How: Find a book that is suitable to the size of your dog. Balance book either on head between ears, on withers or on muzzle. This depends on your dog’s body shape. Hold the dog still with left hand and place book with right. Hold book while saying “stay”. Eventually remove both hands (slowly) until dog is balancing book. Count to 3 and remove and release and reward. Idea is to increase time the dog holds the book. The ultimate is to have the dog come while balancing the book. This is a hard one so don’t expect instant success.

How: The dog can be in a sit or down for this one. The idea is to get her to cover her eyes with one paw on command. It will take some practice to find out the best method for your dog as we find they all respond to different signals. You may prefer to do it in a down. Then with treat in hand, tell the dog to “cover your eyes”. Physically lift her paw over her muzzle and reward. If you blow gently on her nose, she may be inclined to swipe at her face. When she does this, reward. You have to just repeat the command and movement until the dog realizes what is needed to get the treat.

How: Place dog in sit stay. Decide on a hand signal. It can be a circular movement of your hand like a wave or hold hand palm up and wave fingers in and out (as in making a fist). It is not recommended doing a real wave with palm facing down. It looks too much like the speak command and can confuse the dog. Sitting close to your dog give the command and hand signal. If dog doesn’t do anything nudge her paw until she lifts it up. Reward. Eventually require her to lift paw higher. Always reward every time she does it. Eventually start to give command from farther back.

How: Start heeling with treat in hand. Bait dog while saying “circle me” and draw the dog around your body so dog is completing a circle around you. Remember to continue to move forward while doing this. Make it lots of fun and get dog to skip around you. This is a fun trick – not an obedience exercise. Change direction until dog can circle you in both directions. When you’ve got this down to a fine art, do two circle me’s, 2 weaves, repeat, repeat. Then make up different combinations. For example: circle me, circle me, weave, weave, circle me, circle me, bow (and then reward). Note that this can takes several weeks to get or your dog may pick it up very fast.

How: Start heeling off leash. Have a treat in both hands. As you step with right foot exaggerate the step and bait dog under your leg while saying “weave”. Dog is to walk under your leg to your right side. Then as you take the left foot step, repeat to left side. Continue as you move forward. This trick takes time to learn and if you have a large dog it can be more difficult. The trick is to keep the dog weaving in and out under your legs. Once you have this one, you can combine it with the next trick (circle me) into a complete heeling pattern.

How: This is usually a simple one to teach if your dog likes to bark at you. Trick is to get her to do it on command and from distances. First decide on a hand signal that is not similar to any other. You can use a motion of opening and closing thumb and fingers (facing the dog). Some handlers think this looks more like a mouth opening and closing. Other handlers use a closed fist, twisting motion. Tell your dog to “speak” at the same time. When she does, reward with treat immediately and say “good speak”. If your dog doesn’t bark readily, continue to give command until she gets really fed up with you and barks. Then quickly reward. She wont know why but if done enough, she’ll get the message. Gradually give the command verbally only and then hand signal only. Increase distance to the maximum comfort zone.

How: Same qualifications for dogs as Jumping Dogs. Once all of the dogs can bow and hold it, line up dogs very close together and give the “bow” command at same time. Tell dogs to “stay” – handler holds treat close to keep attention. You need to use a very small dog such as a terrier for the next part. While the larger dogs are in bow position, the small one starts at one end and walks under their rear legs. Trick is to keep the large dogs from lying down. This takes great concentration and muscle control by the large dogs.

How: This is an interesting trick to do once you have a group of dogs that meet certain qualifications:

• Get along (i.e., non aggressive with each other)
• Keep a still down stay
• Good at jumping low obstacles

If you have this combination, this trick can look very impressive. First start with pairs. Have one dog in a down stay with the handler holding the leash short and a treat in hand if required. The other handler gives the “over” command and while on leash has the dog jump the one who is down. Repeat in opposite direction to get dog used to jumping on both sides of handler. Then switch dogs. When the pairs are reliable, put up to 6 dogs in down stays about 3 feet apart (depending on size of jumper). One dog (on leash to begin) jumps all of the other dogs. This is repeated several times for each dog and then they change places until all dogs have had a turn jumping.

How: Hold treat at light switch (make sure dog can reach the switch when on back legs. For short dogs, place on sturdy table at light switch). Give command “turn out light” or “light off”. When dog jumps up to get treat make sure her paws hit the switch. Reward with “good light off/out”, or whatever your command was. Gradually start to stand away from switch and send dog. Toss treat when dog jumps up and paws at light. You can also teach this by placing the treat on the switch so dog has to knock it off. This method may, however cause the dog to use the mouth to hit the switch more than the paw so it is preferable to hold the treat in the hand.

How: Train this one by first having dog touch a piece of paper stuck to the wall. Take dog to wall, command “touch” or “target” and touch the paper. When dog jumps up and touches the paper, reward her. Then place an object on floor and send dog to “touch or target. Reward when dog moves to object and touches it.