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More and more cat lovers are seeing that not only is cat training easy, it’s also a fun activity for all family members. For indoor cats that don’t get enough enrichment, time spent training will become a highlight of their day and keep them from destructive behaviors due to boredom.<\/p>\r\n
Training your cat will teach them fun tricks and practical skills while meeting their daily needs for positive human-cat social interaction.<\/p>\r\n
Cat clicker training relies on positive reinforcement principles; we give the cat a treat<\/a> for a job well done, and they learn to offer behaviors in exchange for rewards. A clicker is a useful tool to provide clear training instructions.<\/p>\r\n The clicker is a small handheld device that makes a clicking sound when pressed. We teach the cat that one click equals one treat, and the clicking sound becomes a marker that tells your cat they did something right and a treat is coming.<\/p>\r\n Think of a clicker like taking a snapshot of the action you want to reward. For example, when teaching a cat to high five, you would click at the split second they raise their paw, so they know they got rewarded for that specific action.<\/p>\r\n Once the cat learns that lifting their paw is the desired behavior, they will repeat the paw lift to keep this game going. As long as you remember that behavior that gets rewarded gets repeated, you are well on your way to becoming a master at training your cat.<\/p>\r\n For clicker training to work, we need to find a reward that your cat values. For cat owners, this can be the most challenging step in the process because many cats eat from a bowl of cat food left out all day, which decreases the value of the food \u2013 there’s a reason people get paid AFTER they do the work, not before!<\/p>\r\n You can reinforce your cat’s good behavior with their meals provided that it’s not left out all day for them to free-feed. Introduce small, scheduled meals to build your cat’s food motivation.<\/p>\r\n Before your cat’s mealtime, use a portion of their food for training. If you feed your cat wet<\/a> or raw food<\/a>, the reward can be a few licks of their food off a spoon. If you give your cat kibble, you can use a handful of the pieces as rewards.<\/p>\r\n After training, put the rest of their meal down like a jackpot for all their hard work. The more rewards you have for your cat, the easier training will be. Many cats will also work for healthy cat treats<\/a>, such as little pieces of freeze-dried chicken.<\/p>\r\n Working for food is an excellent way for your cat to expend energy and enrich their life.<\/p>\r\n2.\u00a0Find Food Rewards That Your Cat Loves<\/h3>\r\n
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