Hi Will,

Are you saying that any dog can obtain a SchH title?

To be honest, I've seen some videos from the American based "real protection" organizations that you and others mention and they do not inspire me at all in the least bit. I'd rather train in schutzhund than those other protection based working dog sports anyday. - Greg

Will.. So when a dog has lets say medium drive.. Can you combine, rewards? I am trying to do all of it, this is my first time using any rewards besides voice. It seams to work that little pup is responding to food, voice, or prey item.. and even when nothing but "good boy" is given the pup is excited about commands.. sometimes a bit too excited <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />. Just an idea that maybe all combined can work..
Please just remember this is the first time I am using anything as a reward, before it was a lot of happy praising.

Greg,
To each his own , of course. I can say however, that there has not been any paying off of the judges or overt cheating to receive a title in ASR, unlike what has occured in SchH in the past ( which I observed first-hand with my own eyes ).

Again, to each his own.

I agree with Will and Travis on this based on my own experiences. My older ACD (the one in the link below) has what I consider medium to medium/high prey drive. Nuts for balls, tugs, sleeves and will ignore almost anything when those things are in sight. However, based on his personality, it has not been a skip down the yellow brick road to get him up to par for competition. One of the things that I have found challenging with him is that once the sleeve and the helper stops moving, the "prey" to him is dead and he outs. Mind you, it is always at a time where I am going to give him a command for an "out" but it is less than impressive looking to have a dog of an alternative breed that is not a powerhouse automatically out. It is little things like that, that start ticking off the points. I have done a lot of building drive through obedience - obedience for bites etc - and that has worked wonders. However, I do the sport for the love of it and the love of spending time with my dog. If it was not for either of those things, I might have thrown in the towel <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

My middle male has NO prey drive. Tons of food drive but no prey drive. While I did not have to resort to the ear pinch for the retrieve, it took more patience than I ever thought I had in me to get a reliable retrieve. Tried to do protection with him but it was just not there. I personally can't imagine training a dog with zero to low drives for this sport. Like Will said, I am sure with compulsion it could be done but I would never do that to a dog - just not worth it.

To the original poster - it sounds like your dog is pretty young - how old is he/she. Puppies, in my not so experience opinion, can be distracted in the beginning with other dogs and all the stuff going on around them. My youngest male (nephew to the oldest one) is 8 months old and he still gets distracted sometimes when doing bitework on the field with other people around. At home he nails the french linen puppy sleeve hard so I am just giving him time to get used to the whole field and distraction deal.

I would give it some time as it sounds as if it is all new to both of you.

We are both brand new to the sport and unfortunatelly I never did any imprinting with him. He is now 19 months old. Right now I'm just having fun and learning a lot.

i agree with will in the since that most trainers over-rate their dogs prey drive, that is why i say it just depends on what you consider "medium" toy drives and "high" food drives. i also like will believe that there is a way through classical or instrumental conditioning to train any dog to the level of SCHH I, however it might require the most experienced handlers and some very very creative thinking. i once knew a dog that seemingly had very very low drives for food or toys and there was only one thing the dog would work for, and it took a long time for the handler to find out that a flatten soccer ball was the only toy they would work for.

like i said its generally much easier to train with higher drives provided that you have someone to help you with sticking points.