Touching Animal Souls

Dear PenguinPromises The penguins finished their annual moult and have now left the colony. They have set off on their winter migration and will now be out in the open ocean swimming up the coast of Argentina. Their final destination is Brazil, but it will take them several weeks to get there. They are not in any rush. Just like an ocean cruise, the idea is for Promises to enjoy the journey as much as the destination. The coastline of Patagonia is very beautiful, and there are lots of fish to be found whenever the penguins get hungry. Now that there is no longer a need to travel to and from the nest each day, Promises can relax out at sea, catching fish and swimming leisurely northwards a bit at a time. As you can imagine, the penguins were very hungry after finishing their annual moult, during which they were not able to feed. Now they have full stomachs again. The weather is lovely, the sea is nice and calm, and the gloomy winter days are now behind Promises for a few wee...

If we train animals we have heard of Classical Conditioning (Pavlov dogs) and Operant Conditioning. We are taught that we use operant conditioning and focus on positive reinforcement - which we are told is a part of operant conditioning. I would like to challenge this approach a little. The world of ethical animal behaviour management and particularly animal training is exploding with beautiful concepts. Providing animals with the ability to give us their consent, and to always be at choice is beginning to become a part of what we do as animal care specialists. Animals are being shown how to say no for example, and we take this as information - that we are not making what we are asking them to do clear or reinforcing enough. Hurrah.... So, with this in mind, we need to begin to recognise that most behaviour is - once it is trained - essentially a habit. If we cue an animal to do a behaviour and they have had a favourable association with that particular cue in the past, they a...