Recall Training

sillysmiles

Hi all,

We've recently adopted a lab. He is about 3yr old w reckon. We have been working on his training in the house and his sit, stay wait, come, leave are all great inside.
We haven't taken him off our property without a lead (and have no intention of doing this for a long time) but I want to start working on his recall outside.

If he is focused on you, he is good,but the problem is he is hugely scent driven and once he get the scent of anything in the garden he will ignore/not hear you.

In the house, food works, but outside he doesn't care what you have he just wants to go and sniff.

Any suggestions on how to work on this?

VonVix

sillysmiles wrote: »

Hi all,

We've recently adopted a lab. He is about 3yr old w reckon. We have been working on his training in the house and his sit, stay wait, come, leave are all great inside.
We haven't taken him off our property without a lead (and have no intention of doing this for a long time) but I want to start working on his recall outside.

If he is focused on you, he is good,but the problem is he is hugely scent driven and once he get the scent of anything in the garden he will ignore/not hear you.

In the house, food works, but outside he doesn't care what you have he just wants to go and sniff.

Any suggestions on how to work on this?

Transition to doing sit/stay/etc outside on a long leash before practising recall, there is a BIG difference between being able to do it in the home and being able to do it outside. Outside there are a lot of distractions and new and interesting things. Dogs recognize that home = training time and walks/outside = sniffing and exploring time. You gotta teach your dog that training happens outside too AND it's enjoyable.

Also, try hide and seek in your home. Call him from a different room and reward for him coming to you. Once you feel as if you're in a position to attempt recall in a safe place, make sure you reward him for coming to you and checking in on you, you must avoid that any time you call him automatically means he goes back on the leash and the fun has ended. For example when you put him on the leash, play tug with him for a few moments and then let him off again. You gotta be a beacon of awesomeness for your dog to return back to.

note: dogs are largely deaf when their nose is to the ground. Don't be surprised if he doesn't come back to you straight away if his head is down. Try and develop a special word to call him back to you (or use a squeaky toy!), his name is great and all but he probably hears that 100 times a day and nothing really interesting happens. For my boys I accidentally ended up recalling them by using the word "drops" which was my nickname for a little treat I'd give my boys. I noticed they got so excited when I said "do you want some drops?" they recognized good things happened when I said that word.

mozzy

Have you thought about training classes?

Ashbx

I agree with VonVix. One of my dogs is very nose driven too and if she's on a scent, she will definitely hear me and will come but will do it in her own time. But if you try teach her a different word to call her as opposed to her name. I say Chip or come but if she's really ignoring me, I will say look (in a high pitched excited kinda voice) and she comes darting back over to me.

Once you feel confident letting your dog off, I used to call my dog now and again and put her on and off on the leash. One time I would put her on the leash, next time I would give her a pet, another time I wouldn't do anything, another time I would give her a treat! Just so the dog doesn't get used to "ok once she calls me with the lead in her hand...that means the end of the walk" because the dog will learn to never come back to you. Just keep it mixed up and make sure you are the most fun and important thing in that field and you will be fine.