Teach Sit Pretty
hey YouTube in this video I’m going to
teach you how to train the trick of sit
pretty which is not only good for
building your dogs balanced body
awareness but it also builds your dog’s
core muscles free which is good for
preventing your dog from injury to the
spine during sports like canine
freestyle agility or frisbee so if you
have a healthy dog this is a perfect
trick to train your dog so that it will
protect your dog’s body from injury
during sports but if you have a dog that
has a pre-existing injury to their body
it’s best to check with a physical
therapist if this trick is going to be
good for your dog or detrimental to your
dog step 1
lure the dog into the position you want
to practice this trait on a surface that
has traction like carpet or grass so
that your dog doesn’t slip and the first
step is simply lifting a treat over your
dog’s nose and clicking or saying yes as
your dog’s feet lift off the ground so
most dogs don’t have very many muscles
in that area and it can take two weeks
to a month to build up the appropriate
muscles to be able to sit pretty for
five seconds if your dog is a little bit
uncoordinated like splash was when
learning this trick and tends to fall
when you lure your dog then you can
support your dog while you’re doing the
exercise so that your dog is safe from
falling and scaring themselves if your
dog is scared of being touched or
restrained then you need to work on that
first or not support your dog at all so
to do that you can stand behind your dog
like this and learn the dog into the sit
pretty position and your legs are there
and your arm is here protecting your dog
from falling over if the dog wants to
get down they can it’s not about forcing
the dog into the position it’s about
helping the dog from falling over great
you want to make sure that your dog’s
back feet aren’t crooked and that their
spine isn’t crooked while they’re doing
this exercise because the whole point is
to create equal protection on both sides
of the spine with the muscles and if you
have them sitting incorrectly you can
actually be do
damaged rather than good so as you can
see when I’m learning type to sit pretty
sometimes his legs will swing outwards
or he’s not sitting straight as you can
see there he’s sitting on his side so
that’s not good so you want to lure the
dog forwards and make sure that their
feet are nice and straight and
completely symmetrical before you lift
the dog up into the sit pretty position
you want them to start practicing a
straighter sit for their I’m good good
job tip you can support your dog’s
weight with your arm or a chair when
your dog is first learning the trick
this will help build your dog’s balance
and muscles without having to give the
treat as frequently as when the dog is
balancing on their own step to remove
the lower once your dog can maintain the
position for five seconds then I would
start to remove the lure one way to get
rid of the treelore in your hand is to
lure the dog into the position say yes
and feed the treat and then immediately
after pretend to get a treat lure the
dog into the position say yes and then
feed them the actual treat so your dog
is learning that even though there’s no
Treat in your hand it still pays to
follow that empty hand into the position
yes now if your dog starts getting
suspicious and they’re like hey what’s
there’s no Treat in there then simply go
back and use the treat again to lure the
dog into the position yes and then do it
again yes and then have no treat yes
good boy so another way of getting rid
of a lure is luring the dog into the
position and then as you lift the treat
above their head yes you’re going to
mark the dog for staying in the position
while you move the treat away yes
and then the treat comes back if your
dog’s feet go back down to the ground
simply don’t mark yes or if your dog
stands up you can also use the clicker
for this
step three add a queue so to add a queue
you can turn your luring gesture into
the hand signal or sit pretty to do that
you lure your dog into the position
click and treat and then you can fav
that luring gesture into more of a hand
signal side ready awesome
good boy adding a verbal cue to add a
verbal cue you can simply say the verbal
cue before you move a muscle to do the
visual cue so I’m going to say he
already knows sit pretty so I’m going to
change it to meerkat and then do the
hand signal good job
meerkat and then do the hand signal
awesome
near Kent and then I’m going to click
him offering what he thinks might be the
behavior and it looked almost like a sit
pretty so I clicked it and you don’t
always want to make it harder and harder
so I’m going to go back and I’m going to
learner behavior and get some really
good repetitions of the behavior I like
before making it harder sit pretty good
girl sit pretty yes that’s it good girl
once your dog is a master to sit pretty
you can then add duration and a release
cue so your dog can sit pretty until you
tell them the release cue for example
free / sit pretty good girl great
awesome
step four proofing if you want your dogs
sit pretty behavior to be a reliable
behavior you need to do some proofing
here are some examples of me proofing
the behavior with the distraction of
food these are some tricks that can be
trained after teaching sit pretty don’t
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