ips wrote:
Any tips (without aversive) to help me. ??
Yep,
Start "being" consistent instead of "thinking" you are.. Stop letting your dog run in for balls but not for dummies, how the eck is she supposed to work that one out? Think about it from the dogs point of view...
All retrieves have to be earned and you need to engineer situations whereby she only gets to retrieve if she's steady. Slowly stretch her in duration distraction and difficulty and in the direction you want to go, if you know where that is.. If you don't then you need to swallow your pride and go and see a trainer who can help you... And her...
Its not all about the retrieve there is a lot more to it than that....Although it's a very useful reward or the lack of it as a punishment for a dog that loves retrieving, you can really make them think about what gets them what they want and what doesn't...
westcountry wrote:Agree with Judy,my young springer is steady to both dummies and game. He will sit out an entire drive on a large commercial shoot and not move until told to.
He was taught steadiness very early to dummies Also he attended training classes where 20 or so spaniels sat in a circle whilst dummies were thrown about. Training in a group is good as it gets your dog steady to watching other dogs retrieve as they sit still. If you can sit your dog and throw all your dummies out around it,without the dog moving,then you are on the right lines to steadiness.
I regularly throw all the dummies out just to test him, however now he looks at me as if to say 'don't take the pi@@ I get the point!'
Theres not a hope in hell he's steady enough yet, but he's getting there!
The biggest problem with teaching steadiness is that of beating your dog to the dummy, if you don't then the run in is rewarded every time. And every reward embeds the behaviour further. There are multiple exercises you can do to keep the dog thinking but most are better demonstrated than written about... Just chucking dummies around hoping the dog will sit still is likely to cause more problems than it cures.
In life, it is important to know when to stop arguing with people and simply let them be wrong.
Judy wrote:The biggest problem with teaching steadiness is that of beating your dog to the dummy, if you don't then the run in is rewarded every time. And every reward embeds the behaviour further. There are multiple exercises you can do to keep the dog thinking but most are better demonstrated than written about... Just chucking dummies around hoping the dog will sit still is likely to cause more problems than it cures.
And if the dog doesn't stop thats two whammies you have to sort. In my limited experience stopping the dog on the way to the dummy comes way after stopping the beggar going until asked.
In life, it is important to know when to stop arguing with people and simply let them be wrong.
I'm not worried about them reaching the retrieve. If they do, i just meet them and say nope, not really good and we walk out together and put it back. Then we go to where things went wrong and redo it, lots of praise. Problem is when it's hunting days. It absolutely work when training on birds and feather too but on commercial hunts you just don't have the time and leisure to train while hunting. Things to repair before the season to come.
I like place boards to train steadiness - they give the dog a very firm area to stay within when earning the boundaries of sit means sit. I don't chastise mine in any other way for trying to leave a board than a verbal No! And lifting them back on to the board. Initially I only release them from the board by lifting them off also (puppies). There's plenty of good articles about this best way to use place boards.
As for Eze, I'd stop letting her run in. If she needs to "blow off steam" before you work on something harder then start your session with 3-4 very long retrieves from a ball flinger to take the edge off her. While you're working on steadiness put the lead on to throw these. Once she's settled start your training "proper".
I would also be mixing it up and keeping things interesting for her - It sounds (and this may be wrong!) like she goes to the same field every day and does the same short marked retrieves....? I would have sessions just hunting her, ones working just on memories (make them longer, send her back at an angle for it etc). Start left and rights - sit her up back to a hedge, stand in front of her and throw the dummy to the side.
Scylla and i tried place boards, we were both utterly confused by the concept. On the other hand, we did quite some similar stuff as she was a pup but then on sofas, chairs, stones etc. So i think it's a good idea, especially for sneaky creeping cockers. Godis and i will be doing quite a bit of fun sitting, not sure if i will build a place board since i think my home and nature provide plenty of good places to train sit on.
Hepe wrote:I'm not worried about them reaching the retrieve. If they do, i just meet them and say nope, not really good and we walk out together and put it back. Then we go to where things went wrong and redo it, lots of praise. Problem is when it's hunting days. It absolutely work when training on birds and feather too but on commercial hunts you just don't have the time and leisure to train while hunting. Things to repair before the season to come.
Helene
You too eh?
To be scrupulously honest I don't much bother if they reach the dummy, I just refresh my vocabulary with a few sweary words and cast the odd aspiration re her ancestry. Does that constitute positive training?
In life, it is important to know when to stop arguing with people and simply let them be wrong.
If she truly only makes a mistake 1 in 30 throws, Ips, & especially if she tends to self correct when she does, then I think you are well on the right lines. As regards reliability in steadiness, or any other behaviour for that matter, wanted or unwanted, this isn't so much dependent upon what you do now, although that is obviously a contributing factor, but upon the history of punishment & reinforcement that has been developed in the past. So if steadiness has a long history of producing rewarding consequences behind it then you get reliability, especially if unsteadiness has a history of not being rewarded in one way or another. Of course, the same applies if unsteadiness has a history of reward rather than punishment. I find that once a dog develops self-control over steadiness then if it does break it is either by accident or anticipation & if I can't stop it as it takes off I just take the dummy without rewarding the dog, quietly put it back again & do the exercise again but make my cues more defined & that invariably works. I always think that a reliably steady dog's first run-in in the shooting field is usually anticipation as it becomes more experienced & begins to get inventive by skipping a link in the chain, so I always look at it as accidental. If you stop it there then it shouldn't be a problem but if there are contributory factors like sending the dog in rapid succession for runners, or dummies for that matter, and you don't change that then unreliability is going to be an issue. But that's the type of pressure your steadiness comes under when switching from dummies to the real thing & how you deal with that is usually a bit of a balancing act for most handlers, I would imagine.
If you don't then you need to swallow your pride and go and see a trainer who can help you... And her...
Godis and i will be doing quite a bit of fun sitting, not sure if i will build a place board since i think my home and nature provide plenty of good places to train sit on. 
