In the last few weeks Jess has been developing an incredibly annoying habit of stealing tennis balls from other dogs. Her whistle recall and whistle sit is now pretty good but when she has a tennis ball in her mouth she will not come back. She will come close, but she won't let me take the ball from her. If I am standing still (apologising profusely to the owner of the tennis ball!) then she will dance around with the ball, I think trying to get the other dog to chase her. She will also investigate hiding spots for the ball, but usually won't actually hide it. If I walk away, she will go and find a burying spot - somewhere very inaccessible, of course! - and immediately follows me. Once the ball is out of her mouth she is quite obedient again. Her retrieving generally is bad. She'll retrieve a dummy in the garden and house but if we are out and about she will run out with great enthusiasm but after picking up the dummy just tries to hide it. I talked to a gundog trainer who said that I should use a long line consistently for 6-8 weeks until the habit of bringing back to hand was fully instilled. He also said that I have to be careful that during that training period she can't self-reward by getting hold of a dummy and running off with it. The problem with the ball-nicking issue is that I can't always control when a dog owner with a chuckit will appear. Any ideas as to how I can solve this? Are the two issues - ball-nicking and failing to retrieve - even the same problem?? Advice welcome!
No, they're not the same problem at all. The first one has two parts to it. Firstly, you need to proof your cues (recall/stop) against balls. Secondly, you need to work on her not chasing balls in the first place unless she's released to - you can do this by rolling balls by her, building up to throwing them, and then set up scenarios with a friend to throw balls at a distance. Lots of rewards at each stage for not chasing. In the meantime, then you definitely need to stop her self-rewarding by chasing other dogs' balls. This means keeping your eyes peeled all the time for other dog walkers, and popping her on lead when there is someone with a chucker. Use it as a training set-up. The retrieving thing is also a proofing problem. You need to go back to basics in a new environment, forgetting that she "knows" how to retrieve at all. She doesn't in this environment, so start from the beginning again.
The hiding and burying of retrieves is a well know cocker trait. Believe me, I've got the t-shirt. Your gundog trainer is right, you will have to manage your dog in such a way that she doesn't get the opportunity to do it and self reward. I clicker trained my cocker to retrieve and deliver to hand. It was a long process and required a huge amount of patience on my part plus tons of cheese. We got there in the end but occasionally the old cocker habit of burying things will still come to the fore. I have seen him burying the odd pheasant that I had sent him out to retrieve, but luckily I have a very switched on springer who will dig up his buried treasures and deliver them to hand.
Thanks, that gives me a few ideas for getting started. Shame that the answer is "slow patient training" and not a magic spell though This may be more vent than question but my neighbour (and Jess's dogwalker) has a cocker spaniel the same age as Jess. She has actively encouraged his obsession with tennis balls - when she walks him or engages with him she is constantly throwing a ball to him. My prompt to post this thread today is that we met them in the park and I asked her not to throw the ball so that I could let Jess off lead for a bit - but she ignored me, threw the ball, Jess intercepted it and we had a long round of keep-away. We caught Jess, got the ball back - and then she threw it again immediately!! Just a bit unfair, no? I know it's my training problem to solve, but usually I simply keep Jess on a lead while her dog is offlead chasing a ball .... and I suspect that is partly why Jess has come to be so obsessed with nabbing the ball herself. Aarrgh, it's difficult. Obviously I need to avoid that park. If Jess is on-lead, it's incredibly frustrating for her, and if she's off-lead then she will nick balls. So, back to driving 20 minutes each way every time I walk her.....
I sympathise - my sister's cocker is also ball obsessed and does the same - walks are simply an exercise in repeated ball chucking. Yup, you have to work on that frustration threshold. You can do that through training. I'm not familiar with spanners, so @heidrun might say this is the worst idea ever, but I find that using a ball as a reward is hugely beneficial with my Labs. If they are steady to a ball being thrown, they get to chase a ball. Premack at its finest
Does your dog walker do this when you are not there and she is walking your dog for you? If so then she is scuppering all your training and you are wasting your time.
That is a good question. She knows I don't want Jess chasing tennis balls and I've asked her not to throw things for Jess. (And she never lets her off-lead - I've been really firm about this. Jess's recall training has been a long slog and I don't want anyone jeopardising that). I trust her and don't think she would deliberately want to undermine my training. She loves Jess and is very good with her. It's just that her goals for her dog are completely different. Throwing the ball constantly keeps her dog focused on her with less work on recall/leave it etc. But I've been thinking it through and I have a quieter period at work for the next few weeks. I think I'm going to manage my time differently and stop using a dogwalker at all for a few weeks so that I can be absolutely sure that Jess's training is consistent. With spring coming I can give her a good early walk and then 2-3 short training sessions during the day. I find Jess is much calmer when I'm at home more anyway so it's possible that life will be easier all round. Instead of paying a dogwalker I'll go back to renting the training fields I was using last year. She's a clever, willing little dog so I don't think it will take too long if I really take it seriously. I might start a training log to build in a bit of accountability!
Mocha nicks other dogs toys and balls, but as long as it isn't footballs I am happy. We are on a long journey and it takes patients. If she is near me, I scatter kibble and tell her to search or pull out a great toy from my pocket and she usually drops the stolen toy. Feel for you but there are worse things your dog could be doing and he is a dog after all.
I am secretly quite fond of a tennis ball chucker, it comes in handy occasionally during training. Amy my little Clumber adores tennis balls and loves the chucker and nothing will make her more inclined to run in than a tennis ball thrown by a chucker. So in this clip I am totally unprepared and carelessly just chucking the ball without asking her to sit first. That's the sort of thing that happens when you are out in park or a beach and someone nearby chucks a tennis ball. She runs in and I find I'm really unprepared by not having my whistle in my mouth. But she sits on the verbal cue and recalls away from the ball. I sit her up, send her, apply the brakes this time via the stop whistle and then send her back for the retrieve. A lovely delivery to hand earns her tasty bit of roast chicken.
