Michael,

I never had a problem with that...Mine were trained to only accept food if it was in their stainless steel bowl. So when I had to fly and was gone for a week to some competition...My dogs at the time had to be boarded. The staff upon my return said they had absolutely no issues with them even though they couldn't physically handle them. Had them there several times over the years and was told mine were the BEST behaved lol. Now there's an oxymoron... Malinois = well behaved!

As pups they were taught that outside that food bowl...The food came ONLY from me. And they were never allowed to pick up food from the ground. Later, when older and this completely understood and reliable with me present and in various locations; they were 'proofed' and reinforced with me out of sight using an ecollar. But it's something that's always being 'tuned' or reinforced. Not frequently after some point...but nevertheless it needs to be reinforced intermittantly throughout the dog's life.

I highly doubt an animal would starve itself. Even the most highly trained animal would eventually give in to the competing motivation of hunger and probably sooner than we'd think. We once boarded a k-9 while his handler was out of town that had been taught to only go to the bathroom on command. We thought he was sick since he didn't have any bowel movements for a whole two days. One quick call to his handler and we rushed to tell his dog to "take a break". Poor dog. lol. Never seen a dog so happy to go potty.

Thanks for the site..... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

Ed feeds his house dogs in their crate, while it's inside his house. Couldn't you train your dog to only eat food from his crate? That way if you had to have someone else feed your dog while you’re out of town, the only person that he would accept food from, would be someone with access to his crate, inside your house. If you needed to take the dog with you somewhere over night, you would bring his crate anyway.

I like the idea of training the dog to eat with a specific command better than training him to eat in specific area.

When talking about food refusal I always see many different views and I think this is because for this particular training, it is very user specific.
Another words, everyone's situation is slightly different. I personally like the use of a command because I board my dogs occasionally. Sometimes my close friends or my newphews want to give him a treat. For me, its a good solution, I'm sure it wouldn't work for everyone.

Yeah I like the idea of a command also. For example Kane isnt the least bit trained for food refusal and will eat out of a bowl, hand, ground... he doesnt care as Im sure most dogs dont.

Now if I hold a piece of food in front of him and tell him "no" he wont take it until I say "ok." My problem is I say "no" when I should be using other commands such as "leave it" or whatever.

So if I were to teach him food refusal now (hes 16 months old) how do I go about it? Do I first change my "no" to a "leave it" and change my "ok" to an eat command. And then slowly wean from using the leave it? Sorry if I sound confusing <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />
I dont want to have to always use "no" or "leave it" since I cant always be there to tell him what he cant have. Also I remember someone saying you dont have to use an e-collar. How is this done? Sure the dog may refuse food with you in sight but what happens when your out of sight? How do you correct the dog for eating food off the ground if you dont have an e-collar?

I want to train Kane in food refusal and just want to know how to get started...Once he understands commands I can use an e-collar (because I dont yet have one)... or... should I not do anything yet and just do it Lous Way with an e-collar from the start?

It bugs me when strangers try to give my dog a treat, the mailman and UPS guy carry Milkbone's with them, pet store employees have em up at the counter, veterinary receptionists have em on the counter... Unfortunately I trained my dog with a flaw that I intend to correct in future.

If I hold out a treat for Cujo, he automatically sits and waits, I can wave the treat, whatever it may be, all around his face and he will just focus on it, but not eat it until I give him an "eat" command, or move my hand in such a way to suggest he can eat it (i.e. palm up with treat in my hand, or treat between fingers and move hand to mouth height) - the flaw is that when strangers offer him a treat before I can tell them not to, they bring the treat to his mouth once he sits, so he takes it. I need to break him of this and require that he only take it on command.

My reason for this exercise when I started it at his age of 4.5 months was simply because he would take your whole hand off when offering him a treat, now he takes it nicely, I hadn't considered the other usefulness for this exercise.

I realized I had a problem of my dog taking treat too aggressviley also. I realized an easy soulution to the problem. STOP THROWING THE TREATS. I used to toss the treat to him. Now I only offer the treat in the palm of my hand. He takes it nicely.