Wondering what the hype is about when it comes to Location Specific Marker cues? Shade and I talk about what they are, what they can offer your training, how to decide when it's time to consider adding a new one, the role of anticipatory behaviors and more!  

 Transcript

Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau, and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today I have Shade Whitesel here with me to talk about food cues and location specific markers. Hi, Shade. Welcome back to the podcast!

Shade Whitesel: Thanks so much for having me on. I'm so excited about this new class.

Melissa Breau: Yeah, absolutely. So to start us out, do you want to just remind listeners a little bit about kind of who you are and your current canine crew?

Shade Whitesel: Well, I've been teaching for Fenzi for eleven years now and, yeah, so kind of two terms of class for that long, so it's a big thing. My sports that I compete in are mainly Schutzhund, which nowadays is called IGP, and I dabble in AKC obedience.

My three dogs, I'm down to three. I've had as many as six, so three is quite a change. Is One's, who is eleven and three quarters. I counted it up, and when Shepherd's hit over ten, you need to start counting in terms of months. So he is doing quite well, and he'll turn twelve in November. So every day, best day for him. I have a six year old, Talic, who I've just taken out of most formal sports because he's probably got a back injury that we can't really fix.

So we're kind of exploring a lot of nose stuff right now to see what he likes and what he's good at. And then I have a 20 month young guy who loves to do all this stuff. His name is Ion, and I have a Patreon page devoted to raising him and how to have a high drive puppy dog without squashing them or being too permissive. You know, the kind of reality is somewhere in between.

And I have a whole Patreon page about that because I think that the more education about that, the better. So Ion is amazing. He's definitely not for everybody. He's quite the power. I'm looking forward to our career in sports. He's very talented in many things, so I'm excited.

Melissa Breau: That's awesome. I can't believe he's already 20 months and that Talik is now six. I know. I feel like I remember Talik coming home as a baby puppy. It's like time just flies.

Shade Whitesel: Yeah. All Talic's baby pictures are coming up because it's been, you know, he just turned six, so it's just so cute little frowny eyebrows.

Melissa Breau: All right, so before we even kind of jump into our main topic today, I'm dying to ask, how many location specific marker cues do you have and use with your dog? Dogs, I should say.

Shade Whitesel: Luckily, you sent me the question, so I was able to count. But I think off the top of my head, I have 18, and that is dependent upon food, toy, or helper. So direct primary reinforcement that way. But I may be forgetting some. It also may be that I'm using less because I'm thinking of Ion when I'm saying 18, that I might be using less for him than for other dogs. Or it may be that I've forgotten how many I have.

And, yeah, I just. And it's so ironic you ask that because I just did a new one. I just formed a new one a couple days ago to help Ion understand something. So that's what happens with me. I create, if I see a need for an action or an arousal level from the dog, then I form a new one. So the new one is "Dirt," and it means I will throw that toy in between your front legs on the ground.

And it kind of means, like, focus on the ground. That's going to be. Oh, I just remembered that I did forget one. Okay, 19. Should I list them? That might take all day.

Melissa Breau: Sure, go for it.

Shade Whitesel: No, no.

Melissa Breau: Give us a little bit of a taste at least.

Shade Whitesel: Oh, my gosh. I didn't write them down, so I might forget. Okay, so we think about food. I have x, which means come to hand. Toss, which means throw. J, which means I'll bring it to your mouth. And then I have slow, which means I'll bring it to your mouth, but in a really stocky way. So how I deliver those are different. And slow. I want a freeze. And jet, I don't care. Like jet, I use most. Not jet, j. I use most for conditioning stuff where I need to feed in place. Okay, so that's four. Ground, treat on the ground. Sniff. Handful of treats placed on the ground.

That's six. Kipp. I will throw the food to you so I can get arousal so they jump up and catch it. Uh oh. I'm not remembering however many. Cause that's only seven right there. Anyway, those are those. I don't need to run through all of them, but I think it's helpful to have an idea. Yeah. Bite, which is strike. Chase, which is chase. Cheap, which is I'll bring that toy to you for tugging. Jet, which is I will throw it on the ground really hard and bounce and that's different from the one I just formed, which is dirt.

And with jet, I sort of give it to the dog in motion. So they kind of catch it off the bounce, and it's easier for them to catch that one than like a long chase. So some of these I use when they're young. So, like chase, I use a lot when they're young, but then as they're older, I tend not to throw the ball for them. Via is ball ahead of you?

Zurich is ball behind you. Toy on the ground cues right there. I think that's all for toy. I definitely have, like, some position skill specific marker cues. So, like, bounce for jump up and get the food for heeling and food from my hand. And I formed that because a lot of dogs in class told us that collecting treat from your hand on the ground or from your hand when they walk to the hand was different than jumping for it.

Like they understand. So when that's kind of what happens when you see the dog go, well, that's not the same thing, then you form a different marker cue. I have some protection marker cues because I want to keep the arousal of protection separate from my obedience. So I might use different cues there. I'm less strict about that because I'm really working on Ion controlling his arousal no matter what.

But it is sort of a way to keep that protection arousal away from other training. Yeah, I think that might be it. I'm sure that midway through the podcast will be like, oh, yeah, I have another one. So catch catch for the toy. So camp is catch food, and catch is catch toy. And I have those start with similar consonants for a reason, because they're the same action, but I want them different because it's a different thing. That's a lot, huh? I probably will be covering all these.

Melissa Breau: It's a fair handful. Not for everybody. If you're a pet person, you just need three to hand toss trees and sniff on the ground. Three does it all good.

Melissa Breau: Yeah. So now that we've kind of talked about that and jumped in, like, you know, waist deep right off the get go, let's back up for a second. We should probably define what we mean by location specific marker cue. So can you kind of just share what they are and why you feel like using them really kind of adds to your training?

Shade Whitesel: So basically, location specific marker cue, if you're going to use different markers for different things that you're giving the dog and different things that the dog likes, it's basically chopping up your general marker cue, which is a clicker or a lot of people use yes.

And so you're chopping that marker cue up into its individual bits. So instead of saying yes and giving the dog a toy, and then yes and giving the dog food, you're basically making those two separate marker cues. For me, I look at the dog's behavior, so whatever behavior they're doing that you want, that's a different marker cue if they're doing a different behavior. So I also think we should perhaps call them location and arousal specific marker cues, because many dogs have different reward hierarchies, and many dogs are more excited about one type of reinforcement than another.

So I want to name those two separate things because they don't want the dog to feel tricked. So not only is it you come and get this from the hand, but you come and get this food, or you come and get this toy. So those, again, would be two separate marker cues. So you're looking at the action of the dog, you're looking at what, you're giving them what they like, and you're looking at wherever I am.

And so that basically, that's your different location marker cues. And then the reason that I use them is because I think that by keeping the arousal separate, I can use the specific reinforcement that's called something for something I teach in a behavior cue that's really excited, like a recall. And I can have a different marker cue to teach, like a long, down, relaxed stay. And those would be two different ways that a dog accesses.

Okay? One would be running towards you, and the other one would be kind of staying in position. And I can make that super clear to my dog right away. Okay. And I can use the different excitement levels and the different arousal to get the right emotion in the behavior that I'm teaching. The other thing that's really important that I hardly ever mention is that because you have. Because my dogs have grown up with different treats in different places and different toys, and maybe I have the toy in sight and I have food in my hand, and I tell the dog which one they can get.

My dogs are so used to doing behaviors around competing reinforcement. And what I mean by that is they may want the toy more, but they learn that they don't have a toy. There's no access to the toy. The toy is not available, even though it's in sight. And so they take the food instead. So what they learn is that they can't have everything that's in sight, and they learn that concept.

They learn to listen because they're listening to me for their reinforcement stuff. So it's kind of like I've described it as the positive trainers. No. So when I. There's a toy on the ground, and I say x, which is my food cue, the dog understands that that toy on the ground is unavailable, and we can take this concept to that kid chasing a soccer ball is unavailable, even though it's exciting to you.

Okay. I say x, you get food. And I think that having that concept and having a formal way of teaching it is super helpful for dogs in their lives because dogs always see stuff they want and they're not allowed to have it. And so if they're used to that and that's an easy skill for them, I think that is a huge benefit of having different cues for different reinforcement that we don't often mention. Okay, I went down that rabbit hole.

Melissa Breau: Huh. Interesting. I hadn't thought about that. Right. That's all right. I hadn't thought about that. But that's a super interesting additional piece to kind of include when you're thinking about all this stuff just next to that.

Shade Whitesel: Well, you can tell I'm really thinking about marker cues because I'm doing that class. So it's all about all the steps or all the things.

Melissa Breau: So. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So if part of what we're looking for, I think you said kind of in your previous answer, that part of what you're looking for is the behavior of the dog in getting the reinforcement. So I know you also kind of talk about it as, like, the anticipatory behavior. Is that, like, a good way of maybe phrasing it?

Shade Whitesel: Yeah. Anticipatory body language. So did I let you complete your question?

Melissa Breau: No, you're good. You're good. If you want to go, go for it.

Shade Whitesel: So, basically, I want the dog to want what I want. We know we're doing it right, or we know that we're being consistent in our timing and in our words and how we're using them. If we see anticipatory body language that is different from marker cue to marker cue. So because I want to take advantage of the excitement level of toss versus me feeding you in position, those are two separate excitement levels from the dog.

I want to see different anticipatory body language from the dog. When I say toss, I want them to spring up and think chasing thoughts. When I say j, which is my feed to face, I want them to stay there and be sort of relaxed about it. Okay, so you're looking at the anticipatory body language between that marker and the collection of the reinforcement and that way, you know, as a handler, you're being consistent in your use of it and that you're doing a correct enough pause so that the dog can process and then think about the next thing.

It also means you have preloaded treats in your hand so that you can have a clean delivery and not have to reach into your bait bag or pocket or stuff like that with each marker cue to get the treat. So location specific markers are dependent upon a clean loop of dog hears the marker and then is able to access the reinforcement, whatever that is.

Melissa Breau: I think it's super interesting because, like, Huey, my Labrador, for example, he has Labrador instincts. So he has interpreted his chase cue to mean, look away from me. Right? So, like, he turns to watch where the ball is going to land over his head, which is a very labrador instinctive behavior on his chase cue, because he knows what that means to. So it just kind of ties into all of that and just the anticipatory stuff. Yeah, yeah. So when we're talking about stuff like that and anticipatory behaviors, at what point does a marker become a cued behavior? Does it matter, functionally speaking, are they the same thing? Are they different things?

Shade Whitesel: So I think they're all cues. I think every single thing you say to the dog is a cue to do something. And so reinforcement marker cues really should be calling them reinforcement cues, first off, because they're all cues, and they're cues to access the reinforcement. If they weren't cues to access the reinforcement or something the dog liked, then they wouldn't be as relevant to the dog, and it would be harder to teach stuff with stuff.

The dog is not relevant to them. Okay. So they function as both markers and reinforcement cues. And normally, we can include release cues in there for the purposes of talking about them. I often say, yes, they're all cues, but it's easier for us to think about them in terms of, you've got marker cues which lead to reinforcement, and then you have behavior cues which lead to a marker cue, which leads to reinforcement.

So an easy example would be sit the dog gets its butt on the ground, you'd say x, and then deliver a piece of food. Okay, so the behavior cue, the marker cue, then the reinforcement. It's easiest to think of them that way, but in reality, I think that all of them are marker cues. And I do think that even when we use, like, a clicker to mean, like, you know, a general marker cue, if we were to use a clicker for that, the clicker would still mean eat food.

But it would also mean look at my handler's body language to see what I'm going to get and how I'm going to get it. So whereas hopefully, the location specific marker cue tells the dog instantly where to look, whether that's at the handler's hand or whether, like, for Huey, it's. I heard chase. So the ball's out there. So I'll start out there. I'll start running, you know, automatically. So things like that. Clever boy.

Melissa Breau: He is a clever boy. So for those kind of new to this whole concept. Right, where would you have them start? I know you mentioned earlier for pet folks, you'd start with three cues.

Shade Whitesel: Yes, I'd start with three. What would you do? I would start with. So for me, x is the dog gets up from it because remember the release cues.

So the dog gets up from its sit and comes to my hand and kind of walks to the hand. And that's probably the most important thing. You want the dog to get out of position and feel free to walk to your hand because. And so, yeah, so that's just your general one. It's important, and it's easiest for the handler. Toss would be another one that I would have people do because oftentimes toss is very exciting to the dog, and you can sometimes we want to teach the dog exciting things, like, again, that recall.

So I would want chase thoughts? And I would want us as a handler to be able to give that to the dog. Okay. So oftentimes we're trying to control the dog and we'll try not to calm them down. And I want a way as a handler to get my dog excited. And so that's why I would include tossed treat in that kind of basics. The other one I would use would be sniff, which is more than one treat placed on the ground.

So sort of like five treats kind of placed on the ground or dropped on the ground from, like, two inches above the ground so they kind of land and stay there. And the reason I want that one in there is that it can be a very calming thing for the dog. So when you're working on trying to get them out of that excitement, that sniff, or some people call it scatter, can be really super important to the dog.

Practicing that arousal level up. I see something exciting, but I need to calm down and then calming. So those three are. You can get everything done with those three. You can probably get all your sports done with those three too. Yeah. So we don't have to have 20 different marker cues. And it's honestly not for everybody. You know, it really isn't. There are brilliant, brilliant, great, talented trainers achieving really great results with just one general marker cue, and that is great.

I just kind of came across this concept about ten years ago, and I loved it and I just ran with it. And specifically for my dogs, which, like toys and food, I noticed that they were slightly disappointed when they thought they were going to get something, and they didn't. They got the other thing. And so for me, I noticed that I didn't want that excitement or I didn't want that disappointment in my training. So for me, it made sense to be clear about that, and I'm all about the clarity. So, again, I took it and went down a rabbit hole, didn't I?

Melissa Breau: You're good, though. You're good, though. All right, so talk us through kind of what it looks like when you introduce a new marker cue to your dog. Where do you start? And you just did one, so maybe even. Maybe you want to use that example.

Shade Whitesel: Yeah. Well, I make sure that the dog can do it. Okay. So, like, if I'm going to toss treats, I'll make sure that the dog can track the treat and see it, and I make sure that I am doing the correct body language, and then I name it. And that process might take as little as three reps. Okay, so, you know, make sure the dog can track the toy or track the treat and then toss.

Pause. Here you go. Okay, so that's all it would take. My new one, dirt, I just started using it right away, and I took advantage of the fact that he didn't know what it meant, so he waited. Okay, so for that, I didn't make sure because I didn't want any impulse control. I didn't want him, like, trying to leap for it when he just saw the toy leave my hand.

So I kind of dirt and threw it right there. And then he learned, oh, it's going to be right there because I want that anticipation of the toy, like, kind of magically appears in between his paws. So two different ways. I knew it could get there. Since, however, again, it's only been a couple days, I have managed to throw the toy all over the place, so, which means that I'm not great at throwing in between his paws.

I'm excited that he actually did the behavior and the toy goes all over the place. So because of that, I may. Because I'm noticing that eyes, the handler can't deliver consistently. This thing. It may be that it is a marker cue that I have right now that I will abandon because it doesn't make sense to use more than one that all mean the same thing. Okay. I already have a toy that means I'll bounce it on the ground jet.

So if I can't throw my dirt toy consistently, then I will abandon that. And that happens all the time. I'll, like, form a new marker cue that makes sense, and then I'll be like, okay, I don't need that, and it's perfectly okay. Or I might need it for a really temporary time to get a concept across the dog, and then I can abandon it. So I run out of words.

But, yeah, I mean, dirt, that's really, really, you know, in the dirt. I mean, it's unique. It's certainly not something you're going to use for anything else, so. Right. Oh, I remember Jack, as we're going through. I just remembered another one I use jackpot for. We're going to run to the thing, and then I'm going to tell you. But I just. Somebody uses, one of my friends on Facebook uses shopping for that, and I love that.

I think shopping for Ryan, that's super cute. I think that's super cute. So I might have to steal that one, but, yeah, I love that. So you talked about this a little bit earlier, but I wanted to maybe revisit it a little bit. So can you talk a little more about the difference between food and toys when it comes to all this stuff and just maybe elaborate on what you were saying earlier about you're not wanting that disappointment as part of your training?

Yeah, I want to be able to train so that I have treats and toys around all the time. Like, it's not uncommon for me to have, you know, a bag of treats on the climb and along with two toys along with toys scattered around. So I want to be able to train with distractions in sight and the dog, not grab them. So there's that aspect of it, having stuff in sight and being able to clearly tell my dog what they're gonna get in spite of what they see all around.

In addition, they're. They're practicing the concept of paying attention to me in the presence of all the distractions and not thinking that just because they see a toy or just because they see treats, that's what they're gonna get. They have to listen to me a little bit more, and they are having the concept of I don't get what I see. Okay. If that's a thing for that particular dog, the other thing to keep in mind is that most dogs, I think I've met two that like toys and treats the same, but most dogs like toys better or treats better.

And so it could be that it's just a hierarchy thing. They like, you know, treats better than toy, or it could be that it's an arousal thing and it's different then, too, they have to be in a certain state of excitement to take a toy, or the toy itself cues the state of excitement. So again, because I want to have different reinforcement to train my calm down stay versus my recall, I'm going to use a reward or reinforcement to train my recall that's more exciting to the dog, and that might be toys, and I'm going to use food that's not as exciting to teach my down stay.

So you want to. So I'm definitely going to have those be different marker cues because they are different expectations from the dog and they're different excitement arousal levels, so that it really is a difference that happens when you have a dog that likes both. The other thing about this, and I've struggled with this, is that location specific barker cues often matter more with toy dogs, and that's where people go, oh, it really makes sense to have this be two different things because by the nature of rewarding with toys, we oftentimes have them in our hands.

And the difference between chase, where the dog has to wait for you to kind of draw back your hand, your hands moving with the toy in it, and then the chase, you know, is happening, versus strike, where again, you're drawing back your hand to present the toy is huge. And dogs that like toys get really grabby with their teeth. And so it's just kind of this self preservation of having two different cues, basically, for one's going to be off the body versus one's on the body.

And I think that people are struck by that and go quickly to location specific markers because of the difference between chase and strike with your toy driven dogs, with your food dogs. I think still there's a difference in the. In, you know, chasing a treat versus staying there and opening their mouth to receive it, but it's just not as dangerous for the handler unless your ion, in which case the mouth is just everywhere, but it's not as dangerous and it's not as salient to the handler. Like, they don't see it as much with the majority of dogs. So that's a huge difference with the toy versus food thing for dogs.

Melissa Breau: Okay, so we've talked quite a bit about, you know, marker cues in particular. What other concepts kind of come into play when we're talking about food cues and trying to achieve, like, really clear communication.

Shade Whitesel: Timing, that's kind of on the top of my head because I'm really covering that in class, the timing of, because we want to use it, because the other part of it is, it's a marker cue, and so we need to be good about our timing of our marker.

So let's say that I'm using x to teach a sit. The dog, the butt goes down. I want fast sit. So I'm going to mark when the butt goes down, x, and then the dog can get up from the sit. Okay, so that's your basic example of timing. I need to say the x when the dog's butt hits the ground, not when they're hovering. Okay. Or thinking about getting up or things like that.

The other thing to think about is take a hand touch. I used to teach all my pet clients the dog nose to the palm. And like, clockwork, of course, because we're not all experienced, they would mark their ex after the dog had touched the hand. So the process would go. They would extend their palm, the dog would nose, and then be withdrawing their nose. And at about, you know, four inches away from the palm, that's when the owner would go, oh, yeah, they touched my hand, and they would click or x.

And like clockwork, the next rep, the dog would go to four inches from the palm and stop. Like, I just saw it happen. Every single client, it was hysterical. And they'd be like, he's not doing it. Okay, so the timing of your hand touched where you need to mark. And I tell people to close their eyes and just feel that often can be really helpful is that we need to mark the behavior we want.

And if we want more hand touching, we need to mark when the dog hand or nose to our palm touches, when we feel that touch rather than after or before. So, by the way, if your dog bites her hand in the hand, touch mark sooner, mark before they touch, and then they'll kind of. Usually they won't stop, but usually they won't be thinking as much teeth thoughts when they do it.

So that's a. That's a little sidebar there. That's the scientific term, right? Having teeth thoughts. Teeth thoughts. Knife thoughts. Open mouth thoughts. They just, you know, your hands are cold, and they just have open mouth, and they smack their canine against your cold fingers. Ouch. I. Yep.

Melissa Breau: So you mentioned the class. Can you talk a little more about what you're covering in the class? Who should consider signing up what it's all about.

Shade Whitesel: Well, everybody should sign up because that's what I think of everything. I think that, honestly, everybody will find something to work on in this class. But I really have designed the class for people who are location specific marker curious. You know, maybe they use one, maybe they're new to training and they use the clicker and they wonder what the fuss is about. So definitely this is tailor made for people who have heard of it and kind of want to, you know, want to explore because the class basically talks all about that kind of stuff.

And we have a lot of exercises of practicing your timing and practicing the cue discrimination between things and understanding that they are different excitement levels. And so taking a behavior and what marker cue would you use to teach this particular behavior? Things like that. So I do think there's something in there for everybody, and I personally love finding foundation holes and going back and working on foundation, but so I do think that there will be stuff for more advanced people who are familiar with location specific markers as well.

And this class is mostly about food stuff we're not going to really talk about. Toy. Toy markers are in my toy class. So you can kind of find it there. Yeah, yeah. It's all about the food ones.

Melissa Breau: So based on that, we probably at least want a food motivated dog.

Shade Whitesel: Yes. I just added in the description, it's really important that your dog like food because it's all about this.

It's not about creating food drive. We're assuming the food. The dog already likes the food. You know, there's other helpful classes for dogs who don't really like food, but for this class, it's pretty important. It's also important that you be able to hold the food in your hand because we want that pre-loaded treat. So I did already get a couple questions about dogs who didn't like food or were really so so about food, and I would recommend that maybe this isn't the class for you. So I'm sorry, but I have other classes for dogs that don't like food as much, so.

Melissa Breau: Yeah, fair enough. All right, any final thoughts or key points you want to leave folks with?

Shade Whitesel: No, I think we've really covered it. I really wanted to mention the positive trainers know and the concept of competing motivators. Yeah. And that marker cues are release cues. They're marker cues. They're release cues and they're reinforcement cues.

They're collect reinforcement cues. They really mean do a behavior like eat the food here, run to chase the food, you know, and eat the food. Strike the food out of the air, catch the food. You know, they're all cues to do that for the dog. So, yeah, I hope that. I hope I see a lot of people because I'm excited to kind of share the knowledge and how I'm breaking it down. It's exciting for me to do another class, so I'm excited about it.

Melissa Breau: Awesome. All right, well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast to talk about it, Shade. Thanks for having me.

Shade Whitesel: It's always nice to answer the questions and talk about what my latest creation is about.

Melissa Breau: Awesome. And thanks to our listeners for tuning in. We'll be back next week. Don't miss it. If you haven't already, subscribe to our podcast in iTunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available.

Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty free by Bensound.com. The track featured here is called Buddy. Audio editing provided by Chris Lang. Thanks again for tuning in and happy training.

 Credits

 Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called "Buddy." Audio editing provided by Chris Lang.

Thanks again for tuning in -- and happy training!