Dilemma - what if he drops the dummy then touches my hand - do I remove my hand as soon as he drops it?

This is one of the reasons you NEVER throw things for the dog to begin with, if the dog is picking it up next to you, it will have very little time in which to drop it before it hits your hand, BUT your hand touch must be VERY VERY strong.

What do I mean by strong?

I mean if your dog is just bimbling about, and as it is coming towards you and you put out your hand it should practically knock your arm off by shoving its schnozzle in your palm. It will be a conditioned response.

Hence why I say THIS part MUST be done BEFORE you start retrieving.

No I wouldn't want to punish him, I'm not that type of person - I meant like make him do it again - then again that wouldn't make it fun - which is punishing I guess.

I will go and work on some of this now..

You are not thick, you are doing what most people do, not breaking down the training into small enough steps and concentrating on perfecting those steps before moving on.

This is practically universal, and not unique to you, as I said before, most people think a retrieve is just that, ONE behaviour, it is not; it is very many.

I had 39 competitors last week, only ONE of those had full marks for the search square, ie they retrieved all four articles with no mouthing or dropping, to hand.

I meant like make him do it again - then again that wouldn't make it fun - which is punishing I guess.
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If it is not fun, you are not training correctly! My dogs would retrieve until they died, BECAUSE it is fun!

If they find it punishing you are not providing sufficient reward or you are making your training sessions too long; 3 MINS MAX should be your goal!

3 minutes of perfect training, is better than 30 minutes of poor training!

Think
Plan
Do!

Hand touch......one of the best things I ever taught my collie

meant to add just like SB if I put my hand out its just like "superglue"

Found your "article" very intresting read SB. Off to print for later use.

except SLB never posted any such sentiment.

Actually she did and has KW, several times!

That was hard - he wasn't motivated at all - I tried to wind him up by running up and down and asking for touch - he did it but not with much enthusiasm. Maybe I'll try again in the morning - he could just be tired - with the heat..

What was his reward?