Gun Dog Forum

I have a six month old Female GSP that doesnt want to play fetch! So far from the day I brought her home I started training her to play fetch but she never really had a drive to do so other than in the house. The method I started with was throwing any toy she was excited about down a hallway that had only one way in and one way out where she had to come back. . Over time I slowly transitioned to outside where at first she did ok. I could get about five good retrieves in and then her attention started to fade. I never tried to get more out of her than she was willing to give. I always stop throwing before or at least when she starts to become distracted. It came to a point where I couldn't get more than 2 retrieves out of her and it seemed to be a struggle for her to even make those two happen.

What im doing now is, I have her in the top half of a portable kennel and im working on just SIT/STAY for about 15 mins every other day or two. At the end of each the session I will throw a rubber bumper while she is attached to a long leash so I can guide her back if i need to, maybe 25ft long. she gets pretty exited about it but it fades after only 5 of 6 throws. And at this point it seems like im having to cut each retrieving session shorter and shorter for I dont want to burn her out.

The issues is, In the house to this day she will play fetch for however long im throwing the toy, but out side she has little to no interest in playing fetch. Im assuming she becomes to distracted and wants to move on to the next fun thing. Im going to take a few steps back to the begging, maybe im moving to fast.My goal is to have her riveting Dove.

Does any one have advice on this situation or have pointers they can give me or other methods of training I can try to get my pup to enjoy retrieving. A few other concerns im having are as fallowed. Is this normal for female to have less of a retrieving instinct.? Is it possible that she hasent matured enough?

Your dog is young yet. I would limit the amount of throws to 3. No more. In your case, you may want to limit to one. Just a fun throw which will leave her wanting more.

She's too young and you are boring her

One retrieve talk her up with good girls and then do something else

Females do not have less retrieve. Some dogs have less natural retrieve than others. In natural retrieve training, dummy retrieving does not necessarily have any connection with bird training.
Back off the dummy training, maybe none for awhile. Maybe a occasional live pigeon. If she liked it once she will again................Cj

Don't forget at about this age, she might be losing her baby teeth, or her teeth bothering her. (possibility)

Meller wrote:Don't forget at about this age, she might be losing her baby teeth, or her teeth bothering her. (possibility)

True. This happened with my springer female so I stopped retrieving until her adult teeth came in.

Throw some clip wings for her. She's bored with bumpers, try fluttering birds. Some dog's have more retrieving desire than others and she is very young yet. May just be a late bloomer.

One of the best retrieving GSPS I ever owned never retrieved a bumper in her life but birds was a different story.Her natural retrieve has carried on thru her get & Gr Get.

I never hunted bumpers so never saw the need!

Well I dont think its has to do anything with her teething, she lost most of her teeth at around 4 months and now has most if not all of her adult teeth.

I Have about 5 frozen Dove from last season. I hardly ever use them for the fear of boring her with them. she will some times retrieve them but will usually run off with them. This was another reason I stopped using them. I didn't want her to get used to thinking she could run off with the birds. She chases birds all day long in the back yard so makes sense she would rather a bird than a bumper.

Should I try my current method of the long leash with the dead birds instead of using a rubber bumper? Or are their any other methods I can try using with dead birds. I will also be using live birds just as soon as I can catch them.

I would treat her with some food - trade retrieving the dummy for some treats. At first, every retrieve; later, after every few retrieves. This gets the momentum for retrieving going and as she gets older treats won't be needed. I think live birds are always preferable to dead ones.

I don't think there is much wrong with your pup at all. She does have "drive" and she does have a pretty good retrieve instinct, she has shown that inside your house. This thread is similar in ways to another ongoing thread on this board because the pups both have the same reasoning.

I think your pup likes retrieving .....but only when there is nothing better to do. You maybe did not put in enough transitional stages between indoors and outdoors ? That is doubly true if by outdoors you mean places in which a pup with a hunting instinct is likely to want to hunt. Retrieving plays second fiddle to hunting in the minds of many hunting dogs and those of many hunters too !

Try beginning again in the house, then , if you have a garden or a yard , toss the dummy from just inside the house out into the garden. With any luck the pup will run out and bring the dummy to it's "placeboard" .......the house. Then toss the dummy from the doorway of the house into the garden. The doorway acts as a retrieve funnel and you are waiting inside that funnel.
Then move into the garden and if the pup messes about, move back to the doorway until retrieving to you is deeply embedded in it's brain.

I live in a quiet cul-de-sac so my next stage from the garden is to toss a dummy from the garden into the road outside ......the garden is now the "place" the pup will want to take the dummy to and I am waiting just inside the gate. Then I move out onto the road . From there I move into large very boring tar covered car parks or into large very boring parks of short grass where there is nothing much for a pup to investigate and certainly nothing to hunt. Only after all those "stages" do I take the pup to anywhere where it's hunt interest might take over from it's interest in retrieving.

Personally, I would probably stop at just 3-4 retrieves with your pup until it has retrieving off pat. If she will usually retrieve 4 or 5 dummies before becoming bored I'd stop at 3. Retrieving is something to build up on gradually especially with a pup that either isn't a retrieve maniac or a pup that would rather hunt.
I take the time to build up gradually because I do not fall back on F.F. training if something goes wrong. You may prefer to simply wait until the pup is more than 12 months old and then have some competent trainer F.F. her. It is your choice.

I see a lot of this sort of problem here. I get pups to train that are either hunt daft spaniels or hunt daft versatiles. Many of them may appear to have little or no retrieve drive but they all do have it if the right switches are thrown in the pups heads.

This is my own Brittany. She is a hunt maniac and gave me quite a lot of trouble when persuading her that dummies could be fun to retrieve. In this pic she has reached the stage of retrieving in the cul-de-sac I live in , the following pic shows the previous stage inside my garden. I would never claim she is a red hot retriever of dummies but she is one when dummies become fresh shot game. Dummies are of use to install the habit of retrieving and for steadiness and for directional retrieve control......I can still have those things even if a pup will only retrieve 2 -4 dummies outdoors.





Bill T.