I have a 3 year old neutered male GSD who is a rescue. He was very easy to train and i was very pleased with him. When i adopted him he was 1 year old and i did the basic obedience training with him (sit, stay, come...)At the time i thought that was all he needed to learn. I have changed my opinion since. I have no knowledge of his lines so he is strictly a companion for me but i do want him to be well behaved. I have Ed`s DVD on basic obedience training and it is a great help. My GSD loves to learn and we have fun doing our daily sessions. He is definetly food driven, toys are no motivation for him whatsoever. So of course i use treats to train him and it works very well. My problem is this: If he knows i have a treat his butt hits the ground lightning fast (during training sessions) but if i go in and out the door throughout the day and i tell him to sit by the door till i go through first i could make a trip to the kitchen and get a cup of coffe come back and his butt would probably still be in midair. I do have a prong collar on him and i do correct him when he takes that long. Still, if he knows i have no treat he takes his sweet time. Am i fussing over nothing since he is not a working dog? Am i wrong wanting him to obey instantly? I don`t think i am but i would really appreciate your opinion and your advice. Thanks in advance for any help <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I think you should train your dog any way you want. With food it takes 6 to 8 months to condition a response. When you wean a dog off of food, I do it randomly at different intervals. I know that Ed has an article on this on his site. I don't correct for a slow response I believe that understanding why I was getting a correction would take resoning which a dog doesn't have ie Oh I see, I get the correction because I am slow. Dogs learn situations and patterns first. It looks like they know what you are asking. To test this, ask your dog to sit one command only from across the yard. Does he do it??? If not then you can see he doesn't necessarily know what you are asking, he knows the situation and the pattern. Now you add in a correction and he gets confused. Next time he is slow, because he is anticipating the correction. and slower, and slower ect. I hope that this gives you an idea of what is going on in his head. I would read the article that Ed has for the weaning process. I am computer illiterate and cannot even get the search function to work here in this forum so I can't find the article for you or I would. It was very helpful to me.

He does understand the command perfectly, if i tell him to stay(standing) for example and walk away i can put him into a sit from quite a distance but the response is slow unless i have a treat.

Again a contextual response. Situation and pattern. I am talking about when the dog is walking around the property and you give him the command. Try staying away from the corrections for a while. Go to what ever position gets the response that you like. stay there until he is fast. add a bit of distance. stay there until you get the good response and keep going. If you do this at two feet, then four then six, back to two then eight ect I think he'll catch on.

I have no idea what contextual means. It sounded pretty cool though. The rest is for real. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I was wondering if you use a release command. You could maybe build your dogs excitement by using the release command and becoming very excited and animated yourself when you release the dog.Rewarding only after the release.

I see the edit feature is gone. Anyway, making the reward after the release a combo of excitment, praise and reward and taking the emphasis off the food reward only.

Jeff, i used your advice and there is much improvement. Thank you so much for all your help. That goes for everyone who respondet to my post. Thank you.

Glad I could help. Trust me I still screw this stuff up on occasion. Then I hit my head on the wall and lament on how dumb could I possibly be. Good thing my dog loves me so much!

And when I say "on occasion" I am being kind to myself! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />