My 4 1/2 month old male chocolate lab sometimes likes to run from me and play catch me if you can. To make things more interesting he especially likes to do this while in possession of objects i don't want him to have like rocks and other things he should not be chewing or eating. Keep in mind, sometimes he will play catch me if you can even without an object if he feels he doesn't want to obey a recall. I notice this usually seems to happen when he has something he doesn't want to give up and/or when he doesn't want to come back inside yet etc. I have started to try the drop it command while offering something to trade of value and I have noticed a tiny bit of improvement so far but still have work to do. Most of the time he will come when called but my worries are that when i get him in large open spaces outdoors that the distractions will turn into a hard to manage game of him running from me, and possibly dangerous. Any advice or tips would be great as i will be having Badger off leash in large open outdoor spaces often as he grows older. Thanks in advance for any advice.
A couple of things spring to mind. Firstly, if you're chasing him, that is the best game ever and so is going to encourage him to do it more and more. So, never chase him because you don't want him to learn that you can't catch him! I do sometimes chase my two, but I've put it on cue as part of a game, and it's never when I actually want to catch them. Secondly, it sounds like you need to work on your recall (we all do - it's something that you'll be continually working on for his whole life!) and make sure that nine times out of ten his recall is followed by something amazing and then a release back to do what he was doing before. The book Total Recall has a whole programme to teach a proofed recall and should help. But, in the meantime, you don't want to be teaching him that coming to you always ends in something bad - having to give up his "toy", the end of playtime, going on the lead etc - because that's the fastest route to having him start ignoring you. In a similar vein, if he learns that whenever he has something good, you want to take it off him, he's going to stay away from you. A good tactic here is to teach him that most of the time, you just want to have a look at it and then, importantly, he gets it back. So, practice with things that it doesn't matter if he keeps, and do it on lead so he can't wander too far. Give him a treat to drop the object, pick the object up and then give it back. It's a complete win-win for him. Or, if you have two identical objects, you can swap one for the other. My girl Willow used to really play keep-away with balls, so I would hold one up so he dropped the one she was holding, and I'd immediately throw her the one I had (to catch, not to chase). Repeat a lot. Add the "drop" cue when it's reliable and then start generalising it to other objects. What you're doing is, as @bbrown likes to say, imagining a bank account. Every time the outcome is favourable for the dog, you're paying in to that bank account. Every time it's favourable to you, you're making a withdrawal. You want to make sure the balance stays healthy, and that means paying in far more than you withdraw. I hope that helps.
Dogs adore being chased - just don't do it. Where possible keep banned objects out of his reach. If he gets one call him to you and 'swap' for high value treats. There are lots of games you can play which don't involve chasing the dog.
A rock......could live with that, not grat if he swallows them all, but.... A sock, slipper....not too bad. A smartphone, your TV controls, credit card........yeah, you want them back sharpish. Definitely go for a "swap technique" and work on "Total Recall". Chase-me chase-me is SUCH fun! Try developing nerves of steel and totally ignoring your pup and see if he loses interest, he may just be in it for the chase. My default rescue technique was a bowl of food rattled loudly then placed down whilst I nonchalantly circled around behind feigning disinterest. He will get wise, but might work in extremis. Once or twice.....
Once a puppy starts this behaviour, it's difficult to stop. Being chased is such a massive reinforcer for many puppies, that once they have experienced the delight of being in possession of something a human wants very much, and the multiple delight of being chased for it...you have a bit of an uphill battle to put that right. I don't 'swap' for food, because I want my dogs to retrieve I want a hold proofed against food - so I don't want food wafting around to be the cue to drop an object. If you don't care about that, swapping for food is an ok strategy but it's very obviously a bribe and that has the downsides that you are stuck if you don't have food, and stuck if the item is worth more than the food. What is a better strategy (if you can manage it) is to get the puppy to think approaching you carrying things is a really good idea. This is much easier with an 8 week old puppy that doesn't know that you want what it has, than a 4.5 month old who knows exactly how much you want what he has....but anyway - the way to do it is for treats to magically appear, raining down, whenever the puppy approaches you carrying something. As the puppy turns away for the food, pick up the item without the puppy seeing you do it (so you don't transfer value onto stolen things).
I'm really hoping he doesn't do this with birds when we start hunting. I have practiced retrieve with birds and a training dummy with mostly successful results but not complete success on every retrieve. Some people keep telling me "he will grow out of that", but I don't believe that's the case haha.
"Off" is probably the best command we learnt at puppy class. Our cue is a upwards closed hand holding a treat. Training was with the dogs not holding anything, they only got the treat if they stopped pawing or mouthing our hand...we said "off" and treated. This progressed to dropping whatever they are holding. It works brilliantly and quickly. Now I just need to say "off" and Libby will drop whatever she has- yes in anticipation of a treat but the thing is safe. She does occasionally find things to bring on purpose, they're retrievers after all, but it means she comes to me with the things rather than run away.
Don't be bribing, or chasing your puppy, if you really want to end up with a dog that will bring you a shot bird. When you think about it - a freshly shot lump of dinner is a huge deal to get your dog to give you. You can be having trouble with slippers or the remote control as a starting point to that.... If you really want a dog to retrieve birds, and he is already playing keep away in the house, I recommend you get the Gundog Trust's Right Start and Grade One, written by Pippa.
Thanks for the replies! Deb that sounds like a good way to teach the command, good to know. We have been making progress thanks to trying to be consistent and also working on a better recall. To clarify, he only tries to run and do the keep away thing when we are outside. While in the house he most definitely will put items in his mouth that he shouldn't but has never tried running from me in the house, just waits for me to approach and then usually drops the item but not before disobeying the drop it command from a distance haha. Although he has very little access to the rest of the house outside of his gated off dining room area. What I did was started to walk away and ignore him whenever he even remotely acted like he wanted to play chase while also training a better recall by randomly calling him and using treats as a reward if he came to me then letting him go back to what he was doing. This resulted in me being able to call him to me with the object I didn't want him having or approach him rather consistently when he had the banned object, which allowed me to work on the drop it command up close and would treat him when ever his jaw went loose and dropped the item for me, trying to not let him see me take the item like you mentioned Julie. With the negative reinforcement of ignoring his chase desire, establishing a better recall, and working on a treat rewarded drop it command we have made a good amount of progress I think with the limited amount of time we have been able to work on these things. I also was wondering if any of you had advice for getting commands like drop it and leave it to work well from a distance, it seems he only consistently obeys the drop it when I am up close to him a this point. Feel free to leave more advice/comments if you guys think I am doing something wrong or could be doing something better. Thanks again.
Just move away a tiny bit at a time. Try your cue 1 step away, then 2 etc. Trying it at a big distance in one go is too much for him - he is not understanding what you want. Hope this helps.
If you really want to retrieve seriously, I wouldn't train drop at a distance, just concentrate on the dog moving towards you with whatever he has. You can train a give cue as an alternative to your fetch cue, and this is what I use if the dog has picked something up (rather than me having sent him). In terms of training leave it at a distance, I like to use bowls of food. I have leave it and take it on cue, and increase the distance of me from the food.
