Hi all! First post here.
I have a 5 month old GSD female that I'm doing basic obedience work with and she is doing great...on leash. When she is on leash she is so receptive, but off leash she will do little I say. Getting her to come is the hardest thing. Depending on where she is in the yard sometimes she looks at me and just goes the other way.
Any advice would be appreciated

Steve, she's way to young to expect any consistancy off lead. All she learns when you take her off is that she can refuse your command. Unless your training is motivational, at this point, she's to young for any formal training anyway. Enjoy her puppyhood.

Thanks Scott. Your right, I need to enjoy her puppyhood. I had the feeling that I might be expecting to much.
What age is a good age to start more intensive training?

Im not gonna say that your pup is to young to come to you when you call it. This is why I stress the importance of imprinting some basic things in a dog, starting as early as possible. First you should try and find ways to make your pup WANT to come to you, that is the most important thing. Second I would put a 30 ft. line on the dog and let it drag it around in the yard and when the pup has the line stretched out heading in a direction just call him and step on the end of it, praise the dog all the way to you and when he gets there make it worth while with a GREAT reward.The scenario Im describing is a training session.

Thanks again I'll give that a try.

IS your pup very food motivated?

With my pup, he is VERY food motivated. From 8 weeks I would say "here" and reward his coming with a treat EVERYTIME. At first I "reeled him in" with the leash. He is now 8 months old and comes VERY fast and sits in front everytime he hears "here" no matter what he is doing. Even if he is playing with the other dogs, he comes immediately. In his mind, I have something MUCH better than what he is currently doing. I still ALWAYS give him a treat or a toy for "coming" when called. I also don't usually give a formal "here" command if I am going to put the leash on him. (As this can make them hesitant(sp) about coming.) Afterall if you are going to put the leash on, that is going to "ruin" their fun.

I will call him to me, give him a treat or play with the toy for a few seconds, THEN put the leash on.

My dog will typically come to me except on two instances:

1. When she knows I am pissed at her....
2. When she is chasing something/someone..

It seems almost always that number 2 is the direct cause for number 1. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

From the moment I got my dog I used a high pitch come command. She caught on quite fast that it was a good thing to come to me....lots of praise and playing if she did, and a few treats as well. It can be done in a training setting, keeping in fun for the dog at all times. The dog must want to come to you or it never will.

I would like to try the praise method first. She isnt very food motivated.

Praise is all well and fine, but there will be very few dogs on the planet that will choose a praise reward over some other interesting distraction. Something very important to think about as your training progresses. The more rewards you can use in training the better. Use food and praise.


Food drive is an easy thing to build in a dog, don't feed him for a day (or whatever is age appropriate). . .start training the next day with food reward. . .and BAM!! you've got food drive. On top of that, use something that is really good to eat. I like pieces of BBQ chicken, teriyaki chicken, ham, bacon. . .use what you have that smells and tastes great.

Steve,

I agree with VanCamp, food drive must be built. All dogs have food drives. It is simple survival rule. If you are having problem with food drive in your dog means you are either not using an interesting enough food or your dog is overfed. It is good to build up the food drive now to have good inprint for future trainings. Unless of course your idea for his career is garden potato. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

I dont think anytime is too early to imprint in the dog you are the most interesting thing in the universe. You give food, you give play, you give fun to him, you give greatly uplifting praise and you have the wonder touch that the dog yearned for. You are everything the dog ever needed. The other details in O/B forms around this early inprint. So start making yourself the most interesting thing on the field. The rest of the excercise falls naturally on this inprinted foundation. Then the dog will come when called anytime and everytime.

However there will be time where the challenge will come when he will choose to ignore(after hundreds of successful comes and this one time he visibly ignored) That is the time to put on the longline and give it a good pop followed by good praise and food on success come.