Comments on: Think Cats Can’t Learn Tricks? Think Again!

By: Lin

Lin — Thu, 14 May 2009 18:14:59 +0000

All my cats have been taught basic obedience and some tricks as well. Each cat seeming to pick from the menu (so to speak) his/her own repertoire of tricks. The cat I have now is the smartest cat I’ve encountered to date and has taught me creative and innovative training techniques to use with future/other cats. I’ve even found some of Cesar Millan’s techniques work with him …for certain aspects. Of course, I had to tweak them a bit to make them apply to cats, but they do work.

However, as to the “short attention span” that some say cats have …I disagree. I have watched cats focused on hunting/stalking and I have seen them commit HOURS to the hole or regular “stomping grounds” of a particular animal or group of animals. I would have to say this proves that they indeed do have a VERY LONG attention span.

The trick is to make the reward for longer focus on you worth their while, because as solo trouble-shooters and hunters, they have a short “interest in coordinating their efforts with others.”

By: eilu

eilu — Sat, 02 May 2009 12:16:13 +0000

Magee has been amenable to training- she plays fetch.
I also had a cat (now in the Bridge) who knew “sit” and “shake”.
Both of these felines had also taught themselves to open doors, windows and cabinets.
Magee’s brother, Colby, knows “lie down” and “roll over”
So yes, cats can be taught- you just have to convince them it is worth their while.

By: Think Cats Can’t Learn Tricks? Think Again! » White Mountain College for Pets - Blog

Sat, 02 May 2009 11:20:43 +0000

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By: Chris

Chris — Sat, 02 May 2009 05:30:24 +0000

I’m not a professional animal trainer, but it seems most likely to me that the reason cats are generally regarded as untrainable is that they would be highly unresponsive to the more “traditional” (i.e., coercive) methods used for training dogs. The laws of learning are expeirimentally proven to be highly effective on pretty much everything from lizards and fish right on up to, and including, us humans. These laws certainly apply to cats as well as dogs, but the very first time an aversive stimulus is applied to a cat, the cat is going to get the heck out of dodge, precluding the possibility of any further training. It’s much easier to hold their attention with treats or other positive reinforcements! Cats also seem to me to have a significantly shorter attention span than most dogs, so I’d expect training cats to require much tighter timing, hence the utility of the clicker.

In fact, I’m hard pressed to think of any animal other than a dog that would routinely put up with the type and volume of punishment that they have routinely been subjected to in the name of training. Dogs also seem to “get it”, more or less, even with relatively sloppy timing on the part of the trainer, and even when the training is made decidedly less than fun for them. The fact that dogs are so ridiculously tolerant of us, and so exquisitely tuned in to us is pretty readily explained by the fact that they are the product of a few 10,000s of years or so of human-mediated evolution (i.e., “unnatural selection”), selecting for traits that we humans like. In contrast we’ve only been “working” on cats for a few thousand years, and possibly not selecting for traits that would lead to a readily trainable animal. Maybe in the year 22009 cats will be as easy to train as dogs!

For an excellent intro to the principles and applications of the laws of learning check out “Don’t Shoot the Dog!” by Karen Pryor. The title notwithstanding, it’s really not a dog training book, but rather an intro to the nuts and bolt of teaching/learning across the animal kingdom (or at least across the Vertabrata). I actually find some of the most amusing anecdotes and examples are those involving the training of humans!

By: Tabby

Tabby — Sat, 02 May 2009 05:10:00 +0000

Tricks I do on command: sit, come, stay, lie down, settle down (lie down and watch, staying in one place), up, make friends (go up to another animal and sniff or touch noses), go over (to someone), ask (put my paw up to ask for petting), walk with (”heel” on my leash). A couple of them are shown on the videos on my pet page.

By: Paula

Paula — Fri, 01 May 2009 15:15:04 +0000

In high school I had a cat who LOVED playing fetch (without having been trained!), and I taught him to sit and jump up while he was really young. Unfortunately he was hit by a car and is no longer with us, but he was definitely the one of the coolest cats I’ve come across. He was extremely intelligent; in fact, I’m sure he learned fetch from just watching our dogs. I think it just takes more time and patience to train cats because they are such independent thinkers – and maybe that’s why it seems so much more interesting when I see a cat do tricks.