H&C

HOW DO I TRAIN MY DOG TO RETRIEVE AND SIT?

"Dear Howard, I've been watching your training videos with great interest on the website - they've been very helpful. I was wondering if you could give some advice on my dog please? I have a two year old Cocker Spaniel (Henry). He's a rescue dog, that I have had for about a year now. When I first got him, he had a few physical problems caused by his previous owners allowing him to become obese - as these have been overcome he has started to show an instinct to hunt and work - although he looks mostly like a show dog I am pretty sure he will have come from a puppy farm and I think he may have some working dog in his breeding somewhere along the line.

I've been advised to channel these instincts do I've started to do some gundog training with him, and have really seen the benefits in his behaviour generally. I've also become more and more interested in working dogs - I'd really love to work Henry at a shoot one day.

I've been training him to retrieve with the help of a clicker. He's now gone from running about with whatever had been thrown like a hooligan to a fairly good delivery to hand so I'm really pleased with him. He's learned to put the dummy into my hand and is getting better at holding it for a short, but gradually increasing length of time before it's taken, and has really come to enjoy this new game.

However, we are having a bit of trouble getting with one thing - I'd really like him to sit, but I think he currently sees the sit and retrieve as two separate exercises - so if I ask him to sit, either verbally or with a hand signal, while he has the dummy, he spits the dummy out before sitting! How can I get him to see that he can do both at once?

Also, have you any tips generally on training a slightly older dog? Thanks very much, Hannah."

H&C blogger and gundog expert Howard Kirby replies: "Dear Hannah, fantastic! You must be delighted with Henry’s progress and it’s great to hear that you are channelling his gundog instincts. You have asked as to how you might go about teaching Henry to present the dummy to you from a sitting position. It is not uncommon for dogs to misunderstand what it is you want them to do, particularly with the sit/delivery.

I would suggest that you work to solve this training glitch in two separate ways. Firstly, stop asking Henry to sit as he delivers; just keep him coming to you whilst doing your best to get him to hold the dummy. Resist giving any commands at all just encouragement to bring the dummy close to you and hold it whilst you stroke his chest, over time and if this took months I wouldn’t worry - a delivery to hand is much more important than the perfect sit/delivery. Providing you don’t push him, he will gradually hold the dummy for longer periods and gentle encouragement will enable you to manipulate the sit without using the command.

Sometimes dogs that have been trained on feed treats will put a dummy down in order to collect the food reward. Persuading him to work, retrieve and hold for the verbal and physical approval that you offer him is the way forward.

As an aside you could teach him the ‘trained retrieve’, this involves sitting him in front of you and very gently putting the dummy into his mouth. Gently caress him and issuing the hold command as you put the dummy into his mouth, give him the release command (drop, give or dead) and then repeat the exercise. This exercise calls for gentle handling and patience. Just a few seconds in his mouth initially gradually increasing the holding time until he is really confident and thoroughly understands the hold command.

This softly, softly approach will come easy to you, your achievements with Henry to date can only be attributed to a very competent handler, keep thinking on your feet, be flexible and please do keep us here at H&C up to speed with your progress. Howard."