Recall
Recall is not a word an action or a sound. It is the outcome of the dog wanting to be next to you and wanting you to be next to them.
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A good conditioned recall is esential for every dog. Even if you feel like you are never going to let your dog off leash there could be a time when the leash, harness or collar fails or they get out of the house or car without you knowing. Having good recall can save your dog's life.
Benefits of a well-conditioned recall
- It gives you and your dogs more freedom on walks.
- It is a legal requirement to have your dog under Effective Controll
- It can help you and your dog get away from dangerous situations
- It builds and strengthens the bond between you and your dog and creates confidence in each other.
Teaching recall
Step 1. Conditioning the word:
The most common word for general recall is the word 'COME'.
When you use the word Come you may have your dog wondering what exactly does that word mean? and the last thing you want your dog to associate that word with is they are going to be put on a leash and the walk / play has to stop.
Come = freedom
- You can do this at dinnertime. Ask the dog to come to your mark and then reward it by throwing a piece of food to send them away. once they finish eating or sniffing and look back up at you say the word 'COME' again and repeat the process.
- If they start to return without looking at you use the word Come again just before they reach your side and throw the food to reset the distance.
- Avoid repeating the word COME while they are still sniffing the food on the ground as this could teach a dog to start to ignore the word untill they are ready to come to you.
Come = Im the Fun
- Grab a handfull of your dogs Dinner. Say COME and when your dog comes to you drop a bit n the floor next to you and then run to a different part of the house.
- When the dog finishes what they are eating and starts to run towards you repeat the work COME, mark when the dog comes next to you, drop the food at your feet and run to another area.
-Avoid repeating the word COME if they are still busy looking for the food in the last area simply make yourself more exiting by moving quickly from one place to another as if you were trying to run away from your dog.
Tips: We will unconsciously use the word “Come” plenty of times during the day when talking to our dogs as well as amongst each other. Each time the dog hears the word and is not rewarded for it, the word becomes less valuable. We can overcome this by always marking and rewarding their name followed by the word come. This teaches the dog to pick up on an already known cue which is their name, which works best when taught as a cue for Eye Contact) and then when they hear the “COME” command after hearing their name they understand returning to the human means good things will happen.
Step 2. Conditioning the action:
When you use your recall in the real world chances are that when your dog returns you will be reaching out to them and clipping them onto their lead. This can sometimes spook our dogs and they may run away or dance out of your reach when you try this. This can sometimes even turn into a fun game of catch me if you can for your dog. To avoid this when you practice your recall condition the leash into it.
Repeat step 1 - however this time when the dog comes to you hold their collar, click the leash clip as if you have clipped them on and then reward them.
Now throw a second piece of food a short distance away while keeping a hold of the collar and say, LETS GO then release the collar and walk with / follow your dog to the food on the floor.
Step 3. Adding the value:
Start pairing different rewards like a game, of fetch or tug, the opportunity to Go, Sniff, access to certain areas or even to the outside and even the opportunity to meet other dogs and people with your recall command.
You can do this outside by having your dog in a long line. when they see something they would like to get (and is safe for them to go to) simply let them get to the end of the line, then say the COME command. when the dog orientates back to you, repeat step 2 but this time follow them to whatever it is they were wanting to get to.
Always try to reinforce the behaviour with what your dog was doing or about to do when you called them back or something better. For example, if your dog was playing with a toy you can reward with a game, if they were foraging in the grass you can reward with a find it , if they were smelling something interesting you can reward with a novel smell or redirect them to the nearest object that has interesting smells on it.
Tips:-
The outside world has a lot of things that distract our dogs and a distracted dog is often a non-responsive dog. If you struggle to get your dog's attention when outside Chirag Patel's Counting Game may help.
Ultimate recall I use a whistle for the ultimate recall as the sound is extremely loud and can be heard over great distances. Also unlike the word come a whistle never conveys anger or panic like your voice sometimes can and dogs can often pick up on fear, anger or frustration in your voice and this may make them ignore you, slow down or move/run away in an attempt to give you the space to calm down which is often counterproductive to a recall.
We can also make sure we always set the dog up to succeed when training a whistle and make sure we are ready to heavily reinforce it, thus creating an extremely positive emotional response in your dog’s brain when they hear the sound.
Steps to start conditioning a “Whistle”1. Put your dog in a long line 2. Wait until your dog is already running back to you or use the “COME” command to get them to run towards you. Whistle as soon as the dog is close then quickly run away from the dog to build speed, fun and exitement.4. When your dog catches up to you make a big deal of it, celebrate their success with multiple forms of reinforcement such as food, praise, play, pats and smells.5. Once you have finished rewarding your dog say the “Let's GO” command or something similar and go with your dog back to the area they just came from. 6. Slowly increase difficulty, by adding more distance and practising in more distracting environments.
Tips-Only use your ultimate recall in Emergencies or while training when your dog is 100% guaranteed to come back to you so they NEVER associate it with anything other than coming back to you.
While it is possible to use a tool to whistle it is recommended that you learn to whistle so that you can use it in emergencies when other tools are not close at hand.
More fantastic resources:
Susan Garret Dog Training Blog, Fear Free Happy Homes, Whole Dog Journal, Karen Pryor, Podcast: Absolute Dog - Sexier than a squirrel,