Hello everyone.
I am new to Schutzund, and have been working my 22 months old working-line German Shepherd for last 8 weeks. He had done minimum work in various area before I got him, but pretty much green dog. His dam goes to Mink and Troll, and his sire goes to Nores vom Jagerstand and Cilly vom Kuhnhof. According to several experienced schutzund trainers who have seen him, he is stable, yet has some serious civil aggression, normal toy/prey drive. For last 8 weeks, I have been played with him every single day 2-3 times a day with balls, also taking him to Local USA Schtzund club for obedience and protection training. Also I started him on foot-step tracking.

I have been building his drive and focus using a ball in string like Flink's video, and so far he has developed pretty good ball drive. I got accidentally bitten many times during drive work already <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> He seems enjoying playing a little rough (that boosts his drive, I think). Another thing is that he is not 24 hour ball crazy. He seems like turn his drive on and off like light switch. At home he is pretty calm, out at the field, I have to excite him a bit with ball and my voice "do you want to play? huh? huh?" something like that. Then now he jumps and jumps with crying for the ball, etc... I play with him like 5 minutes pretty intense. When I bring him home, he suddenly turns off his drive and very calm/stable dog. That is at least what I see in him so far....

Anyway, he sits, downs, short-stay, come, and front pretty well with pretty high drive using a ball. The problem is during heeling. At the beginning he was wrapping and crowding. I read the other thread about that, and suggestions there have helped a lot.

Our problem now is that he heels with his butt wide from my body. His body is not basically parallel but his butt-end is wider from my body than his head position is.

This is how I do heeling so far. From sitting position, I stand side by side. I usually do two things here. Either holding the ball with my left hand about the level of my left shoulder, or I hide the ball under the left armpit. Then I say "fuss". His concentration to my eye or ball is very good. His energy level is also pretty good. When I started heeling, he still sometimes become crowding. So I make sharp left turn or serpentine circling. His butt starting to sway from my body wide while his head is still close to me. When I stop, he obviously sits in a crooked position, not straight parallel.

What should I do? I do not want to correct him too much to kill his drive level, especially he just started bonding with me and his toy/prey drive has been just starting to blossom.

Long post, but I wanted to sxplain the background and what I have done as detail as possible.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks in advance!

Im sure you will get several suggestions. Most often this is caused by giving the tug or ball from your right side , but your not doing that, So I would suggest one of two things, or three. First try healing very close to a fence or wall on the left side of the dog. Second, Use a piece of whip os a switch in your left hand and tap on the dogs butt, left side if he is out of possition. Third, If you have one use a E-collar placed on the left side near the butt and stem lightly if out of possition.
Luck to you
Ron

Thanks Ron!
The crowding did start after I keep popping the ball out of my right pocket with my right-hand all the time.

Now he got smart, and he decided to heel angled with butt wide so he does not have to turn his head 90 degrees to look up while his body is parallel. I think it is just more comfortable for him....

He is twisting that far becouse he was looking for the ball way over there on the right.
I got a dog at seven months old that was trained that way and did the same thing.
To cure it I used food in my mouth. When he began looking at my mouth instead of my right hand his healing became a lot better.
Ron

I would train in an area where you can go along a wall. I find working along a wall will stop them from going wide. Since your dog also crowds, you will probably have to be in an area where you can switch from wall to open to wall.

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One of the solutions I saw at a seminar was to wrap the leash right across the wide part of your butt...and keep it tight when you start to move. This forces the dogs head right up against your left knee. It's hard for him to move the rest of his body to the left then as it will be at an awkward angle. This was also advised for correcting a forging dog.
As with any exercise, it will take repetition for the learning behaviors to take hold.

I haven't had to use it (yet...), but it worked on the demo dogs !

Not being able to edit, I'll have to add here...
"wrap the leash across the wide part of your butt, and hold it tight by using your right hand pulling the leash forward"

You might try going back to food. I see this when people hurry through the heeling. I have found it is better to solidify the position before going to the prey item. I know some people do it differently, but it is also not there first or even second dog. Also Ed has a video that shows how to use markers in training. This will help you as well. A good thing to remember is if you have to use gadgets to "fix' something, it is better just to go back.