Quote: Denise Keckley

He has no desire to play tug or return any toys. He will go to a spot and lay down with the item. I understood from the Michael Ellis video that tug can increase a dogs possessive nature so I am looking for a starting point to start the retrieve exercise since he does not want to interact and bring toys back to me. No, I never chase after him.

Denise, about what Bob said (backchaining) .... do you know this?

I actually taught couch-potato toy dogs (Pugs!) to do simple fetch using that link-by-link backchaining method and also being very careful at first to stay within what Bob called the individual dog's "circle of influence."

The first thing I taught (for fetch) was the release into my hand. This was started indoors, in a no-distraction setting, and was perfected before I started any tossing of the item. (Then that was also started indoors, no-distraction, in a small area with just the dog and me.)

For plain old fetch, the release was my first link taught, because it's the last thing the dog does in "fetch". (If I had been teaching a competition retrieve, I'd have started with the finish: going from front to heel position.)

As Duane says, I started with zero distractions. Zero, including eliminating the distraction of distance. This is where the dog's "circle of influence" came in. If the dog paid attention only when the toy was within a foot of him, then that's where we worked.

All of this, every step (or link in my backwards chain) was taught with markers.

It wasn't like with GSDs. But I think if it worked with Pugs, then it would work with pretty much any dog.

Thanks, I believe that might be the way to go with this dog.

Thanks, for the idea. I do use long line when I work with him and might give it a try.

Just a thought; I like teaching with food because the dog gets highly motivated (less compulsive). My earlier post on this thread explains how.

 Quote: Duane Hull

Just a thought; I like teaching with food because the dog gets highly motivated (less compulsive). My earlier post on this thread explains how.

Me too. All the mentions I made of marker training meant that I was using food for the marker rewards.

The long line is certainly one way to go, and it's a good backup anyway. I've used it plenty in the past when teaching both fetch and the recall, and particularly when there were vestiges of poor training that I was trying to undo (whether from someone else or from me ).

But with the method Bob describes, if I needed to reel the dog in while teaching a retrieve, I'd know that I was working way too far outside the dog's attention circle and also maybe in way too high a distraction-y area at that point in teaching.

Excellent point, Connie. Sadie caught on immediately, so I didn't have to link behaviors or work backwards.
I always feel bad when I see a dog that has to be reeled in on the retrieve, but in all actuality, it is the fastest way to teach some sport dogs. That's probably why I've seen it done so much.