Duane's advice is very good. Some dogs can take corrections and settle down after them, but many cannot without damaging their 'mood' for that evening.

That sounds like a good routine to implement here, thanks Duane!

How's it going?

It's going well the last couple of days. I am using his meal times and toys to teach him his bark command. In only two days you can see the light bulb slowly turning on above his head.

We go to IPO/SchH training every Sunday, so I will be implementing the good advice so far when we go this weekend!

Isn't it great when you can see the connections click?

It really is. He's such a bright boy, you can almost hear the gears turning!

Sunday we headed out to IPO practice, ready to implement these suggestions.

I explained the situation to our trainer who was happy to help out. We started off a good distance away while one dog was working in the field and two others were in long downs along the sidelines. Brody would get excited and pull towards the field (as always) because he thinks he is going to go out there and do protection work, which he loves.

When the leash had slack in it and he looked at me, I would reward with some good treats. We worked on this for quite some time, and eventually he "got it" and kept focusing on me for treats. Once the trainer saw he was doing this well, he had me reward him by pulling out his tug and bringing him on to the field to do his obedience routine (after all the other dogs were off). He did great.

I also stretched a black cloth across the back of my Jeep right behind the front row seats so it effectively created a sight blocking barrier between his kennel and the field. This worked, but not 100%. Back in the Jeep he would still bark like crazy when he was in his kennel if he saw another dog. So I started to praise/reward him when he was quiet as another dog passed by. He was doing quite well towards the end of the day.

Our trainer said we would continue to do this as much as he needs in order to get him to the point of neutrality. I'm looking forward to that!

Thanks again for all the help everyone.

sounds great lee . . . remember to balance every few of those " bark , mark , reward " with , " quiet , mark , reward " to get the maximum benefit of the opportunity .

Thanks Ian, we'll be working on that for sure!

Just an update... Brody has been doing great with his bark and quiet commands. Last weekend was the second time at SchH practice that we worked on remaining calm and focusing on me instead of other dogs while he was out in the field with him. He's been doing great, especially for just turning 10 months old today.

He improved so much in just the second week that our trainer had me put him in a long down on the sidelines while the other dogs worked their recalls, groups, etc. He did get up a couple of times, but only lunged to go play once. We are working on remaining calm and staying in the down for longer periods of time. Next weekend I plan on bringing a much higher value food reward.

Thanks again for all the help!