Working hard, and hardly working

I've had a productive few weeks, while still managing to put off way too many things that need to get done. Turns out being injured means you prioritize...but for me that means the things I always put off just keep getting put off for longer and longer.

*sigh* I'm going to have to pull up my socks and just get the darn laundry done! ....Wednesday.

Anyways, catching up.

The community garden plot is coming along really well so far. I've gotten almost all the planting done! So far the plot has (* next to seedlings I started):

-Zucchini*
-Cucumber* (although it may die it was perking up as of the last time I was over there...fingers crossed. I did plant 2 new seeds in hopes that if the original kicked the bucket the new ones would germinate. I could potentially end up with 4 cucumber plants sharing the spot. Yeep!)
-Patti pan squash (a kind of zucchini)*
-Hubbard Squash*
-Sugar Pumpkin*
-3 Bloody Butcher tomatoes*
-2 Black Krim tomatoes*
-1 Cherry tomato*
-1 Lemon Boy tomato (yay free seedlings! :) )
-2 Jalapeno peppers*
-2 Bell peppers* (these seedlings were poor to start and are decidedly behind the two best jalapenos)
-6 Brussel sprouts
-4 Asparagus (which won't be harvest-able for at least a year)
-6 green leaf lettuce (which just would NOT start from seed for me...:( )
-6 bright lights chard (ish...there were definitely a few extra plants in there but I certainly won't be complaining! I LOVE chard!)
-10 corn stalks (very experimental...I'm excited to see if it'll work)
-4 celery (I'm interested to see how these store-bought starts compare to my home seeded survivor. I planted 2 store bought right near my home grown one in my home garden so I can compare)
-Walla walla onion sets (I'm planting a single row all around the perimeter of my garden in homes of dissuading pests...between that and the marigold I still need to get in I'm hoping it'll discourage many of the bugs)
-Yellow onion bulbs
-seeded sprouting broccoli (probably too late, but we'll see Maybe I'll get a late crop)
-seeded lettuce, 2 varieties
 
Garden pictures!

Corn
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The back of the plot.
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Left to right: Rhubarb (came with the plot, I have two BIG ones), asparagus, hubbard squash, sugar pumpkin, zucchini. The cucumber is sort of in between the rows.
Tomatoes, then peppers.

The whole plot, just after the first bunch of planting (forgive the sad-looking plants, there was more weeding and soil prep than I'd thought so the starts had to sit in the sun while we worked.)
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Artsy shot of the broccoli starts - courtesy of my sister who took the pics
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I still have to seed carrots, radishes, and beets. I'm planning to line the path in the middle of the garden with rows, as a sort of growing border. I'll do either 2-3 carrots/radishes, or 1 beet. Hopefully I'll get that done this weekend coming up. Then all I have left is mulching around the larger plants and down the walkway! Hopefully that will minimize my weeding and also improve the soil for next year.

All in all I'm counting the seed starting adventure as a success!

Notes for next year:

-Plant fewer tomatoes!
-Plant tomatoes later!
-Plant fewer squash - then the ones I plant will have more room under the light and more attention (besides, I prefer zucchini and cucumbers anyways!)

Strawberries on sale!

 

I found an amazing sale on strawberries at the local grocery store, $6 for a flat! Since we're almost out of low-sugar jam, and there's a recipe I've been dying to try for months now I got two flats.

Last night I made strawberry kiwi no-pectin jam. This is a method I used last year as well, and the results are amazing. Super flavorful, not too sweet, and much more natural than other options. It's also really versatile, you can do just about anything with it. 

I originally read about it on Erica's blog Northwest Edible, one of my favorite blogs to follow. Specifically, I've loved Erica's can-o-rama posts (totally doing my own can-o-rama this year!). I took the basic method for low sugar, no pectin jam she has, and I have plans to try some of her wet and dry 'zing' ideas later this year.

Strawberry Kiwi Jam

 

*Note: I did double the recipe, and it lengthens the boiling time needed. You need to boil the fruit until a spoon pulled through the center leaves a trail that slowly fills in. It makes a softer set of jam than you might be used to, but I really prefer it.

2 cups cut strawberries (you can hull yours if you like, I think it's too much of a pain)

1 cup cut kiwis

1 1/4 cup sugar (I used 1 1/2 cups total in my double batch and it tastes perfect. Sweeten it to your own tastes.)

Juice from 1/2 a lemon (for the acidity...do NOT mess with this or it will affect the safety of your finished product. Fresh lemon is the best choice)

Combine your cut fruit and sugar in a bowl, then stir until it's quite syrupy.

Put the fruit mix into a wide saucepan (for more surface area to boil off the moisture quickly), and boil for 8-10 minutes stirring regularly.

As the jam is cooking down have your boiling water bath pot ready. Boil the jars, set the rings aside, and use a smaller pot for the lids. Don't boil your lids, put them in once the water has boiled and the heat is turned down.

To check if the jam is ready there are a few tests you can do; the one I mentioned above with the stirring spoon, a sheet test, or a plate test. See below for more info.

When you're satisfied with the set of your jam remove it from the heat and ladle it into the jars, leaving a 1/4 inch of head space.

Run a knife, or other flat utensil, along the inside of the jar to remove air bubbles, wipe the rim, then lid and band the jars. (My double batch made nearly three pint jars - since you can't process a 'near pint' that one is ours for eating immediately and went right into the fridge.)

Process in the boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Due to our altitude I processed mine for 20, so make sure to check here for your required processing times.

I tested some last night on toast and it was wonderful. I'm looking forward to repeating the process later this week with plain strawberry jam for our cupboard.

Testing the set of your jam

Plate test

The plate test is quite simple. I've used it before with good success.

As your jam is cooking place a small plate in the freezer, by the time you're ready to test your jam the plate should be well chilled.

To test the jam, remove it from the heat (or it will keep cooking as you test and could pass the level of set you want!), spoon a dollop of jam onto the plate. Wait a minute or so, then run your finger through the jam. If it makes a clean line that doesn't re-form you've got a pretty good set. You're ready to jar up the jam.

Sheet test

This is a bit trickier, and requires some practice. As the jam cooks use a spoon to get a dollop of jam. Tilt the spoon and let the jam slowly fall back into the pot. You're looking for it to fall in one smooth sheet, rather than as drips and dribbles.

I have used this method, but it's not as simple as a plate test and can be tricky.

I typically use a mix of the three methods outlines in this post, along with a taste test ;) (clean spoon of course!) to determine when it's at the texture I like. Remember that hot jam from the pot is runnier than it will be once set and cooled, so if you only do the sheet test keep that in mind.

Happy jamming :D

More planting and a problem solved

I finally got around to planting the last of my starts last night, which means we're finally getting closer to spring! I'm so excited to get out there and plant things, even more now because I've found a solution to the 'no more lawn killing' problem.

This winter I made a deal that I wouldn't replace any more of our lawn with food-plant-things; and then spent a while trying to figure out how to expand my planting and garden space, without eating more lawn.

I came up with two possible solutions - a large window box in the front under our big picture window, and a community garden plot. I can't build the planter until the soil in the front thaws a bit more, but I did hear back about the garden plot and I got one :)

So as I'm busy planning what to put in the community plot and what I should keep in my home plot. I'll probably put lower-maintenance things in the plot and well used and more delicate things at home. We'll see how it goes.

Anyways, on to the update!

I saw a bunch of videos on youtube that suggested planting 2 seeds in one cell for squash and other gourds. Then to plant them together, I guess then each plant grows in a different directions and you get more production. So I decided to give it a go and planted all my gourds and the cucumbers that way.

I planted 2 pots of:

-National Pickling Cucumbers
-Costa Romanesco zucchini
-Spaghetti Squash
-Golden Hubbard Squash
-Patty Pan Squash
-Small Sugar Pumpkins
-Butternut Squash

I also planted two kinds of cilantro.

The other seedlings are doing pretty well too, especially the cherry tomatoes. I've got a mix of sizes for the Bloody Butcher tomatoes, but about 6 that look really great. The Krims are a little smaller, but look nice and healthy anyways. I had to give them a bit of fertilizer last week, the leaves and stems started looking a bit purple and after some searching that was caused by a need for fertilizer. They do seem to be greening up a bit more anyways.

The peppers are generally slower than the tomatoes, but I've got two great looking jalapeno plants. The bell peppers seem to be slow, I might try to find a way to warm them up a bit...ditto the habneros.

Two of the eggplants look pretty good, and so do the 2 celery tarts that have made it this far. All of those are pretty small though.

Here's some pics of what's going on:

The new starts
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Forest of tomatoes
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Some strange leaves
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Happy jalapenos
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The smaller starts
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Eggplants!
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Well, that's it for now :) Happy gardening!

Seed Starting - Update

It's been getting warmer here, MUCH warmer. All the snow in front of our house has melted, but there's still a depressing amount in the back yard on top of my garden. I did get my first peek at the dirt of the garden yesterday though. I feel a bit silly, but I was so happy to see that little bit of rich black earth.

I noticed something about the seedlings that I think is a bit strange and I can't quite explain. It's something I read about on another blog (Lights In My Basement) and thought to myself "No way. There's no reason that would happen...right?" Yeah. Turns out my gut instinct was way off on this one.

I started all my tomatoes at the same time. The same day, planted them all in one go.

They germinated quickly, and grew well. I noted in my last post that the Bloody Butcher seeds germinated the best, but the Cherry tomatoes were the hardiest looking, and that I had up-potted a few of each variety. Admittedly, at the time I did pick the strongest looking starts...but I don't know that that can entirely be the cause of what happened after I up-potted some.

The plants I moved into bigger pots are now easily double the size of the others...easily. They look stronger and healthier, have thick leaves, and lots of little hairs on the main stems. The starts that had to sit in the tiny cells stayed much smaller. I thought maybe it was because they had less room to root, but I up-potted another bunch of them the other day and their roots weren't more than one little tap root and a few off shoots. They weren't anywhere near reaching the edges of the pots.

Basically I have no idea why...but it does make me consider planting the next bunch of starts (the gourds, cucumber, zucchini, ect) right into my bigger pots (which may or may not be cheap white plastic cups...*cough* If I reuse them it's environmentally friendly, right?).

I have been bottom-watering all the starts as much as possible, the exception being anything very tiny or just repotted.

Despite the wild success of the tomato starts I'm equally thrilled with the other plants I've got going so far. The peppers, bell and jalapeno, are coming along nicely, and three of the 4 habanero seeds came up. I even up-potted the best looking of the habanero starts. I'll probably up-pot one more and then either offer the others to friends or toss them.

I'm really excited about the celery starts. they're still tiny tiny tiny...If I do them again next year I'll plant them MUCH earlier as I don't know if they'll be ready to transplant into the garden by the time the garden is ready for them. I have three and they're all doing pretty good. One is noticeably bigger than the other two, so we'll see how they all progress. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

The last thing I'll add is the salad mix is doing OK. I'm not crazy about it, I thought they would be growing better, but they're turning a bit leggy. I may end up just buying lettuce starts.. :( I'm not giving up on them yet and I'll definitely be doing an early planting straight into the garden as soon as I can work with it. I didn't have much luck with that last year, but maybe I'll try and cloche them to give them a bit of a boost.

Until next time ;)

Pictures to come - Post written April 10, 2014 (I should do another update pretty soon, and I've dawdled on this one long enough I thought I should date it for an accurate timeline ;) )

I'm Back!

Alright, alright, it's been a while.

In my defense I've been crazy busy. Here's a brief update of my flurry of activity the last few months:

-New jobs! 2 of them since the beginning of January! (A non-profit group, and a library, YAY!)
-House guests, in the form of snakes! (They'll be here until the end of this month, and have been with us since the end of December.)
-I registered my business with the city :D This was especially big for me, as it makes my business (pet sitting, dog walking, and pet training) much more official.
-Setting new gardening and self-sufficiency goals. More on this below.
-Starting a bunch of house plants from cuttings (pictures to come at a later date ;) )
-Seed starting!

So I've been quite busy, as you can see.

Now, however, I want to write about self-sufficiency and what that means for me and this blog.

I feel like calling what I'm doing 'self-sufficiency' is a bit like cheating. I'm very much in the baby steps portion, but I am trying to work towards being a bit more reliant on myself and the items I can grow and make (preserve), as well as eating healthier and more locally.

Last year I had made a goal for myself that I was pretty nervous about, to tell the truth. I wanted to not buy any tomato sauce/canned tomatoes between August and January. Now, that seems like a teeny tiny goal to reach compared to some of the other bloggers and self-sufficiency buffs out there, but since I was working full time and canning only in my free time AND it was my first year making canned tomatoes...I felt it was going to be tough.

Well, good news. It's the middle of march and we STILL haven't bought any sauce or canned tomatoes! I am absolutely thrilled. Overall, it cost me about $40 ($1/lb tomatoes, I bought $30 lbs, plus cheap/free jars of kijiji, plus some lids) to make 5 jars of delicious salsa (definitely a recipe I'll be re-using. YUM!), and 8 jars of pasta sauce. Plus the FREE (my favorite price ;) ) 5-6 jars of tomato paste made from the waste products of the salsa and tomato sauce.

The only thing I would change is that I wish I'd made more canned crushed tomatoes. They were sort of an after thought (which means I bought them from the grocery store rather than the farmer's market) and I made about 4 jars...and I wish we had a LOT more than that! Not only was it much easier than the sauce and salsa, I could use it in so many more things.

Other fun things that I did last year include the fridge pickles. Another recipe I'll be going back to this year. They were absolutely amazing, even if they did need more salt (I added more than the recipe called for, but it turns out we just like our pickles saltier!). Especially the single jar of jalapeno dill pickles. I don't know what it was, but man those were amazing. One jar was not enough, and the four big jars I made total barely made it into December.
That makes me want to look into a mini fridge to go in the basement so I can make many many more jars without having to worry about where to put them in our constantly over crowded main fridge! Anyone know where I can get a free mini fridge?

Unfortunately I have no idea what the cost of the pickles was, since I've completely forgotten what I paid and how many pickles I bought. Oh well. I am planning on keeping track better this year (yay blogging! lol) and since I have a lot of things I want to try that'll be important.

For my birthday I got something I've been oogling for YEARS. A pressure cooker! I know most of my friends would have unwrapped that and promptly smacked their significant others for such a gift...but I LOVE it. I haven't gotten to use it yet (maybe some cherry jam is in my future if I get a day off...) but I'm really looking forward to being able to make meat sauce for our spaghetti, non-fridge pickles, and a few other things. I just can't wait for spring!

My goals for this year are:

-Seed starting: Check! (Well, partially. The tomato seedlings are poking up, and eggplants and peppers are planted. I have to wait another few weeks before I can get the squashes and zucchinis started. Because Canada. That's why.)
-Growing enough to can some of my own produce
-Canning

• tomato meat sauce!
• plain spaghetti sauce
• crushed tomatoes
• non-fridge pickles
• fridge pickles
• meal-parts (aka Things We Will Use - rather than boat loads of jam and jelly which we don't go through all that fast...)
• Canned peaches? (Costco has moved into our town...I'm hoping I can get a good enough deal on peaches this year to make this feasible)

-Freezing (rather than canning)

• peas - home grown (shucked?)
• beans - home grown
• fruit (Why did I can so much fruit when I could have been canning veggies!? Can more veggies and freeze the fruit for later!

-Eating more locally, specifically buying local (and ideally organic/heritage breed) meats. With 4 local organic chickens in the freezer and 15lbs of local heritage pork, this is well on the way :)
-Improving the garden

• BIG window boxes under the front window? It's such a sunny area, and completely wasted because of the crappy soil in the front bed :(
• Improving the soil in the front bed (Composted horse manure? Sounds like a plan.)
• Improving the soil everywhere (just can't get too much organic fertilizer :))

-Learning more about cold storage and cellaring. We've got some good spaces where we can store food, but I'll need to learn how to store everything I grow and can glean (free fruits and veggies? *fingers crossed*) so I can stretch our local/home grown stores further into the winter. I'd like to have potatoes, apples, carrots, onions, and garlic until January. And a few odd squashes too.
-Home made bread! I need to get back into this. I'm in the process of reinvigorating my starter (which I killed through neglect :( ) and once I do that I want to bake a loaf per week. Freeze what we don't use immediately for weeks when I just don't have time. (*cough* like this one...lol)

My goodness what a list!

I should add that I also want to blog about all these things. I originally intended to blog about books, my pets and animal behavior, and some gardening/preserving...but in my eternal search for more blogs to follow I've found there are none about gardening and preserving the harvest HERE. Where I live. Near Edmonton, AB.

There are a few out East in Ontario, but our climate here is so very different that it's not a ton of use. I find myself chuckling at the 'hard' winters in the states. You know, where they can still grow broccoli, kale, and other brassicas into February...when we're at -40 here?

I know a lot of places had completely ridiculous amounts of snow, I'm not trying to down play that. But you all still go to start your seeds in January. I planted mine this week. Mid March. that's a pretty serious climate difference.

So, as I bumble through, reading books and trying to gain knowledge I hope you'll follow along with me. Whoever else is out there in internet-land ;)

-Becky

Busy-work

Also known as crocheting!

I've been very busy the past few weeks, hence the lack of posts. Working, making bread on my weekends (Which has all turned out very yum, if I do say so myself.), and trying to finish something...anything! lol

Well, all the wrist pain (no jokes!), the sore necks (still no jokes!), and the unhappy eyes have paid off! This weekend I finished two finger-less mittens and a mathing headband. I also started making a shrug and am just less than 1/4 done, so far.

Yay! Fingerless gloves :D

The whole set, gloves and headband.

On a bread-related note, Im trying something a bit new! While my bread is delicious, I havent been able to get any actual sourdough flavor. That particular tang that I crave. So I thought about it a bit, and I came up with two things to try.

The first was letting my culture 'age'. Up until this week I had been getting out some of the original starter, feeding it, and letting it griw for a day; effectively giving me a 2 week old starter. (The stuff in the fridge is kept in a sort of stasis, so it doesnt age.) This week, instead of just putting the extra starter into my 'mother', Maggie, I kept it out and fed it each day.

When you feed a starter the first step is to start with a small amount , a few Tblsps, and then add equal amounts of flour and water. Equal amounts will give you a 100% starter, which just means the flour is fully saturated. TBH i just eyeball it, and stir it together until the texture looks right; sort of gummy when stirred, but it relaxes into an even puddle fairly quickly. This, obviously, took practice. Once you like the consistancy you cover it loosely and leave it out in a cat-safe place on the counter for 24 hours. Then you feed it again, starting by reducing the starter to a small amount by adding some to your 'mother' (which I keep as a safety net in case I mess up), or by just throwing it out.

I did this all week, giving the culture time to age, or ripen, and hopefully get a stronger flavor. Pro tip....don't taste your starter. They are G-ross. Also, if you DO taste your starter and its gross (which it will be) dont throw it out. It's fine.

The second part of my 'add more flavor' experiment takes up fridge space. I don't know about you, but in our home fridge space is a hot commodity. So heres hoping the 1/2 hour rearranging things was worth it.

I mixed up the dough as normal (350g warm water, 100g starter - mix. Add 500g flour and combine. Let rest for 20-40mins, depending on how quick you can clean your kitchen...lol, then mix 25g water and 10g salt in a dish before mixing that into the dough.) then, instead of sitting it on the counter and turning it every 1/2 hour, I put it in the fridge, covered with saran wrap.

It will stay there, getting turned if I feel like it, until tomorrow morning when Im planning to bake it. Im hoping the extended rise will help the dough ferment and gain extra flavor. The trick is that, unlike bread dough from 'regular' yeasts, you cant guess what the bread will be like by sampling the raw dough....cause the dough is gross. (sadface, I love bread dough, but not THIS stuff!)

Heres hoping it turns out the way I want!

And a happy cat in the sun, just for fun :)

*note* turns out posting from a phone is a pain in the bum. I blame any and all typos, missed punctuation, ect on my phone.

-Becky

Misadventures in Cookery

Well, after last weeks beginning and random crap uploads...on with the good stuff!

I'm sure everyone needs to read about someone else's misadventure - I know I always do - so here's the word of the week: Blah.

I was all excited last week so find an ad for a dehydrator online for CHEAP. $20. I thought "Hey, twenty bucks...I can afford that!" (ok, this was before the major vet bill on saturday, so forgive a little optimism) So, on Saturday I drove myself out to pick it up. Stony Plain is definitely farther than I thought it was.

On the way home I stopped to grab a few things to dehydrate, 'cause I wanted to get this thing running! Turns out it's a good idea to have some idea of what you want to dehydrate BEFORE you go to the store since I came home with:

-Limes
-Lemons
-Grapefruit
-Oranges
-Strawberries
-Beef
-Salmon

Despite the fact that my favorite dehydrated food is apples...which somehow slipped my mind in the maze of an unfamiliar Safeway.

The rest of the day was a stressful, agravating, bloody (*sigh* I LIKE that vet Jitzu, don't make her bleed!), EXPENSIVE mess. So, needless to say by the time I returned home with one angry half-sedated cat (who also bled, to make things even) and one disgruntled but very good orange cat I was more than ready for some de-stress time in the form of cooking.

So, I sliced up my citrus, figuring what could be easier, and fired up the machine. Two hours later I rotated the trays - while battling off the two cats who were not still disgruntled and avoiding me - only to find those on the bottom tray were a bit...browner than they should be. I think.

A quick internet search later and I've realised that the dehydrator I procured has hot spots. Seriously!? Seriously. Oh well, I can just put the trays on 'backwards' and roate them that way every few hours while I'm also rotating them top to bottom. Doesn't seem like it's all that bad, right?

At the same time I decided to make up some fruit leather out of apple sauce and black berries. Turns out it was a good thing I did - more on that later. I also had a brainwave and connected the thing to a wall dimmer I happened to have handy. I dialed down the power a bit and hoped the rest wouldn't get too crisp.

A few more hours and another few rotations of awkward trays and I had finished about 1/2 the citrus I had cut...the rest began inhabiting the compost bin. Sentanced to decompose due to 'brown-ness' (read: I burnt it.)

Oh well, I shut off the machine for the night and decided to give it another go the next day. Prepped the soon-to-be beef/salmon jerky and went to bed.

The next day, armed with my marinated meats, I went to turn the dehydrator on and...nothing. NOTHING. After dissassembling it and poking about a bit I got a second opinion from the BF. Seems the lamp dimmer might have caused the fuse to blow...and since it's a cheap thing we can't locate the fuse to see if it's possible to replace it. Bottom line? Waste of $20.

The fruit leather turned out well though! Too bad we nommed it so darn fast!

Breadmaking adventure continues!

-Originally posted by me on January 11, 2013.

Bread making #2

Tonight was day three, so according to the instructions I threw out 1/2 of each starter. Then added 1/4 cup flour (sticking with the same as before) and 1/8 cup water.

When I was mixing them I noticed a few things. Liza is still very stiff, but is gaining some elasticity...I'm debating adding quite a bit more water so the consistency is the same as the other two, but haven't decided yet. Of the three she smells the most pleasantly, which isn't saying much at the moment.

Both Maggie and Juliet have a strong cheesy, fermenting odor. I think Juliets is worse, but I'm not positive.

Juliet is definitely working away though, lots of bubbles, high elasticity...she's doing good.

Maggie got lots of bubbles today too, a little more brown liquid, but not as much as yesterday. She's gaining elasticity for sure.

I also noticed they had started rising!!! This is a major thing, since the last attempt was at nearly a week and no rise at all. All three starters rose, it seemed like Maggie rose most, and Liza least. I put marked tape on them tonight so I'll have a better idea of how well they're rising from now on.

Exciting things are happening! Pictures were taken and will be posted tomorrow.

Breadmaking Adventure

-Originally posted by me on January 10, 2013.

I've recently decided to give sourdough breads, and starters, a try after receiving a copy of Tartine Bread for Christmas. (The book, btw, is lovely enough to fully satisfy my inner bibliophile :) )

I will also be uploading photos fairly regularly (at least at first) to a new photo album. I figure between logging my progress and having photo evidence I'll be able to avoid repeating mistakes...if not making them in the first place.

Onwards! This is attempt #2...#1 ended in me throwing out my 4 day old starter last night after doing a quick web search on 'sourdough starter turning pink' which may have left me slightly concerned for my health if I attempted to make bread from it. :/ But enough of that! Looking positively forward is what's needed!

Attempt #2 is part experiment, part learning experience.

The method I'm following is posted here: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/10251/starting-starter-sourdough-101-tutorial

Last night I started off three starters: Rye (Liza), Whole Wheat (Maggie), Unbleached All-Purpose (Juliet). The recipe called for 1/3 cup flour and 1/4 cup of water, and to mix it together. I read on another tutorial that starters work better if you use your hands...so i got right in there. I noticed a few things right away as I felt the different textures. Aside from the obvious difference in the three types of flour they reacted very differently to the water even though I measured them all the same way. I only mixed them until the water and flour were fully combined and then I scraped the mix out of the bowl and into a container.

Liza slurped the water right up, and stayed quite stiff and firm for a dough. The color darkened right up, of course, and the initial smell is rich and pleasant, I'm most excited to see how she smells in a few days!

Maggie seemed to be the 'happy medium' between the three of them. The wheat flour also absorbed the water fairly quickly, but didn't become as stiff, spreading out a fair amount within the first few minutes after being placed into the container.

Juliet was a whole different story. It took a little bit more stirring for the AP flour to absorb all the water, but the texture at that point became fairly elastic right away. I was a bit surprised, especially since both Maggie and Liza were barely stretching at all. As soon as I put Juliet into the container she spread right out, covering the whole bottom of the container.

The last step was labeling each container, covering semi-tightly with plastic wrap, and setting them in a corner of my counter. Pictures will be put up at some point today of the lovely ladies. :)

I checked on the girls this morning, and saw a little bit of change. While Liza seemed a bit darker to me she otherwise looked the same. Stiff, with some peaks; like a very thick muffin batter that's been over mixed. Maggie had spread out much more, to the point of being flat rather than wavy on the surface. Juliet had a few bubbles on her surface, which seems too fast to be true...we'll see what happens there.

*Note* In case you're wondering "What is she talking about...why do they have names?!" It's a tradition, apparently, to name your starter. The older a starter gets the more it matures and has a better flavor when made into bread. There are many people out there with 15+ year old starters...and you have to feed them fairly regularly. Makes sense to name them.

I did use just plain tap water to create my three starters, if they flop again then I'll switch to using bottled spring water in the hopes of avoiding any disruption by chlorine and chloramine...or a may cheap out and use my water dechlorinator that I have for the toad water. We'll see how it goes with regular tap water first.

Teaching Good Manners to Cats - Part 2

If you haven’t seen it already check out Part 1

 

How to Deal with Problem Behaviors

“He did it on purpose!” / “She’s spiteful/mean!” Ect. I’m addressing this because I hear it a lot from owners from all walks of life. This is one of the biggest, most harmful, misconceptions about our pets.

In order to change the behavior you don’t like you have to understand the cat’s motivation. What is it about the behavior that they like or that rewards them?

Common Motivators
-Instinct
-Attention
-Food
-Illness
-Other

Instinct

This is the main motivator for what cats usually do. Things like hunting, chasing, jumping, climbing, scratching, marking, stealing food, biting, ect. When you deal with these sorts of ‘bad’ behaviors you need to remember that they are doing this because their instincts tell them to.

The best way to stop them is to provide a more appropriate outlet.

Ex:
If your cat tries to eat the hamster don’t allow them in the room with the hamster, and provide similar sized toys they can pounce and bite.

If your cat jumps at, scratches, or bites you try to find the cause of that problem. Is this a kitten who wants to play? An adult who felt cornered or scared? An elderly cat that is losing its hearing and got startled? There can be many causes behind the behavior, but they aren’t doing things just to hurt you or make you mad.

Prevention also goes a long way. Don’t leave food on the counter if you don’t want it stolen. Close the garbage lid if you don’t want them pulling things out. Tire your pet out so they don’t need to ‘pounce’ you for a play session.

Attention

This is a type of behavior that is very hard for people to deal with. It seems like they are doing it ‘on purpose to make me mad!’ when in reality they have learned that this behavior always gets your attention.
Attention seeking behavior looks like this:

You are sitting reading/on the computer/not paying attention to your cat. The cat is bored, so to get your attention they do something. The cat looks at you and then starts scratching you or a chair, jumping on the counter, chasing a sibling, meowing constantly, taking an object of yours and running around with it ect.

The problem here is that since they did that particular behavior to try and get your attention any attention you give them means they are winning.

If you scold them, get up and chase them, clap your hands, open a door for them, give them a timeout, look at them…they are getting what they wanted.

Now, that doesn’t mean you’re supposed to just sit back and let them eat your dinner or destroy your house. It just means you can’t, in any way, react directly to them.

What you can do depends on what your cat is doing. If they are scratching/biting or meowing directly at you the best thing to do is get up, act huffy (think teenage girl in a snit), and walk out of the room. If they get worse at that point it means it’s working! If they bite or scratch harder go lock yourself safely in the bathroom for 30-60 seconds then come out and get a toy to give them in place of your limbs.

If the behavior isn’t directly related to you (the cat jumps on the counter, or pulls leave off a plant, ect) do something to distract them. The distraction can’t be directed at the pet, because that’s attention, so do something random. Use a plastic bottle with a few pennies in it, and give that a shake, or throw it on the floor. Spray a plant with a spray bottle, drop a pencil or utensil on the floor.

What you’re aiming for is startling the animal into pausing in their naughty behavior, without directly interacting with them.

Once they startle and have stopped the naughty act offer something else.

Ex: Your cat looks at you, then walks up to a chair and deliberately scratches it. Without looking directly at your pet you casually grab your handy bottle-o-pennies and casually drop it on the floor. Your cat jumps, startled, and you can now call them over for snuggles/play time.

As long as they aren’t doing the negative behavior when you react to them you can give them something positive to do. In the above scenario if you had called kitty over while they were scratching the chair they think “Oh! When I scratch the chair mum/dad will call me over for snuggles, cool!” Obviously that doesn’t work. But because you startle the kitty first they forget what they had been doing.

Food

This one is pretty self explanatory. In our house food is the motivator that caused Jitzu to learn how to open cupboards, dig into garbages, chase other kitties away from the food bowl, and eventually learn to be nice to people. If you leave food on the counter chances are, no matter how well fed your kitties, they will try to steal it at some point.

Fixing food motivated problems mostly requires prevention. In our house food is never left on the counters, everything goes into cupboards or the microwave/oven. Specific cupboards used to have baby locks (we’ve taken them off once Jitzu realized she was never going to get into them regardless of how hard she tried), and our pantry has a hook to keep it closed.

Illness

One of the most common complaints I hear is “She peed on my bed to get back at me.” or “He was mad I left him alone, so he peed on my stuff! This is simply not true. If your pet (regardless of species) peed inappropriately there was an actual reason for it. The most common ones are illness, dirty litter box (cats), and lack of house training.

When a cat pees inappropriately the most likely cause is illness. To find out which it is requires a trip to a vet. You can’t just say “He looks fine. Why go to the vet?” Well, unless you have x-ray eyes and an in depth knowledge of cat physiology you can’t know just by looking at your pet. Even then your vet will require a test or two to say for sure your pet is in good health.

Other

There are a few other motivators, but the biggest one left is stress. If you go on a vacation and in your absence your cat begins peeing all over your house it was not caused by anger, but rather stress or illness. If you have just gotten a new puppy and all of a sudden your cat refuses to snuggle and instead attacks anything within reach stress or illness are your likely causes. If you have recently moved and your cat starts howling all day and night, stress or illness are likely causes.

It is important to remember that all of these motivators can be used to get your pet offering good behaviors. Food is an especially great reward and motivator for teaching. I used food to change Jitzu’s perception of strangers in our house from “INTRUDERS! Kill them!” to “Hey, you look kind of nice. Pet me?”

When used properly any of these motivators I mentioned can be used either to cause or to reward good behaviors. This is just as important as why they do the ‘negative’ behaviors in the first place.

Things that DO NOT motivate your cat

Now that we have talked about what might cause your cat to do something you consider inappropriate it’s time to cover things that do not motivate animals.

Your cat is NOT motivated by
-rage/hate/anger
-dislike
-vindictiveness
-stupidity

Basically you cat will NEVER do something because they don’t like you, or because they want to get back at you for something. I know how tempting it is to believe that they are just little fuzzy people just like you. But the truth is that your pet is an animal. This doesn’t make the feelings that they have any less meaningful, or any less true. But in accepting that they are an animal you have to realize that they aren’t actually human. Meaning they do differ from us in some ways.

Animals are not capable of vindictiveness. If your new puppy pees on the floor they did not do it to spite you. They did not “know they were wrong”. They did it because they do not yet understand that peeing in the house in not allowed, and they had to go. If your cat pees on your bed when you went on vacation they likely were incredibly stressed out, and unfortunately when cats are stressed their instincts tell them to pee where they feel most comfortable. So take that as a compliment, your smell makes your pet feel comforted.

Your cat does not scratch your chair because they hate you, maybe they like the texture as much as you do! Your cat did not take your dinner because they believe themselves to be ‘dominant’ over you…they thought your steak smelled very yummy and you weren’t watching.

I’m sorry if I’m saying this too plainly, but I find that this is the concept people have the most trouble with when training their pet. I would much rather over-explain this than have someone misunderstand what I’m trying to say.

In order to do something to make you mad they would have to go through a thought pattern like this:
1. I’m mad at mum for not giving me a treat.
2. I want mum to be unhappy.
3. Mum doesn’t like it when I pee on her bed.
4. I should pee on her bed.

The truth is most animals are not capable of this type of thought train. Their actual thought patterns are more like this:
1. I want attention.
2. Mum always gives me attention when I scratch her chair.
3. I’ll scratch her chair.

And that is only after many, many repetitions.

Notice how in the first thought pattern the cat uses abstract thought. They have to be aware that other being have emotions, and how to spark those emotions. Mum…when do children learn other people have emotions? Around 3-4? Kitties, I’m sorry to say, are not as intelligent as a 3-4 year old human in many ways.

I’m sure you have noticed that throughout these two parts I have used ‘bad’ and ‘naughty’ like this. The reason is because of how I think about inappropriate behaviors. Saying “wrong” or “naughty” implies guilt; implies knowledge that the behavior was wrong. I believe that untrained, or young, animals don’t understand this concept. You can certainly teach your animal that a particular behavior is not allowed, but that doesn’t mean they will see it as ‘wrong’. What they will think is that you don’t like/allow that behavior. So, with consistency, it will go away. But you can’t teach a cat that killing mice is wrong, because to them it’s what comes naturally.

I made a point of using appropriate/inappropriate instead of right/wrong. That’s because most of these behaviors that we don’t like are natural, not wrong. But we can think of them as inappropriate or not allowed in this setting. Kind of like farting in church. Not the best place to do it, but the behavior itself is normal and natural.

So, to sum it all up.

I promise that your pets will never do anything on purpose to make you mad or to get back at you. I do want to stress that just because your cat is not capable of doing spiteful things that this doesn’t mean they can’t love you. I strongly believe they can feel and express love, anger, distrust, confusion, ect. It’s how they use them that is different.

Any opinions on what I should cover next?

• Feral Cats (and what to do about that nearby colony)
• Clicker Training (for issues, fun, and prevention)
• Other suggestion???

Teaching Good Manners to Cats - Part 1

-Originally posted by me on May 24, 2011. Edited today.

I haven’t updated this is a while, so I’m overdue. I promise I’ll be talking about a few books later this week, but today I’m posting about an issue that I see all the time.

I know many people who think cats magically train themselves. I have people tell me all the time “Wow, your cats really listen to you!” Well yes, they generally do. They aren’t perfect, and there’s still some rusty bits we’re working on, but in general I think they do pretty good. These same people then tell me about how their cat claws furniture/pees on things/scratches or bites people ect. Well guess what, so did mine! The difference is unlike most cat owners I set out to do something about it.

So, here is the first of a series of posts on how to raise a well mannered kitty. Or, if you currently have an adult with behavioral issues, how to manage or change those problems.

I am going to skip over how to responsibly get a kitten/cat, what to feed your pet, and anything related to vet care. There’s lots of information about those topics around the internet already, so I don’t feel the need to rehash it. If you are interested in how to get a cat/kitten check out www.catforum.com to find some info. I suggest checking your local rescue.

Teaching Good Manners to Cats Part 1

 

I’m going to begin by making a few assumptions. First; that your kitten is healthy, eating well, and well socialized. If your kitten is ill, feral, or hasn’t become comfortable with you yet there are sidenotes you should pay attention to throughout this post. The basic principles I’ve written about can also be applied to adults animals so I have added extra notes on how to modify the activities for an adult.

If you are dealing with an adult please remember that this can be like breaking a bad habit. The longer they have been practicing the ‘bad’ behaviors the more work and time it will take to change them.

Kitten Basics

I highly recommend everyone does these things with their kitten. It will help ensure you end up with a loving cat that you can easily handle and care for without stress to your pet or harm to yourself.

So, in order of importance:
-Handling
-Paw Handling/Nail trimming
-Playing nicely with people
-Kennel training
-Wearing a harness
-Correction words


Handling

By ‘handling’ I mean that at least once a day you pick up your kitten, snuggle them and rub them all over. I suggest going top to bottom. Look in their mouth, eyes, nose, ears. Rub their chest, back, paws, tummy, hindquarters, tail.

With a kitten that’s young, under 12 weeks, keep this brief and fun. Never, under any circumstances, put them down if they fuss! If they fuss simply hold the kitten firmly until they calm down, then continue your handling.

If you always put them down when they fuss you will not be able to do anything they don’t like when they are an adult.

If the kitten shows over-the-top signs of stress you can put them down, and you should likely be more gentle next time. These signs include screaming (NOT just meowing), hissing/spitting, real biting or scratching. (Not Play biting/scratching…to see the difference keep reading)

(*note: for feral kittens you will have to wait for me to make a post on socializing feral kittens…if your feral is under 8 weeks you might still be able to do this. It will largely depend on the kitten.)

Handling sessions do go better if your kitten is sleepy or has just had a big playtime. Don’t try to snuggle a kitten who’s in full play mode, at least not at first.

Paw Handling/Nail trimming

This is important enough to be separate from regular handling. Paw handling should be done anytime you are having a snuggle, or whenever they are calm enough. Make a point of being calm and relaxed when you do this, no tickling toes or you’re making it a game which will be no fun with an adult.

Always try to exercise the kitten before you start paw handling.

Calmly hold a front paw, stroke it, gently play with their toes. Get a nice close look, no pressure yet. When you have done this enough times that they have learned to accept it then you can begin to gently push each toe down so the nail pops out. Hold it their gently for a second, then release. Do this with each toe on each paw, not necessarily all at the same time. Don’t stress them out with paw handling. If you can only do one paw per session then do four or five sessions a day, rotating paws each time. The most important thing is to not stress the kitten, you want them to enjoy this.

When you can easily manipulate each toe start introducing trimmers. Cradle the kitten with one arm, with that hand hold the paw out and hold out a nail. I like to practice this posture as that will also help reduce stress. Have the trimmers nearby, sneak them out and snip the very tip of one claw. Do the rest of your paw handling normally, no more trimming! One nail a night for as long as it takes.

Gradually work up to the point where they don’t care at all when you trim, but don’t release them even if they fuss. (Think of fussing at this point more like a temper tantrum. If you give in they learn it works!)
When one nail is easy work up to two nails, then three, ect. Go very slowly. If you become impatient and stress the cat out you could very easily wind up with an adult cat who will not let you trim their nails.

With an adult cat who hates nail trimming you go even slower. Start by having a yummy treat in one hand, and gently running you hand down their leg starting at the shoulder. Pay close attention to your cat, when they tense keep your hand where it is, feed them the treat, and be done.

Do this step until you can calmly handle their paws, using treats as necessary. You are teaching them that people holding their paws brings yummy things.

Then very gradually work up to trimming one nail. Keep in mind with an adult cat you are also having to build trust that may have been broken, or never given. If you push them to fast you take several large steps back, and you lose their trust!


Playing Nicely With People

Cats don’t do things on purpose to annoy/hurt us. They just don’t think that way.

To fix the issue you need to be aware that you pet isn’t hurting you on purpose. I find that really helps with increasing your patience, because that’s what you’re going to need lots of!

When kittens want to play with each other they start the game with a pounce. Keep that in mind and be grateful that your pet wants to play with you. If she does pounce you as an invitation to play you want to teach her a new way to start the game.

You’ll see a certain glint in her eye, a wiggle in her walk, when she’s about to pounce you. Before she does pounce you grab a toy that will keep the play away from your body. Wand toys or laser pointers are best at this stage. I ask my kitties to sit before I start a game, I leave that option up to you.

If she has already pounced you keep in mind that she is trying to get you to play, and that you didn’t catch it before she pounced. Even though it hurts when b\she bites and scratches show as little reaction as possible. She is hoping to get a reaction out of you, so if you react she is ‘winning’. That means she’s getting what she wants, a reaction, so she will continue to do that behavior.

The best thing you can do is ignore her and wait her out. If she gets to the point where you cannot ignore the behavior then stand up and go lock yourself in the bathroom, interacting with your pet as little as possible. Don’t even look at her.

Wait until she calms down/leaves you alone and then go get a toy. I suggest something either very large like a big stuffed animal, or something like a laser pointer or wand toy. Basically something she can’t misinterpret to be you.

Make sure you pay attention to her lots when she’s being nice. When she’s a sweet nice kitty that’s when the toys come out and when you show her the most attention. This way she learns that being good is the behavior that gets her the things she likes.

Basically you give her lots of fun things when she’s good, and no fun things when she’s naughty.

Along with this I suggest getting her used to a kennel or ‘naughty room’, and a harness. Use lots of yummy goodies to introduce both to her.

Kennel Training

In my house I leave the kennels open, with a towel in each. The kitties regularly nap in them, and I have them scattered throughout the house so that there’s lots of options. This makes the kennel a nice place rather than ‘that scary box that takes me to the man with the needles!’

*added* Update: I no longer leave all my kennels out, but the cats still don't fuss when I need to put them into one. One of the kennels is still doing double duty as a bed/sneeze-shield  and all four cats use it happily. Partly because that's the current location of the heated bed...but they still use it and that's the point.

I’ll address older cats who are already terrified of kennels at the end of this section.

With a kitten simply use treats and toys. Throw something fun into the kennel, let her go in and ‘discover’ it. Praise her for going in the kennel, ect. make it an enjoyable place to spend her time.

I also use kennels when my cats have been naughty. When Doran was about 12-14 weeks and he tried to get me to play by biting I would say “Doran, uh uh.” And wait. If he did it again I would calmly pick him up and place him in a kennel for a short time. Less than 1 minute. When I brought him out again I was ready with another toy and we would play with that instead.

If he again tried to bite same deal, back in the kennel for a short time out.

The key to a time out is that you must be calm. All you’re trying to teach her is that if she’s naughty the fun stuff goes away. Timeouts should never be longer than 5 minutes, and that only to clean up a mess without tripping over a kitty!

For adult cats you must go slow. Just like with the nail trimming. Start by taking the door off the carrier, otherwise they can bang and scare an already cautious cat. Leave the carrier in one of the rooms you use lots, and put yummy smelly treats just inside the door. Then pretend like it doesn’t exist. Continue pretending it doesn’t exist for as long as it takes for your cat to investigate it. very skittish cats, or cats who HATE the kennel won’t eat the treats or go anywhere near the kennel when you are in the room. That’s fine, just keep refreshing the treats until they will go in or eat the treat with you there.

When they are calm with you in the room, or near the kennel practice just throwing treats and toys in. When they are completely comfortable that’s when you progress. If you don’t need to use the carrier for time outs then just make that your nightly treat place. Give them a bedtime, or morning, treat there every day. That way when the time comes for the vet they’ll have no issues jumping right in the carrier for you. Ta DA!

Wearing a Harness

Partly because I had two kittens at once, partly because I was concerned what would happen with Jitzu and Torri, and partly because they were just so darn naughty my boys wore harnesses until the were over 6 months.

I liked the harnesses because I could use them to safely remove the boys from the (many) sticky spots they got themselves into, and to catch them if they did something especially naughty or dangerous.

With little ones just put the harness on, tighten it so there’s no way they could get their jaw or paw in it, and leave it on. Kittens might fuss about it, but they’ll get over it very quickly. Practice putting it on and taking it off too. use lots of treats to take off and put on the harness, and try to do it as quickly as you can.

With an older cat it is still possible to put a harness on them…once. if you need to harness train a cat use lots of treats, and don’t even try to put it on them at all for at least 2 days. Then just put the head part on briefly, long enough to feed a treat, take it off, feed a treat.

progress that way until they are comfortable putting it on. Then put it on, make a trail of cookies and when they reach the end of the trail take it off. this will teach an adult cat that they can still walk with a harness on.
If they simply freeze and lie on their side take two steps back, and go slower.

Correction Words

You need to be able to tell your pet when she is about to do something naughty, or dangerous. I say ‘Uh uh’. To my kitties, that means “You are doing something mummy doesn’t like, consequences will come if you don’t stop.”

Don’t pick “No”, we say it waaaay too often when it has nothing to do with our pets, this can confuse them and make it less effective. If you use ‘No’ you get one f\of two responses, generally.

1. They always ignore the word ‘no’. So even though you might be screaming “No! Ginger NO!. Bad cat! NO! NO NO NO NO NO! Not my lamp!” *crash*

Your cat is thinking Mum just keeps saying that word…I already know it doesn’t mean anything. You said it to Dad earlier, and to the thing that has other peoples voices coming out of it, and you say it to the little person LOTS. I get it, it doesn’t effect me.

2. They never ignore the word ‘no’. this usually happens to skittish or nervous pets, especially smart ones who want to please you. They react every single time you say that word. So when you’re telling your husband/significant other you don’t want dinner your pet is thinking Oh god! What did I do? I’m sorry Mum, I didn’t mean it!

Not fair.

Other than that what sound you pick is up to you. Don’t pick their name because you want them to think good things when they hear their own name, but you can pick “bananas!” or “Golf!” whatever floats your boat.

When you use a negative word you also have to have positive words that happen when they are doing the right things. Make a point of saying certain words (short is best) when good things are happening. typically we pick “Good”, “Nice”, “Pretty”, ect. That’s fine as in this case it’s mostly the tone that will convey your meaning.

So, for example:

Jitzu is on the counter. I say “Jitzu, uh uh.” Wait a second as she jumps down, then say “Good girl Jitzu!” And pet her. She learns I like it when her feet stay on the ground, and I pet her when I like things, so that’s good.

When you start using a correcting word you must ALWAYS give them a different behavior to do, then make that the better choice.

Don’t jump on the counter, sit on this stool and get treats.
Don’t claw my furniture, here this cat tree smell like catnip!
Don’t scratch/bite me, kill this toy.

This way they will learn which behavior it is that you DO like, and they will do it more often.
(Keep in mind that even though you don’t like what they are doing it might still be something their instincts tell them to do. So it’s not really ‘bad’, just undesirable.)

End of Part 1

Clicker Training Cats

 - originally posted by me on June 7th, 2011. Edited today.

 

When I started training my cats I did it for 2 reasons. For fun, and to try and deal with some problem behaviors. At that time I had 3 cats, and had been training dogs at PetSmart for about 4 months; because of this the method of training I chose was clicker training.

 I did lots of looking online and found a few YouTube videos and Karen Pryor’s Clicker Training website.
There’s a bit of background inf you need to know to understand how to teach an animal something.

Generally speaking there are two ways that animals, and people, learn; classical conditioning and operant conditioning.

Classical Conditioning: Basically classical conditioning means that one thing happens before a second thing often enough that when the first thing happens you anticipate the second thing.

The most common example is Pavlov’s Dogs. Pavlov developed a study in which he rang a bell before offering food to each dog. Over time he found that ringing the bell caused the dogs to salivate. To the dogs the bell ringing meant food.

Operant Conditioning: Operant conditioning is a bit trickier. It uses four quadrants of response to either enourage or eliminate a behavior.

In the brackets I put the way I think about it, for simplicity’s sake.

Positive reinforcement (adding good things)
Negative reinforcement (taking away good things)
Positive punishment (adding bad things)
Negative punishment (taking away bad things)

Everytime you interact with your pet you are using one of the quadrants, maybe without realizing it.

A. Your cat jumps on your lap and you pet it. Positive reinforcement.
B. Your cat jumps on the counter and you squirt them with a water bottle. Positive punishment.
C. You are petting your cat and they bite you. You stop petting them. Negative reinforcement.
D. Your cat meets a new dog and hisses in fear, you remove the dog from the room. Negative punishment.

These interactions teach your cat something each time.

A. If I jump on my persons lap they will pet me.
B. If I jump on the counter and they see me they will squirt me.
C. If I bite my human they will stop petting me.
D. If I hiss bad things go away.

Make a careful note that what they learn may not be what you expected, or something you like. They can also teach themselves:

A cat knocks over the garbage can and gets a yummy snack! Positive reinforcement.
A cat knocks over the garbage can and it makes a huge scarey noise. Positive punishment.
A cat jumps on the counter when no one is watching and finds a snack. Positive reinforcement.

When you clicker train your cat you are using mostly positive reinforcement, and generally some negative reinforcement.

You also need three other things to help them learn as fast as possible. Cues, markers, and release words.
Cues tell your pet what you want. We use these everyday. Come, sit, off, down, any words you use that your cat always reacts to the same way. When I say “Dinner time!” or “feed the cats” my cats know that is my cue that they are about to be fed. The best cues are short and simple.

Markers tell your cat about what they did in response. Was their response to the cue right or wrong? If I said “Doran, off.” and he jumped off the counter I would say “Good!” as a marker to let him know that was the right choice and I would probably either pet him or praise him in a happy voice as the consequence for making the right choice.

If I said “Doran, off.” and he squinted his eyes and hunkered down that tells me he has learned (through classical conditioning) that the word “off” will be followed by a squirt from the water bottle. I would then say “Uh uh.” to mark that choice as wrong and he would get the consequence.

When you’re training you need to be very obvious. remember they don’t know English, they can’t read your mind, and they might have a harder time picking things up than you expect.

Pick a word to use as your positive marker. Pick a word to use as a negative marker. Most of us do have a sound our cats are used to as a negative marker, but we frequently use many words to express both positive and negative responses. Pick one for each, this will help reduce your pets confusion.

To ‘load’ your positive reinforcer you have to link it to a positive thing in your cat’s mind. Find things they like; treats, toys, a certain game, head or tummy rubs…but whatever you pick has to be rewarding for your cat. This is the most important thing.

Consider this: Your friend asks you to help them move and they offer to buy you pizza in exchange. If you like pizza you think “Awesome! I’ll do it!”

The next time a friend asks you to help them move they offer you a dollar, or the food you can’t stand. You might still help them, but you’re thinking “Well I won’t do this again! I’m only getting (blank).”

Make sure the positive reinforcer you pick is something your cat likes or they won’t want to work for you!
Now comes the fun bit, linking that word with the good thing. It’s really easy. I used a clicker, but a word will work too if you can’t get a clicker. (clicker pens make good replacement clickers )

Click, reward. Click, reward. Click reward. Repeat over and over. At least 20 times. Then wait until your cat is looking at something else. Click and wait. If they look at you expecting good things, give them the good thing and stop. They get the point.

As an example, Doran’s favorite toy is a bottle cap. For him I might click, then let him play with the bottle cap for 3 minutes or so. I repeat that until when he hears the click noise he is expecting to get the bottle cap.

For the negative this is a bit trickier. While you can reward your cat for nothing, or for not doing anything bad, you can’t punish them for nothing.

Wait until your cat is doing something inappropriate, then use your negative marker and follow it up with a consequence. If you cat has never heard this marker before please be fair and don’t expect them to respond.
When my boys were babies it would go like this. Doran would scratch at a speaker. I would say “Doran, uh uh.” Then I would remove him from the speaker (negative reinforcement, since cat’s like scratching) and place him on his cat post (positive reinforcement). I replaced the negative behavior with a positive one. If he scratched the post I would reward him. (more positive reinforcement).

As he grew I began expecting him to understand and change his behavior on his own. So the pattern changed slightly. He would go to scratch the speakers and I would say “Doran, uh uh.” Then I would pause. If he stopped scratching the speaker I would praise and pet him, sometimes giving him a bottle cap, to let him know that was the right choice.

When he usually (19/20 times) reacted correctly I knew that he understood the behavior, so the consequence changed.

He would scratch the speaker and I would say “Doran, uh uh.” Then pause, it is really important at this stage to give them a chance to react correctly by changing their behavior. If he continued scratching or didn’t remove his paws I would follow up with a squirt from the water bottle. He came to learn that if he didn’t change his behavior when he heard the correction he would receive a positive punishment (adding something bad).

Now we’ve gone further, to prevent the behavior from occurring at all. As he approaches an object I know he is tempted to scratch (currently my new yoga pad that is rolled up and leaning against a corner) I watch carefully. As he gets to scratching range and gives the rolled up mat the ‘eye’ I say “Doran, uh uh.” And he backs off. Now he is being corrected for thinking about scratching something he shouldn’t be scratching.
It will take time to get to this stage, at least 6 months, with any cat. If you rush it they will never understand what you want, so make sure you take your time.

To use a clicker to teach a different behavior I could also watch for every time he did something I like. For example every time he chooses to scratch his post rather than my yoga mat. When I see him scratching his post I say “Doran, good boy!” Or I could use the clicker, and I pet him and ruffle his fur the way he likes. Sometimes I start a game of chase, sometimes I give him a treat. Varying the rewards is also important.

 

Clicker training isn’t just to teach tricks. When you use it properly you can teach your pet anything, good behavior included!

 

*added*
 

A little update and some comments on this already epic-ly sized post.

 

One thing I neglected to mention here is prevention as a way of...preventing bad behaviors from becoming habits.

 

Our cats all currently enjoy spending time on our counters, something which drives my BF up the wall. They all know we don't want them on the counters, but they have all periodically been reinforced for getting up there. Enough so that the only way to really break the behavior would be to never allow them in the kitchen unsupervised.

It only takes one stolen shrimp, plate licked clean of sauce in the sink, or warm spot to lie in the chillier days of winter to ruin the training you have done up to a point.

When you own pets you have to have a certain level of understanding. They do get off the counters; when I'm in the room and tell them to. But they also push the boundaries to see if they are still the same. The fact is that, just like us, cats are living beings and are fully capable of learning all their lives. Just because you teach your cat good manners when they're little doesn't mean that they will always have good manners. Ditto for dogs.

To me, it doesn't matter all that much if they're on the counters. I just make sure to wipe the counters before I bake/cook. For me that solves the problem. I'm fine with them being up there when I'm not home, in another room, not cooking, ect. But not everyone is.

You need to decide what training goals are the most important for your home, and act (and react) accordingly.

Debunking Dominance Theory

- Originally posted by me on June 9th, 2011 (edited today)

I’m going to start this post off by saying that I’m going to deal with dominance theory in general.

To really understand why I’m even going over this you need a little history on the topic. Keep in mind I’m paraphrasing quite a bit here, and I might have taken some liberty with the interpretation. Supporting links will be posted at the bottom along with more info about why Dominance Theory in general is kind of useless…IMO.

Dominance Theory came about in the 70s when a group of scientists decided they should learn more about wolves, particularly their social interactions. To do this the scientists had to study wolves. This is generally pretty difficult considering that wolves tend to try very hard to stay far away from people, especially since at the time there was a concerted effort to exterminate them throughout Canada and the US. So, rather than go into the ‘wilderness’ this group decided the logical thing to do was to get some wolves and put them in a large fenced area so that they would be easy to study.

So, they got a bunch of wolves. They couldn’t get a whole pack all at once or from one area, so they got some here and some there and they put them all together. Then they studied them and declared what they saw to be “The Way Wolves Are”.

This is a bit like if a bunch of randomly selected people from many different countries, religions, cultures, age groups, and walks of life from all around to world were put them in one big room with food and surroundings that they aren’t used to, studied and then the observers declared “This is The Way People Are”. I'm sure you can imagine how accurate that would be.

Anyways, what they ‘discovered’ was that in a group of wolves there is one who is in charge, the ‘Alpha Male’, and one who is on the bottom, the ‘Omega’. The others will all fall somewhere in between. The Alpha Male will pick his favorite female, and she will be the only one allowed to have pups. The Alpha and his female will always eat first, the Omega always last.

This theory then bled into everyday parlance as a meme (for more on meme’s click here) and into everyday life and training with our dogs. There are a few problems with this. The main concept was flawed (and has been scientifically proven to be so), dogs are not the same as wolves, and it was taken WAY too far.
When it comes to our interactions with dogs almost every incorrect behavior on the part of our pets has, at one time or another, been put on ‘dominance’.

• Your dog eats your shoes? He’s dominant and trying to show you that by destroying your things.
• A puppy pees on the floor. He doesn’t know his place in the pack and is trying to become dominant. (even worse if the animal pees on a bed/personal object/person)
• Cat scratches your couch? She thinks it’s HER couch because she’s too dominant.

In reality the dog probably ate your shoes because you left them out and he was bored; the puppy peed because he had to go (and likely isn’t house trained); and the cat scratched the couch because she doesn’t like her scratch post and needed to sharpen her claws.

The strangest thing to me is that this meme didn’t stay with it’s species of origin. What harm would it have been if Dominance Theory had stayed with wolves. Who cares if wolves are constantly trying to be dominant over each other? Instead this idea spread, and spread...and spread. Not only were dogs now to be watched for signs that they wanted to rule to home, but cats too were possible dictators! Your hamster escaped from the cage to finally put forth it’s own little bid for cheif-dom. The fish in your tropical tank weren’t too crowded, no - they ripped up each others fins in a bid to rule the watery world within your living room.

Believe it or not I have actually heard each of these things said by someone. Someone who meant it, someone who actually thought that every thought that flitted through the brain of their pet related to social status and how they could go about getting a better one.

I have seen dogs who have been so strictly controlled because of their possible dominance that they no longer feel safe in their own home. They don’t know what, if anything, they can put in their mouth for fear their ‘Alpha’ will charge up roaring and take it from them and then roll them aggressively onto their backs.

As you can tell Dominance Theory is a hot-button topic for me. It is something that pervaded my job, and therefore my day to day thoughts, for quite a while and still taunts me regularly.

How does dominance theory relate to cats? Theoretically, it shouldn't. But in many people’s homes the inappropriate  behaviors of their cats is attributed to dominance. If you consider the whole thing before you react you come to realize it has no place in cat training at all. (IMO it has no place in dog training either, but I think you may have caught that, lol.)

Dominance Theory was developed for wolves. Canids. Pack animals. Animals who live their lives requiring a set of social rules to govern their behavior.

Cats are solitary by nature. Their instincts guide them to keep clear of other cats unless their is a bounty of food great enough that they don’t have to protect every morsel, and even then they don't hunt together...their groupings are more of convenience. Dominance Theory should not apply.

This is the prevalence of Dominance Theory. It has wriggled it’s way into a corner of our mind to the extent that we don’t even think before we answer. Of course bad behavior is caused by the animal you are dealing with (no matter the species) trying to bully you, out rank you, or take one of your resources! What else could possibly explain bad behaviour!?

IMO Dominance Theory has long outlived it’s welcome. It’s time cooler heads prevailed and we showed some compassion and understanding when we interpret our pets’ behavior. I’d be willing to bet once you take dominance out and put logic in you’ll be happily surprised with your interpretations. I know I am.

Sources:

­The Wolf: Ecology and the Behavior of an Endangered Species by David Mech published in 1970 (This book helped establish Dominance Theory.)

Alpha Status, Dominance, and Division of Labor in Wolf Packs by David Mech Published in 1999 (Changing his stance.)

Whatever Happened to the Term Alpha by David Mech published in 2008 (Taking it back.)
Other good info:

Position Statement on the Use of Dominance Theory in Behavior Modification of Animals by the American Veterinary Association of Animal Behavior

Debunking the Dominance Myth by Carmen Buitrago – CPDT, CTC

-Becky