# 8 months old and wont do recall



## sparklesthegolden (Feb 21, 2018)

Hello everyone, 


I hope this is where I am meant to put this. As you can tell, I am new to having an account here. 


My Golden is now 8 months old and I still cannot get her to "come" or do "recall", or at least not most of the time - occasionally I can get her to respond to the 'come' command if we are in training mode and at home with no distractions. 


I have tried everything I can think of. I reward her when she responds to her name. I never call her to me and then 'punish' her ie; locking her in her room. I always say it in a firm, calm tone and reward her with a treat and give her lots of praise when she actually does it. However, 98% of the time she will either a) completely ignore me or b) look at me and choose not to respond/come over. It is getting extremely frustrating especially as she has done extremely well with all her other training. I have tried treats, toys, nothing seems to catch her attention. 


I am at home with her pretty much all the time. She gets plenty of exercise, two walks a day and plenty of play. We do training everyday (such as sit, drop, stay, wait, leave it, heel) and I try everyday to get her to do recall. 


I would really appreciate any advice, helpful tips or just your own experience with this. 


Thanks!


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## Nicoleandjake (Oct 20, 2017)

Do you go and get her when she ignores you or just let it be? If you just let it be, you only have to do that once and she'll have figured out if she ignores you there are no consequences and will keep doing whatever she's doing. I would recommend a long line/leash. 20 ft or so and just practice for now in the yard. Call her with your come command and if she ignores you, pull her gently towards you and repeat repeat repeat. I would also have the long line on her on walks until she realizes you mean business. Since Jake was 9 weeks old I started practicing. At first of course he didn't get it because he was so young but I would try call him when he was already coming towards me and that helped. Never call her (for now) when you know she won't come (sniffing things, playing with another dog etc) . I would just start with easy stuff and get really excited when she comes towards you. Out on walks it helped me a lot to hide on Jake every few mins so he would keep his eye on me and stay closer. You have to be more exciting than whatever she's doing! Those are just my personal experiences with both my dogs !


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## LynnC (Nov 14, 2015)

Hello and welcome. I had a huge problem with Luna's recall that started just about 1 YO. I think one problem might be your pups age. She all of a sudden may have "selective memory". IMO you need to up the treat value. I have treats I only use when I do recall. I use hot dogs which are her all time favorite. Also, I still at 2 1/2 practice almost everyday! In the house if I see her in the family room I will go in another room and call her. I do this several times a day. I think like mentioned get a long lead and practice outside. Make it a fun game and when she comes reward her and release her to go play and repeat. Good luck!


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## Hilabeans (Feb 27, 2018)

Maybe you're too far away from her? Close the "training bubble" as Zak George would say. Go back to basics and with her standing right next to you, give the command. If she moves in your direction she gets a treat. Then take a step back and ask her to come, if she steps in your direction, she gets a treat. Only try it from a distance once she gets it from very close.
I'm sure you'll figure it out!


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## Megora (Jun 7, 2010)

sparklesthegolden said:


> I have tried everything I can think of. I reward her when she responds to her name. I never call her to me and then 'punish' her ie; locking her in her room. *I always say it in a firm, calm tone *and reward her with a treat and give her lots of praise when she actually does it. However, 98% of the time she will either a) completely ignore me or b) look at me and choose not to respond/come over. It is getting extremely frustrating especially as she has done extremely well with all her other training. I have tried treats, toys, nothing seems to catch her attention.



I put in bold what might be the issue... and that's based somewhat on watching some other people in puppy classes dealing with the same problem. And there's more of a problem once the dog hears you telling her to come, but she is not given the additional information that she HAS to come. So it becomes a meaningless command to her. 

When you train recalls with a young puppy (9 weeks old, etc), you take all distractions + alternatives out of the equation. 

So with my dogs, we have a long hallway. We close all doors in this hallway and have 2 people playing the game, taking turns holding the pup in place while the other person goes to the opposite end of the hallway and gets down on their hands and knees to do a very HAPPY HIGH-PITCHED "Dog's name with an EEEE at the end + COME" call. And as the pup comes running, you could even do a "play bow" so the pup can mouth your head or whatever.

The point is that when teaching COME to your puppy, it should be the most exciting game EVER for her. And always rewarding with both play and treats (or other reward). 

Also - calling your dog's name should be synonymous with calling your dog to come. So likewise, any time you call your dog's name - it is in an uplifting-HAPPY PARTY tone. 

Low, calm, firm tones are to be used when you want to "stop" or slow your dog down. I would use these for training stays. 

Only time I use low/firm tones in connection with "come" is when teaching my guy to drop on recall, because instead of getting him AMPED UP to run his butt off getting to me, I'm signalling to him that a drop is coming. So he needs to trot, but he's not coming at a full gallop.


Because it sounds like you've broken the "come" command, you need to go back to square one with a long line and do a quick POP when you do a very happy/excited call your dog's name and have a huge party (treats flying, you getting down to your dog's level) when your dog comes to you. 

Don't ever try off leash recalls unless you have narrowed everything down to your dog not have any alternatives but to come. 

Meaning, I would do off leash recalls in a long hallway with my dog in a wait at the opposite end. 

Worse thing to do with a dog in training is to test him before he's ready. So dog is out in the backyard being a dog.... calling that dog to "come" is setting the dog up for fail if he has not been doing solid recalls all the time. It's also setting YOU up for a big pain, because if your dog does not come on the first call, you have to GO OUT AND GET YOUR DOG. There is no shrugging it off and trying next time, because that just reinforces the dog's decision to IGNORE you when you call her to come. 

And I'll be honest, my dogs have obedience titles and are very good boys - but I do not use the "COME" word when calling them in informal situations. I call their names and if they do not come right away, I go out closer and HOLLAR their names to get them to come running. 

The words COME and FRONT (for me) are only used in formal situations when I can easily reinforce. 

Informal situations - I have informal commands (calling the dog's names) which mean that if they don't come right away or I have to call a second time, nothing important is getting broken.


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## oldlamp22 (Mar 28, 2018)

Seriously is she partial deaf? Double check! There are 3 manners of communication: verbal command: hands and fingers only: and your body language, shoulders, etc. Are you using only verbal commands and then treat. Try hand signals and then treat. Or turn your body 180 and give treat. Or try all three commands simultaneously. Some trainers give a verbal but the wrong body language. Also watch your eyes as this is the most used expression of a hunting dog. Are your eyes visible or covered by your hat or shadows?


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## mylissyk (Feb 25, 2007)

Look up Recall Games, you can probably find some videos on Youtube.

Make coming to you the most fun, best thing that has ever happened to her. Call her name and run from her, when she chases and catches you reward that. Have someone hold her, get her favorite thing, toy/food, whatever it is, and walk away from her, tease her with the toy/food from a distance while the other person holds her, get her really excited and wanting to come get that thing but not letting her go just yet, then give the command and have the person let her go. When she gets to you praise and reward, give her the item she wanted. 

Play hide and seek. Have her in one room, you take a noise making toy into another room, call her and squeak the toy, when she finds you it's play time. 

Work on having her come to your hand so you can treat with one hand and grab her collar with the other.

As someone else mentioned, tone of voice probably needs to change to high pitch excited, like a little girl!, calling her name and the command to come to you. Coming to you needs to be exciting and always, always a party.


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## usually lurking (Apr 21, 2017)

Megora said:


> The point is that when teaching COME to your puppy, it should be the most exciting game EVER for her.


This x1000. Megora is exactly right. 

Not sure if it was mentioned, but you can also get a long line to use outside. Start over short distances with no distractions, work up to longer ones with distractions. If you treat your dog like she has done the greatest thing ever by coming to you, each and every time that she returns to you, she will always come. Be happy, be proud, be ecstatic. Give her pats and happy voices (and happy body language) and treats. Act like she has solved the greatest problem in the history of humanity. Then, let her go back to whatever she was doing. If a recall always means in her fun is ending, she also won't want to come. Spend time calling her, rewarding her, then sending her back out to play.


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