I hope lots of you respond, please

[science_doc]

I was wondering about the recall skills of everyone's dogs. In addition, I was hoping you would be willing to share your techniques for teaching and testing recall. I am trying to find the best methods to work with my little door dasher.

Thanks in advance for sharing :P

[imported_Kat]

Recall is the most important exercise you can teach your dog, to avoid a potentially dangerous situation (along with the emergency down of course). Meg was taught recall when she was a pup and through her obedience, agility and pet life she has always used recall. Her recall skills are great now but when she was younger she was a little brat!

She lives with her brother and I co-own Meg with a lady who doesn't do anything with her. This lady's hubby works Meg's brother and when he was working her brother Shane when the dogs were younger, Meg would do a dash from one end of the field to the other to her brother to play. It came to the crunch one day when we were at an agility show and the carpark and showgrounds were separated by a busy road. Meg did 3 jumps and jumped over the tape and out of the ring to the carpark, nearly being smacked by a car. From that day on she was on a flexi lead for 3 months solid and she did not get off even when she was not near any other dogs. She hasn't looked back and is now working championship obedience and agility, and is qualified for the obedience world championships for Crufts 2004, so don't give up! There is always light at the end of the tunnel!

Basic recalls: Start with the dog on a lead always. Arm yourself with cheese, sausage, livercake, something really really tasty that the dog will be into. Keeping the dog on the left hand side of you put him into a sit and flick the lead being held in your right hand up slightly and say wait. Take a step to the side but keep your right hand on the loop of the lead and use your left hand to slide up and down the lead, as a control. i.e. the left hand goes closer to the dogs collar if he goes to move as the lead will then tighten. Reinforce the wait again. The lead only slackens if he is sitting. Take a step to the side and keep saying wait and if necessary use your left hand out to the side to reinforce that wait. Hold that position for a few seconds, back into heel position and praise him up and feed him the tidbit.

Only when you have the wait sorted with no movement when you gradually back away from the dog, then you can start the recall, but take it in small steps. Don't gallop before you can trot. Use a decent length of lead (5/6 ft) and keeping that wait with him on the lead still, call him to you (use his name and come), using your arms out wide to encourage him. When he comes to you, hold the food above his nose and say nothing or do anything until he sits. Immediately when he sits praise him and feed him.

After doing this for a bit, you can start dropping the lead in front of you and calling him, then gradually increase your distance until he can be taken off his lead and will come with no problems. If you always have a cheery disposition when doing this and raise your voice excitedly, then your dog will want to come to you and will know that he will be getting a reward. This should also help with him dashing out of the door, and his name and come will be associated with a praise session or/and treat.

Good luck :wink:

[imported_Cassie]

All of my dogs do fantastik recalls! at the obedience trials people make a point of staying to watch my Newfoundlands do their recalls...they are so excited to come running back to mom! :lol:
It also depends on what breed of dog you have as well...I used to own a Husky which did wonderful recalls as well...he did really well in obedience...but, some people have a hard time training a horizon dog to come on command..it depends on the dog.
I make the experience a very happy one. When I first adopted my dogs they were already adults and did not have any freedom before I took them in...I would take my dogs out into a ball field which was completely fenced in and have a baggy full of wonderful liver treats. When my dog got running around the field and having a great time I would call the dogs name and run the other way...this promted the dog to chase me...when he caught me I would reward him big time! I would then play a bit and let him run around more with out putting him on lead...I would continue to do this and my dog started realizing that when he came back to me he was not always going to be put on lead and taken home...some times they start to associate the come command with being put on lead...I also made sure that when I was walking around the field with him I would pass him every once in awhile when he was busy sniffing a great urine mark...this way my dog did not associate my walking up to him as an assertive behavior...unless I am competing in a trial I find this is the best way I found to train a dog to come to you. I also found that using a whistle helps a great deal as well (unless you are training for competition...) my dogs ( I own 6 dogs currently) will stop what ever they are doing when I blow my whistle and come running to me as fast as possible...I trained them to sit in front of me before they get their treat...I couldn't handle have 4 Newfoundland dogs, a Rottweiler and a Dobie mix all jumping on me when they come back! :lol: I find this method is wonderful..they get so conditioned to the whistle and the treat (basically like clicker training) that they do not fail in their recall when I blow my whistle....I use a whistle as I live by the ocean and when we are walking on the shore the waves drown out my voice etc. the only thing which can be heard above the waves is the whistle.
I also have taught my dogs never to let me out of their site...when out walking in the country if they get too far ahead I hide in the bushes...when they find I am no longer in site they get upset and come running back to find me...they usually go right past the first time then realize they can't get my scent...I let them find me and then they get a wonderful big praise and treats...
The only dog I really had a hard time training to a recall was my Great Pyrenees...they are quite the horizon dog :-? I was only able to let her loose in a well fenced in area...or keep her on a lunge line made for horses (I owned her long before flexi leads where invented! :lol: )
What ever training method you choose...make the lessons short and sweet and make it fun. Dogs are conditioned to repeat things which bring them pleasure...and positive training makes for a better companion. :wink:

[kendalyn]

Buck has a very good recall and it was pretty easy to train. I just made it as positive as possible to come to me, pretty much like Cassie stated but I didn't try running the other way.

Even before Buck's recall was great he was off lead when we took a walk in our woods. I could do that because Buck does not like to be out of my sight for very long so I didn't have to worry about him bolting. When we were walking I would periodically call him back to me and praise him like crazy and let him go on about his business. I would also hide from him sometimes. It made him pay a lot more attention to where I was. To further his skill at paying attention to me, I praise him like crazy when he looks back at me while we walk. I want him to be aware of where I am at all times. One more thing I do, is when we're on the trail and he's getting a little far ahead for my comfort, I just say, "Far enough, Buck." At first obviously he didn't know what this meant so I would say it and if he didn't stop I would sternly say, "SIT" and make him sit there until I caught up. Now when I say, "Far enough, Buck." he stops and waits for me.

Now I can't hide from him because he catches me before I get very far!

[Guest Mutts4Me]

Well... I didn't train recall with my dog, but since you wanted lots of responses, I'll just say what I can. Some background info:

Sasha is a chow/shepherd/etc mutt we officially adopted when she was about 1 year old. I say officially because we'd known her much longer, as she lived down the road from us but wandered a great deal. Her owners were not the best. They were neglectful and abusive, and Sasha found comfort with us. She roamed freely, and she could often be seen carrying dead rabbits and squirrels she'd caught (for fun or food I'm not sure). She was initially afraid of us, but we cured that, and she hung out at our house with us and our lab Bandit. It wasn't until her owners dropped her at the pound when we officially adopted her.

Re "Recall" - Having roamed most of her life, Sasha was hard to train boundaries. But I boundary trained her, and by the next summer we could trust her to be off her leash. BUT even then, there was the problem of rabbits and squirrels, and she would occasionally break boundaries to go after them. And other dogs... she was/is extremely territorial and cannot stand other dogs in or near her yard, especially females.

We used to have to hold her, or take her inside when she saw something she wanted to run after. But I had to trust her, so I gradually stopped physically restraining her, just telling her over and over to stay... But if she was startled by a small animal breaking out from high weeds or something, she would go after.

Err... this sounds more like boundary training than recall, but like I said, I didn't "teach" recall, really, it just happened.

Now, if she runs after anything, I can yell "Sasha!" and she WILL stop. Another dog can be coming into the yard, and I can yell "Sasha!" and she WILL come. This is an amazing, beautiful thing to me, because I have felt the fear of her charging another dog, I have chased her through several backyards in the dark when she went after a rabbit, I have detached her from other dogs, I have run barefoot down my dirt road screaming as she chased a pickup truck with a Rottweiler in the back. And I can't tell you when it happened that she developed into such a GOOD dog, or even how, but she is a good, good dog.

Sorry if I sound adamant here, but more than once she's broke out after something, and returned when I called, and I just get all shaky and hug her and tell her, "good dog, good dog" over and over, because I always fear her running too far, or hurting someone's dog, and me losing her.

When her recalling first developed, she seemed to be scared when she returned to me, kind of like what Mei-Mei said, because if she ran after something, I would be very very scared and so yell at the top of my lungs in a very emotional voice, which probably spooked her because not only did she hear that emotion and think it was anger, but I'm normally a very soft spoken person, and to have me screaming for her probably spooked her as well. But I was always so happy when she came back, hugging and praising her like I said above, that now she almost always comes back to me with her tail flying high and waving across her back.

[alpha sheltie]

(I'm afraid to admit), Kai's recall isn't strong. We've been working on it though so I have seen some improvement. I want to have his recall really reliable by late march because we're going to a dog park with a bunch of friends so I'd like to have him come instead of chasing him.

Kaedyn has a wonderful recall. We adopted him 5 months ago and back then, he knew nothing except for come. He always had this full body wag when we asked him to come (which definately made things easier for me). Just a month after adopting him, we took him to the dog park but he crawled under the fence and started going towards the cars. Luckily, he came running back to me with his tail wagging when I called. Thank god he has such a great recall.

[science_doc]

Thanks for sharing guys, your stories give me hope. Hailey gets better all the time, but she has got so much wandering in her soul, :lol: When I took her to the private dog club area, I took her on a long line and kept her on, even thought I felt like a dope. I'm sure people were whispering, what a goof, won't even let her dog free inside a fence. But, I learned some interesting things. Hailey is great at ignoring me when she is doing something fun like chasing moles in the snow or sniffing deer tracks. So I guess I haven't worked with her enough yet. I think that she would be alright and come summer when the fence is a little taller (basically after the snow melts, :lol: ) I might be able to trust her off lead. I put her inside one of the chutes by the gate (holding her line tightly) and went on the other side and then watched. She whined and whimpered, but she didn't try to dig or jump the fence. I know she grew up with a fenced in yard, so I'm hoping she will recognize the boundry......but for now we are going to work on recall, a bit everyday and just keep trying to get better. The next obdience class we are taking is focused on off lead control of your dog so that should help us too.

[MajiesMom]

I used a harness and a 40ft training lead.
(Warning: If you have a big crazy dog running around attached to a 40ft lead with the other end in your hand, pay attention or you will get serious leash burn in your hands, it really hurts!)
My fianc