Thread: trouble with bark and hold

Nathan

It’s not really a bad thing for your dog to do a bark and hold by keeping a bit of distance between it and the decoy.

1. It may be giving the decoy the opportunity to run for it so he can have a bite.
2. It is out of range of any attack the decoy may make with an object such as a stick, or by kicking etc. This gives the dog the opportunity and space to engage the decoy on his own terms.

If you want him to stay in close, your decoy could always use his favourite toy and reward the dog with a bite or the toy when the exercise is over.

Peter

Hi Nathan

Your dog is creeping backwards in the bark and hold simply because of being reinforced for this behaviour by the helper. If the helper rewards only correct positioning the dog will quickly understand what is required to achieve drive satisfaction.This also obviously depends on whether you are trying to teach a sport or service hold and bark. Take the dog back to just asking for one bark in the correct position and reinforce ,when the dog understands this concept ask for more barking and increase the time between the reinforcement.
Good luck with your training

Regards

Paul

If your helper utilises the dog’s toy (a ball on a rope say) which puts the dog in prey drive; throw it a few times (you not the helper) beforehand to put the dog in drive and get the dog to bark each time before you throw it. Your helper can then go through the usual routine and when the dog finds him he encourages continuous barking and correct positioning of the dog using the ball. Until the dog is positioning correctly (close in) and barking, he does not reward the dog with the ball. This should be enacted quite a number of times (your dog should be kept on a line so that you can prevent contact with the helper), and gradually the time (before you reward him) should be extended until he is barking close in to the helper and non-stop until the handler (you) allow the helper to reward your dog with the ball. At first the ball should be just visible behind the sleeve, so that the dog is barking for it. Once you’ve got to the point of the dog knowing that the helper has the ball, and is barking close in for it, your next step is to have the helper conceal the ball behind the sleeve. At this stage your dog should be finding the helper and barking in the correct position until you arrive. Obviously, while the dog is giving you what you want in each of the stages, you should be praising him.

Once you have achieved the above, and you feel happy with him, the helper continues the next session by NOT taking the ball; instead you reward the dog when it does the bark and hold properly (i.e. in the correct position and barking continuously). Once you’ve got this far, and after a number of sessions, you can then decide whether you want to continue with the ball reward (given by you), or give the dog a bite-reward, or in fact change his reward to praise only. There is no reason (in fact it’s good practice) not to continue to reward your dog with his ball well after this exercise.........in fact this should happen after all training so that your dog finishes in a positive frame of mind, looking forward to the next training session.

If your dog won’t chase a ball, you have a drive problem and need to work on that before training Hold & Bark training.

Peter

Nathan

I should add that initially I train this exercise WITHOUT the helper wearing a sleeve, so that the dog’s focus is on the ball only. Needless to say the dog is on a line. I should also add that when giving a bite reward for Hold & Bark, I allow only one bite reward in six sessions, and that is ONLY after the dog is achieving a decent Hold & Bark.

Cheers
Peter

Nathan

Here is a Rottie doing a hold and bark. This is a very impressive dog, and it's Hold & Bark is excellent.

Peter

Hi all,

I'd like to add another angle to this topic on bark and hold. Not wanting to cause conflict in this discussion but in my opinion, training a bark and hold whether it is for a service dog or a sport dog is done by utilising the dog's natural drives to create a detaining behaviour. The use of a ball in training a bark and hold is purely trick training and has nothing to do with teaching the dog to detain a suspect or helper. If a dog is barking at the helper for a ball as reinforcement, he is working only in play/prey drive, not what we really want.

The dog must genetically possess the following traits in order to undertake security/police work:

a) prey drive
b) active dominance based aggression, as opposed to reactive fear based agression
c) courage
d) hardness
e) the dog also needs to have natural suspicion and medium level of sharpness
f) strong nerves

I don't like the word defence, as defence denotes fear. What we are all looking for is a dog with natural combative instinct or fight drive - a term which is overused by many people. Just because a dog is biting a sleeve or suit does not mean the dog is in fight or combat. Combative fight drive is a genetic trait that only certain bloodlines carry.

If a dog won't chase a tennis ball, the dog is obviously lacking instinctive prey drive, which is one of the most important drive components in teaching the foundation training of bite and grip development and is used to relieve stress when the helper takes on a more challenging role during bitework as the dog matures.

Once the dog is mentally and physically mature and has had correct foundation training, conflict can be introduced to teach the dog how to overcome physical and mental stresses put on him by the helper, which will enable him to break through and engage in combat to achieve drive satisfaction. Through scenario training we condition the dog to become prepared for real life situations that may be encountered on the street.

The other thing you may want to consider is that in what scenario during the dogs role as a security dog would a bark and hold be used?

Food for thought....

Paul