I’m reading the Toronto Star article about the incident in the subtitle. The writer quotes a Toronto Humane Society team member about this. “Train your dog to drop items on command.”

I disagree with that suggestion because prevention can be much simpler to train: teach your dog to ignore items on the ground without a cue.

Many dog trainers instruct owners to teach their dogs to “leave it” which is a cue. Any cue tells your dog to do something. Which means your dog is already doing something else. Often, something you don’t want your dog doing.

Have you ever told your dog to sit after your dog jumps up on someone?

Do you see the problem? Think about how you taught the sit using positive reinforcement. Chances are you used a food treat held above your dog’s nose to get the sit. Then you gave your dog the treat.

After the word was added during the education, your dog understood what would get him a treat: you say sit, she plants her butt on the ground and the treat follows.

All cues reinforce the behavior happening immediately beforehand.

Reinforced behaviors repeat (BF Skinner)

Telling your dog to “leave it” reinforces your dog ignoring you to investigate an area for something to sniff and consume. Throughout your dog’s life, you have to be actively be involved in everything your dog does. That is stressful.

I was just consulting with a couple about reinforcement going wrong. The couple thought about this and realized whenever the dog investigates the backyard and picks up acorns in her mouth, the owners ask the dog to “drop it.” The dog complies every time, releasing the acorn and gets a treat for doing exactly that.

In my mind, I could visualize the clients doing this when they recognized what was going on.

(Editors note: As we head into peak mushroom season, think of how dangerous it can be for a dog to investigate and pick up a bad mushroom. You’ll want to encourage the dog to seek you for reassurance before anything!)

I’m glad I had a chance to detail the reinforcement process for them.

Thanks for reading!

Being diagnosed with a chronic disease with no cure can be depressing. However, I am an opportunist.

My opportunistic nature means I will grasp any advantage my condition confers. These advantages may not influence my health outcomes permanently, but they are something to write about and grow my insights to promote the health of many species. I often use these to create short video content on social media to promote animal or human health.

One advantage I have recognized is the temporary symptoms that I might get when I am outdoors walking my dogs during warm weather. Before I leave, I always check the weather app on my cell phone. The data I collect are air temperature and humidity because those impact how well I function (or not).

I have learned the narrow temperature range where I do not experience any distress from MS. Ideally, I prefer being outdoors when the air temperature is 14C/57.2 F.

Coincidentally, this overlaps with veterinary recommendations about safe temperatures for dogs.

Air temperature impacts the surfaces that dogs’ paws touch. There are many social media posts talking about air temperatures and corresponding temperatures on asphalt or concrete. Those are common surfaces that dog paws come into contact with during walks.

Asphalt and concrete can get incredibly hot despite comfortable air temperatures for both humans and dogs. The heat on those materials rise to the point where paw pads get burnt. If you have ever seen any photos about burnt paws online, those are true burns.

Which hurt and require extensive treatment.

Because I am incredibly heat-sensitive, even a slight rise of 1 degree in air temperature means I start experiencing symptoms. These symptoms are temporary and go away when I get myself out of the heat. When I start feeling dizzy or my coordination becomes more compromised than usual, that tells me the air temperature has gone up from when we left the house.

My automatic response is to tell my dog to go onto the grass. This is so that I can place the back of my hand onto a concrete or asphalt surface in the immediate vicinity. The back of my hand remains on those materials for 5 to 7 seconds as a test.

I then take a sip of water and begin trekking back home, because my heat sensitivity has begun telling me the air temperature is rising. Since I always walk my dogs in the morning, I know the day will continue getting warmer. While we are safe then, I am familiar enough with my condition to recognize that remaining outdoors would mean expecting an increasing decline in my cognition.

To the point where I wouldn’t be able to look out for the dogs.

Being heat-sensitive isn’t great, but I can act as a thermometer to take action immediately. That means I still have some cognitive function able to make decisions before I get into trouble or before my dogs do. This condition can be annoying, but I have learned to make it work.

Thanks for reading!