"Emergency" recall

 Yeah, Neiko is similar to rex Jackie. His stop on recall is so solid because we had to do it so much with herding. Lily has a teeny tiny drop on recall because she did a little bit of herding too and we worked it somewhat just for fun but I need to get more serious about it. For Abbie, it's a requirement for SAR so we have to do it no matter what. The problem for her is that I have to watch my body language when giving her commands. She is very sensitive and gets nervous if i lean toward her while giving a command. So, I will need to get creative.

 I should watch some platz training videos and maybe take some cues from that. I really want that to be 100% solid with all 3 dogs and Abbie really needs some formal obedience for SAR. I just can't take her to formal obedience class settings

Julie, I always train the sit on recall using a whistle, again due to retriever training.  we start with the dog heeling and already knowing sit when we stop walking.  Add the whistle and go from there to the harder stuff such as sit on the going out and sit on the recall.  Always much harder to train the sit when going out for a bumper or bird since the dog is in full on retrieve mode.  

miranadobe

There is always a reward at your disposal if you use physical or verbal praise.

This is true, although admittedly using "only" these types of reward repeatedly will not work that well with the majority of dogs, and will quickly result in the dog realizing that the bunny out there is more exciting than the rubbies or the "good girl" that it hears all the time anyway. Touch and verbal praise can be great rewards, but generally you can't teach a dog everything it needs to know, and maintain it, with just those - games, toys, and/or food are generally what a dog is really willing to work hard for. This is, of course, talking about only rewards. I can see how only praise and physical rewards would mean more to a dog who is also experiencing equal amounts of corrections (I'm not saying you are or do that).

miranadobe

We're no longer in training once we're off-leash with no reward other than the act itself, and/or the physical and verbal praise.

See, I guess I differ there. In my experience dogs are always learning, and are always learning contingencies, and *training* never really ends for us. There is maintenance of behaviour, sure, when you aren't giving rewards every few minutes, but any behaviour that is not rewarded (or punished) on a variable schedule will eventually become extinct, unless it is self-rewarding. And most self-rewarding behaviours that involve offleash exercise are not the ones that have to do with humans. LOL. Maybe with Labs or Cavaliers, but with terriers? No way. There's always an element of "What's in it for me?" and "Why?". It's why I love them so much!

miranadobe

As you know, not every dog is rewarded by treats, so physical/verbal praise, playing tug w/the leash, being released to go do something else can all be a reward.  Doesn't have to be a smelly, tastey food item.

I agree. It's why I said "reward" in my post, instead of "food".

miranadobe

Then I also think about dog parks where the dogs are off-leash and you're not allowed to bring food into the park. 

I don't use dog parks, I don't like them, so where I take my guys offleash there are no fences or boundaries of any sort, and no limitations on the rewards I can use with my guys. I haven't built enough value for toys in distracting areas, and my dogs won't tug outside of the house (my own past errors, I know, but hindsight is wonderful right? My next pup will be imprinted on toys early), so for them food is the biggest reinforcer. With the exception of Gaci....her best success came from the use of Premack where "coming back" was rewarded with the opportunity to obtain freedom again immediately.

All the puppies I've bred have been taught the basics of an "emergency" recall before they leave for their own homes. From around four weeks old I'll blow into a whistle twice before giving the puppies their chow. Rinse and repeat and they are quite fast and very reliable by the time they reach seven weeks. I give instructions to follow, if they want to keep the recall at 100%. Practise with their bowl of food at home and outdoors and when a bit older for instance during a walk in the woods and treat with something significant like a whole pig ear. If the recall is used in an actual emergency situation one has to go back and reinforce it in easy situations. I use a whistle, because the possible angst in one's voice in a real emergency can result in the dog not even recognising the command.

And yes I do think a single recall should be enough, but not every puppy owner with their first dog can master that. Therefore this type of an emergency recall seems like a cheap insurance for the puppies I breed.

Kim_MacMillan

so for them food is the biggest reinforcer. With the exception of Gaci...her best success came from the use of Premack where "coming back" was rewarded with the opportunity to obtain freedom again immediately.

miranadobe

no reward other than the act itself, and/or the physical and verbal praise. 

miranadobe

I tend to believe the reason G's recall is so stellar is based on it being self-rewarding experience.  She LOVES to run fast-fast-fast. 

Running/release to run, or thrashing a stuffie are what G finds most rewarding.  So I think I misunderstood your earlier post:

Kim_MacMillan

To go somewhere off-leash, with no type of reward at all at your disposal, is to me, poor training to be honest.

miranadobe

In a real emergency, I doubt I will have the extremely high value treat that the dog had been conditioned to, so, what difference does it make to attach a meaning to it as "emergency"? 

I thought you were saying that if I didn't have a reward that I was training poorly, since I'd just said in the previous post that I don't always have high-value food rewards when we're off-leash.  Sorry, didn't mean to be chasing the wrong tail. 

Whew, I can see how things could easily get confused there! Glad we got it all straightened out! 

 as always all of the posters here are much more experienced and knowledgeable than I -

Bugsy however has never turned on a dime to recall.  It, no matter how much work we've put in - it is always tenuous.  He considers his options and desires and then comes - he does at this point 'come' 85% of the time (that's an estimate) No reward is deemed greater than what he wants at the time he wants it.

In our classes his recall was the best of any other class members - in real life, ........... not so much. I wish I could identify why this is -outside of this being who Bugsy is ..........

A couple of years ago we went to a cabin in the mountains. It was very remote and the cabin was near the peak and completely wooded. DH & Bugsy were BBQ'ing.  Bugsy was dragging a line.  Then he saw a deer and took off. I ran inside and got a whistle, DH cut a hunk of steak off, I blew that whistle hard.  In a few moments we saw the grass/shrubs moving and Bugsy emerged from the woods and received a piece of steak when he reached DH.

That was my version of an emergency recall - I had never worked him with the whistle and I have no idea why it worked.  But I do know that calling him would not have worked. 

Since then I have adopted a duck call that I use to mean 'come pronto' to keep it fresh I rarely use it.  For Bugs that seems to be a key.  Something infrequent is more significant than something used regularly. So for us the emergency recall is the special occasion recall - if I used it consistently he'd start blowing that off too

Praise does seem to be his best reward, followed by immediate release, playing, and food is last.

Liesje

For the GSDs, there's just one recall (their name), and they tend to respond depending on the level of "I mean it!" or sense of urgency in my voice, so we don't need different commands depending on the pace or the seriousness of the situation.  But I think I'm lucky in that regard, that overall the GSD is going to be much more naturally responsive than more independent breeds.  They do have a formal recall for competition, and I try not to use that in every day context because I don't care if the don't come and sit in front, as long as they come back close enough for me to grab the collar.  Coke on the other hand....he's four years old and I've yet to find something that's valuable enough to him to get him coming back!

 

My bitch can be a little independent cow of a dog and while she has recalls that leave 99% of dogs dead, there is that 1%. I do use an emergency drop. I have found that the persistence of classical conditioning in her case is quite poor. I have given up using such stratergies in her training. I have no idea why.  She is quite food orientated, and very toy orientated and extremely environmentally orientated. She just loves investigating though. What does work is the threat of emminent removal from this environment,

Sam is a turn on a dime type dog. He is so so good. Even off other dogs,  toys anything. Again i have no idea why.

My favourite and very easy recall method was invented by John Fisher. It worked fantastically with my old Lab. I just cut up Cadbury's food in to 10 portions for 10 recalls, and did that every day for a fortnight. If he failed, the food got discarded. Within a couple of days just the beginning of the word "come" would see him turn around and come. That dog called be called off anything anytime. we jsut refreshed it once in a while .

I was deeply saddened to see this wonderful man debased by several people with strong personal agendas, and fairly marginal training methodologies which involved the use of Aversives.

While I agree that a dog should come every time you call, you pretty much cannot avoid, if you live with other people, the possibility that others will allow your dog to blow off a recall.  They say the dog's name too much, or they call and don't do anything if the dog doesn't come.  So, the purpose of our emergency recall is to have a word (or a whistle) which represents the one cue you *NEVER* get to blow off.  It's not a substitute for training, it's a back up system for when others (or even you) might have allowed the dog to be inconsistent in its recall.  It's also a great idea to condition a dog that "has its own agenda" such as hounds or terriers, so that when they are engaged in predatory or scent driven behavior, you can get through to them with a cue that is so conditioned that they respond to it automatically. 

Spiritdogs, that is why we use an emergency recall as well. It's to help us be better trainers. Our dogs are off leash a lot and we have everyday recalls that mean "come" and work fine about 90% of the time. But, it might take two or three calls, and they might meander back. If we have used that recall it's because it doesn't really matter. We're just reminding them to hang around. They usually come all the way in as they get an opportunity to earn a few treats, and we reward fast recalls with no added requirements. I think it's a human habit to call when we shouldn't. The emergency recall is preserved against our habitual over-use. I believe this is more important for some breeds than others. The Lapphund took a long time to get reliable with recalls and his reliability will never be as good as Erik's, even though Erik has had hardly any recall training. Erik is just a sticky beak and can't live with the notion that we could be doing something without him. What's more, Erik is uber alert. He nearly always hears a recall no matter how excited he is. Kivi is not a multi-tasker and if something else has his full attention he probably won't hear an emergency recall, but he's more likely to respond to that than a regular recall. We have learnt to recognise the signs of a Kivi Tarro that is drifting mentally and try to recall him before he's gone completely.

So I guess for us an emergency recall has two purposes. To preserve the "get here as fast as you can" signal and also to get our dogs moving before they get a chance to think about whether they want to move or not. Once they are going they usually follow through and come all the way.

 Hi Spiritdogs

Off lead it is only ever me that calls my dogs. I will do some more work with emergency recalls, and will probably choose Luci to work through it. She is the kind of dog that will start coming back.... and oh there is that GSD over there that needs saying hello to :)

 Of course, i am the perfect trainer and never get my cues wrong or confused :)