When is enough enough ?

[Quaffalot]

I had similar problems with my ESS playing stay away and also possession aggression so i went down the CT route and also professional help, after months of this i am starting to see a great improvement. I found lots of great videos on youtube and you can also find all you need to know about clicker retrieve on totally gun dogs website. I still can't get my dog steady but hey ho i am still happy with the progress.

[James]

My Lab is now 13 months old , I have had several issues with his training most of which have been well documented on here.

The advice was to get him to a pro trainer this advice I took and he had 8 weeks away with one to one lessons to follow .

The dog will still not retrieve to hand 80-90 % of the time , he will still just run around like a demented thing with the dummy and it can take a age to coax him back to me .
The trainer was also having this problem perhaps not quite to the same extent but each time I went over to observe progress he had this issue.

So this mornings session ended with any retrieve I gave him ending in this way.

This afternoons session was a new one as he would either stop on the way out to or the way back from the dummy to sniff at scents etc if it was on the recall he would drop the dummy to sniff at the ground

I know the dog is still young but I also know he is useless to me the way he is , I am not sure if we are ever going to get this out of him .

So when is enough enough , if I need to re-home him as a pet then I will, but I would really hate to go down that route but it is now in the back of my mind that he is not going to make the grade and my time and money would be better spent on another dog

Its really getting me down and its not pleasant knowing the chances are I am going to have these issues every time I take him out .

Finally please no "you need to bond with the dog " replies , me and the dog get on just fine and I perhaps have the cleanest ears in Lincolnshire

Where abouts are you?

[kennel maiden]

Who is the 'pro-trainer'? Are they really good? (PM me if you would rather). I'm very surprised they haven't managed to iron out some of these very fundamental training glitches, and help you back along the right track.
And how is the dog bred? (this may inform the questions above...)

13 months is still very young, and if you are a novice handler/trainer it is quite early to make a call on this dog. And as somebody above has said, you may end up making the same mistakes with the next one, unless you can get some professional help.

If your goals are competition with this dog, I would get along to a respected pro-trainer/trialler and get some help/advice. Your current trainer may not be the right person for the job perhaps?

[Judy]

So, what exactly are you doing with the dog? Are you still training twice a day and walking it for an hour at a time too? What do you do when training? Do you just chuck a dummy and send him? Is it on grass or into cover / water? Do you do memory retrieves with him? Do you train in the same place every time?

Dog sounds bored stiff to me, I would lay off training, take him different places, probably to the beach as much as possible and let him do as he likes within reason. After a week or two I might try one retrieve into some long grass, light cover, probably a tennis ball or rabbit fur ball, let him run in if needs be and get really excited when he picks it. Leave him another week and try again, leave him hungry for more not bored with same old same old twice a day, day after day. A lot of dogs get bored easily and start to b' about especially if they are under pressure to perform. At the mo you sound as if you are taking dog and dummy out and throwing the retrieve sending the dog and letting it rehearse the unwanted stuff twice a day? If it isn't working don't do it. Did you take the dog to Rory Major? If the dog has had twelve months of pratting about it might take rather longer than a month for a trainer to sort out and the dog may still revert when with you.

After all that there are some Retrievers who just don't want to retrieve, for whatever reason, so maybe give the dog to a good home.

[Hepe]

I would train recall like mad with a very hungry dog and have food treats, sit the dog and lean forward to pet it when it comes in before giving the treat and then let it run off again. When i hold courses i see this a lot with young dogs (and older) i tell the peeps not to worry and completely ignore the silly dummy, it's of no interest at all in this case, instead focus on their own handling, the dog and the recall. In the beginning the dog may drop the dummy and rush to the owner to get the treat. We ignore that, sooner than later the dummy will follow all the way in, we still ignore it though, pretending not to see it but praise extra as long as the dog holds it. If it's a repeated behaviour we let a long leash drag after the dog so we can haul it in, praising as it's with us again, often the play behavior occurs close to the handler so the leash doesn't have to be that long. It's mostly to save time on the course and give the poor handler a bit of security, it seems this running around not coming in us a huge source of embarrassment for most dog owners making them very flustered which i want to avoid. There's a lot of other things to do of course to break the habit, I'm a bit surprised that your trainer haven't addressed this a bit more since you seem to be so worried about it, probably needlessly i'd say even if i understand that it must be very frustrating. Maybe the trainer isn't overly worried about it either?

Your dog is just over a year and probably being a bit of a teenager right now, i realize you despair but really, it's a VERY common thing that they play around like that. If you don't feel that you get help from your trainer, swap! Maybe someone here from the forum can help? Doesn't have to be a professional dog trainer really, just someone experienced. My little one is about the same age as yours and she still can't deliver to hand. *oops*. Nor can she heel without a leash. *doubleoops*. Work in progress, slow and easy, don't panic.

I'd LOVE to see a phone video snippet of him and you as he's doing his antics, it would be way easier to understand what's going on?

Helene

[fenboy]

Ok to answer some points in the previous couple of posts

Firstly the trainer is very well respected and was recommended to me on here , I am certain it is not any fault of the trainer.

The dog has around a hours excercise a day , some on lead some off.

Since I have had him back each training session has been at a different location .

He has been perhaps having 3-4 retrieves a session , some dropped into very light cover , some dropped and the dog walked away from it at heel.

His heel work and steadiness is much better .

He has been away for 2 months not 1 , would love to have left him longer but unfortunately my funds are not unlimited and it is quite an expensive affair boarding them with a good trainer, the idea was that 2 months would give him a good start with one to one sessions to follow .

I have no interest at all in competition , I need a good retrieving dog for the marsh.

Much always seems to be made of my ability to train the dog and I would not argue that I am perfect but I have trained my cocker myself to a standard that is perfectly adequate for my needs , he is never going to be a FTCH but is a decent enough working dog

I have no doubt made mistakes with this one , and to be honest have perhaps listened to much to too many people most of whom cannot agree with each other ( no offence intended) and confused myself and the dog in the process.

I don't particularly want to give up on the dog yet but if further training / lessons do not pay off I am aware I will be dog less on the marsh for the next two seasons which is a huge problem (the cocker is 11 now and not up to cold water work )

[kennel maiden]

Get yourself along to a specialist RETRIEVER trainer for a second opinion....

(Still interested in the pedigree/lines of this dog, as this will also inform more of likely traits and approaches that can be made to training this style of dog)

[Hepe]

It may be it's a difficult dog, really, the thing is, if it's the dog being not so good then moving him on might be a good idea but i think we all here sort of hope it's something you can solve by doing something differently to solve it. That's why it might seem that we 'blame' you for the irritating stuff, i know for sure i don't. So don't take it personal that we seem to pick on you rather than the dog, thing is, we can't talk with the dog. And yes, it's confusing with advice which goes against each other for sure, i understand that bit too.

Helene

[kennel maiden]

It may be it's a difficult dog, really, the thing is, if it's the dog being not so good then moving him on might be a good idea but i think we all here sort of hope it's something you can solve by doing something differently to solve it. That's why it might seem that we 'blame' you for the irritating stuff, i know for sure i don't. So don't take it personal that we seem to pick on you rather than the dog, thing is, we can't talk with the dog. And yes, it's confusing with advice which goes against each other for sure, i understand that bit too.

Helene

That's why I'm asking a) about the pro-trainer and b) about the pedigree
If a good pro-trainer has struggled to suitably progress a young dog over 2 months, then it may be a very difficult dog (or not the best trainer....)

[fenboy]

Pedigree wise the dog is not ideal to be honest , the sires side is all working pedigree with some FTCH /FTW along the line , but their is some show blood on the dams side, including the dam herself .