Mary Allen
By no means stubborn and stubborn: cats can definitely be enthusiastic about training. The animal trainer Anita Ziegler explains the first steps for successful cooperation between humans and cats.
Many people think that, unlike a dog, you can’t teach a cat anything. That’s wrong. If you know-how, you can teach a cat all sorts of tricks and at the same time stimulate and keep it busy. Especially cats that are not allowed outside like to get bored. For example, Mona, the cat in the photos, has broken her leg and is very happy to be busy while she is recovering. Positive training also promotes the human-cat relationship. But how does such training actually work and how do you start?
Broadly speaking, cat training consists of praising desirable behavior and ignoring dissimilar behavior. The consequence of this: Because the cat wants to be rewarded again, it will show the desired behavior more and more often. For example, suppose a cat is rewarded every time it sits on its scratching post. As time goes by, she’ll be sitting up there more and more because she’s realized that it’s worth it for her.
The Cat Must Participate Voluntarily
A reward doesn’t always have to be food; Play or pats are also suitable positive reinforcers. If you know your cat well, you can estimate which reward the animal particularly appreciates in the respective situation. In general, you have to know your animal and its behavior very well if you want to train it. Never forget: Successful training is based on the voluntary cooperation of the cat.
To facilitate communication between cat and human, a marker (many trainers use a clicker, picture below) is used. As the name suggests, a marker is used to mark the desired behavior. In summary, we observe the cat until the desired behavior occurs, mark it with the clicker, and then immediately reward the cat. The best place to start training is to find a quiet place where the cat and trainer will be undisturbed. The cat should be alert and active and not have eaten an entire meal. Of course, you don’t starve the cat for training; but it helps if she doesn’t have a full stomach. Treats are recommended as a reward, which the cat particularly likes to eat.
First, the cat has to learn that it can “earn” a reward through active action. A simple exercise to start with is “finger touch”. The cat learns to touch the trainer’s finger with its nose. Alternatively, she can be taught to touch a so-called target stick (extendable stick with the ball, available at pet stores, pictured below). With this basic exercise, you can later teach the cat other exercises, such as making a manikin.
The best way to signal the cat that a training sequence is coming is to set it on a chair or elevated surface. Then hold the finger or wand directly in front of the cat’s nose and click towards the finger on the first reaction and reward the cat with a treat. In the beginning, it is enough if the cat sniffs your finger and does not touch it directly.
Then hold out the finger again and click and reward the approach to the finger. It is advisable to keep the training session short. After ten clicks at the latest, a pause should be activated. If the cat runs away before then, the training sequence was too long. It is also possible that the selected reward is not perceived as a reward at the moment and the cat is therefore no longer interested. The time of day also has a major influence on any success; some animals train better in the morning, others better in the evening. The cat will only appreciate it if the training is well thought out.
The Cat Should Become Active Itself
You stay with this first training step until the cat has understood the exercise. It becomes slightly more difficult if you no longer hold your finger/stick directly in front of the cat’s nose but move it slightly to the left or right, slightly up or down. One is often tempted to help the cat by showing it what to do with the other hand or by not holding the finger/wand still. However, this point is crucial. The cat should become active itself and come up with the idea of which behavior is worth showing. Otherwise, you are training a passive cat that needs help.
The task should be chosen in such a way that the cat has a realistic chance of being successful. The goal is that she reliably touches the finger/stick in different positions without having to move much. Once she has understood this training principle, she is ready for advanced exercises.