at the club session yesterday i couldnt get paco interested in the toys at all. he wouldnt respond to much of anything. he was strictly interested in exploring the wood shavings that cover the floor of the animal barn, searching for bits of manure and strong smelling tid-bits. i tried just about everything but couldnt get more than a half-assed attemt at a bite out of him. we even tried putting on a puppy sleeve and teasing him with that. i was told he has low drive. i am more than willing to accept that, its probably true. i just need to figure out some way to make play more rewarding for him; somthing to make his toys irrisistable. i am open to suggestions here. one note that may be of interest though, he did respond much better when we got him on a tiled surface that didnt have cow piss all over it, and after he was able to meet everyone and explore. at that point he played with me some, but soon lost interest and started smelling the the snack table and exploring again. if this pup is low drive,(im assuming he is) i need to find a way to work with what little he has and bring the most out of him.

To me this sounds like displacement behavior. He is focusing on smells because he is nervous about the situation. We see this over and over in weak nerved dogs. Your probably dealing with more than low drive.

Blake, I think an animal barn would be a great distractiion. Plus I'm sure not below zero. My dog has drive, and he would sniff.

Blake posted;

 Quote:

i just need to figure out some way to make play more rewarding for him; somthing to make his toys irrisistable. i am open to suggestions

Blake, remember your pup doesn't have any toys.
THEY ALL BELONG TO YOU!

How does he do when tracking?/ what level of intensity does he have working a track.

How much food drive does he have?/

The big question for me that is, How much OB have he had??

My female pup at times show less interest in playing tug or doing prey drive routines, She has more food drive then anything, I need to rechannel this to other drives.

Let me know what you think the answers are to my questions. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I think Butch hit this on the head here. Those are your toys. Now, regardless if there are smells, etc...if your pup has good drive he would play over the smell. Remember you have to be more interesting than anything else.
Now you can build drive. You can't build it higher than the dogs genetic potential but you can make it a little better in most cases. Only let him play with your toys when he it with and interacting with you. Then when he is done.....back in his crate/kennel without the toys. Try to frustrate him before you take the toy away too.....this will help make him want it even more.
You can only build on what he is genetically capable of.....good luck.
Pat

I am assuming your dos is young but I dont really know but to say that your dog was distracted in the barn and another place with tile floors is not so unusual since these places are not part of the dogs every day life. To over come these distractions Id say goes back to what you are doing with the dog every day at home.You definately need to build the dogs desire to be with you,play with you, and build his drive for your toys at home before you can expect that same behavior at a new location.So the question is what do you do with the dog at home to build drive?

the pup is 6months old. the thing that distracts him most at the barn is the fresh animal smells. pigs, sheep and cattle are judged there, and on this particular session they had been there within the past few days. about what i do with him at home, it is mostly when i come home from school or work and let him out of the crate. i tease him with toys and he loves to play there. his drive at home is decent. at the barn, results vary greatly. some days he focuses and others he would rather not. there is obviously direct correlation between amount of people/dogs in the building and amount of new things in the arena. the surface we do the training on is 6in of wood chips, usually wetted down to keep the dust low. my biggest problem, as far as i can tell, is improving his desire to win my toy. i am trying some new things at home, which probably souldnt be new, but i am about as novice a handler as you can find. i.e. i will get exited and praise him a lot when he wins the toy. so far so good; well see how he does in the barn. any more suggestions? everything helps. and even the most basic concepts are probably ne to me. so do me a favor and pretend i dont know anything at all when you explain. thanks to everyone who responds.

Do you have the pup tied out to anything to restrain him during these attempts to build drive. Have you used a whip with a popper on the end to build excitement/drive? I wouldn't give this dog a bite until he's sufficiently worked up. The bite should be the reward for hightened drive not the means to build it. It requires a lot of skill and patience to build up a dog with low drive. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Have you bought the "building drive and focus" tape from Leerburg?

i generally dont have him tied up accept when we are at the club meetings. i cant afford the building drive and focus tape. i will start giving him a bite only after he is in drive and as a reward. good advice; thank you very much. i was thinking about displacement behavior and weak nerves like eric lund was saying. he could be right but if the pup has weak nerves, i cant see any signs of it other than what i have already told you. when he is sniffing around the barn, he does not show signs of fear. he isnt afraid of new people, and doesnt shy away from new things. he has always been very bold and not afraid to express his oppinion. no one at my club has brought up nerves as an issue so far. my honest oppinion is that i didnt do a good job working with paco when he was younger and since he is most likely low drive he just doesnt know what i am expecting from him. i also think that he does most everything with his nose first, and the combination of him being a young dog and the barn being a new environment makes it hard for him to concentrate. we are trying somthing new with him at club meetings. this is bringing him in to watch advanced dogs do protection. he watches for 1minute, or long enough to see a bite or two, and is brought back out. dogs learn from other dogs so we will see if this helps. the first time we tried it he stayed at the end of his lead the whole time, and even lunged during a running apprehension where the helper came fairly close. he was wagging his tail most of the time and seemed to be wanting to get closer. dont know if this is good or bad, but i know he didnt shy away, and that was his first time watching somthign like that. i still need all the help i can get and truley appreciate everyone's advice and oppinion. you are all honest people and most of you dont beat around the bush. thanks for your help, keep it coming.