Obedience Is a Way of Life; Not a Daily 15-Minute
Drill
Obedience Defined
Obedience consists of three simple behaviors, heeling, sitting, and coming. Pup is heeling when he is walking along at your side with his nose within a foot or so of your knee. Heeling is typically done on the left side for the right handed shooter to keep the dog out of the way of the gun. If you are right handed, reverse it, or if you like make pup ambidextrous and have him heel on either side.
Coming is obviously coming when called.
Sitting is a two-for-one command. Pup should sit upon
command and he should also stay where he’s sitting until told to do
something else. Thus sit also means stay.
These
basic behaviors of obedience can be taught in about three to five training
sessions of 20 minutes each. The challenge is then to ingrain the habits
strongly enough that pup will consistently respond when he’s further away
and also consistently respond in the face of extreme distraction and
temptation. This behavior comes with repetition in the face of gradually
increasing distance from the handler, and with repetition in the face of
increasing distraction and temptation. All this is overlayed with the trainer
consistently maintaining his position as pack leader.
The myth of Refresher Training
When I was running Wildrose Kennels and training up to 30 dogs a day, I
used to love to see dogs coming back for refresher training. The owner
brought the dog back because his responsiveness had gradually
deteriorated over the intervening year. . These dogs were absolute gravy. The
simple expenditure of a couple of obedience training sessions would snap that
dog back into his former responsiveness and he became a real pleasure to work
for the next month or two. All his training was still in there, he just needed
a pack leader to bring it out. Reestablishing the handler’s dominance with a
few obedience drills would snap that pup right back into his good habits.
The
secret is in knowing the trigger for responsiveness. Dogs don’t “forget”
behaviors that have been trained. They may become unresponsive, but they don’t
forget. All you have to do to reestablish your position as the pack leader and
responsiveness will return. The simplest, most gentle way to do this is
through obedience training and obedience drills.
Obedience is the foundation of all the subsequent trained behaviors and
it is the foundation for responsiveness. Train pup well in obedience, and keep
requiring responsiveness, and you can get him to do any thing. Even better,
you can get him to do anything without any heavy use of force.
The Wrong Way
To explain how to start training in obedience, let me first tell the
wrong way to train. Unfortunately,
this wrong method is all too prevalent in the dog training community at large.
It involves a choke collar and a lot of dragging and nagging of pup, while the
handler shouts commands that have absolutely no meaning to pup. Here is the
way it goes:
Put a choke collar on pup and start dragging him along, holding him at
your left knee, all the while you are barking “heel!, heel!” at pup. Do
this daily for two weeks and pup will learn to heel in spite of the the
training program. After you’ve got pup well programmed to heel and keep
himself right beside you, then start trying to get pup to stay while you move
away from him.
Let me tell you what is really happening here. When you put that choke
collar on pup and start dragging him along, you are triggering an opposing
response in pup that makes him pull harder against the choke collar. He’s
being choked and his neck feels very uncomfortable in the very location that
you are trying to teach him to seek. When he’s by your left knee, his neck
hurts. The hurting neck makes him want to leave that space by your left knee.
While all these reactions are going on, the trainer is barking “Heel!,
Heel!, Heel!”
In these circumstances, guess what “Heel” means to pup. From pup’s
perspective, it is “Heel means my neck is hurting and I want to leave this
space by this guy’s left knee.” The most amazing facet of this training
method is that dogs are adaptive enough and flexible enough to eventually get
trained in spite of such methods.
The Right Way – Lesson Number One
The trainer’s demeanor and attitude is all important. Pup’s primary means of communication is body body language and attitude. You better believe that he is a master at reading you. Your attitude should be positive, businesslike, and authoritative. Conduct yourself in a manner that conveys that you expect compliance. Conduct yourself in the manner that a CEO or supervisor conducts himself or herself.
This discussion of obedience is appropriate for a dog
of 6 or 7 month old and up. It is the most important training session of pup’s
career, because this session is going to greatly influence how pup views
training in general. Make sure pup is successful. Make sure that you engineer
the session so that the desired behavior occurs. Then you can reward it and
pup will not only learn, but also find out that training is pleasant. We are
going to teach pup to heel, sit, stay, and come in this first lesson.
Heeling is the most important part of initial
obedience training because, done properly, it also teaches pup that you are
the pack leader. Heeling also trains pup to watch you, the handler. These are
two major facets of dog training. The dominance of the pack leader elicits
response from pup. Pup can be perfectly trained in responses, but it takes a
pack leader to consistently elicit the responses.
Watching the handler is vital to communicating, since
most of pup’s communication is visual. It is very difficult for pup to
respond to a audible command in the absence of some visual signal, so to make
training easy, we need at the beginning to teach pup to watch the handler.
First step is make sure he has learned to give to
neck. If he’s ever been tied to an immovable object then he’s probably
learned to give to his neck. If he’s been drug around on a leash he’s also
probably learned. The test is to tie him to a tree, and walk away. Use a
non-slip collar. If he doesn’t fight the restraint, then he has obviously
already learned to give to his neck. If he does fight the restraint, then keep
some distance from him and let him keep fighting the restraint til he gives in
to it. You would rather pup have this particular argument with a tree and not
with the trainer. It will make learning to heel much more simple. Be careful
in very hot weather that he doesn’t over heat. If he gets frantic about it,
calm him with reassuring vocalizations. When he quits fighting the restraint
then he’s learned to give to his neck and you are ready to continue to the
next phase, heeling
First put a choke collar on pup. I much prefer one of
regular rope over the chain ones. The chain collar doesn’t release as
quickly and smoothly as rope. Next, attach a 6 foot leash to the collar, and
start walking. Keep your eyes on pup. When he’s in the heel zone with his
nose within a foot or so of your knee, the leash should be slack, and you
should be saying “good dog, good dog”. When he gets ahead of you, extend
your arm to give him additional slack while turning quickly and quietly 180
degrees and keep walking briskly. Suddenly
pup gets a health tug on the neck that turns him around and starts moving him
the other direction. Simultaneously, he looks up and finds that he’s 6 feet
behind you and way outside the heel zone. The discomfort occurs outside the
heel zone. He hurries to catch up. When he is in the heel zone you say, “Good
Dog! Good Dog!”.
Five important things are happening here:
(1)
Pup feels discomfort
of tug on the neck when he’s outside the heel zone, but comfort of slack
leash when he’s inside the heel zone.
(2)
That forceful tug at
the end of the leash imparts your opposite momentum to pup and jerks him
around toward you, lifting his front feet off of the ground. This forceful
shift of his weight, taking his
front feet off the ground is very important. It triggers a response in pup
that creates dominance for you the handler. It is a fractional piece of the
instinctive behavior that occurs when the pack leader of a wolf pack
establishes dominance over a rebelling subordinate. The pack leader lunges
into the shoulder of the subordinate, rolls him over and grabs him by the
throat for a vigorous shaking. This automatically reestablishes dominance. The
key portion of this behavior is the rolling pup over, thus taking him off of
his feet. During heeling, you’re your directional turns extreme and crisp
and forceful enough to lift pup’s front feet off of the ground. Shifting pup’s
front feet off the ground triggers pack leader status for the handler.
(3)
Pup is getting reward
in the form of verbal praise when he’s inside the heel zone
(4)
Pup is learning that
it’s his responsibility to watch you and keep himself at heel. When he’s
not paying attention, he suddenly finds himself out at the end of the leash
with you going rapidly the other way.
(5)
Pup is not
associating any commands with any of these fragments of behavior, because you
are not giving any commands. You will save that for after the behavior is
formed. After pup is heeling properly, you start using the command “heel.”
Then pup will associate the command with the appropriate behavior.
So
continue this first session in silence except for the praise when pup is in
the “heel zone.” It is very important to keep your eyes and attention on
pup. Whenever he gets out front, or focuses his attention elsewhere, you
should, quickly, quietly, and forcefully turn while giving pup maximum slack
in the leash. Suddenly he finds himself 6 feet away at the end of the leash
with you going the other way. Simultaneously your momentum is imparted to him
through the leash and suddenly his front feet leave the ground as he’s
jerked around to follow you. Whenever his eyes stray from you this should
happen. After four or five “to-the-rear-marches” with accompanying hefty
tugs for inattention, pup will be looking at you and keeping himself at heel.
Then you may start saying, “heel.”
Two
other behaviors will occur in some dogs: lagging behind you and hugging your
leg. Lagging is overcompensation on pup’s part as he modifies his
charging-ahead behavior. Pup finds out that in front is not the place to be,
and thus tries lagging behind you. The solution is for the trainer to walk
faster and give a good tug on pup as he falls further behind. As you get him
back in the heel zone praise more. He will very quickly correct himself.
Hugging
your leg during heeling is attempt by pup to avoid the mental effort of
watching you with his eyes to keep himself at heel. Pup will move in close so
that he is touching your leg. Then he can tell by sense of touch when you are
turning. Then he doesn’t have to focus much attention on you.
Pup should be quickly discouraged from this behavior
by the simple tactic of turning right into him. Every time he moves into
physical contact with your leg, turn rapidly and forcefully ninety degrees to
the left and walk briskly right into him. Keep walking briskly into him until
he moves away from your leg. One or two repetitions are usually enough to
modify pup’s behavior. Then he will use his eyes to keep himself in the
proper position and you will be reinforcing the very important communication
habit, “watch the trainer”.
I
can preach quite well on how easy this is as Ive had several thousand dogs
worth of practice. In fact, looking back
over ten years of teaching obedience classes I can say that a large number of
people don’t have the motor skills and timing ability to be terribly
effective with a normal choke collar. There is a fairly simple solution.
An Effective Training Collar
Some
degree of hand eye coordination and motor skills are needed to perform the
initial obedience drills. Also required is a degree of timing. I have noticed
over 10 years of teaching obedience classes that a lot of people have
difficulty managing the timing issue with a standard choke collar.
Additionally, small people with large dogs sometimes don’t have the strength
needed to properly modify pup’s behavior during the initial obedience
lessons.
There is a simple solution in the JASA training
collar, also known as a pinch collar. This is a very stiff leather slip collar
with brass tacks protruding to the inside. The tacks are a little too sharp on
a new collar and should have points dulled slightly with a file.
The pinch collar looks mean but it’s is very
effective. In fact the pinch collar is much kinder to pup that a handler with
poor timing jerking pup around inappropriately and thus vastly prolonging his
discomforts. The pinch collar eliminates timing and coordination problems and
makes the lessons crisp, effective, and brief.
To
begin heeling you simply put the collar on with the roller to the outside,
away from you. Then you grasp the leash about 18 inches up from the collar,
keep your hand extended down and locked at your left side and start walking.
When pup forges ahead he makes the collar constrict and pinch is neck. He will
automatically slow to release it. The same occurs when he lags behind. Pup is
in control of the collar when you keep your hand immobilized, and he quickly
teaches himself to remain in the “heel zone”. Dogs will not abuse
themselves when they are controlling the pinch of this collar.
On
the quick turns, much less muscle power is required from the handler due to
the leverage given by the pinch collar. A few rapid reverses of direction
during heeling drills will have pup watching you closely and keeping himself
in the heel zone. With the pinch collar you still need to tug pup vigorously
enough to shift his front feet and activate the dominance mechanism.
Sitting and Staying
Sitting and staying should be taught in the first obedience lesson. This
is in keeping with a basic tenant of dog training: “Don’t train in a
behavior that you have to train out later”. Heeling trains pup to stay right
beside you. Training pup to stay involves you moving away from pup. Before you
get pup thoroughly programmed to stick right beside your left knee, it would
be wise to start teaching him that it is also ok to be away from you.
During
this first obedience lesson, after pup has started heeling a little, teach him
to sit. As you are walking along with pup at heel stop, and hold a mild
tension upward on the leash. You want just enough pressure that pup is
uncomfortable and needs to do something to relieve the discomfort. If you are
holding light tension straight up, then the natural thing for pup to do is
raise his head up by sitting. If you hold a steady pressure as pup fidgets, he
will decide to sit. As his rear hits the ground give the command “sit.”
Then stroke pup gently on the shoulder and say, “good dog, good dog.”
Pup will associate the command with the appropriate response. Do not
say “sit” prior to the action of sitting, otherwise pup forms the wrong
association. You don’t want the command, “sit,” associated with
fidgeting behavior. You want the command, “sit,” associated with sitting
behavior
Repeat
this sitting sequence a few times and pup will be sitting automatically as you
stop walking. Now add on the “stay” behavior. After pup sits raise your
hand in a traffic cop’s “stop” gesture; command “sit!”; take one
step away from pup while watching him closely. If he starts to move command
“sit!” again to keep him there. Let pup sit a couple of seconds and then
step back next to him. Stroke him gently on the shoulder and say, “Good
Dog!, Good Dog!”. Keep your voice tone gentle and calm. You do not want to
overdo the praise and excite pup. That emotional state is not conducive to
obedient behavior.
Repeat
this sequence but take two steps away, being careful to keep pup in place with
your raised arm traffic cop gesture, and direct stare. Again step back to him
and calmly praise him while gently stroking him 3 or 4 times on the shoulder.
Repeat this sequence three or 4 times as you extend the distance you move away
each time. By the 4th or 5th repetition you should be
out near the end of the leash and 3 or 4 steps from pup.
Training pup to Come
We are still in lesson number one and have so far
taught pup to heel, sit, and stay. We want to end the lesson with coming. For
training pup to come to you, the best command to use is “here”. “Here”
can be vocally projected with authority to a distant pup. Thus it is the
command of choice.
Begin
with pup sitting, give the traffic cop gesture, step out to the end of the
leash and pause to let pup sit a few seconds. Then give a tug on the leash,
and as pup is coming
There
is a reason for mixing up the pattern on calling pup to you versus you walking
away and then returning to pup. Whatever you do consistently, pup will get in
the habit of. If you consistently sit pup; then walk 6 ft away, turn, wait 5
seconds and then call him to you, then that’s the habit he will form. Do it
enough and he will become unable to sit longer than the 5 second wait that he
been programmed to.
Lesson Number 2- Repeat What You’ve Started
Lesson number 2 is very easy. You simply repeat what
you’ve started in lesson 1. Do a little heeling, sitting, staying and
coming. Make the stay’s a little longer in duration of time. Keep the lesson
short and try to conduct it in a manner that pup is successful at every
command. Ten minutes is plenty.
Lesson Number 3 – Repeat Again
Change equipment here. Trade your 6 foot leash for a
20 foot check cord fastened to pup’s collar. Move further away from pup on
the stays. Make sure you always have a hand on the checkcord to insure pup’s
compliance. Keep the lesson brief. The more time you spend the greater the
probability that pup will screw up and you’ll have to correct him. We want
these initial sessions to be short, sweet, and successful.
Lesson Number 4 – The Non-Retrieve
The non-retrieve is the backbone and foundation of a
steady calm hunting companion. Incorporate this training principle into your
dog’s life and you will produce a gundog that will be vastly superior in
behavior and manners.
To
begin, put on pup’s 20-ft checkcord and go through a couple of repetitions
of heel, sit, stay drills. Then tell pup to sit. Walk about 6 feet away from
him. With hand raised in traffic cop gesture and your eyes glued on pup, and
with an authoritative “sit, ” give a tiny, very low, very slow, 3-ft toss
of a dummy away from you. The toss should be away so that you are between pup
and the dummy. It is very difficult for him to run straight past you. You are
giving a very weak, slow, low, short toss because that makes it much less
tempting to pup. You are engineering the situation so that pup will be
successful and you can reward him.
If
pup has remained sitting you’ve got it made. Tell him “sit” again, and
slowly step out and pick up the dummy yourself. Then walk back to pup and
stroke him gently several times on the shoulders: the reward for the correct
behavior sequence.
Go through this same sequence twice more, with you picking up the
dummy.
Don’t move toward pup as he brings you the dummy.
This will tend to cause him to either drop it or move away from you. If he
shows any reluctance about bringing the dummy to you, simply back away from
him.
Don’t worry if he drops the dummy. The objective
here is for him to retrieve the dummy and come back to you. If he drops the
dummy on the way back don’t worry about it. Encourage him to come, and pet
him when he gets to you. After the behavior becomes more solidly established,
he will forget to drop the dummy.
Finish the training session with one more
non-retrieve with you picking up the dummy. This is a fairly good ratio to
maintain during all pup’s training sessions. Pup should retrieve about one
out of four dummies that he sees fall. Then he doesn’t expect
to
retrieve every fall and it will be much easier in the future for him to remain
calm and steady while guns are shooting and birds are falling.
Lessons five through 10
The
next five sessions should be a continuation of the first four. You should
repeat the same heeling, sitting, staying, and coming drills. He should be
trailing a 20 or 30 foot check cord, so that you can get a hand or foot on it
if necessary. The distance you move away when pup is staying should increase
gradually to 50 or 60 feet.
Remember to walk all the way back to him occasionally, so that he doesn’t
get in the habit of always coming to you after staying.
The
non-retrieve should lengthen in distance in 3 to 10 foot increments, so that
by lesson number 10 the dummy falls 50 to 60 feet away from you. Keep yourself
in the habit of standing a few feet in front of pup so that he would have to
run right past you to break on a retrieve. With you in front of him, it is
much easier for him to keep himself sitting there while the oh-so-tempting
dummy is falling out front.
When
you and pup have reached this point, you have taught him everything he needs
to know to be a good gun dog. In these first 10 lessons we have trained pup to
heel, sit, stay, and come on command. He is steady and doesn’t retrieve
until sent. We have even started him on hand signals. We’ve been sending him
from several feet away with a hand signal. The non-retrieves have also planted
the seed of calmness which will make it easier to get him to stop on
a whistle and take a hand signal in the future.
All
that is required now is repeating these behavior patterns in the face of
steadily increasing distraction and temptation. Also we will steadily increase
the distances involved.
Obedience Is a Way of Life; Not a Daily 15-Minute Drill
The
good news is that an obedient dog is a real pleasure to live with. The bad
news is that obedience takes some degree of commitment on the part of you, pup’s
pack leader. For pup obedience is a way of life. It is not something that 15
minutes a day of training is magically going to implant.
A major facet in continuing pup’s progress is for
the handler to maintain his position as pack leader. This is done through
requiring obedience all the time, not just during training sessions. You can
spend 2 hours a day doing obedience training sessions, but if you let pup
disobey during the other 22 hours, disobedience will predominate. So require
him to obey all the time and he will be very responsive to you.
If the handler is consistent in his demand for a
high level of responsiveness from pup, then pup’s life is much more
pleasant. If you squelch the small rebellions, then the big ones never occur.
Pup understands what the program is and he is happy. Additionally you never
have to severely punish pup, and he doesn’t have to be totally confused
about why he was severely punished for something that your inconsistency
telegraphed was OK. Obedience can be taught in 3 or 4 days. Maintaining
obedience takes a lifetime.
Obedience
Is Not for Everyone
Just because pup obeys you doesn’t mean he’s going to obey
anyone else. He will obey consistently the person he perceives to be dominant
in the pack hierarchy. He can obey you perfectly, but he will not obey your
wife unless she maintains her dominance by requiring consistent response from
pup.
A good measure of pup’s relative dominance is
whether he can pup his paws up on you. The nature of a pack animal makes him
unable to put his paws up on a dominant
I
used to regularly demonstrate this mechanism at the first session of obedience
courses. I would take a dog from one of the students and entice him to put his
front paws up on me. It invariably was very easy to get him to jump up on me.
After
putting him through a short obedience lesson, I would try again to get him to
jump up on me. Invariably, the dog would be unable to put his paws up on me
because the obedience would have established my dominance. Frequently,
prolonged enticement from me would get the pup razzed up enough that he just
had to jump up on someone. Though I was the one enticing him to jump on me, he
would run over and jump up on his owner, ten feet away. This was a great
illustration of the power of obedience in reinforcing dominance, and of the
mechanism of rearing up on a subordinate.
The
most valuable behavior for you and for pup is certainly obedience.