Introduces cat lovers, breeders, and trainers to the all-positive approach to teaching your cat to: come when called, play without biting or scratching, stay off the table, get along with dogs, walk on a leash, play cat games and do cute tricks.

Cats are clever animals and are often hopelessly under-stimulated in the daily grind of indoor life. This book shows cat owners how to nurture their cat both in body and mind and how to teach them a variety of different tricks and exercises using clicker training in a cat-friendly way. Great fun for owner and cat!

"Target training" rewards your dog for touching your hand, a target stick or just about any object you choose to help shape the behavior you want. A fun and useful skill for the family dog or dog sport competitor.

Chickens Are Smarter Than You Think Your chicken can do anything a dog can do if you train it right! Hens and roosters can be ordered go to the coop, perch on your arm, come when called, and generally respond and behave as you wish. This book presents an effective training program to get domesticated chickens to follow a variety of commands. Animal behavior specialist Giene Keyes shows how to use the positive reinforcement of clicker training to effectively manage your flock. Giene explains how a chicken thinks and socializes, expanding the range of what you may know about communicating with animals. Dog owners especially will find that working with chickens helps sharpen observation and timing skills that keep your animal engaged. Training chickens is fun too! Amaze your friends as your birds perform tricks like circling a cone, turning around, sitting down, and recognizing colors and patterns. Inside Click with Your Chick · Understand and connect with your chickens to effectively manage your flock · Clicker-train your chickens to follow fun and practical commands · Discover how a chicken thinks and socializes, and how to make that knowledge work in your favor · Learn how to use operant conditioning, luring, and positive training methods on hens and roosters · Gain insight for training any animal by improving observation skills and timing

"I have to hand it to Bradshaw and Ellis: Once you suss out their basic cat-training philosophy, their methods totally work." -- Slate We often assume that cats can't be trained, and don't need to be. But in The Trainable Cat, bestselling anthrozoologist John Bradshaw and cat expert Sarah Ellis show that cats absolutely must be trained in order to enrich the bond between pet and owner. Full of training tips and exercises -- from introducing your cat to a new baby to helping them deal with visits to the vet -- The Trainable Cat is the essential cat bible for cat owners and lovers. "I doubt you'll find a more well-informed or scientific book on cats that better shows you how feline thinking works." -- Times (UK)

Learn to communicate with your dog—using their language “Good reading for dog lovers and an immensely useful manual for dog owners.”—The Washington Post An Applied Animal Behaviorist and dog trainer with more than twenty years’ experience, Dr. Patricia McConnell reveals a revolutionary new perspective on our relationship with dogs—sharing insights on how “man’s best friend” might interpret our behavior, as well as essential advice on how to interact with our four-legged friends in ways that bring out the best in them. After all, humans and dogs are two entirely different species, each shaped by its individual evolutionary heritage. Quite simply, humans are primates and dogs are canids (as are wolves, coyotes, and foxes). Since we each speak a different native tongue, a lot gets lost in the translation. This marvelous guide demonstrates how even the slightest changes in our voices and in the ways we stand can help dogs understand what we want. Inside you will discover: • How you can get your dog to come when called by acting less like a primate and more like a dog • Why the advice to “get dominance” over your dog can cause problems • Why “rough and tumble primate play” can lead to trouble—and how to play with your dog in ways that are fun and keep him out of mischief • How dogs and humans share personality types—and why most dogs want to live with benevolent leaders rather than “alpha wanna-bes!” Fascinating, insightful, and compelling, The Other End of the Leash is a book that strives to help you connect with your dog in a completely new way—so as to enrich that most rewarding of relationships.

Chaser has a way with words. She knows over a thousand of them—more than any other animal of any species except humans. In addition to common nouns like house, ball, and tree, she has memorized the names of more than one thousand toys and can retrieve any of them on command. Based on that learning, she and her owner and trainer, retired psychologist John Pilley, have moved on to further impressive feats, demonstrating her ability to understand sentences with multiple elements of grammar and to learn new behaviors by imitation. John’s ingenuity and tenacity as a researcher are as impressive as Chaser’s accomplishments. His groundbreaking approach has opened the door to a new understanding of animal intelligence, one that requires us to reconsider what actually goes on in a dog’s mind. Chaser’s achievements reveal her use of deductive reasoning and complex problem-solving skills to address novel challenges. Yet astonishingly, Chaser isn’t unique. John’s training methods can be adopted by any dog lover. Through the poignant story of how he trained Chaser, raised her as a member of the Pilley family, and proved her abilities to the scientific community, he reveals the positive impact of incorporating learning into play and more effectively channeling a dog’s natural drives. John’s work with Chaser offers a fresh perspective on what’s possible in the relationship between a dog and a human. His story points us toward a new way of relating to our canine companions that takes into account our evolving understanding of the way animals and humans learn.