"Old" dog/new tricks

[mrsjoyfulprizeforraffiawork]

Has anyone else found this?

I adopted a rescue (staffie cross) at the age of 4 and a half (Rescue vet's estimation). Her history was mostly unknown except that she was picked up as a stray (pregnant too, I think) by the dog warden in an inner London area. The rescue had her for 3 and a half months before putting her up for adoption so I think they would have taught her some things. When I got her, she had some measure of recall and was very keen to please - I think she also knew sit. I have done some training with her and her recall is now very good and she also now understands when she is told to go and sit somewhere else or "go away now" (when she is chasing my free flying parrot or sticking her nose in something I'm doing). When I work she has a dogwalker and when I go abroad she stays with a home dog boarder who has other dogs at the same time. To my surprise, after about two years with me, when she wanted something and I was busy, she would then sit up and beg (she still does this). I never taught her this and she had never done it before. All I can think is that either one of the dogwalkers got her to do it or (possibly more likely) one of her fellow dog boarders did it and she saw it got results. Also, my parrot sometimes comes out with entirely new words and sounds that I didn't teach him either - I live alone so where he learned his new words is very mysterious. Maybe I have someone living in the roof space who comes out and trains my animals when I'm out.....

Some of this has to do with the dog's prior experience with trying out new behaviours (even if those behaviours were different to this one).

What I mean by that is that if a dog has a prior history of trying brand new things out and them resulting in something good (attention, treats, etc) then they are MORE likely to try novel behaviours out in the future.

If they have a history of being punished or not getting anything at all for novel behaviours they are more likely to stick to only what they know.

You are quite right, though, it's also possible she has a faint memory of begging working for something and so thought it was worth trying now to see if it worked to get her what she wanted - which it did.

I can see my own dog do this. If he does something you find a bit funny one day then, at some point in the future, he will try it when he wants something specific to see if it works for this, too.