Pairing freeze-dried salmon rewards with a clicker

Salmon treats for clicker training are the payment that follows the click. Click at the moment you like what your dog did, then hand over one small bit of salmon. Break the pieces ahead of time so the bit is ready when the sound ends, and weigh the day's salmon before the first click.

Can you use salmon treats for clicker training?

You can. The click is the marker and the bit is the pay, and the two jobs stay separate. The listing says: "Break each piece down before you start and pay out one bit at a time." On this page the click marks the moment and that one bit pays for it.

The store rates its salmon at 4 of 5 for training value on its own scorecard. That is the store rating its own treats against each other, and it tells you nothing about how your dog will respond to a clicker. Your own dog's sessions are the only test of whether salmon is the pay you want.

Set up like a pit crew before the green flag: bits broken, clicker in one hand, pay hand ready. The salmon goes into the freeze-dryer raw, so your pay hand falls under the bag's hand washing line. The bag says: "Wash your hands after handling it."

How do you charge a clicker with salmon?

Charging the clicker means pairing the sound with a bit, with no cue asked of your dog. One way to run it:

1. Before the session, snap a few pieces into small bits.
2. Click once.
3. Hand over one bit straight after the click.
4. Click and pay a few more times, then end the session.
5. Reseal the pouch and put it away.
6. Wash your hands.

The listing says the pieces are medium sized and break into small, quick rewards, so a single piece can be split across several clicks.

Which comes first, the click or the treat?

The click comes first. Click, then treat, every time. Hold the bit in your pay hand before you click, so your hand is already there when the sound ends.

One click gets one bit. If you click twice, you owe two bits. That keeps the arithmetic honest, and the arithmetic matters once you start weighing the day's salmon.

Pay from your hand, not from the pouch. The bits are broken and waiting before the first click, and the pouch stays resealed. If you run out of bits, the session ends there, and you skip the click you cannot pay for.

If you use a marker word instead, it takes the click's place in that order. Say it where you would click, then pay. Which cue you teach with the clicker afterward is a separate question, and this page stops at the click and the bit.

How do clicker sessions fit the treat allowance?

Each paid click is a small piece of weight, and it all comes out of the same day's share. To find that share, open the treat budget calculator on our product page: you enter your dog's daily calories, and its fixed 10 percent setting comes back as grams and ounces of salmon, the most your clicks can spend that day. Behind the result is the label's figure of about 85.6 kcal per ounce.

Your veterinarian sets the real calorie number and the real share, and a vet's figure overrides the calculator's every time.

Here is a practical way to run a session: weigh out the day's salmon before you start, break it into bits, and put the bits in your pay hand or a pocket. When the weight is gone, the salmon part of the day is done, and anything else you click for that day gets paid some other way. The basics behind every session are in our guide to salmon training treats, and the guides hub lists every other salmon page.