Stair Training: Denver's First Formal Session (Patreon)

When we're thinking about going down stairs, we want our dog to walk next to us and pause when we pause. Basically we need them to heel, but on a disjointed surface.

Stairs can be challenging for many dogs if they don't have good body awareness and aren't confident pausing with their front feet on a different plane than their back feet. Because of this, I didn't start training Denver to walk with me until now, when I felt he was confident in his body and could easily do what I asked - pause when I paused, be able to look up at me with his feet on different planes (we did a lot of work with front foot targets and rear foot targets to achieve this level of confidence). This takes both body awareness and balance. I also waited to start stairs because I'm cautious on stairs with young dogs (i carried Denver up and down our stairs at home until he was 4 months old).

In this video I show you our formal stairs session. Besides that it was a good location to film, I chose this stair set because I like to start stairs outside where there is a bit of width to the stairs and it feels open for the dog, as well as this set being a short flight of stairs, which I prefer to start on (so they have to concentrate for a shorter period of time). They are also concrete so slipping is unlikely.

I first start by essentially luring the stairs, one stair at a time, and if needed, using that lure to stop the dog in place (trying not to let them get ahead). This was mostly unnecessary with Denver, mostly because we have spent so much time workin on reinforcement zone at my side. But using the food to stop them can be helpful with some dogs. I quickly transition to hand at belly, reinforce by my side, and then hand back to belly.

In this video we then transition to a few steps at a time, and then almost the whole set, but don't necessarily expect that from your dog. You may be working step by step for a while to help them get the hang of it.

I will go back to step by step for each new stair set we encounter for at least the first 10 stair sets so that he starts to understand to stay at my side while walking stairs, no matter what set of stairs we're on.

I also think it's good, for a while at least, to reinforce stopping on the approach to the stairs before the first step. This makes sure they don't run up or down the stairs, but also gives them a second to think about what they need to do on the stairs.

You'll notice in this video he is tipped out and away from me. I can fix this over time by feeding to the outside of his face (tipping the butt in) and as I fade reinforcement from every step to stopping once or twice on the stairs, he'll naturally line up and face forward over time.

Happy Training!