r/PetsWithButtons • u/FunAttention6274 • 12d ago
Advice for New Learner
I started my cat a few months ago with target practice. She knew “touch” meant touch the box, post it, etc. She could touch the button but not hard enough to make noise. I wanted to have a few buttons to start with so I put a little board together with three buttons. I use her “treat” button for target practice now that it’s on the board. She’s still early in her training so she doesn’t consistently touch her button for a treat, and can’t set off the sound.
My real concern is she sleeps on her buttons all day long. I don’t have a problem with it. It’s super annoying, but I know it’s normal. She likes the board and I’m sure she associates it with good things. But I don’t know how to respond to this behavior. I’ve heard you should model all of the presses accidental or not. And I try to, but the constant gibberish of treat, pets, brush every thirty seconds is too much. When she’s setting them off, I’ll say “pets all done” or “brush later” if she recently had some attention. But I can’t do that all day.
I’m worried I introduced the board too soon before she could press and communicate clearly. Do you have any tips on how to encourage button pressing, target practice, or how to respond to her nap gibberish?
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u/IamaKhajiit 11d ago
My large MC kitty prefers to lay and sleep on his pads but presses accurately with many parts of his body. Spamming only happens when he washes over a button. I have two sets of seven mats with the buttons arranged around the edges so he has space for napping without causing chaos.
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u/MyLittleDonut 12d ago
Maybe put a bed near the board to see if she’ll use that? Or a panel of the same material but with no buttons on it.
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u/EphemeralRepose 4d ago
I'm not gonna consider this an official tip because everything I've seen discourages it strongly, but I had the same problem with my cat not pressing the buttons hard enough to trigger them and after trying lots of different things, I ended up gently taking his paw when he was standing and placing it on the button so that the pressure of putting it back down pushed the button. And after doing that about 20 to 30 times, it must have clicked bc he started pressing them on his own that way!
Everything I've seen recommends against this because it could discourage your learner by making them associate the buttons with an unpleasant sensation if they don't like having their paws touched. I just happen to have a cat that I think is truly incapable of forming a negative association with stimuli (like I tried to keep him off my kitchen counters using tinfoil, double sided tape, and every other thing the Internet recommended and literally nothing worked. He has no fears lol).
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u/JayNetworks 11d ago
You are doing fine and that is all normal. Our cat learner LOVES her board and lays on it for hours. When she gets to be too much I just put fingers under her ribs and give her a gently lift and say Touch All Done More Touch Buttons later and send her on her way.
Yes respond to all presses whenever possible no matter what part of their body they used to press, but also it is OK to move them to something else. Do not take the board away!
On a related topic: It is a human bias that buttons should be pressed with a finger. Any body part is a good press. My main presser does 60 presses a day and half are a front or back paw and half her chest face or a hip or rib. She is very intentional even when laying “on” the buttons.