Attention new puppy owners! Let your puppy off the lead.

Abbiesmom I'm not an expert but I would say not to worry about what training your puppy has previously had regarding walking on lead, recall etc. A good book to help you with the recall is Total Recall, advertised at the top of the page on the right, which helps you through the training process step by step. Also for help with puppies and puppy training you may find The Happy Puppy Handbook useful as well, particularly if you missed the early months. is she OK with a collar and lead? Does she respond to her name and come, if so you have a basic recall to work from and it is a case of building on a foundation of recall in the garden and then with distractions and then in the big wide world.

 

bringing puppy home tomorrow ... it will be a 700 k.m....should I put the pup in crate right away or hold in the vehicle to bond?

 

Hi Pippa .
I let Myfi black lab,off her lead yesterday down one of our country lanes,only for a little while but she was brilliant.Her recall for an 11 week pup is excellent so far. Of course she has had her vacs and got the all clear from our vets,so it is grand to get her paws down.She has been out to lots of places towns the village etc,and so it will go on.we love her and enjoy her so much and we have only had her Three weeks. Thanks for your book Pippa no your input.
Maggie.

 

Mossy (11 weeks) has been off lead at our local playing fields and today at the farm where I have an office. She's been pretty good - generally sticking close by me. The times that she has wondered off I have just run in the other direction shouting like a loony and clapping my hands and she has come back. However, there have been two times when she wouldn't come back at all - both times there were lots of children playing and she just made a beeline for them and I had to catch up with her and pick her up. Probably my fault for not choosing a place with fewer distractions.

 

Our 13 week old Lab puppy, can go out for his first walk on Saturday. We are really looking forward to it and want to let him off lead. Excited and apprehensive at the same time.

 

First day out today, we took Dexter up our road to local shop then later drove to an area we could do some off lead time, armed with plenty of roast chicken. Happy to say, Dexter was excellent, didn't wonder too far from us and enjoyed returning at break neck speed and being rewarded with chicken. Big relief and felt so proud of him. Met one dog whilst he was still on the lead, they both gave each other a good sniff. The lead walking was not as competent as in the house and garden but with everything new to Dexter, we didn't expect it to be. Love this pup.

 

We live in a town so off lead is difficult with our 8 month lab Sophie she is lucky that we have a fenced off garden and yard to run in to give her a good run we will be renting a large fenced off field where she goes for training this is reasonable at 5 quid an hour and to improve her recall I think cheap at the price

 

Welcome KY1, what a good idea to rent a field for your puppy.

 

That's great that you can rent a field to work on recall and let Sophie have off lead experience. We have to drive to most off lead areas where we live. What I've seen on TV, America seems to have more properly fenced in dog parks, something that is lacking where I live

 

Any photos of your puppy Sophie?

 

Since this has been resurected, that is what I did with my puppies.

Teaching a Puppy COME by the Fear of Being Too Far From You Method

Young puppies want to be with you and become worried when all of a sudden they find they are further from you than they feel comfortable with. Then they run to you. While they are coming to you give them your word for their action. COME or HERE or whatever you choose.

You don’t need treats as puppy’s relief at being safely back by your side is a powerful reward and motivator. Praise, pets, cuddles will help reinforce the action. You can treat if you want.

You can up the practice by hiding behind bushes and corners. Make it a game of hide and seek, you hide. If you are lucky enough to have off leash areas that are safe for a pup then visiting them will help. It must be just you and pup, no other dogs and no other people. Make sure the place you do this is safe, no roads near by.

Once puppy gets comfortable being further from you and becomes interested in exploring on his own this won’t work. This might be around 16 weeks old, give or take.

This is called contiguity training on natural behaviours. You wait till puppy does what you want and assign a word. You do exactly this when you potty train. My puppies were solid on COME after two weeks, making them 9 and 10 weeks old. It’s the first command they learned.

 

A bit late but this is the video of Dexter off lead on his first day out, so cute.

[video]https://flic.kr/p/yK2xdA[/video] by Donna Cruise, on Flickr

 

So glad I found this thread all those weeks ago.... We starting letting Murphy off from the first day he was fully vaccinated (previously done work with him off lead in the garden) - out and about, and at just over 5 months we have a LOVELY recall - he will go and say hi to other dogs and comes back as soon as we call him. He is a pleasure to go on a walk with and as a result of some (short) off lead exercise very calm and chilled at home. Would advise anyone to do the same!

 

Yes, this is exactly what we are taught to do with Guide Dog pups. Their recall is very important as their owners won't be able to see them. GD pups are not allowed free runs until 18 weeks old (two weeks after their last vaccinations) but, even a few weeks later than 'normal' this method is excellent. We spend a lot of time on recall before they ever go for a free run too, of course.


With both Twiglet and Gypsy, this method worked wonderfully. Twiglet is already really careful to keep close to me even speeding around and hoolying. We use the name + whistle for recall (sometimes one, sometimes the other). When they come back they must touch your hand and sit, we must hold their collar while we treat. Every now and again during the run we must put their lead on for a few seconds so that lead doesn't = end of run.

 

Thank you, snowbunny, for fixing my link.

 

Do you have anything in writing from Guide Dogs to explain this method? That you could share? I have posted it in several places but I'm just a person with a dog on the internet saying what I found to work. If there was a well known and credible association behind it I think it might get more of the respect it deserves as a training method.

 

Interestingly, a book I've just read is completely against using the "hide" as a method of keeping your dog close, since she believes it causes undue stress to a puppy. She likens it to doing the same to a child - you just wouldn't do it, because it's cruel.

​I'm not saying I agree, just putting it out there as a different point of view.

You're welcome. Dexter looks lovely and very alert. I love how he sits down when he gets to you. Lovely pup

 

snowbunny that's interesting as my neighbour told me I was wrong for having Mabel off lead and hiding when she was 11 weeks. She said it really wasn't the way to go. Funnily enough at 10 months, 9 times out of 10 Mabel doesn't stray far her puppy is 9 months and still on the training lead. Although the puppy is better with her husband. I struck up conversation with her and she informed me it's just the type of dog I have. They're easy, Labradors, conversation came to a quick halt.

 

I think the video at the start of this thread does a pretty good job.

 

Sorry, no I don't.

My supervisor came with me for each first free run with Gypsy and with Twiglet and taught me how to do it.

We walk sensibly on a loose lead to the free run area (easy the first time!) making sure we are alone, no distractions. The I let her off saying 'go free' and she is allowed to play and run. After a while I get her attention, call her back and after touch, sit, collar I treat her. We repeat this with me and my supervisor calling her between us. Then my supervisor takes her out of sight of me and lets her off - she hurtles to find me. The advice then is to hide at least 3 times per walk and not call her, be sure I can see her but that she can't see me, I take Tatze with me and wait quietly 'till she comes looking, then give her a fuss. Recall is slightly different and done in the open (no hiding) when she recalls successfully I give her a special treat, saved for free runs (fish4dogs tiddlers and coachies licky thingie) or we have a game with a high value toy which is saved just for free runs. Twiglet adores retrieving (Gypsy never did)

She does worry - I can tell because her hackles go right up. But the relief on her face when she sees me is a picture. It gets harder and harder to hide as they soon learn to keep a very close eye on this unpredictable human!

Now we are working on recalling from distractions, which she has done 100% so far (touch wood) even from a 6 month old puppy this morning.