Red, hoping for some advice here if the Lurgy's not laid you low.
THe folk's new pup Kerry has been a wild wee thing, but fairly obedient, learning not to go in the front room very quickly, not going out of the gate if out on her own in the garden etc, but the last week she's discovered rabbits & seems to have gained the confidence to go streaking off into the distance to look for them, not caring if we're shouting for her to come back.
This isn't being helped by my Dad's bad leg which is reducing his mobility so the wee terror knows she can outmanouvre him.
Any advice as it's got the folks pulling their hair out.
Getting a dog to come to you when you call it, every time, (not just 19 times out of 20) but EVERY SINGLE TIME, is one of the most important, and yet one of the easiest things to teach. It's also the thing that most people make a hash of.
Once you have made a hash of it, it ceases to be one of the easiest things to teach, and becomes one of the most difficult.
Let me try to explain why this particular command causes so much trouble.
Virtually any other command you give is enforceable. Tell her to sit. If she ignores you, you can push her bottom to the ground. Tell her to stay out of the front room. If she ignores you, you can throw her out.
You can't
force her to come back to you when she's running free, you can only
ask her.
The solution is simple, but you have to be 100% consistant.
NEVER CALL HER UNLESS YOU KNOW FOR CERTAIN THAT SHE WILL COME.
It's pointless to call her when she's chasing rabbits and you know she won't come. Think about it. All you are teaching her is to disobey you. You are demonstrating to her that she can get away with it. After a very short time indeed, she won't even hear you. She really won't. It's called "Deffing out" She's having a whale of a time folowing the instincts that have been bred into her for thousands of years, why on earth should she stop?
You have taught her that she doesn't have to come. Every time you call her and he doesn't come, you are re enforcing that lesson.
Even if you give her a jolly good hiding when you do get hold of her, in her mind she's being punished not for running away, but for COMING BACK!
NEVER CALL HER UNLESS YOU KNOW FOR CERTAIN THAT SHE WILL COME!
OK, lets look at the other side of the coin. Instead of calling her when she doesn't want to come, call her when she does.
If you have any dog sense at all, you will know the times when she will come to you. Dinner time, play time, just come home from the shop time, whatever. it doesn't matter, as long as you know she will come.
Let her see you preparing her dinner, but have someone hold her until you call her name. Then have someone hold her while you hide around a corner and make her dinner, but make sure she can hear or smell you doing it. Call her name and let them release her, she will be there like a shot.
Basically what you're looking for here is a conditioned response. She hears her name called, she comes. She doesn't think. She doesn't need to. IT'S ALWAYS SOMETHING GOOD!
Once you have that 100% "Comes first time every time" response, it will be there for ever. Your dog will come when called, even if it knows that you want it for something unpleasant. BUT YOU HAVE TO GET THERE FIRST.
One last point regarding your particular situation. If you do let her run free to chase rabbits, resign yourself to the fact that you will probably never be able to call her back while she is doing that. The hunting instinct is too strong, and the spark in her has already become a flame.
The only solution to that would be to put her off chasing rabbits for ever. I've done that a couple of times, but that's another story.
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