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cwalt

MH
Posts:180

08/21/2008 6:30 AM
Jere Murray wrote: > Ken was able to train his pointers to "sit" (in the British sense) and found that > once they realized they would be promptly rewarded with a release to continue the > action they wanted most - to run, they rapidly and enthusiastically complied with > the "sit" command - which initially they had hated. > > Similarly, I used the black dog's intense "drive" to run and retrieve to train the > remote "sit" (in the USA retriever protocol sense) and found the dog behaved > similarly to Ken's pointers. > > It is not the command that becomes self-reinforceing in these cases; rather an > intrinsic reward follows compliance to the command in the training environment as > well as in the dog's everyday working environment so the proper response to the > command is regularly reinforced by the occurance of that intrinsic reward. > > Jere > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I understand what you mean, I use a similar system with my young dogs, when we're out for a run I wait until the pup is heading towards me and then kneel, spread my arms and call the pup. This is only to praise them, give a stroke or a quick pat and then I tell them to run on again. All too often the recall for a pup means end of fun, back on lead. I show them that the recall is only a pleasurable interlude that doesn't end the fun until they're tired and ready to quit. I've always been able to make my retrieve training sessions into a game in which the whoa or sit is the prelude to a toss of the training dummy. I haven't really had any problems since for me the retrieving work is a game and my dogs accept it as such. Some of our best sessions over the years have been with three dogs at the same time when I send them by name for the retrieve and they are always eager to get on with the game... these aren't retrievers but shorthairs, Griffons and wirehairs. They also learn that if they get too excited over retrieving games they have to slow up and the other dogs go before them. I got these results only after I started working on retrieves alone with the dogs where I could relax and not wonder if I were doing it right... I'm certain that changed my body language. The retriever exercises are chaining games for my dogs and I teach them as games. I know a lot of fellows that are dead serious about their training and retrieving is a test of wills between man and dog. That always leads to problems in the long run. Sometimes you get an over excitable dog, some wirehair lines are like that, and they get to whining and barking to get their turn at the dummies... I have to calm down these dogs and I don't work them in groups until they have learned some restraint. I know some trainers who would get rid of a dog that whined. Cj

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