I'm a little muddy on this. I understand wait to mean "wait until I give another command" and stay to mean "stay there until I say so". They seem the same to me. Another thing I read was wait = pause, as in "wait a bit then do whatever you want (within the bounds of acceptable behavior )", and stay meaning "wait until I tell you what to do next". Help appreciated.
It means whatever you train it to mean For example I have sit which means put your but on the ground and then I say wait which means do nothing else until told otherwise. I tried to have sit mean don't move until told otherwise but other people didn't ensure that cue was consistent so I had to train a wait (some might train it as stay). Try not to get hung up on the words. As I said above cues mean what you train them to mean. Be consistent with the meaning, that's the key
Axel's training class, wait is described as temporary. Example 'wait' while you open the door and get you and what ever or who ever else out the door before your dog. Or 'wait' to get out of the car while you make sure it's safe to do so. Stay is to be held for a length of time until you release the dog. Example sometimes I get Axel to lie down beside me while I eat and I say stay until we are done and then I say 'ok good stay' to release him. Or to stay in his bed while I am mopping or vacuuming until I release him. Hope that helps. That's just what we have been taught each class so it's what I've been doing.
It really doesn't matter what cue word you use as long as you use it consistently. With Molly I use stay to mean stay in that position until I either tell you to do something else or release you. I use 'wait' to mean 'stop' - if she's getting a bit too far ahead on an off-lead walk, I call 'wait' and she waits ( in any position) until I catch up. At the dog club where I did the KC good citizen scheme, one trainer likes people to use 'wait' when the dog is going to be recalled and 'stay' when you're going to go back to your dog. At another dog club where I go for competitive obedience classes, the trainer says there should be no need for a 'stay' command, as 'sit' should mean sit until I tell you otherwise ( but as Molly is accustomed to the 'stay'command it's quite hard to dispense with it.) So as I say, pick what suits you and train it.
I don't have a wait or a stay cue. When I ask them to do something, I expect them to do it until they're released. So, "sit" is, "sit until I say otherwise". It's strange, normally I'm very verbose and would leap at the opportunity to use more words
For us, "wait" is stay where you are until we give the release cue "ok"...we use it for getting out of the car, eating, taking a toy/treat, when I've taken off the leash but not released her to run off. "Stay" is in a sit or down and followed by another command, usually "come" and it includes distance, time and distractions. For example, our current "stay" work is her in the park in a down while i circle her or run and then call her to me. We also use stay as part of games - such as finding a ball we have hidden so the release there is "find your ball" and off she runs.
I never fully comprehended the reason for "wait" when we already had "stay." We learned "heel" was a position in relation to my body whether the dog was moving or not. So to me, "Stay" was similar in that it applied regardless of dog position or my position till told otherwise. Dog position was determined by preceding the "stay" with sit, down or stand. Ditto "down" was a position but when doing a drop on recall lots in our training class used "drop" instead of "down." To them, I guess, whether the dog was moving first made a difference and I'm sure it does to some.
And this is the reason I don't use it at all. I really don't understand the difference between "wait" and "stay", anyway, however much people try to explain the applications - you're still telling your dog not to move out of position until cued, or am I wrong? To go back to my point, when you say "sit...stay", are you saying that every other time you say "sit", they can stand up again immediately? What value does "stay" bring to the party? To my dogs, being told to sit applies regardless of where they are and what I do afterwards. I'm not saying it's wrong to use a cue, but I haven't yet been able to work out its value. If someone can explain it to me (and I promise I'm not being obstructive, I really, quite honestly, don't get it!) then please feel free to try
the problem with sit is not everyone who told Riley to sit would release him or cue him to do something else so eventually he'd get up AND THEY'D LET HIM AAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!! So I had to add a stay or in my case I used "Wait" Other people wouldn't use Wait so that cue wasn't damaged. I could have used an alternate sit cue to mean park until I say otherwise but I didn't, I added an additional cue.
Me? Just how I was taught I guess. We learned sit. Yes, they are expected to remain sitting till told other wise. But in competitive obedience we learned stay separately, I guess so we could work on lengthening it to the three minutes out of sight. I never asked why but now I wonder if it's because we needed to indicate that WE would be moving on without the dog after having taught a heel continued after a sit unless told to stay. Stay has it's own particular hand signal. And then, once you move up abit in obedience you can't say or hand signal these things. ????
Thanks all, much food for thought. I like the idea of teaching wait to mean "hang on for a minute", eg not barging through doors, stopping on walks, etc. I will teach stay more for formal training class recall type work, as outside of class I don't see the practical use. Other than posing for pictures or the rare moment when I need him to stay put no matter what.
Palm to dog, fingers pointing up, hand vertical (or slanted a bit if dog is low down) and pushed to dog a bit or just held up. Probably very much the same thing you do anyway to tell someone, "Stay out the floor's wet." When we started teaching it our fingers were down, now that I think of it. Bet others have different ones.
Yep, me too. EVERYONE tells my dogs to sit. Vets. Vets are the worst. Every vet picks up a treat (at the end of the appointment), holds it up, bribing my dog, and says SIT! Duh. My dogs sit and then get straight back up again. Ditto people in the street, my OH, my Dad....drives me mad. Wait is my cue and I hide it from people, because everyone uses Stay too - which my dogs happily ignore, or stay for about 10 seconds. Wait has been trained and proofed properly though. I use it a lot, it's a hugely useful cue.
We use 'wait' meaning wait for the next command, keep your attention on me. 'Stay' meaning relax but stay where you are, you may be some time and may go to sleep.
I think it comes back to my dogs responding very differently to me than to other people. They will respond to other people, but there's far more of an attitude of "what's in it for me?" about them. When I tell them to sit, they know it means sit and stay. When other people say sit, they know it's "get your bum on the floor sometime this week, after twenty repetitions". They're great at contextualising I heard in obedience that you teach the dog to carry on heeling depending on which leg you lead with when you walk off? So, start with the leg closest to dog, dog follows; start with farthest leg, dog stays sat? I know I would never be able to remember which leg to use myself, but if you can't use verbal signals, I suppose something has to take its place So, my equivalent here would be - your "wait" is the same as my lack of cue (I'd have them sitting or laying down or whatever and expect them to be paying attention to me while doing so). And your "stay" is my "settle", meaning they can sit, stand, lay down, whatever they fancy, just stay in the same spot and know they're not needed to be "switched on". Why, oh why, oh why are people so desperate to make dogs sit?! The first thing they do after meeting a dog is say, "sit". I want to start saying it to their children! Or them! "Hi, Jeffrey, good to see you. You're looking well. Sit, boy! Sit! Sit! SIT!"
I'm the same as Fiona, we don't have a "stay" or "wait", "sit" means sit until told otherwise - either another cue like "heel" or "down"..or a release, "ok". Same with "down". Coco is also good at contextualising..I've only just thought about this and realised it.
I try to remember to lead with the correct leg, but in the UK you can give as many verbal commands and physical signals as you like in the early classes (pre-beginner, beginner and novice) and in the next class, A, I think it's one simultaneous command and signal for each movement. How on earth people & dogs achieve what they do at the championship level I don't know - the dogs seem to read the humans' minds!
I use 'stay' and have instructed my OH (hehe) to use 'wait'. My 'stay' means stay where you are, in the position you are in, until I release you (with a release cue or other instruction) where as my husband's 'wait' cue means stay where you are until I get distracted, forget that I have told you to stay there and you can eventually wander off and that's fine
