Do you like to use a Tug or a ball for a reward in obedience?

There is not an issue of only using one toy for every dog. The correct answer is to figure out what toy motivates your dog the most. There are a couple of ways to determine this:

1. Put the dog in a sit-stay right in front of you, (in the recall position). Take a ball on a string in one hand and a tug in the other. Hold them straight out from your body and see which one the dog looks at. Then slowly transfer the ball and tug to opposite hands and hold them out away from your body again. See which one the dog follows with his eyes.


2. Put the dog in a sit-stay and put the various toys on the ground - spaced about 10 feet apart in front of the dog. Give the dog a release command and see which toy the dog goes to first.

I like a dog that prefers a ball on a cord over a tug or Frisbee.

The key to using toys as rewards for a competition dog is to build the training to the point where the dog never knows when he is going to get the reward. This can only happen if the toy can be hidden from the dog. Balls on a string can be hidden under the arm, in a pocket or under a jacket much easier than a tug. If a trainer wears a string around his neck with a clothes pin attached, he can clip the ball on a string to this clothes pin and hide the ball in his jacket with only an inch or so of the string sticking out. This allows very very quick access to grab the string and flip the ball out.

There are some dogs that are not motivated in prey drive with toys. These dogs will have to be worked with food. There are also dogs that have such high prey drive for a toy that the toy becomes a distraction to the dog. This only happens with inexperienced handlers but it happens. These handlers are also going to have to use food in those exercises where the toy is a distraction and they cannot control their dogs.

Then there are also dogs that are not motivated by toys or food, these dogs should be sold as pets.