where to from here?

**Bernie** · 12-18-2010, 09:06 AM

Bernie is our family pet. Bought for me by my husband, as i wanted a dog i could do dog sports with as a hobby.
So, did all the socialising, basic obedience through GSD Victoria. End result lovely natured family pet that is obedient. No dog aggression, or people aggression. Very different from my rotties, who loved us, not keen on other dogs though.
Ive had rotties before, never trained a GSD. So this was my challenge. How far can i take my dog, training wise?
I discovered training in drive for the first time ever. We (dog/me) are very excited by this type of training, and he is so 'lit up' for this, in comparison to my previous obedience training say. So, this is the rd im taking with him.
I have been gratefully linked to a trainer, (kindly recommended here - thankyou!) and cant wait for our first lesson.
my question(s)
1. dog has very strong prey drive, working stock, sheep farmers.
when training using his prey item, i dont have much control. I heard that it maybe best to use food instead of toy, so less excited. But he wont eat when we are working. Not till i say 'ok' meaning, that's it, we are done. Will he take food. Any suggestions?

2. We had a new neighbour move in with a cat. Previously Bernie was great with cats, or should i say neutral. Didnt show interest, which is what i wanted. The next door cat, sits on our fence, waving his tail and teasing the dog. Bernie has worked out, if you take a long run and bump the fence the cat 'sometimes' falls off! And then he'll chase it. So, its behaviour that is being re-inforced.
I have a mate who owns cats, willing to let me use them to train Bernie not to do this. How could i go about re training him not to pester cats?

3. Tracking. Where do people, how do people start this training. Bernie has had nothing in this dept. so far. I do however notice that he cant find his toy in long grass, doesnt appear to scent it at all. Just randomly runs in circles till he stumbles upon it. Where should i start?

He's 14 months. very confident in any environment. Im not a pro, clearly lol, just a pet owner, who has high drive for quality time with my dog daily.

thankyou in advance.

**Neville Patterson** · 12-18-2010, 10:11 AM

Hi Bernie,

When training in drive, you want the reward to be the most exciting thing for the dog, so if toys excite the dog more than food, stick with toys. The basic principal of training in drive, is teaching the dog a command and then using a release word like OK and rewarding the dog with the toy. The dog learns that obeying a command results in a reward which escalates the dog's enthusiasm to work. It takes time and consistancy to condition the responses you need from the dog, but ideally, handler control and motivation from the dog will be greatly increased.

Cheers
Nev

**Vendo Vincent** · 12-18-2010, 10:43 AM

Use a combination of toys in play and toys in prey. Try to achieve a balance, unfortunately like most that have tried like myself there is a good possibility of overdoing play ( fetch and retrieve ). Get you game under control first in prey, your dog must know when the game begins and ends , concentrate on that first. And as Neville said it must be exciting for the dog. When you do progress to OB in drive timing and patience is very important.

**Craig Murray** · 12-18-2010, 11:16 AM

............

**adam VIPSS** · 12-19-2010, 10:03 PM

deleted by me

Thread: where to from here?

LinkBack

Thread Tools

Display

where to from here?

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Neville Patterson For This Useful Post:

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Vendo Vincent For This Useful Post:

The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Craig Murray For This Useful Post:

The Following User Says Thank You to adam VIPSS For This Useful Post:

Visitors found this page by searching for:

Members who have read this thread : 23

Posting Permissions