Training the Independent Breeds

I am training my beagle to compete in obedience and hopefully we will enter our first trial in the not too distant future. I found that I really had to think outside the square with her. When you rock up to obedience club with a beagle you have to be prepared to hear the standard "A Beagle? You're game!" or "Haha, a beagle, good luck there!" or "I'd rather train a zebra than a beagle". LOL. Lucky for me, I found a great trainer who taught me beagles aren't really hard to train - they are high drive dogs and have all that drive there, it's just a matter of harnessing it and knowing how to work with it.

So glad you said this.  I had a great Beagle for almost 17 years.  She was very easy to train, and had quite a repertoire of tricks that helped to keep the kids amused during their visits here.  And, we have a trainer in the area who competes in agility with her Beagle.  Glad you are setting those obedience freaks on their ears:-)  My response to those comments would be "Careful the batteries don't go dead in that Golden Retriever."

spiritdogs

So glad you said this.  I had a great Beagle for almost 17 years.  She was very easy to train, and had quite a repertoire of tricks that helped to keep the kids amused during their visits here.  And, we have a trainer in the area who competes in agility with her Beagle.  Glad you are setting those obedience freaks on their ears:-)  My response to those comments would be "Careful the batteries don't go dead in that Golden Retriever."

LOL, I like the Golden Retriever comment ;)  Training a goldie would be boring after training a beagle anyway, haha.

huski

spiritdogs

So glad you said this.  I had a great Beagle for almost 17 years.  She was very easy to train, and had quite a repertoire of tricks that helped to keep the kids amused during their visits here.  And, we have a trainer in the area who competes in agility with her Beagle.  Glad you are setting those obedience freaks on their ears:-)  My response to those comments would be "Careful the batteries don't go dead in that Golden Retriever."

 

LOL, I like the Golden Retriever comment ;)  Training a goldie would be boring after training a beagle anyway, haha.

 I think people who have "easy" breeds get just as sick of the comments about how easy their dogs are. If one is very into competition obedience or agility, there is nothing wrong with choosing a dog with a temperament that suits what you plan to do. It isn't as though if someone picks X breed, they will excel in their given dog sport without having to put effort into training. I like sighthounds and some day will have one. I will certainly have a lot of fun with training the dog but will only pursue competition obedience or agility if the dog seems to have a good apitude for it. Since dog sports are supposed to be for fun, I refuse to struggle with a dog who isn't really into it just to prove I can get a title. And that goes for my "easy" herding dogs too - I stopped pursuing agility with one of my dogs because she just didn't seem to like it. Funny though, now years later she has decided that maybe she does want to do agility (I guess watching all the other dogs practice in the yard got to her - she hates being left out LOL).

AgileGSD

huski

spiritdogs

So glad you said this.  I had a great Beagle for almost 17 years.  She was very easy to train, and had quite a repertoire of tricks that helped to keep the kids amused during their visits here.  And, we have a trainer in the area who competes in agility with her Beagle.  Glad you are setting those obedience freaks on their ears:-)  My response to those comments would be "Careful the batteries don't go dead in that Golden Retriever."

 

LOL, I like the Golden Retriever comment ;)  Training a goldie would be boring after training a beagle anyway, haha.

 

 I think people who have "easy" breeds get just as sick of the comments about how easy their dogs are. If one is very into competition obedience or agility, there is nothing wrong with choosing a dog with a temperament that suits what you plan to do. It isn't as though if someone picks X breed, they will excel in their given dog sport without having to put effort into training. I like sighthounds and some day will have one. I will certainly have a lot of fun with training the dog but will only pursue competition obedience or agility if the dog seems to have a good apitude for it. Since dog sports are supposed to be for fun, I refuse to struggle with a dog who isn't really into it just to prove I can get a title. And that goes for my "easy" herding dogs too - I stopped pursuing agility with one of my dogs because she just didn't seem to like it. Funny though, now years later she has decided that maybe she does want to do agility (I guess watching all the other dogs practice in the yard got to her - she hates being left out LOL).

Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's easy to train any dog especially to competition level. I've seen people struggle with a range of "typical" obedience breeds, border collies, labs etc. What I meant when I said I would find a Goldie boring is that I am not that into the more biddable breeds. They might suit dog sports like obedience but their temperament doesn't really suit what I'm after in a dog, overall. 

huski

Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's easy to train any dog especially to competition level. I've seen people struggle with a range of "typical" obedience breeds, border collies, labs etc. What I meant when I said I would find a Goldie boring is that I am not that into the more biddable breeds. They might suit dog sports like obedience but their temperament doesn't really suit what I'm after in a dog, overall. 

 I apologize if I came across as sounding like I was implying you were just out to prove something with your breed choice. It's cool that there are so many breeds for everyone to pick from. Some breeds I like because of how different they are from my biddable (yet extremely quirky and far from boring) Belgians and GSDs. I too have seen people struggle with "agility/obedience breeds" and have also seen some non-traditional breeds that more did extremely well at performance. Have you ever seen the Never Say Never Greyhound page? The person who's site it is has had two MACH Greys (one is a MACH2) and has gotten multiple OB titles on her Greys, one was a UD. And the dogs are all track rescues that she gets as adults - really nice accomplishments! http://neversaynevergreyhounds.net/

Gina said to me when I was deciding on a breed something along the lines of "Just get one of the more people-focused breeds you've mentioned, but pick the most dominant, drivey pup in the litter".

Well, I did that, and he's damn easy to train! So much for that challenge. But his temperament has opened up all sorts of possibilities and I'm hoping to do agility with him at some point. It's really made me realise that Kivi is a good deal more challenging to train than I originally thought. He's so gentle and laid back that I really have to keep things very easy for him and keep the reward rate up very high. There are things that Erik can do now in a minute of free shaping that are well beyond Kivi even though he's older and more experienced and Erik is still a baby. I think that teaching Erik will teach me a lot about teaching Kivi. The more I see how different they are, the better I understand how I need to adjust my style for each one.

I still want to train a Badsenji, but for the moment I have a hare to train, which is way more challenging than a dog, but far slower and I'm very limited with what I can do with him. Kit is coming along really well with his target training and I still dream that I will be able to have him walk voluntarily into a crate one day (see what I mean? This is my big dream for this animal). I might move on to the rabbit, but you need a pretty energetic rabbit to get them doing much on cue in strange surroundings, and I have a decidedly unenergetic rabbit. I can't really say why I like training animals that aren't very easy to train. I just enjoy figuring out their limitations and being surprised by them. But Erik has made me realise how much fun it is to train an animal that is very trainable. It's cool that the sky is the limit for Erik and I look forward to having a clicker savvy dog. He's already picking things up from three clicks and just getting better.

Use a lot of free shaping. Free shaping works better with these dogs because it is their idea vs yours.

Quality bonding time. You have to develop a very strong bond.

I agree with starting early. However, you can get into a false sense of security with these breeds when they are young. With huskies they will be the best puppies in the world and never want to leave your side, but once they mature and that running instinct kicks in, forget about it. All recall goes out the window.

spiritdogs

Hounds, bulldogs, terriers, huskies...others with a will of their own.  Anyone want to share their training tips for the "I'm not Lassie" types? 

My advice would be to...

-Start early
-Keep it short
-Make it fun
-Have patience

I find the beagle incredibly easy to train. She is so food motivated and will do anything for food. She will learn new tricks much easier than the Rottweiler.

The rottweiler, while he is a supremely confident dog, I wouldn't say he is difficult to train. His motivation is pleasing FH. He could care less about food, but wants/needs a positive response from FH. He loves working and having a job to do.

My advice would be the same as most other peoples: to find what motivates the dog, start early, make it fun and keep it short. The beagle we trained ourselves, we read a lot of books and went that route. We anticipated training to be more challenging with the rottweiler, so we started him in training classes very early on. We got him at 10 weeks and by 12 weeks he was in training classes. He LOVED them. He had an absolute blast. It was a great thing to do. With him, the socialization was the most important thing. We wanted him to get used to being around other dogs most of all.