m not sure if you can see LarryDog’s tongue here in this first photo, but it is sticking out a bit as he waits!
Now the food is in position and LarryDog is focused on it. The very second I took the picture, my husband said, “Okay!” and Larry moved faster than you might think an old dog could!
We feed Lola nearby in the living room. She always sits as we walk across the room toward her feeding spot. Here she is watching intently as Kelly puts her dish down.
Dinner at last! As you might guess, with all this reinforcement, our dogs have great sits at any time.
I don’t think of it as power/control, rather as a way to make my kitchen a bit calmer while having some training fun.
It’s good to get dogs to wait while they’re being fed, which is something I do and while some may think it’s a ‘power and control’ thing, it helps reinforce the fact that there is a reward for their ‘behaviour,’ too – which is always good.