I'm having a problem with Scout and getting her to sit away from me. She is 10 weeks old today. I have her to the point where she will "sit" for me without rewards consistently. 5 times out of 5. I have been trying to teach her to "sit" when she is at a distance away from me. When she wanders away I try giving the command and she always comes back to me and sits right next to me. Any suggestions on how to get her to sit right where she is? Thanks.
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. You don`t say how far you are going "away" but my suggestion would be only a pace away and work up VERY SLOWLY from that point. 10 weeks is still very young!!
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. Thanks. I know she is young. I keep telling myself that. I think I may have been too far away. I was standing about 8-10 feet away. I will try it closer and see how she reacts.
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. I think at 10 weeks the fact she is sitting nicely is brilliant. Give her time, she has only just left her doggy family so probably needs to be closer to you for a while before she is confident to be on her own. Enjoy her
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. I totally agree , to achieve a SIT is really great , she is very young indeed to be progressing further . Keep training sessions really short, pups get bored so quickly and then it becomes counter productive , keep it fun and lots of praise, good luck
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. I agree with the other posters - very well done for getting a good 'sit' so early on. I'm guessing that you started by rewarding the 'sits' with treats and/or verbal praise. Therefore your pup associates the command and action with getting these rewards and quite reasonably has decided that there's a better chance of getting them if she's close to you. To be able to sit on command at distance she'll have to have grasped the idea that the reward will come, but not immediately, and this needs maturity and experience. If you feel she's soaking up the training and could do more, have you tried introducing the 'down' position, recalls or even little informal puppy retrieves? All these will give her confidence and build your training relationship so she can move on to really tricky things like sit-at-distance (and it is tricky) in the future. In one so young it's a good idea to keep intermittently rewarding with treats even if she seems very reliable as without as she might lose interest if there's never a tangible reward.
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. When we teach dogs something they can be very specific about it. You have probably spent a lot of time teaching her to sit right next to you or in front of you. In her mind, 'sit' doesn't mean 'put your bottom on the ground right now, wherever you are'. It means 'put your bottom on the ground next to me (ie the heel posiyion)'. The action and the location are tied up together. When you tell her to sit, she comes over to you and sits - exactly what you have taught her. She is obeying perfectly! She is probably a bit confused about why it's suddenly not paying dividends. Now are effectively wanting to teach her that 'sit means put your bottom on the ground right where you are, without moving your feet, regardless of where I am'. That is a fairly advanced exercise. First I would just work on teaching her to sit in difference positions around you (at the front, on your right) so she learns that it doesn't always have to be beside you. You may need to go back to basics (like luring) for a few goes as in her head this may well be a totally different exercise. Once you have mastered that then have a read of all the 'stop whistle' training articles on the main site. Effectively they are all about training your dog to sit on the spot the moment they get a sit cue (aka 'stop whistle'). I would go about teaching the 'sit at a distance' using the stop whistle technique. But, don't be in a hurry. At our dog club the 'sit at a distance' is not introduced until dogs have done 6 months of training It's not really an exercise for a baby puppy brain
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. So she can sit on command, great Now forget about sitting at distance, that pup is too young for that carry on. Recall Recall Recall. Thats what you want to be doing. Your pup is going to be running to you alot, when she is, give that a word and repeat it as she is running to you, it's not a command 'YET'. It's conditioning...... Have some fun with your pup, and let her be a pup.
Re: Getting her to sit.....away from me. Just wanted to say Tillydyes I love your reply. If there was a "like" function I would use it
