Dog Mat Training: Teaching Your Dog to Relax on a Mat!
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- Опубліковано 1 бер 2022
- Mat training is a super valuable skill for dogs to learn! It involves teaching your dog to go to a mat on cue and then lie down and relax.
Not only is mat training great for teaching hyper, high-drive dogs how to chill out and relax, but it's also handy for when you want to take your dog out in public to places like cafes, breweries, restaurant patios, or sporting events.
In this video, I'll be teaching my own dog Remy the basics of mat training. Give it a try with your own dogs and let us know how you use this skill!
Sections:
1:08 First session, starting indoors
3:30 Second session indoors with more challenges
6:52 Working outdoors, in the yard
Music by Naomi - Saturday Light - thmatc.co/?l=5C517CF5 - Домашні улюбленці та дикі тварини
I love ths video. I send it to clients it's so good.
Aw thank you!!
Thank you so much for this and all of your videos. Your content for dog training is by far the best produced that I’ve seen on UA-cam. Your tone is so good and the video is extremely well edited. I am binge watching your channel to get all your training goodness!! As a fellow UA-camr, I know how much effort and time making content like this requires. Thank you so, so much for your hard work!!! You are make life better for dogs and their people. Lots of love from Oregon! - Finch’s Mommy
Wow, thank you SO much for such kind words! I can't tell you how much that means to me. Haha, yes it can definitely be a lot of work, but if my videos can help people and their dogs it's all worth it. Thank you again so much for the support!
OMG....me too! I am binge watching these videos!!! I have a rescue GSD for the past 3 months...I think the first 2 months were hell :) but I am committed to using positive training methods and have a trainer, and other videos I've watched. By far, these videos are the best. So much more realistic than some of the reactivity videos I've watched and so many very good real life examples. Thank you!!!
Amazing! Can’t wait to try this
Thanks for this video! It's really really good
Nice video, well explained.
Thanks for making this video. This is super informative and really easy to understand. Remy did great!
Thank you so much, I'm glad it was helpful! I think he did really well too. This will definitely be a skill we continue to work on, because it's pretty darn handy!
Thank you for this video, Remy did such a great job! I‘m working on this with our Heeler puppy, getting on the mat an lie down is not the problem but she doesn‘t get that she should relax on it and is always on fire 😅
Heehee, that sounds like a Heeler pup for sure! Some people really target rewarding when the dog sits on their hip, as that's a more relaxed posture than the sphinx style. Maybe that would be a good place to start!
Thanks a bunch for providing this training info.
Glad it was helpful!
Great video! Question for you -- my pet only likes to train with a squeeze up treat. Do you have any suggestions for how we can start if I can't throw a treat to the side to reset her?
Thanks for making this video. It's really helpful.
Can you please share link to the video of you training him to go to bed
Sorry, I don't have that on video! But it would be a similar process to this.
Thank you for this super helpful video! I would like to teach this to my rescue dog and was wondering where you purchased the mat? Any information would be appreciated!
Hey Ryley - I actually just found this one randomly, but I bet you could find something similar looking for bathmats!
Great video. Maybe I missed it but when do you include the cue "Settle"? I've been doing ROM with my 5 month old pup but the treats almost over-stimulate her that she can't just chill. She's so excited that she knows her behavior should be "I need to wait, I need to not make eye contact" but I can tell she's ready to spring into action. Any advice on that and when to introduce the settle cue? Thanks !
Great question! I wouldn't recommend introducing the cue right away. With Remy, I relied heavily on just pointing and luring until he really got the hang of going and lying down on the mat. Once they kind of get the idea that that's what they are supposed to do when they see the mat, you can start introducing the cue while still pointing and using hand signals. Dogs tend to rely a lot more on hand signals, so the cue probably won't mean a lot initially, but eventually once you've practiced the cue with the mat, hand signals, and verbal cue, you should be able to slowly rely more on the verbal cue, and then just the verbal "settle" cue if that's your goal.
If you feel like she's a bit too excited, you could try doing a nice big walk before your training session to wear her down a bit! You could also try lower-value food (like kibble) that isn't so stimulating.
is it possible to eventually put the mat in the crate and crate train them that way?
Absolutely! You can also basically use this entire method and just direct the dog to the crate instead of onto a mat if you prefer.
Isn't the mat too small for him?
Nope, he fits perfectly on it! This isn't his bed, it's really more like a place marker. In fact, I could probably go a bit smaller.
But haven't you only trained him to lie down not to relax? Especially since you used a lot of exciting movements and praises? I had the same issue and both my dog and I hate mat training. The dog lies there tense waiting for the next treat and eventually will get frustrated and restless. My friends had the same issue unfortunately.
You make a great point! I would say this is more of a pre-requisite to getting your dog comfortable and familiar with a mat, and learning that the expectation is to stay on the mat. A good next step would be to do something like Karen Overalls' Relaxation Protocol. This is where you'd continue to reward as you perform increasingly strange behaviors. And, specifically, you want to reward for relaxed body language (so, for example, when the dog goes to rest on his hip rather than lying down at attention, putting his head on his paw, etc)