Hi guys, we're back with Animal Wonders! This is Lollipop the striped skunk! I was about to do a training session with her and I thought it might be fun to bring you along for the ride. 

--Intro music--

I have my little training pouch here which is full of treats, natural balance cut in just perfect little squares, and I have my clicker ready. 

I think I want to start with a couple of the behaviors she already knows, and then we're gonna try something brand new. Here you go, Lollipop, here's some treats. 

So she smells her treats - here you go - get her attention with the target. Alright, now we're gonna try a circle. Oh, that's pretty close. Try one more circle? Much better. Good girl! 

She already - that's offering - she offered her, I'm gonna try the other leg now. Come on up here. Good girl. 

I'm gonna try a rise-up now. Good girl! Nicely done! 

I would love it if during a presentation, I could get her to dig on cue because skunks are such diggers, it'd be a great behavior to show the audience, so let's try that. 

She can smell the food in my hand right now, and I want her tro try different ways to try and get the food out. So she's pushing her nose in - oh, we had a little bit of foot on my hand, so I'm gonna click and reinforce that and we're gonna try and see if we can get that foot behavior again. A little bit more foot this time, I want - ooo, nice! So maybe if I shake my hand a little bit and get more of a digging, dig dig dig dig dig dig, nice! So then this'll be the response, the dig dig dig. Can you try and get that foot in there? Get that foot! There we go! Nice! Can you dig? Dig dig dig dig dig, nice! Good girl. 

Alright, I don't like my training sessions to go on too long, I like them nice and short and sweet and very positive, so we're gonna end with some easy behaviors that she knows already, so we can all be super happy, no frustration involved. Alright, ready? In a circle. Good girl. Can you come up onto my leg now? Good. Now rise up. Up here. Good girl. Nicely done, Lollipop. 

I think that was a great first time trying out the digging behavior. I'm excited to see how far we can get with it, and hopefully soon we'll be doing it in presentations. 

I hope you enjoyed coming along on the ride on this training session with Lollipop. We all had a lot of fun, she enjoyed it for sure with all those treats. I'm gonna let her go back to sleep. If you'd like to join us on an adventure every week, subscribe to our YouTube channel Animal Wonders Montana. You can find me on Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook throughout the week, and if you have any questions for me, leave them in the comments below! Thanks guys!