I had been trying to teach Bella to fetch by throwing the item and telling her "Bring." then I would treat her in exchange for her putting the item in my hand. We played fetch probably about 5 or 6 times and she would bring the prey to me. Well, she had started to out before she got to me; this made me do a search about it on the forum.

Ed said this behavior is because of too many outs. I can believe that I have outed Bella too much. I haven't outed her in the last few days. I have also stopped trying to teach her to fetch. I have been playing the flinks game still, but I will get the tug back by pulling it out if possible, or running her until she drops it, or trying to trade it for a bone.

I don't understand why outing at your feet on the way back is a sign of stress from outing too much. When Bella would do this, she would just look like she wanted to play more. Can someone explain this to me? Thanks, all!

Chewing is normally the sign for excessive outing. Dropping the item at your feet is, in my opinion, showing that your dog is conditioned to the fact that outing gets the game started again so she is outing. Are you going to try Schutzhund with her? If so, you don't want this behavior. If she is just a pet, who cares if she drops it at your feet?

I don't even have the Flinks video but maybe I can comment. I taught my Aussie Lab mix that I will throw her ball as long as she drops it at my feet. I don't want it 2 feet away or in my hand. I won't throw it if she doesn't do it correctly the way I want. The dog now does it automatically without being told.

My guess is that Bella is anticipating what you want her to do. She thinks that the faster she can drop the toy, the sooner you will throw it. In my dog Emma's case, this is correct. In Bella's case, you need to figure out how to teach her that you want her to wait until you tell her before dropping the toy. I don't think it's necessarily a sign of stress, rather of anticipation (of a command). You need to have variety so she doesn't know what the next command will be, and therefore cannot anticipate.

Oops John, we posted at the same time. What he said.

LOL - It took me quite a while to teach our Golden Retriever to play FETCH ... We'd throw the toy and he would run and check it out. That's it. So we started tossing dog food (he was in his treat free phase) and he'd go get it and eat it. Then we'd try it with a toy. He finally got so he'd pick it up and then we'd call him back to us. He finally got it and now he loves to play fetch.

I actually prefer the drop at my feet routine. He drops, I make him sit and then I pick it up. Or if we're doing "Two Ball Fetch" ... then I throw the ball and pick up the one that he's dropped while he's fetching the active ball.

He's fine with giving things to my hand ... (and tries to get in a game of tug in the process, which I discourage) ... but when the children are playing fetch with him, No Way do I want them reaching for it, or him trying to play Tug with them.

Then there's the Hot Summer Day Lazy Way of playing Fetch ... sitting in my Chair with my glass of lemonade, just out of reach of the puppy on his tie up ... and he drops the soccer ball such that it rolls to my feet.

Alls I can say is One VERY Hard Year has been completed ... and still plenty to learn. :-) But I still believe that after you read EVERYTHING you can, and gotten EVERYONE's Opinion, that you need to decide for you and your dog what is BEST for You.

So if you want him to Fetch a Certain Way ... you need to motivate him to do so.

Rick,
It may have a lot to do with the fact that Labs are naturally "supposed" to be soft mouthed dogs.

Our Lab did the same thing and since he is our "bird" dog, we had a heck of a time getting him to pick it back up and "bring it".

We never had to teach him the out with the bird hunting or the decoys.

Now, with the ball and frisbee games we play, I have a heck of a time getting him to out the ball or frisbee for the next throw. It is actually really bizarre but I am thankful he does not maul the birds. He now brings the birds and we take them from him.

Not that Marley is smart by any means but he seemed to know the difference right away.

Thank you, everyone! John, I am not going to do any Schutzund...although Bella loves her prey!! And, I agree with you, who cares? I just was concerned because I thought she was feeling stressed, and I didn't want to keep doing this if I was doing it the wrong way...

I agree that this is more in anticipation of me playing more than anything else. She has tried to avoid me about two times, but when she turned away, I would say "No. Bring." Both times, she turned around to come back when I said "No." And, she came right to me, then gave me the item. This is two times out of about 25 retrieves, and at the beginning stage of learning. So, it was kind of baffling to me that it could be stress, when she would continually bring it back drop it and look at me like she wants more!

Is my method of treating in exchange for bringing the item a good method to train the retrieve?

I would say your method is good, since it is working. For my dog, the prospect of having the ball thrown again was a good enough reward. If I would treat her she would never leave me alone haha. Every dog is different.