Reassurance

[WGD]

Stop tossing dummies when the dog is hunting.

Thats why I love this forum simple answers to simple questions
On a serious note though. If teaching dropping to shot how do you get around yourself or someone else throwing a dummy?

Teach retrieving as retrieving and hunting as hunting, keep the two separate until he's flowing and as said gamey ground should help a lot. The drop to shot need not be followed with a retrieve.

[Naj]

Ya see, simple answeres to simple questions. Never fails.

[Springfield Pointers]

If teaching dropping to shot how do you get around yourself or someone else throwing a dummy?

You don't need to throw a dummy to teach drop to shot. You just need a shot.

[Judy]

Bang'nsit, simples!

[Naj]

There's nothing wrong with adding dummy throws, per se, to teach drop to shot and/or fall and/or steadiness or any other behaviour but you need to understand that retrieves are intrinsically rewarding for gundogs and will strengthen any behaviour that precedes them. So if you don't ensure that you have a strong and wanted behaviour prior to using a retrieve then you will inadvertantly train in unwanted behaviours, such as a watchful behaviour or cautious hunting typically seen when handlers have been clumsy when combining retrieving and hunting. You get what you train for, even when it's not quite what you are wanting.

Naj

[Bang'nsit]

There's nothing wrong with adding dummy throws, per se, to teach drop to shot and/or fall and/or steadiness or any other behaviour but you need to understand that retrieves are intrinsically rewarding for gundogs and will strengthen any behaviour that precedes them. So if you don't ensure that you have a strong and wanted behaviour prior to using a retrieve then you will inadvertantly train in unwanted behaviours, such as a watchful behaviour or cautious hunting typically seen when handlers have been clumsy when combining retrieving and hunting. You get what you train for, even when it's not quite what you are wanting.

Naj

Just the answer I needed, thank you.
The learning chain of steady to shot and also expectation of a retrieve is something I need to get to grips with.
I thought about it in a simple way but only when the hesitation with hunting started did I realise I'd been doing something wrong.

Thanks again

[RAH]

This probably ought to go onto a separate thread, but since you chaps are talking about it ... (But please feel free to move if necessary Admin Judy )

With a hunt mad pup who has absolutely no interest in treats at all when out What sort of rewards can you suggest for stop & drop exercises?

retrieves are intrinsically rewarding for gundogs and will strengthen any behaviour that precedes them.

I had thought that a retrieve to reward the stop might be a good idea, but reading this thread it seems that is it the absolute opposite of what I should try.

So far all I've done is praise and stroke, but sometimes pup looks away from me, so I think stopping and touching her might actually be (almost) adversive for her. She just wants to get on! I genuinely didn't believe that non-foody pups existed. My other two will do anything for food, so this is a bit of uncharted territory for me. Goodness only knows how I'm going to sort out heelwork

[munstyman]

With a hunt mad pup who has absolutely no interest in treats at all when out What sort of rewards can you suggest for stop & drop exercises?

So far all I've done is praise and stroke, but sometimes pup looks away from me, so I think stopping and touching her might actually be (almost) adversive for her. She just wants to get on!

Just like a dummy being rewarding for some dogs for the stop, your dog is telling you what she finds rewarding...Hunting. Again the simple answer is reward with more hunting, or more correctly as a quick release from the ( quick ) sit, and the alternative slow release from the ( slow ) sit.
Whilst my dogs take praise as a reward, working at a distance means treats are not an option when training and proofing the sit/stop. So the quick/slow release game became a logical choice, and for me it has proved a very useful tool once taught.

[Saul]

I got the stop training wrong with my first GSP in that from the dogs perspective it was always framed as a negative, stop the thing you are loving doing ... running, chasing, hunting because I say so, and I'll couple it with negatives if you don't. Consequently I achieved a treacle slow stop/sit. Took a lot of undoing, and I think if I'm honest only partially undone so far. The other mistake was to fret about tennis balls.

Second dog now 6 months I'm spending most of my time on play / chase / retrieve, building the drive for the ball and he sits his bum down as fast as a spaniel because what comes next is positive and fun. And, just occasionally, a stop when hunting, which he does just as quick with the reward carry on hunting or a retrieve. There's the occasional run in, but I'm less worried about a ball/retrieve obsessed pup running in on occasion than I am by a crap stop as he's had no discipline at all so far.

[Naj]

RAH - not sure why you think retrieves are no good for rewarding sits/stops. They are excellent if used correctly. What I was trying to get across was if your dog is only hunting half heartedly in anticipation of a retrieve then it is a learned behaviour that you have trained by rewarding the dog for hunting half heartedly. If you're going to use retrieves as a reward for a stop when a dog is hunting then only use them when the dog is hunting hard. In any event, when you're using rewards to train a dog it should be taught the rules of the game and a crucial one is impulse control around rewards so it will continue to perform at its best even though it knows there are rewards on the table. This is just a management issue.

I train a stop to whistle separate from hunting lessons and when the dog is at exercise or as a separate lesson in the yard. If the dog knows the stop whistle you can use a retrieve to reward a sharp stop. If you insist on steadiness then you're adding another factor into the exercise and the dog is really being rewarded for steadiness rather than the stop command, although the 'stop' will benefit by association. I prefer to use a ball chase as an immediate reward for a fast stop response, releasing the dog to the thrown ball immediately it stops and looks at me. Once you have a strong behaviour you can then add duration to the stop prior to sending the dog for the retrieve so you develop steadiness if you prefer. I let dogs chase balls but never dummies and they soon learn to discriminate. Once you have a reliable stop command you can start incorporating it into hunting practice with a retrieve or ball chase as reward but ensure it is hunting with commitment first and at a level of distraction in which it will respond.

I start stop training in the yard by tossing treats to one spot and holding the dog there with more tossed treats, a bit like place training, then develop it from there. You have to build food motivation with some dogs and hand feeding all their daily ration will soon fix this. But just because a dog will take a reward in the yard doesn't mean it will do so under the distraction of game, you have to work on this by increasing the level of distraction by degrees so the dog will respond. Building engagement is a major part of training however youbtrain. The advantage in having other rewards at your disposal instead of just one or two is that it opens up more reward options. Hunting is an obvious reward but has limitations.

Naj