Springers air scent & training is gradual & it helps the recall because the dog learns to track & then stop when they have found what or whom they have been tracking. The dog learns control & recall can be then trained for.

Why does the dog have to be close to track ?? Have you been on a nosework course with her ??

It does sound to me as if you are not making yourself & training interesting enough.

I'm surprised that she doesn't respond to reward based training-you don't feed her before training do you ?

You sound quite down with the training situation, perhaps you need to look for a motivational training group & start from the beginning again ?

That was my thinking - if the dog learns to track his/her owner and enjoys it, then the dog can be recalled using that.

No i don't feed her even tried NILF, and no i'm not down, i'm actually quiet happy at how far Moll has come the ultimate aim is to get her out beating with the others (she managed half a day last season) she is still not steady enough to do more.

As i said before the hunting is the most rewarding thing for her, nothing i can do will ever be as interesting

The question is how would you deal with a dog like this who is not motivated by food or toys, and i have seen several springers like this most of them about 8 months when they have come in to rescue, they haven't been taught control.

We have two Beagles. Recall and off-lead control are a huge problem with this breed. They've been bred to work independently from people and to follow their noses. Tackling the problem is still ongoing, but I can tell you where we are now and how we achieved it.

Firstly, I'm very proud to say that we do have a 100% reliable emergency recall. We used the approach described in the following links and it was working reliably for us after a few weeks. We can now call our dogs of a scent. In this mode we could stick a freshly roasted chicken under their nose and they don't even notice it. Yet we call them and they skid to a halt, turn on their heels and sprint to us as if the devil was on their tails! Here are the links to the system we use:

http://www.dogagilitypreschool.biz/H...e%20Recall.pdf
http://www.dogagilitypreschool.biz/H...0Part%20II.pdf

Now the fact that yours isn't interested in rewards makes it harder. But try and get hold of the book "When Pigs Fly" - I think that'll help you to think about things in a different way and solve your problems. It's working well for us. It explains why you can't really treat 'independent' breeds the same way as labs for example (at least, not if you want good results). It'll make you feel better too about all the people that tell you that you aren't making yourself interesting enough!

Good luck with it! I know it can seem like an impossible challenge.

With a gundog I`d use play / with a Labraor I`d use food / with a GSD I`d use praise. To sum up, I`d find what motivates the dog and use that.
I think the hardest bit is to avoid the dog `failing`. So the dog doesn`t learn that recall is optional.
So with a dog with an iffy recall, I`d change the command and method. First teach it when the dog is already coming to you (e.g for his dinner) treat or play with a tuggy or jump about squeaking whatever.
Then when that is learned take it to other parts of the house or garden. Again, don`t attempt it if the dog is likely to `refuse`. Then outside on a line, or when he`s already trotting up to you.
The object is to make it a Pavlovian reflex - hear whistle or voice, must have that reward.
This is a positive training method - reward the good, avoid the unwanted. And repeat till it is learned.

keep em coming guys interestingly all the replies are from the positive side of the fence, which i agree with, I suppose with Moo she was a bit of an exteme example.

C & D i'm not exagerating when i say i have laid on the floor with numerous toys squealing like a big girls blouse with warm sausage on my head with Moo. The hunt is what motivates her nothing else and now we have recognised that and stop trying to actually change her we can work with it

If it is the scenting that motivate her I would allow her to do that as a reward.

It is always working with what the dog wants - that is the essence of reward based training. You find what rewards the dog responds to and use them accordingly.

If your girl enjoys the search I would teach her to search on command.

Possibly starting in the garden....hiding her rabbit skin - allowing her to see first....teaching her to search etc and slowly making it harder to find.

Then move that into a walk situation (still with her on a long line).
Introduce some control exercises....sit/wait/down heel (whatever you want really) then sending her to search as her reward (alloowing her to see you place the dummy to start with).

I would hand feed her all the time - not always for NILIF but just to get her associating you with what she needs.

I would also go back to teaching a recallon a totally new command - one that she has not learnt to ignore (possibly a whistle) and making sure she has to respond 100%of the time.

I would also work on instant downs/sit (at a distance) which would give you a little control even when she was at a distance from you.

Have you done any targeting with her? (nose or foot targeting?)

That sounds like a brilliant plan to me.

Also, is it worth trying the sit and wait command to train her? At dinner time hold her bowl in your hand and make her sit/wait. Then walk back, gradually further and further and give her a recall command before giving her her bowl.

This is how we trained Woody on the whistle and he was doing out in the fields within 3 days.

Might be worth a try.

She actually has 95% recall now, i wasn't asking for advice as such as i was asking a question how other people would have trained her, i didn't want to put it in the dog whisperer thread as it would have got lost, it's just my own curiosity as to how the ceasars way followers would train her against how the purely positive would, especially as she is not motivated by all the usual stuff.

The thing is with Moll is that you have to let her off to move forward, there is no point long lining her, she knows she is on a line and will come back every single time.

She is trained to the whistle, and its a long time since i have chased her round the woods because she won't come back!

however i do have to be on top of her the whole time if i'm not and she gets away, thats her in to self hunting mode, her reward for coming back is more freedom, she is asked to sit, stay and then sent away, if she does all this her freedom continues, if she doesn't then she's popped back on her lead.

If she does one properly ie naffs off for more than about 5mins then the next couple of nights she goes back to pure training, ie heel work, sit, stays and long lines we then try again. I have to say that the length of time we go between having to do this has increased from once every couple of weeks, to once every couple of months, whether this is right or wrong i don't know, but most importantly it seems to work for her!!!,

The next stage of getting her ready for the season will be to walk her up through some cover absolutely under control, now wish me luck on this one i could be some time.

Here she is the little monkey in full flight coming back to mum


and sitting and waiting for me to release her



It took me the best part of two years to get to this using only positive methods, as what i neglected to say at the start is when we got Moll she crawled out of the pound on her belly the kennel staff said she had never walked, thats how scared she was, and any type of harshness would have just been counterproductive.

I suppose the point i was trying to make is how can you teach that through using ceasars methods, and i was interested in how other people would have gone about it

Sorry - I was just responding to the senario - had not really read the whole thread.

From what you are describing I would imagine it would depend on when you started 'formal' training with her as well...ie - how much time did you allow her to settle or did you start on day one....

There are so many factors when dealing with dogs it is often hard to really get in depth with little knowledge of the dog - which of course applies to 99% of what you get onforums...simply through time and space constraints.

I am confused as to whether you used what you felt were CM's methods or not....(probably me - I am really not 100%!)