So I have been following the steps of Total Recall - only got to Exercise Four as I'm doing each one thoroughly. But... My OH took Bruno for a walk over the weekend, in a quiet field, no other dogs so she let him off the lead. Shortly after another dog entered the field (one that isn't the nicest and has snapped previously) so Bruno was called back, nothing (obviously), the other dog was right at the end of the field and Bruno then started to sprint towards it. My OH panicking, knowing what the other dog is like decided to blow the whistle not once (he didn't listen of course, but three times! - three loads of 4 "pips"). The thing is I know that he was set up to fail, so isn't his fault. Question is what do I do now? Has he now built up the defense to ignore the whistle? Can I just start again from exercise one? Or go back a step? Or do I now need a new recall noise? Can this be just a series of three pips? I'm so gutted as Ive put so much effort into this.
Re: HELP!? RECALL I personally would just ignore that one failure and continue. Although, if you don't want your dog to run to other dogs, you need him on a long line. You also need to train him not to run to other dogs in addition to training a recall because a) stopping a dog with a recall when he is heading away from you at speed is very difficult (a stop whistle is usually better for this) and b) you will anyway ruin your recall in no time if you use it to call your dog away from other dogs all the time.
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10493.msg154992#msg154992 date=1428417071] I personally would just ignore that one failure and continue. [/quote] Me too. Lesson learned and move on
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10493.msg154992#msg154992 date=1428417071] I personally would just ignore that one failure and continue. Although, if you don't want your dog to run to other dogs, you need him on a long line. You also need to train him not to run to other dogs in addition to training a recall because a) stopping a dog with a recall when he is heading away from you at speed is very difficult (a stop whistle is usually better for this) and b) you will anyway ruin your recall in no time if you use it to call your dog away from other dogs all the time. [/quote] I understand this, and try to avoid being in the situation of having to recall away from a dog - as read in the forum a while back I try to spot any distractions before he does, and then clip on the lead. Ive been reading upon the stop whistle today on a different thread, and will try to implement this in the next few weeks after reading in more detail. Thanks for your prompt and helpful response, as always.
Re: HELP!? RECALL The first strategy for stopping a dog running to another dog is to train him to keep his attention on you outside. Broadly, this is done by making it very rewarding for him to watch you and keep tabs on you. You want your dog listening out for your recall all the time, hoping to hear it, because that means something interesting is going to happen. So that basically means playing with your dog - retrieving is one game, but there are loads of others - and rewarding with food all attention voluntarily offered. Once you have your dog's attention outside, and it's become automatic, all sorts of things - including recall - are a lot easier to train. But only training recall, and not working on getting your dog's attention, means you have all your eggs in the recall basket, which is a lot to ask of one cue...
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10493.msg154996#msg154996 date=1428418060] The first strategy for stopping a dog running to another dog is to train him to keep his attention on you outside. Broadly, this is done by making it very rewarding for him to watch you and keep tabs on you. You want your dog listening out for your recall all the time, hoping to hear it, because that means something interesting is going to happen. So that basically means playing with your dog - retrieving is one game, but there are loads of others - and rewarding with food all attention voluntarily offered. Once you have your dog's attention outside, and it's become automatic, all sorts of things - including recall - are a lot easier to train. But only training recall, and not working on getting your dog's attention, means you have all your eggs in the recall basket, which is a lot to ask of one cue... [/quote] I know I need to be more appealing to him, having being very little experienced I now know I did things a bit later than I maybe should've. I do now though praise any attention he does give me (very little) and his love for food (before he was ill) when outside seems to be non-existent? Have you ever came across this? If there are no dogs he still doesn't seem to be interested in treats, hot dogs/ dog biscuits - even when stuck right in front of his nose. He has been under the weather the last few days, having got a cold, chest infection and eye infection his training has been little with him being on antibiotics and not so interested in his food.
Re: HELP!? RECALL Some dogs aren't so food orientated as others so treat rewards for attention don't have the same impact. I know many GSD who aren't food orientated for training but love squeaky toys or balls. Just a question of what you dog loves most - apart from you of course.
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=Markieee link=topic=10493.msg155001#msg155001 date=1428418678] I know I need to be more appealing to him, having being very little experienced I now know I did things a bit later than I maybe should've. I do now though praise any attention he does give me (very little) and his love for food (before he was ill) when outside seems to be non-existent? Have you ever came across this? If there are no dogs he still doesn't seem to be interested in treats, hot dogs/ dog biscuits - even when stuck right in front of his nose. He has been under the weather the last few days, having got a cold, chest infection and eye infection his training has been little with him being on antibiotics and not so interested in his food. [/quote] It's not really a case of the dog not being interested in food outside - unless they are stressed or very excited, but leave that aside for the moment. You can't really use anything effectively as a bribe, either because it's not possible to compete with the environment, or because your bribe will be short lived. So not being able to get your dog's attention by wafting food around doesn't mean anything (luckily ). That single bit of chicken is never really going to be worth giving up other dogs, exciting smells etc. But it doesn't really work like that. What you have to do is reward repeatedly, again, and again, and again - in this way, the dog starts to associate an action with a reward and then the history you build up in rewarding that action eventually means it becomes automatic. So you first have to get the behaviour you want to reward. If that's attention one way to do this is to "capture it" that means waiting for it to happen, marking it, and rewarding it. I did this with a clicker and roast chicken - for hundreds of hours. Once I'd done it for ages, it started to become automatic. So start somewhere that's a bit boring, say a very familiar field without other dogs, and build up from there. But it's slow at first, and don't think it's not going to take months, because it's going to take months. If you have to start somewhere where there is absolutely nothing else for your dog to do, well start there. I don't believe any dog is uninterested in food, really - they have to eat to live. So train with a hungry dog, in a boring place, with super treats.... You can use games as rewards too, I use reward balls, tug and a few other games. It works very well and is very powerful for a dog addicted to games (as mine is). But food is a lot more convenient, and a lot quicker, when you want to mark and reward something like attention.
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10493.msg155009#msg155009 date=1428420595] [quote author=Markieee link=topic=10493.msg155001#msg155001 date=1428418678] I know I need to be more appealing to him, having being very little experienced I now know I did things a bit later than I maybe should've. I do now though praise any attention he does give me (very little) and his love for food (before he was ill) when outside seems to be non-existent? Have you ever came across this? If there are no dogs he still doesn't seem to be interested in treats, hot dogs/ dog biscuits - even when stuck right in front of his nose. He has been under the weather the last few days, having got a cold, chest infection and eye infection his training has been little with him being on antibiotics and not so interested in his food. [/quote] It's not really a case of the dog not being interested in food outside - unless they are stressed or very excited, but leave that aside for the moment. You can't really use anything effectively as a bribe, either because it's not possible to compete with the environment, or because your bribe will be short lived. So not being able to get your dog's attention by wafting food around doesn't mean anything (luckily ). That single bit of chicken is never really going to be worth giving up other dogs, exciting smells etc. But it doesn't really work like that. What you have to do is reward repeatedly, again, and again, and again - in this way, the dog starts to associate an action with a reward and then the history you build up in rewarding that action eventually means it becomes automatic. So you first have to get the behaviour you want to reward. If that's attention one way to do this is to "capture it" that means waiting for it to happen, marking it, and rewarding it. I did this with a clicker and roast chicken - for hundreds of hours. Once I'd done it for ages, it started to become automatic. So start somewhere that's a bit boring, say a very familiar field without other dogs, and build up from there. But it's slow at first, and don't think it's not going to take months, because it's going to take months. If you have to start somewhere where there is absolutely nothing else for your dog to do, well start there. I don't believe any dog is uninterested in food, really - they have to eat to live. So train with a hungry dog, in a boring place, with super treats.... You can use games as rewards too, I use reward balls, tug and a few other games. It works very well and is very powerful for a dog addicted to games (as mine is). But food is a lot more convenient, and a lot quicker, when you want to mark and reward something like attention. [/quote] I know i expect way more from him than I should, so that's my fault. You say start in a boring place, so what I could do is start in my front "garden" (smallish paved area, which is enclosed, not a lot of interesting things) and then whenever he looks at me/ pays any attention to me I should reward him - this being a food treat or a game of tug maybe? Then maybe take this to the local field, where there is rarely any other dogs, and as soon as he pays any attention reward, and just do this as many times as possible until it becomes learned/ automatic?
Re: HELP!? RECALL That's about it, yes. Although your front garden sounds very boring (I mean that in a nice way ) so hopefully you can progress out of there quite quickly. Think about using a "marker" a word or a clicker to mark the instant he looks your way, or even starts to look your way if that's all you get at first. Here is Charlie on quite an interesting walk (it's an area with a lot of rabbits, and busy with a lot of dogs - so super smells) getting rewarded each time he looks at me. It's not a very interesting video, but if you can stand to watch it (it is like watching paint dry) you'll see that when I go under the trees and can't see him, I don't use his recall - I don't need to - I just need to make any sound for him to come to me. This is because leading up to that point he had been rewarded for paying attention to me, so only needed the smallest prompt to do so when he was busy doing his own thing. https://www.flickr.com/photos/123706979@N04/16688575445/ It took about 6 months of work to get from a dog who would leg it to the nearest source of excitement, completely ignoring me, when his lead came off, to this.
Re: HELP!? RECALL To add, I've been using the steps that Julie has mentioned with my two over the last few weeks and the difference is absolutely phenomenal. Mine are young (only 8 months) so hadn't got to the stage where they learnt that their environment can be a million times more interesting than me, but were on that path. By C&Ting every check-in for the last few weeks, they are so much more attentive in every environment. Yes, they still smell great things and get engrossed in them, but combining the C&Ts for check-ins with generally being the giver of all things good (catch games, chase games, treats etc) along with turn-about walks, they're always keeping an eye on me. The thing about making any noise to get them to come back is also something I can vouch for. Anything I say to them elicits a response of some sort without me worrying about breaking my recall. They came back to "hippo!!!!!" today..... ;D
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10493.msg155012#msg155012 date=1428422090] That's about it, yes. Although your front garden sounds very boring (I mean that in a nice way ) so hopefully you can progress out of there quite quickly. Think about using a "marker" a word or a clicker to mark the instant he looks your way, or even starts to look your way if that's all you get at first. Here is Charlie on quite an interesting walk (it's an area with a lot of rabbits, and busy with a lot of dogs - so super smells) getting rewarded each time he looks at me. It's not a very interesting video, but if you can stand to watch it (it is like watching paint dry) you'll see that when I go under the trees and can't see him, I don't use his recall - I don't need to - I just need to make any sound for him to come to me. This is because leading up to that point he had been rewarded for paying attention to me, so only needed the smallest prompt to do so when he was busy doing his own thing. https://www.flickr.com/photos/123706979@N04/16688575445/ It took about 6 months of work to get from a dog who would leg it to the nearest source of excitement, completely ignoring me, when his lead came off, to this. [/quote] Love the video! Have started to be more appealing and rewarding any non-cued looks at me with treats or a game of fetch. Thanks for all your help!
Re: HELP!? RECALL Bella just keeps legging it to other dogs even when there's roast chicken on offer, which I know she loves!!! I'm going to have to keep her on a training line or clipping her lead back on if dogs do appear and will keep trying with the non cued look at me too :-[
Re: HELP!? RECALL This is all really excellent (as always). Can I just ask, in those moments when you've not noticed the approaching dog and your dog goes bounding off, what should you do? Just let them go and go back to working on keeping your dog's attention? Or would you say don't let him/her off the training line / lead until you're sure you can keep your dog's attention? The main thing with B is that she becomes a "kissing pogo stick" with the other dog's owner, that really MUST stop Also..... I've noticed that at times when I recall Bonnie she seems to hesitate and do a 360 degree scan.... almost as if she's looking to see what the distraction is I'm recalling her from!!! Is that possible? Could she have learned that? I don't use her recall just when there's a distraction, I use it several times on a walk, distractions or none, just to keep it fresh. Maybe I should stop doing that and do click/treat for every time she looks at me. (However, that could be a lot as she's already pretty focused on me. If she's wandered off all I need to do is stop walking and she looks up when there's no footstep sounds. This is because she's always been a tad nervous, not because I'm good at keeping her attention!). I think I'm becoming obsessed with the science of recall! ??? I need to get out more!
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=Bonnie link=topic=10493.msg156280#msg156280 date=1428920264] This is all really excellent (as always). Can I just ask, in those moments when you've not noticed the approaching dog and your dog goes bounding off, what should you do? Just let them go and go back to working on keeping your dog's attention? Or would you say don't let him/her off the training line / lead until you're sure you can keep your dog's attention? The main thing with B is that she becomes a "kissing pogo stick" with the other dog's owner, that really MUST stop [/quote] Plan A is not to let this happen because the more your dog legs it to another dog, and then has great fun when she gets there, the more she is going to leg it to another dog. If this happens to me, I go and get my dog (well, these days my recall would work, and I can use it because he doesn't leg it to other dogs very often, but unless I'm 100% sure of that, I go get my dog). If your dog jumps up at people, definitely go and get your dog right away. Blowing your recall when your dog is running very fast away from you to another dog is very risky, unless you know this is going to work, don't do it. Even now, I don't do it, but will use my stop whistle, which has been well proofed with a lot of other dogs. [quote author=Bonnie link=topic=10493.msg156280#msg156280 date=1428920264] Also..... I've noticed that at times when I recall Bonnie she seems to hesitate and do a 360 degree scan.... almost as if she's looking to see what the distraction is I'm recalling her from!!! Is that possible? Could she have learned that? [/quote] Yes, definitely. You need to work on your recall until you get an instant "spin round" on your recall, no hesitation and a look round first.
Re: HELP!? RECALL I agree with Julie about preferably not letting the situation arise. If either of mine gets excited when another dog is approaching, I tend to shout to the other owner to keep their dog back until I get mine to calm down, then we approach in a controlled manner. To be honest, though, I'm lucky because mine are not generally interested in unknown dogs at all. We walked past a Yorkie earlier that was straining at its lead to get to us. Shadow barely raised an eyebrow at it. I do try to make myself super exciting throughout my time with my dogs, though, and I think that is really helping with keeping them more focussed on me than other people or animals. Disgustingly tasty morsels are a different matter, though, and something I need to work on when it comes to stopping them from running off when they get a whiff!
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10493.msg156284#msg156284 date=1428922282] [quote author=Bonnie link=topic=10493.msg156280#msg156280 date=1428920264] This is all really excellent (as always). Can I just ask, in those moments when you've not noticed the approaching dog and your dog goes bounding off, what should you do? Just let them go and go back to working on keeping your dog's attention? Or would you say don't let him/her off the training line / lead until you're sure you can keep your dog's attention? The main thing with B is that she becomes a "kissing pogo stick" with the other dog's owner, that really MUST stop [/quote] Plan A is not to let this happen because the more your dog legs it to another dog, and then has great fun when she gets there, the more she is going to leg it to another dog. If this happens to me, I go and get my dog (well, these days my recall would work, and I can use it because he doesn't leg it to other dogs very often, but unless I'm 100% sure of that, I go get my dog). If your dog jumps up at people, definitely go and get your dog right away. This happened to me again today, I had her attention on me with dogs in the distance, then another dog appeared and off she went :-[ I didn't even bother with the recall, just said her name but she ignored me, so I just trotted after her , the other dog and the owner, and caught her when I got a chance, then popped her back on lead. These girls ;D
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=snowbunny link=topic=10493.msg156286#msg156286 date=1428923023] I agree with Julie about preferably not letting the situation arise. If either of mine gets excited when another dog is approaching, I tend to shout to the other owner to keep their dog back until I get mine to calm down, then we approach in a controlled manner. To be honest, though, I'm lucky because mine are not generally interested in unknown dogs at all. We walked past a Yorkie earlier that was straining at its lead to get to us. Shadow barely raised an eyebrow at it. I do try to make myself super exciting throughout my time with my dogs, though, and I think that is really helping with keeping them more focussed on me than other people or animals. Disgustingly tasty morsels are a different matter, though, and something I need to work on when it comes to stopping them from running off when they get a whiff! [/quote] Do you think this has anything to do with there being 2 of them as well that they are less interested in other dogs cos they play so much together? Or just the way they are? ( and you being super exciting too of course ;D)
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=CDM link=topic=10493.msg156343#msg156343 date=1428947942] [quote author=snowbunny link=topic=10493.msg156286#msg156286 date=1428923023] I agree with Julie about preferably not letting the situation arise. If either of mine gets excited when another dog is approaching, I tend to shout to the other owner to keep their dog back until I get mine to calm down, then we approach in a controlled manner. To be honest, though, I'm lucky because mine are not generally interested in unknown dogs at all. We walked past a Yorkie earlier that was straining at its lead to get to us. Shadow barely raised an eyebrow at it. I do try to make myself super exciting throughout my time with my dogs, though, and I think that is really helping with keeping them more focussed on me than other people or animals. Disgustingly tasty morsels are a different matter, though, and something I need to work on when it comes to stopping them from running off when they get a whiff! [/quote] Do you think this has anything to do with there being 2 of them as well that they are less interested in other dogs cos they play so much together? Or just the way they are? ( and you being super exciting too of course ;D) [/quote] I don't think it has anything to do with there being two of them, because I do a lot of their walking separately and even when we first had Willow before we got Shadow, she wasn't really interested in other dogs. I think I'm a bit lucky (as well as being super exciting, of course!)
Re: HELP!? RECALL [quote author=snowbunny link=topic=10493.msg156421#msg156421 date=1428962278] [quote author=CDM link=topic=10493.msg156343#msg156343 date=1428947942] [quote author=snowbunny link=topic=10493.msg156286#msg156286 date=1428923023] I agree with Julie about preferably not letting the situation arise. If either of mine gets excited when another dog is approaching, I tend to shout to the other owner to keep their dog back until I get mine to calm down, then we approach in a controlled manner. To be honest, though, I'm lucky because mine are not generally interested in unknown dogs at all. We walked past a Yorkie earlier that was straining at its lead to get to us. Shadow barely raised an eyebrow at it. I do try to make myself super exciting throughout my time with my dogs, though, and I think that is really helping with keeping them more focussed on me than other people or animals. Disgustingly tasty morsels are a different matter, though, and something I need to work on when it comes to stopping them from running off when they get a whiff! [/quote] Do you think this has anything to do with there being 2 of them as well that they are less interested in other dogs cos they play so much together? Or just the way they are? ( and you being super exciting too of course ;D) [/quote] I don't think it has anything to do with there being two of them, because I do a lot of their walking separately and even when we first had Willow before we got Shadow, she wasn't really interested in other dogs. I think I'm a bit lucky (as well as being super exciting, of course!) [/quote] I so need your excitement, I've tried squeaky toys and games of tug that she LOVES indoors but she's just not interested outdoors likes to sniff, keeps checking in, chases me when I run away, but as soon as there is another dog, bye bye :-\ I'm being good and getting her on lead ASAP but obviously some dogs just appear so I'm not using recall just collecting her : I must say when dogs are in the distance she looks ... but doesn't run away.... so there's something about that, she also was sitting on request today (on lead) watching the other dogs but not pulling loads so I kept c&t. I might trial my friend and her dog getting closer and me running away too to see what she does, but with unfamiliar dogs and owners I daren't in case I lose her! Or she gets snatched ( anxious puppy mum!) ;D
