# How to keep him from running off?



## Rango (Feb 24, 2011)

Hi everyone. 

I let our golden, Rango, out to play this morning with our next door neighbor's dog in the back. Our next door neighbor's dog knows to stay within a certain radius of the house (no back fence...house backs up to a bayou) but Rango apparently does not as I had to chase him half way down the bayou this morning. We just rescued him last Sunday so he may not be familiar with my voice yet and he's certainly not trained yet.

I know to keep him on the dog run now out back, but my questions are:

- Will he eventually learn to come back when called?
- Will he eventually learn to come on his own or stay nearby?

Thanks in advance!


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## CarolinaCasey (Jun 1, 2007)

Most dogs are in rescue or a shelter because they never learned to 'come' or were let out once and took off- never to be seen again. IF you want to see Rango again, begin by not letting him outside off leash. Put a long line on him and hold on to the other end while he's outside. Dogs don't come trained, it will take a lot of work and patience on your end to get Rango where you want him to be. Read on...

Enroll in a good obedience class. They will cover this as well as other issues that you're certain to encounter. You can start today by starting in the house with low distractions. Put Rango on a 6 ft leash and hold the other end. Tell him to 'come' in a happy voice and give him encouragement. When he comes, give him a tasty treat. Repeat x a million. Eventually build up to more distracting areas (always on a leash) and repeat the same command and praise. You can then begin on a longer leash or a long line. If he doesn't come when called, just reel him in. Don't give him the chance to ignore you. That is where a lot of owners make mistakes. If he doesn't listen, reel him in, start running backwards and be excited. He will choose you. That is what you want.


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## lgnutah (Feb 26, 2007)

And just a PS, just because you get him "trained" to come on command, you must periodically repeat training to reinforce. 
Brooks has started to become a little lax in his response to my "come" command......like, if he FEELS like it, he responds, but if there is something really interesting in his radar, he has started to ignore me.


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## Elisabeth Kazup (Aug 23, 2008)

You need to keep him on a leash until you train him for reliable recall. I would say that with water (bayou) close by, that will take some work with a Golden!

He's new to you, the area and totally confused. You say you just rescued him Sunday. God bless you for rescuing him. He doesn't know you from a hole in the ground, not your voice, not any commands, not even where he lives. 

Please be careful with him. He isn't too big to be alligator lunch. 

Can you explain what 'on the dog run' means? Is that like a zip line or tie out? If he were mine I would never leave him out there without supervision. I would be out there with him. They can get into all kinds of trouble when left alone and trouble can come into the yard and find them.

Again, thanks for rescuing him and giving him another chance at a forever home.

Pictures please?


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## lgnutah (Feb 26, 2007)

The alligator thing occurred to me too.....they can come up out of the water, snatch your dog, and drag him back to the water and drown him before you could get out your door.


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## Rango (Feb 24, 2011)

CarolinaCasey said:


> Most dogs are in rescue or a shelter because they never learned to 'come' or were let out once and took off- never to be seen again. IF you want to see Rango again, begin by not letting him outside off leash. Put a long line on him and hold on to the other end while he's outside. Dogs don't come trained, it will take a lot of work and patience on your end to get Rango where you want him to be. Read on...
> 
> Enroll in a good obedience class. They will cover this as well as other issues that you're certain to encounter. You can start today by starting in the house with low distractions. Put Rango on a 6 ft leash and hold the other end. Tell him to 'come' in a happy voice and give him encouragement. When he comes, give him a tasty treat. Repeat x a million. Eventually build up to more distracting areas (always on a leash) and repeat the same command and praise. You can then begin on a longer leash or a long line. If he doesn't come when called, just reel him in. Don't give him the chance to ignore you. That is where a lot of owners make mistakes. If he doesn't listen, reel him in, start running backwards and be excited. He will choose you. That is what you want.


Good advice. We definitely plan on a class. Maybe Rango is just never going to be the type of dog that can be let out and will come back. I can make peace with that. We can get him a long leash. We also planned on getting a back fence (hurricane Ike took care of the last one) but haven't yet due to finances.



lgnutah said:


> And just a PS, just because you get him "trained" to come on command, you must periodically repeat training to reinforce.
> Brooks has started to become a little lax in his response to my "come" command......like, if he FEELS like it, he responds, but if there is something really interesting in his radar, he has started to ignore me.


More good advice.



Penny's Mom said:


> You need to keep him on a leash until you train him for reliable recall. I would say that with water (bayou) close by, that will take some work with a Golden!
> 
> He's new to you, the area and totally confused. You say you just rescued him Sunday. God bless you for rescuing him. He doesn't know you from a hole in the ground, not your voice, not any commands, not even where he lives.
> 
> ...


Pics here: http://www.goldenretrieverforum.com/member-introductions/93515-rescued-katy-tx.html

The dog run is a basically a long cord (~15ft) of cable connected to a spike driven into the ground giving him a ~30ft or so radius to walk in. I can connect a longer cable (if I can find one) to the spike.



lgnutah said:


> The alligator thing occurred to me too.....they can come up out of the water, snatch your dog, and drag him back to the water and drown him before you could get out your door.


LOL! No alligators in this bayou. I make it sound like I'm out in a rural area but this is very much a suburban neighborhood. Only thing in this bayou is some small fish, dirty water and the occasional Red Eared Slider turtle.

The water in this bayou normally isn't any deeper than about a foot.


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## Looni2ns (Mar 26, 2010)

For the time being, unless you've got a fenced yard for Rango to play in, he needs to be on a leash, or lead. If you have any trees, try to make a run for him w/the wire suspended between trees. Less chance that he'll get tied up in his lead. 

Watch out for the water moccasins. They love the bayou, and will chase you or the dog to bite you. Plus, there are copperheads out on the Katy prairie. We used to walk up on them sunning on the greenbelts in Kingwood.


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## Ranger (Nov 11, 2009)

I feel your pain! Ranger came to me after being chained up for the first 9 months of his life and thought of only one thing: freedom. He'd bolt through doorways, break through fences, and lead me on merry chases throughout the neighbourhood. The first time he did it was a day after I'd rescued him. Like Penny's Mom said, Ranger didn't know me from a hole in the ground so me calling him meant less than nothing to him. Not to mention he didn't know his new name or respond to his old one. The next day I started working on his recall.

While Ranger has gotten way better, I doubt he's ever going to be the kind of dog I can let off leash and trust him to stick around. He's high prey drive and overly interested in anything so if he sees something he thinks is interesting, he's gone. My only option is to recall him off something so we've been working diligently every day.

Start off inside the house where it's familiar and distraction-free. Call him to you and use the same command every time. "Rango c'mere" sounds different than 'Rango come" to a dog. Use a normal tone of voice and when he comes to you, praise and treats. Make a BIG fuss over him. Repeat this as many times inside as you can. You want to not only teach him the command but also to establish habit. Keep him on a short leash if you need to reinforce it and never, ever scold him when he does get you (or ever call him to you and scold him for something unrelated; he'll start thinking going to you is a bad thing and your recall training won't get off the ground). Once you can guarantee he'll come to you every single time, start moving out of sight in a different room. Leave him napping in the living room, walk out to the kitchen and call him. BIG party when he gets there! Repeat, repeat, repeat. Once you trust him 100% to get to you when you're out of sight in the house, you can move the training outdoors.

Once outdoors, keep him on a longeline as there'll be more distractions and you're still working on building the habit of him coming to you when you call. You don't want to call him, him start to come, then get distracted and run off. That would put you guys back at step 1, training 100 times a day in the house again. Longe line so you can reinforce the command. Start off when he's looking at you, then gradually build up to when he's distracted, like smelling a tree or something. Call him to you, party and treats, then let him go back to what he's smelling so he realizes that going to you doesn't mean the end of what he wants to do. The more times you practice this a day, the better his recall will be. Start letting him go further and further away from you (but still hold onto the longe line) and when you can start recalling him from 50-100 ft away without needing to reinforce the command, you're on your way!

It takes a ton of time to do this but the more effort you put in, the better he'll be. You may not have a dog that you can trust to not go anywhere (i have one, too!) but if you work continually work at it, you'll get a dog who you can at least call back to you when he wanders off. Ranger got loose for the first time in a year the other day and I was panicked (thinking of the last times this had happened and I'd had to chase him down). We live in an urban setting, it was nighttime, Ranger's black, and he didn't have his collar on. I called him and saw him shoot out of an alley 50 ft to my right and I thought he was chasing a rabbit. I was pleasantly surprised when I realized he was actually coming towards me! Yay for recall training!

Oh, another note: Dogs that are on tie-outs are sometimes the hardest to teach recall. Something about being frustrated that they can't get loose, then when they ARE, they can't stop running. Just something I've read from a few sources and god knows it's true with Ranger. He was so bad the first few months I got him that he'd bolt if he even heard his leash unsnapping off his collar.


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## lgnutah (Feb 26, 2007)

Just a word of caution about the outside line you use, as I don't know when or how long he is on it. Just be sure you are aware of what he is doing when he is on it as he could wrap it around something and then be in the sun--unable to get to his water dish or shade.


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## Rango (Feb 24, 2011)

All good advice! Thanks much. We don't let Rango outside, on the line or not, without us there. We're always outside with him.

Right now, Rango's having the time of his life at the Katy Off Leash dog park. He's playing running and jumping with everything that'll play run and jump back. 

I'm going to re-read these posts later and soak them in.


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