# How to start in obedience



## the S team (Dec 8, 2009)

Atticus is my third golden and he is now 11 weeks old. His little life is not very long but we've been thinking about wanting to train and maybe compete in obedience with him. He has a stellar temperment so far, is eager to learn and soaks up all of his baby puppy training. 

Scout, my first dog, was a certified delta therapy dog (now pet partners) and we visited hospice patients. Sara, 2nd golden, went through lots of obedience training and had her CGC but was a one woman dog and had anxiety issues and fear of other dogs. She was a great pet and loyal and obedient and loving but not so much outside of our home. 

Are there things we should/could be doing now if we want to get more serious about Atticus getting into obedience? 

He starts puppy school on May 16 at Pawsitive Partners. They have a track for competitive obedience when he gets older. 

For now he knows his name, sit, down, watch me, loose leash with turns and sits when I stop (he does better with turns and sits off leas), drop it is a work in progress and we are working on a tiny puppy stay. What else could we be thinking about? His challenge areas are puppy nipping and wanting to hold the leash when we walk. 

I also have a socialization goal of meeting 100 people and having 100 new experiences his first 100 days with us. We're off to a great start there. 

Any advice would be much appreciated!


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## AmberSunrise (Apr 1, 2009)

Welcome 

I really enjoy Fenzi Dog Sports Academy and Susan Garrett's online courses. I limit my brick & mortar classes - usually to drop in or agility classes - although my young puppies go to puppy class (they do not socialize but rather learn that I am way more fun and rewarding than the other people & dogs)

I will spend months teaching rewards & play, impulse control and things like Its Yer Choice, crate games and house manners.

I will teach sit and come and some agility shadow handling, but their first year or so is spent building their desire to explore and choosing to work with me 

I compete in obedience, rally and agility -- I have dropped field although my youngster may 'need' to have field exposure to truly bring out his full potential.

Enjoy the journey -- btw; 2 of my dogs hold their leashes. I think its cute, provides them with a ring ready toy and they will not hold their leashes while heeling formally. My first golden carried his leash and I see no harm in it.


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## SheetsSM (Jan 17, 2008)

I'm new to the game--my girl just got her BN, RN and CGCA and am loving the journey with her! As I'm a complete newbie, I rely heavily on the brick & mortar type facilities but do the Fenzi classes now too. Look for a training facility that offers a variety of classes with progression to the competitive levels. Not all trainers are created equal, so if you can see if you can observe a class to make sure their methods/style/personality are in alignment with yours. As for additional things to do now, I am happy I took an agility foundations class when my girl was a young pup, the hind end awareness she came away with has been instrumental in going forward. Also, socialize & expose to a variety of places (sights, sounds, people) so that the show environment isn't overwhelming.


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## Megora (Jun 7, 2010)

You are doing what I'd suggest - train somewhere where they offer all levels of classes.

Enjoy the journey -  

My first step always is working on "binding". Walking that puppy 1-3 steps with him in heel position and looking up. That's your foundation and what you want to really encourage being the best thing ever. You are not always working on long distance "heeling" (or using the "heel" word), turning, sitting, changing pace, etc... the very basic foundation for heeling is being in heel position and looking up. You will gradually build all the other stuff. Lots of rewards. Lots of luring. Using your hands to bring and keep a puppy close, etc....

Other foundation things you can be playing with right now is chair fronts or little scoots. This is really starting to build a foundation where your puppy knows to come directly in front and sit in front. When they're puppies, I'd have them sitting right up on your toes even. Make sure the little butts are straight and reward. Scoot fronts are getting your puppy in a straight sit in front of you and taking a lure-step back. The less distance your puppy has to go - the less chance he will go crooked. So you will always have straight fronts while teaching them. <= And this will be what you do for a long while. 

Fun comes - get a partner to help you with this - they will hold your puppy and you will go a distance away - get them revved up with a toy and call them to come. You will get a fast enthusiastic come each time which you will reward. At this point all comes will be you on your knees and down at your puppies level. You are working on getting them to you as FAST as possible when you call their name. The "come" command is worked in there as you go and always part of the praise (good come).

Start teaching "hold" with something in their mouths. Empty toilet paper rolls folded in half work pretty good. You want to have your puppy take something in their mouth - INSTANT praise and INSTANT release. And you will gradually (this can be days or weeks or months depending on how natural your puppy is as far as wanting something in their mouth) build a longer hold time before you praise and reward. 

With a lot of dogs the hold is something that takes time. Because while golden retrievers are natural retrievers in most cases - they still have a lot of stuff they do naturally which you do not want. A lot of gnawing and flipping things around in their mouths and juggling is not to be encouraged. A good hold is clamping down and holding an item - from pick up, while running, while jumping, while sitting - and then waiting for release. It's something that doesn't happen overnight and with some dogs it's something they always practice even after the dogs are obedience champions and so on. 

And actually all the things above are things that will always be part of training. They are foundation stuff - and they are different items which get sloppy even with well trained dogs. 

You always want a close binding heel with the dog happy to be there -

You always want straight and solid fronts from the head back to the butt -

You always want fast and enthusiastic comes -

And you always want to have a steady and solid hold with stuff in their mouths -

Other things you want to also work on are sits on command and downs on command. And teaching your puppy to stand and hold a position for a few second before you reward. 

With stands - you teach initially with you sitting on the floor with one hand under your puppies belly to steady them and one hand in front of your puppy's nose with a treat that they can nibble on. And you say "good stand" and reward while they hold this position. Over time, you will not always have treats right front to nibble on and you may gradually work towards you standing at your dog's side - and then standing in front - and then walking around your puppy - and then leaving your puppy and returning and later on introducing somebody else walking in to touch your puppy's head, back, and rump while you initially stand close with constant rewards to keep their focus on you... and then gradually build distance during the exam. 

With the judge - there is no "lingering" going on. They touch head, back, and rump and immediately back away and call you to return. And with you, you would have come out in front about three steps and faced your dog during the exam - after which you return around your dog and stop in heel position. That is it. 

Stand for exam - is something that a lot of dogs seem to have difficulties with, especially golden retrievers who get all excited about strangers coming up and touching them (the usual is a dog that gets all wiggly and excited). If you start teaching the foundation with them as puppies and going all the way through... by the time you start teaching this for real with a regular group class, your dog should have a solid understand of what a stand stay is - which should make it very easy to transition to having non-family members doing the exam. 

Teaching sit and down on command - helps because at higher levels in obedience you will have at least two exercises where your dog needs to sit on command and drop into a down position on command - both with you a distance away. 

Generally it all starts when they are puppies and you are doing fun foundation stuff. Tossing treats and luring - building distance gradually. 

Other thing to play with is teaching "touch". Touch your hand - REWARD. Touch an item on command - REWARD. Set your puppy up to go a couple steps to touch on command - reward. This was taught with my youngest with a binder clip on a dish towel hanging on the stove handle. The binder clip would make a clink sound as he touched it - so it worked like a "clicker" for him because he knew he did it right, and I instantly praised and rewarded when I heard that clink.

And a new thing I know with my youngest and will teach the next puppy early is a good "mark" in addition to going out and touching an item. This is a puppy sitting pretty close to an item and looking at it on command. With my youngest - I want a slight head dip and lean forward before I praise and send my dog. <= And here I'd have rewards at the target. Which for my youngest when I really worked on teaching this was an empty toilet paper roll taped to the wall - with cereal inside. When my dog touched the roll and nudged it up, it would empty the cereal on the floor for him. This was an instant reward which built his excitement about getting out there to the target. 

Have fun - this is the best part of doing obedience. It's building the foundation stuff the right way the first time. 


*** meant to say. Most of the stuff above is all done off leash. You don't need a leash to teach any of it.


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## Panama Rob (Nov 26, 2015)

Thank you everyone responding on this thread special thanks to Megora for some wonderful information. I am a complete novice at competitive sports and all this information is great.


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## AmberSunrise (Apr 1, 2009)

Hey, one additional thing you may wish to keep in mind 

I love rally, but honestly use it as a stepping stone and tool kit for traditional obedience. It is a lot of fun !

If you are considering upper level obedience classes, and go to a brick and mortar school consider finding an instructor who has trained & shown in higher level obedience classes (UD, UDX, OTCh, master etc). This way your instructor would be very aware of what cost points in traditional obedience versus what will not cost you in rally. It can be very disappointing to many people who say nod their head on a recall to see their dog not understand the exercise without the head nod.

And remember there are tons of training methods out there, if you feel uncomfortable with anything your instructor suggests, sit that exercise out. As an example, I no longer train the stand as Megora mentioned...one submissive/excitement pee-er (when young) had me look for other ways. Some instructors might have told me to keep using that method but itwas not the right method for that dog, at that time.


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## Megora (Jun 7, 2010)

> And remember there are tons of training methods out there, if you feel uncomfortable with anything your instructor suggests, sit that exercise out. As an example, I no longer train the stand as Megora mentioned...one submissive pee-er (when young) had me look for other ways. Some instructors might have told me to keep using that method but itwas not the right method for that dog, at that time.


Sharon - off topic, but how do you teach the stand? 

Bertie was a submissive pee-er, so the nonstop flow of treats as people touched him did the job to keep his mind off offering submissive puppy compliments... that was also a few months after I taught him everything about doing stand for exams without adding the non-family member aspect (and forget about the more thorough stand for exam requirements for conformation that I was thinking about after he turned a year old).  

Knock on wood he hasn't peed at any show or trial - but sometimes people at classes are just too impressive for him to deal with even now...


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## AmberSunrise (Apr 1, 2009)

I start with teaching a hand touch, then slowly move it high enough so they kick back into a stand  praise and reward. Then the usual stages of my moving, focused attention on me etc. 

I just do not put my hand near their flank or under their belly so no peeing, no hunching .... Just a really nice kick back/jump into stand 

Much less cleaning that way (win win)

ETA: the hand touch into the stand flows really nicely into the rally and utility stands too. For people approaching & examining, I work a with focus, stepping in to reward as the dog is examined, sitting for exams etc. I will work for solid stays on the sit for exam as well as my approaching, circling and doing silly proofing (like belly crawling under them) before I add the exam into the stand


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## Megora (Jun 7, 2010)

Oh I see. Got it. Ha. I was looking back up at what I said and trying to figure out what would trigger a submissive pee-er. The part with chain-feeding the treats was a LIFESAVER and I can't believe I didn't know about that with Jacks (who took forever to get him to not wiggle-dance-twirl when practicing the SFE in class when he was young).  

I put the hand under the belly to keep a puppy standing and block the rear legs from moving forward while you lure a pinch until the pup stretches into a natural stack. <= Not necessary, but I found it really helped them figure out the locking feet in place part early on (this was never done with people approaching other than family). To make the position more comfy and relaxed - I'd scratch them on the belly and praise. <= Even now that I know how to place feet for the conformation stack, I probably will still start stand stays the same way (me sitting on the floor and feeding treats with the right hand and left hand under the belly blocking the back legs). There's only a couple months window that you can do this - they grow so fast and become fairly too unwieldy long from belly to muzzle to practice this soon enough.


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## Loisiana (Jul 29, 2009)

I stopped teaching the stand with the hand underneath, not because I had any kind of submissive dog (I started teaching it this way with Flip) but because I found some dogs had trouble weaning off the hand help. I started teaching a hand touch stand to Flip, but that didn't work out, because I had either a dog doing a hand touch if I held my hand lower, or a leap into the stand if I held my hand high, both of which are scored in utility. So now I teach the stand by stepping backward and have the dog step back with me, ending up in a stand.


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## the S team (Dec 8, 2009)

Wow...you are all so amazing and kind to provide such insightful and detailed advice. So much to digest and learn the lingo but this is great! 

For now we are still in the baby steps of all of it (literally and figuratively). 

Stay tuned for more questions. I so appreciate the wisdom, advice and willingness to share.


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## puddles everywhere (May 13, 2016)

I liked the Pat Nolan videos and truly enjoyed Bridget Carlsen seminar for puppy training ideas. As far as the biting the leash, get a metal/chain leash from dollar general and it won't take but a couple of bites at the leash to stop that behavior. This is the only time I use them but very effective.


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