An Abused Mule Responds to Clicker Training

[MicheleHHP]

ehem, mule!

[terriesales]

Very smart animal. A small back step over and over until none were able. Wow!

Your video reinforces the importance of patience. Nicely done

[makezmuzic]

What a wonderfully patient trainer. And beautiful mule.

[kmcsweet2]

animal heroes are saints! what a beautiful mule!

[MedusaDari]

What a beautiful mule.  It sucks that the people who owned him before were heartless enough to abuse him.

[horseygalyeha]

gorgeous mule and will this work with any problem a horse may have e.g. bucking when riding in canetr for no reason....

[AeronRiding]

good job with him.... I'm all about the rescue critters!!! I wonder if he wouldn't have gone in anyway with just the treats?...... not that I have anything against clicker training!

[artgoat]

There's nothing magic about clickers. The click is called a "bridge" (between action and reward.) Anything can be a bridge, including voice. The important thing is consistency and promptness.

[dragonracer76]

and he is really pretty btw. lol

[dragonracer76]

hmm.. why did she stop walking forward? why not treat the stall like you do when loading. walk all the way in and don't stop at the opening. she stoped before he did. prime example

[horseridinggrl54]

That donkey is gorgeous!

[luckygrla]

This is so nice to see an abused animal learning to trust again! Great job!

[horseluvin11]

oh bless him x

[zubery]

It's bizarre but I've trained my rabbits like this. They have a patch outside they play on in daylight. When they need to come in, I make a click noise with my mouth. No treats needed. Although I do occasionally give them to reinforce the idea that the click means food. They RUN into their houses looking for the reward. Anyway, it's helpful as running after 6 rabbits could take hours.

[cammarkgross]

What a beautiful mule.

[HorseGirlBre]

wow, very nice! His body language showed hesitant, as if he where saying "I don't want to go in there, its scarey, I might get hurt" but once he calmed down, and relaxed, he looked like a champ! Very beautiful also. I should use clicker training!

[fealomwen]

Watch Ringo's body language. He's just a tiny bit stressed at the beginning - he's not sure if he's going to be pushed or hurt - but he quickly calms down, relaxes, and moves where he is asked. The second time he walks into the stall, his body language says he's been doing it forever. Nice job! :)

[carritard95]

wow thats really cool how the second time he just did automatically but the first time he was so hesitant. that was amazing

[jenrific]

What do you do if you forget your clicker or worse you click and realize you have run out of treats?

[sarahthediva]

for a very temporary situation click your tongue and make sure you always have treats but in a pinch a small piece of cheese works but only in a pinch don't use the cheese all the time use cheese as rarely as possible

[fealomwen]

If you forget your clicker, just use a marker word, like "yes." It's not as exact, but it works fine in a pinch.

If you click and realize you're out of treats, give praise and some nice petting, or some other thing your dog likes, then go get some more treats.

Neither of these should be regular problems, since clicker training is used more for teaching new behaviors than in day-to-day management / training.

[CaromVideo]

I love the way Ringo has his back feet nearly on the same line as the front there for awhile!

One good looking mule, I must add...

[slovakmath]

YES that was soooo funny! good training by the way, not forceful, let teh animal make the choice

[malteserus]

This is a great story and demo.

[Pro3110]

The sound a clicker makes is so irritating to me that I could not use one to train. Despise and loathe the noise. Don't know what it is about it, but it immediately makes me mean.

[RescueMeDog]

The sound of a slot machine making all that ca-chinking noise makes me mean too. BUT, I get all that money and it makes me happy.

[Pro3110]

Maybe that why I don't play slot machines, either! :)

[jellybelly578]

what is clicker training? i never really have gotten it heh heh heh :D

[dhuinn]

The basic concept behind clicker training is that the animal comes to associate the click with a reward. You click and reward whenever it does something right until it's consistent. That way it learns to exhibit the right behaviours because it wants to, it associates them with good things, and not because it's scared and associates it with bad things. Clicker train a dog to sit and it will enjoy doing the action. Push a dog down and it'll do it because it's scared of the pushing. Does that help?

[jellybelly578]

question-

i have never really gotten the idea of clicker training... like, how does it work and what is it? I have heard it mentioned a couple of times, and watched this video, but i still don't get it...:P

p.s.-gorgeous mule!!!

[tomazzin]

"He is a mule after all" What's that suppose to mean?

[ponger29]

I agree! I am a mule trainer myself and could see this exact senerio happening with any mule in training, and without all that annoying clicking and with scratches instead of treats. Mules are very smart!

[paulawood1]

AMEN! Mules are WAY smarter then that,, looks like he got them trained to hand out treats!

[dhuinn]

I think it's a bit of a tongue-in-cheek reference to the common assumption that mules are subborn, rather than an insinuation that he's stoopid :~)

[AaseLange]

A classic. The training could be more precise, but it's still an inspirational story.

[LukaviBlaidd]

It's amazing what people will stubbornly cling to despite what they see.

Animals get motivated by the positive reaction they receive by doing something, performing an action. The most basic, and misunderstood, concept of training is that without a REASON to do something, the animal involved, even a human one, isn't going to WANT to do it. If you cannot positively reinforce an action that you want the animal to do, you will not encourage that animal to perform that action.

[Sirblaze1313]

Half the time in tis Video she is doing something wrong.... anyone no what?!?!?.....3.....2......1..­..no

She is Looking at him... NEVER look at a horse/mule when trying to lead them... same thing with trailer trianing ....you don't look at the horse....

Basicly .. the shoulder means "Ok you can Pass"... you looking at them is a thret so they get a mixed sign;)

[Pro3110]

You are soooooo right. Anyone who's been correctly trained in leading knows this.

[sublimequine]

Sure looks like 'mule loves food' training, rather than 'clicker training' to me. ;)

Adoreable mule, though.

[Metqa]

To those comments which say the mule is only food motivated by food: Would you get up everyday & go to work just to hear your boss say "good job"? Nope, If your boss didn't follow up with a paycheck every week, you'd stop in your tracks just like that mule. The food is part of the training as the reward.the clicker tells him what he did right, and thus the mule knows what to do next time to get the reward.

[gryphonkeen]

though this is better than some "trainers" i've seen on here, she's only teaching the animal to motivate for food. Clicker training doesnt create trust and a bond with the trainer but with the food.

[Metqa]

This mule doesn't HAVE a trust bond with a human. It was abused by humans! The only thing it can count on is that food is good. Trust comes after action.

[horsechickie2]

That was so beautiful. What a lucky mule to have found a kind owner in you. Keep it up! :)

[southernfriedchick]

Yeah and what happens when you have no treats to bribe it in with? Nothing. Pointless, I say.

[theairalchemist]

how can you say its pointless she got the mule to go into the stall(washbox) in which he wouldn't before hand then second time in which he walked in no proplem. I have a human shy horse and yes i havn't don't clicker train i do parelli which is kinder the same princible. and it has great effects so don't be negative when the result is positive.

[fireflytattoo]

Then you don't click...and if you are a smart trainer..you ALWAYS have treats on you..for emergency. you eventually "ween" off the clicker when the behavior is consistant.

[starbabe58]

cool video

[Jbear9]

How could anyone not treat this beautiful animal bad? I can see her love of animals in her patient and loving treatment of this magnificent animal. Thanks for sharing.

[iPodSlaaf07]

Me thinks you weren't paying attention when you typed your comment, I think you meant to say, how can anyone treat such a beautiful creature bad, and not, how can someone NOT treat such a beautiful creature bad, this suggests that you cannot understand how someone can resist treating an animal bad(ly).

[bootshank234]

She is briding the mule to come into the stall. Not something I would do.

[MacHamish]

Thank you for posting this vid, this is amazing. :-)

[ilubabe12]

cute

[ugetsublue]

Mules are so cool!

quiethorseranch(5 posts back) tells it right.

[Blackhorsecladdagh]

what a beautiful animal..how could anybody abuse such a magnificent creature?

[8TiShTaSh8]

rodeo is disgusting, well done on saving a beautiful animal

[email4lynne]

Great video. I know nothing about horses, I could hardly believe how close he got his feet together before finally deciding to cross the line. Well done mule!

[quiethorseranch]

You show your ignorance by saying the mule is stubborn. Mules have a VERY high sense of self preservation. They are cautious. Not stubborn!

[HappyHounde]

Great video!

[dippynicky123]

i think that the clicker training in this video is a very good example of how successfull it can be. I used clicker training to train my horse to go into a horse box because he was nervous. it worked a treat.

[stayingup2late]

What is "stubborn"? If he didn't want to do it, the answer is not to label him as stubborn, but to realize that he was frightened.

[englishrose62]

I LOVE RINGO

[anuttama]

Great example of the practical applications of clicker training! That mule didn't look scared, though. More like stubborn. But the treats did motivate him.

[horsegodess]

This mule is so beautiful, i'm glad she was rescued. Oh, and nice job!! :)

[Alunai]

Absolutely gorgeous boy, such a beautiful animal. The cat was cute too. Ringo was sooo nervous going into that stall at first. When the food was put on the floor, he walks on his tip toes and jerks his feet up, along with the tail swishing. He was scared. But she did excellent! I need to get a clicker because mine disappeared. lol

[anuttama]

When I clicker train a horse, I click and say "bleep" (in a high voice) simultaneously. Eventually I can stop using the clicker and just bleep. It is a real advantage when using clicker training while riding. I used to accidently click when the horse bucked or spooked--not a good thing!