I started Xena on a voice recall (COME XENA!) rather than a whistle. I honestly thought that the whistle was just an ordinary referee's whistle which is why I chose to start with the verbal recall Then I discovered the forum, watched your videos, and realised how effective the HUNTING whistle was, and I'm wondering whether I ought to switch from verbal to whistle. But is this necessary? Can a vocal recall ever be as effective as a whistle? Do any of you not use a whistle? If I'm likely to get a better recall from using a whistle then I'll buy one...but how to switch from verbal to whistle? We're still at the early stages of training - recall and run, and with zero distractions (she will run to me like a bullet at obedience, but the trainer is holding her and I'm facing her at the other end of the hall...) Would I have to go back to square one? As an aside, we will never gun dog train (the clubs are all dying out and there's no positive training that I can find anywhere in the country). Would appreciate your advice
Yes, a vocal recall can be as effective as a whistle, but I decided to add whistle too. It carries further, a lot further. It is consistent (voice isn't). For example, the first time Coco slipped out of my grip and chased some sparrows into a garden, my voice had panic in it, he ignored it. My whistle was just my whistle, he came back. I used the Total Recall book to help me train it, so yes - back to square one, but you won't be at square one with your verbal recall. Most of the things I add to Coco's repertoire are mainly because it is fun to train, Coco loves to learn. We will never do gun dog training, but learning the recall whistle and the stop whistle is great fun.
Hi We started with voice and then added a whistle. We now use the whistle for distance, mainly on the beach but also at times like edzbird said 'panic' in the voice. For short distance I just use the voice. Both work, but I have noticed I get a far better response ie: imediatly compared to voice. Plus it also allows me to calm down by the time she gets back. We are working through the book and so far going well for being 5 and a bit months old.
My two were trained to the whistle from weaning, so have a very strong association with it. That said, I had to re-train during adolescence and am constantly keeping my eyes open for opportunities to strengthen it; it's one thing that I never want to lose. They do recall to my voice, but the whistle is a lot stronger. You can never be completely consistent with your voice recall because, even if you (somehow) manage to keep your emotion out of your voice, simply shouting louder if she's farther away will change the sound of your voice. Do you have Total Recall? It's an excellent recall training programme. I'd start from square one with the whistle, which is associating the whistle with amazing things. If you already have a pretty solid recall, she'll probably get the idea pretty quickly and, as long as your reinforcers are strong enough, she'll whizz through the early stages.
I'd never thought about my voice affecting the recall, but of course, it makes perfect sense that it would. Ok, it sounds like adding the whistle won't be confusing, so I'll give it a whirl. I've borrowed Total Recall from the library before, maybe I ought to invest in my own copy
We seem to have evolved 2 recalls, particularly with Bramble. The response we get to a verbal recall is.."OK I am coming back to you...eventually.." The whistle recall is "OMGCOMINGRIGHTNOW!" response. We have trained this by high value rewards the instant she turns, thereby a more unconscious response to the whistle. We have also got a strong stop in Benson, and working on this with Bramble. The whistle stop in my mind, is the most important cue you can train a dog.
Going back to step one is something you should do all the time anyway. You should always give some cue in advance of a bowl of food going down, and why not your recall. You need to maintain your strong cues. So play ping pong recall and so on - all the time. It's easy then to work through the steps with a whistle, or you can give your verbal cue and then blow your whistle as she heads towards you. But only if your verbal cue is great. If it's not amazing, I'd start again with the whistle.
As with all puppies, Ted's training can be a bit hit and miss. He's great at loose-leash walking, waiting for his food, being alone in his crate and on the whole, returning when
Sorry.... my finger caught the wrong key and I accidentally posted too soon. returning when whistled - with one or two exceptions. When Ted is some distance away and has discoverd either some fox poo or a discarded take-away, he just won't return on the whistle. I don't whistle again, but start running away until he notices and pursues me. The other occasion is if he spots a potential playmate and hurtles towards them, across the field, at full speed. The whistle doesn't get him back. In that scenario I have to run to catch up with him and the apologise to the other dog owner (aren't dog owners great? They're so tolerant of a bouncy 5 month old lab), and fix his lead on him until they've managed to escape, but even then he strains to restart the game. I have thought up a strategy for dealing with fox poo in general, but I would value some advice on Ted's convenient deafness. The treats, by the way, for whistle recall are high value, chicken, sausage and small pet food pouches.
You know, it's generally not "convenient deafness", it's actual deafness. Have you every been concentrating on something so hard that, when someone talks to you, it's just "wahwahwah" in the background, and you don't hear the words? It happens to me all the time when I'm in the middle of work and my husband talks to me. The same thing happens with dogs - they are so "into" something that their hearing actually switches off. I'm having a similar thing with Shadow at the moment. There's a bitch in heat somewhere around and he keeps finding places where she's been, and getting engrossed in the smell. He's completely deaf to me when this happens. So, what you have to do is teach him to always keep one ear open. My strategy for this is to set him up, on lead, around the smelly area. Clicking and treating for responding to my attention-getting noise. That's great, but what about when he already has his nose deep in it? I've been carrying really smelly treats and plonking them under his nose. It has to be something really good to get his attention away from this smell. Ham didn't cut it, cooked pork was better. So, holding the treat right under his nose and trying to get him to follow it a centimetre. Rewarding him with both the treat and the license to carry on sniffing afterwards. It's going to be a tough one to crack, but we'll get there As for the running off to other dogs, you really need to stop this happening, because he may run up to a dog that's aggressive, or injured. You need a training plan which will probably include him being on a long lead when there are other dogs around, until he's learnt that it's not acceptable until you tell him he can say hi. The more he practices this bad behaviour, the harder it will be to stop it happening, so you need to nip it in the bud. Work on keeping his focus on you, making yourself the most exciting thing in his world. Reward him with treats and games when he manages to ignore other dogs - starting at a distance he can manage, and working gradually closer. If you don't already own Total Recall, I'd strongly recommend you getting it - it contains a structured training plan for proofing your dog so that the recall works in all scenarios, which is as important as stopping your dog running off in the first place.
Your first paragraph describes my own convenient deafness. My wife has long been saying "can I have some eye contact?" before she tells me something I have to remember. I'm in an active working phase with Ted at the moment so your advice on him around other dogs is really helpful. I do have Total Recall but I haven't "totally" finshed it yet. You are acting as my conscience this morning. Thank you!
First thing I noticed is the order of your commands. I was taught the dog's name comes first. If there is only your dog, in our field classes, you don't use the name at all. If there are 2 or more dogs the name is given first so the dog's will know which dog the command is meant for and only that dog should respond. I don't think you will get a better recall out of a whistle but you probably will get more distance out of it. Unless you have a fantastic yell. And as said in a post above, the whistle always sounds the same. I use verbal, whistle and hand signal. They can all be used, you can even use the hand with the verbal and whistle. I see there are no gun dog clubs near you but you might want a whistle STOP for other reasons. I was told to train it first. One tweet means stop, sit and look at me no matter where you are. Then you signal to go left (for hunting, field trial or we used in our working level Rally) or right or whatever you want the dog to do next. Apparently dogs like the recall better because it signals action, to run to you. And even though it's three tweets (for us) it's harder for dogs to learn to stop action than to continue it in another direction or start it. So I trained the whistle STOP before I did the whistle recall.
I just tested Ted on the whistle this morning when he started eating dog/fox poo in the park. This time I was only about 20 feet away. One sharp, piercing whistle, which he totally ignored. He is absolutely resolute in finishing off his gross little find. I'll check out Total Recall again and see if I need to go back a few steps. But I know he certainly heard the whistle, because he briefly lifted his head
In which case, you've not got a trained response to it. Proofing, proofing, proofing. At this stage, if you don't know he's going to come, don't blow it. You just taught him the whistle means nothing and can be ignored.
This damages your recall - think of it like a bank balance. Every time you use your recall and your dog comes and gets a great reward you put money in your bank balance. Every time you use your recall and your dog doesn't come, you take money out - and a lot more money out than one successful recall in.
