Hi I was trying to proof my recall by recalling Alfie away from his food bowl so I put food in his bowl then gave my recall signal and he came to me (admittedly with a little zig zaggy second thought but he did come) and got chicken for coming. I have been trying this for few days but now he wont sit still while I make his food he runs in and out of the room and can't settle and seems on edge. I think he is anticipating being called away but I'm concerned I ve made him a bit edgy round his dinner. If I just leave it for a few days and don't recall him away from his dinner do you think he will settle down again?
I have to wonder why you would want to call your dog away from his food bowl that has food that is his to eat in it? Curious.
I agree - by all means train calling your dog away from food, but let him eat his dinner in peace. Some dogs are ok to work for their dinner (my older dog is fine, he is keen on his dinner, but is ok to fetch something to earn it) other dogs are just far too concerned about their dinner to mess with it (my puppy is anxious about her dinner, and I don't ask her to do anything for it but sit still while I prepare it). There is nothing wrong with a dog getting dinner without it being about training. By all means make it a small dinner so you have lots of food available to train recall away from food, but for a puppy anxious about getting his dinner, then just let him eat it without any strings attached.
We trained both our dogs to wait until released to eat. It sounds mean but I'm a small lady and if two big dogs are trying to knock food out of my hand it'll be a disaster. So we took a whole week to train them to not eat anything until released. I even left the house once to see if they'd sneak a bite if I'm gone. Nope! They just wait, I think it's great for dogs who get way too excited for meal time.
It's not mean and that's perfectly normal - but that's not the same as asking a dog to follow a lot of cues before it gets its dinner. I still say let a dog eat at least one meal in peace, even if you use food bowls and the rest of the food in training at other times.
