Wednesday, June 25, 2008

First Drop

We have having a real issue with the first drop on recall of the day.  Wyatt does not drop if I do a cold recall with no practice downs beforehand.  If I practice him, he is fine.  I am trying to get that first one.  I suppose I can practice before we go in the ring but I wanted him to be able to drop the first time, everytime.  I have been working with him hoping we will get the idea but no improvement yet.  

2 comments:

Unknown said...

John,
I think I mentioned to you that was our worst exercise too. We could do them at home fine and at run-thrus only after trying a few times.
Here is what a friend of mine had me start doing 1 week before we headed to the Pensacola, FL trial. She said you need to do lots of 'first times'. Meaning go do the drop one time only. If he does it, lots of praise and treats, if not, do not scold do not give a treat, no getting mad or disappointed, just stop. I hope this makes sense. (This is under the assumption that he already knows all the exercises.)

We were camping the week before the trial, so I had a lot of diferent venues to work in. I went through the exercises in order and we stopped and went back in the camper after any exercise he didn't do right the first time. Then we would try again in a couple of hours. Sam really did catch on quickly.

It worked for us... 2Q's and a CDX.

Good Luck,
Alice

John Heffernan said...

Good idea, Alice!

I'll try it.

Interesting that today he did do a nice drop cold on his first try,,,