Hello,

Am starting to teach my 4 month Beagle-retriever how to heel (and stop pulling & darting during our walks).

When I say heel he'll stop pulling and fall back but comes right in front of me rather to my left. I've almost tripped over him a few times. Help needed

Bev,

Do you use marker training with your pup?

Yes. I have the DVD "Trg with Markers" but need more specific advice on how to break down this command. Tx.

Hi Bev,

I'm not an expert, but when teaching my dog to heel, I got him into correct position by using luring - I held treats in my hand and held my hand by my side, just over his nose. As I walked, his nose stayed pointed at my hand, which meant his head was naturally aligned with my side, and his body behind me. I verbally marked and gave treats at intervals, from the hand over his nose, as we walked.

Some people take it a step up and put the treats in their mouth and spit them to the dog while they're walking, which has the added benefit of training focused eye contact during the heel... though I've never been coordinated to actually pull that off myself. Either way, you want to be actually giving the reward WHERE you want the dog positioned - luring is a good quick way to move a dog around to where you want it.

Once you've got the dog excited about following you around by your side, and understanding that forging ahead doesn't get him any treats, you can start incorporating whatever command you want to use on top of the marking and treating - I actually use "with me" instead of heel.

I don't know how tall your dog is in relation to you, but if he's too short to make holding a treat over his nose convenient, I've heard of people putting peanut butter on the end of a stick and using that as an extension of their hand...

Hope some of that helps,
~Natalya

This is awesome direction - and so simple! You're right about the height differential (won't be too much longer before I'll once again be the short one in the family).

Another question: Currently, I do my fitness walk/jog (walk 2 min; jog 1 - over time I'll build up to where I'm jogging 9 minutes walking one) for a total of 60 minutes. When can I do this with my beagle-retriever pup. He's currently 17 weeks.

YEP! What Natalya said!

 Quote: Bev Thibault

This is awesome direction - and so simple! You're right about the height differential (won't be too much longer before I'll once again be the short one in the family).

Another question: Currently, I do my fitness walk/jog (walk 2 min; jog 1 - over time I'll build up to where I'm jogging 9 minutes walking one) for a total of 60 minutes. When can I do this with my beagle-retriever pup. He's currently 17 weeks.

Bev, here's a thread that discusses the jogging with a puppy topic. The answer starts down about half way through the first page and then the second page:
http://leerburg.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/237069/page/0/fpart/1