Teaching The Retrieve?

[Kavik]

My main problem seems to be that Diesel pauses once he gets to the dumbell, looks around and then picks it up. Once he picks it up he comes back at a good pace and happily. But he looks a bit unsure? stressed? when he reaches the dumbell. This has improved somewhat by just clicking when he picks up the dumbell and not worrying about whether he drops it or not. He has a good hold so am not too worried about that, though it can be a bit loose at times.

[MonElite]

Dogdude - I would certainly eliminate your point nr 1!!!

But my dog learns very fast and she is more or less a natural retriever.

Plus she likes to carry stuff in her mouth, pretty much anything is good to be carried around.

I knew about the clicker method and attended a workshop with a German schutzhund clicker trainer and she covered how she teaches the retrieve.

I met her about 3 weeks after the workshop and told her that after the workshop I taught my dog to retrive and by then she could also retrieve over a jump. I had to do a demo (on the flat) and the trainer was very impressed.

I guess I paid attention and it paid off

Having said that I havent proofed the excercise as yet, got busy doing something else.

Gotta go back and do more retrieves I think, thank you for reminding me.

[dogdude]

Hi Monelite

Just wondering why do you say "months" of frustration??

Purely my experience when I tried it on my first two trialling dogs. Perhaps I was a crap clicker trainer, or maybe because they were Bull Terriers? I here the same complaints all the time on dol (that it often takes a long time to teach to non retreiving dogs). Perhaps a slight exaggeration.

Hi squeak

Yes, don't move on until you get a calm and solid hold. This is normally the easy part. The hardest part of the whole exercise is to make them reach for it.

Nobody talks about F/R particulary over the net, because there are too many "do's and don'ts" involved. And its not so much to do with wether the dog is suitable for the method, but more to do with wether the handler is suitable. From what I understand, it is still the most common method used to teach retreive in the U.S, particulary in the gundog community.

Like all aversive type methods, the pressure used should be as light as necessary to get a good response. This varys from dog to dog.

If its just a grounding that you want in the method, I have a good book you can borrow. PM your mailing address.

[MonElite]

A friend of mine - old style trainer teaches a retrieve by a forced method and if the dog is fast learner it takes couple of hours all up. The dog retrieveing looking happy etc in about 3 days.

[squeak]

Every time I see a clicker video or such, trying to teach hold and/or retrieve, it seems to me they are causing mental stress to the dog. Teaching hold simply seems easier to me. Gently holding their lower jaw closed and praising.

I have previously tried teaching her this way, but with basically the same result - her throwing the dumbell across the room, even if I remove my hands for a nanosecond.

How frustrating. What does she do, when you keep gently holding her jaw closed?

Any chance someone could Youtube the both of you?

Fogot to reply to you last night lablover. If I try to keep holding her jaw, she starts to try to throw her head around - and if I cannot keep hold, yes she spits it out.

[Kamunyak]

Fogot to reply to you last night lablover. If I try to keep holding her jaw, she starts to try to throw her head around - and if I cannot keep hold, yes she spits it out.

Friend of mine had this problem as well with a lot of mouthing thrown in for good measure. The recomendation to them was to get the dogs nose up so it was harder to spit the item out. For this particular dog it was done by scratching between the eyes as he pushed into it and while he was concentrating on the scratch he forgot to mouth and or spit it out so could be rewarded - the original suggestion was to scratch under the jaw as you could easily position your hand to grab the dumbell if they did try and spit it out from there.

You did mention the fun the dog had with the soft toy so maybe it would be worth getting him to understand the exercise with something he doesn't mind hanging on to - a rolled and taped towel for example. Once he understands the principle of what you are asking it should hopefully then be easy enough to transfer across to the more formal item.

[Dogs4Fun]

She is resenting you holding her mouth tight around an object she clearly doesn't want in her mouth.

In my opinion, you are causing more problems by trying to force the hold in this way, especially if you are otherwise trying to use positive methods to train. I think you need to decide - are you going to do a forced retrieve or positive trained retrieve, then research each step, and stick to one method.

I used a clicker to train two terriers that initially hated retrieving (would refuse to even LOOK at a dumbell), and had happy, reliable retrievers in about 6 months, but took things deliberately very slow, and was very sure that each step was cemented in before moving on.

Could someone have a look at a training session and give you feedback on what they can see? Often a second pair of eyes can reveal the cause of being "stuck".

Cheers

Every time I see a clicker video or such, trying to teach hold and/or retrieve, it seems to me they are causing mental stress to the dog. Teaching hold simply seems easier to me. Gently holding their lower jaw closed and praising.

I have previously tried teaching her this way, but with basically the same result - her throwing the dumbell across the room, even if I remove my hands for a nanosecond.

How frustrating. What does she do, when you keep gently holding her jaw closed?

Any chance someone could Youtube the both of you?

Fogot to reply to you last night lablover. If I try to keep holding her jaw, she starts to try to throw her head around - and if I cannot keep hold, yes she spits it out.

[squeak]

Sorry, I should have clarified. I was originally holding her chin, trying to encourage her to hold the item, but am not longer doing that, as it seemed to be stressing us both out. I only mentioned it as someone asked what happens if...

[dogdude]

The chin hold is only gently done, and it must be the dogs choice to keep hold of it.

It sounds like it could be a motivation related problem.

[Kavik]

I fixed a mouthing/holding issue with Diesel by simply patting his head He thought that my hand coming near dumbell = let go, so I decided to touch end of dumbell then slow gentle pats and his hold got so much better! Ditched the clicker for that part, as I think it was contributing to the problem.