Clicker Training a Cat to Ring a Service Bell

Kindle is a 3 year old cat who was adopted a couple months ago. Prior to adoption, she had no experience with clicker training. This week I taught her to ring a service bell using food treats, luring, and shaping.

This cat does not use her paws very often, so the first step was teaching her to raise a paw and bat an object. From there, we could focus on touching the bell. The training quickly became a very precise shaping game; the bell button is an extremely small target (no larger than a few millimeters in diameter), and must be pressed downward with enough force for the bell to ring. Each training session focused on very specific aspects of her pawing behavior (e.g., downward swipe motion, sustained press, speed, force) to gradually shape the desired bell ringing. Once she began hitting the bell on her own, the bell sound became the new “clicker”.

The final steps we still need to take to “complete” this behavior are: 1) vary the position of the bell in relation to Kindle so she works harder to find the target, 2) reward only the louder bell sounds, 3) work on the trick in various locations, and 4) add a verbal cue.

I only took a couple cell phone videos of Kindle’s progress, but tried to make this somewhat of a tutorial video so you can be inspired to train your own cat!

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16 Responses

  1. Yo-Landi
    | Reply

    👏👏👏 What a cutie 💓💘💖❤💘💘💓

  2. zezu zaza
    | Reply

    this is like henry jackel and mr.hyde

  3. Bigorna Doce
    | Reply

    I would do that… if I could have a cat 😭😭😭

  4. Noam Kohavi
    | Reply

    My cat doesn't lift her leg. She only touch the treat and bell with her mouth :/

  5. Tine Vlekken
    | Reply

    Omg he already learned putting his paw on it on day 3!

  6. D Lovely
    | Reply

    That was great!

  7. Radovan Stojanovic
    | Reply

    What did amazing Dazzle think anout the cat??? ( about the cat's adoption)?

  8. J.V. Decker
    | Reply

    awwww she IS a good girl! well done! both of you!

  9. Self Serve Raw
    | Reply

    She's sooo pretty

  10. Radovan Stojanovic
    | Reply

    He is so cute!!!!

  11. landfair123
    | Reply

    My cat just tells my dog to order pizza. Never give a dog a credit card.

  12. Mofleh Alrofidah
    | Reply

    RING RING >> nom nom nom

  13. My Crazy Shichon
    | Reply

    He is beautiful!! I love how he 'talks' to you 🙂

  14. cheerioTrainer
    | Reply

    What a cute and smart kitty! 🙂

  15. Nox Orion
    | Reply

    That's a very cute cat. I'll try this way. Thank you.

  16. La Pülga Otaku
    | Reply

    This channel is since 8 years avaible 😮

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