Working tug/obedience with toys

[hippocampus21]

Hello, I am new to this field but I've worked with/trained animals for the last 8 years. I am exploring this field for fun and helping out a friend with a Brittany. I've read various ideas surrounding training with toys. Should one completely avoid working tug or using toys to shape behaviors? Or could it be helpful with initially teaching solid basic obedience and a drop cue as it does in other fields?

[birddogger2]

Since one of the primary jobs of a bird dog is to locate and retrieve a downed bird, I am cautious about playing tug of war with a youngster as it MAY translate into chomping on birds(so called hard mouth). Any toys, like kongs and such are fine as long as the puppy brings them to me when I call them. It is OK if they leave the toy to come to me. If they play keep away...the toy is gone.

I use treats all the time with youngsters...and oldsters too.

RayG

[shags]

Do you mean using a toy as reinforcement or reward, the way law enforcement K9s or search dogs are trained?

I suppose if you wish, you could do that for basic around-the house obedience drills, or for parlor trick training. But I don't think I'd want my bird dog messing around with squeakies or tennis balls during field training. For myownself, I don't use treats at all for training around birds, or even for much yard because I want my approval to be the dogs' reward, and not for them to be performing for cookies. I find treats useful for some things, like recall and maybe whoa drills. There, they can work well.

If I misinterpreted your question, sorry.

[hippocampus21]

I realized my question might not be very clear. I guess I mean both using toys as reinforcement (like protection dogs/nosework dogs) and using play to capture/strengthen behaviors off the field. For example, when working tug there are clear boundaries and certain behaviors expected such as sitting before the game initiates and being able to understand that when a "game over" cue is said that the dog completely disengages and understands the game will not be restarted. This helps build impulse control and clean cues. With some dogs, a drop cue is taught by playing with the dog. Play is very important in some fields so I was wondering about it's importance in training a bird dog. And not having toys in the field makes sense. When I did work with herding dogs, toys were not used in the field at all.

[hippocampus21]

Since one of the primary jobs of a bird dog is to locate and retrieve a downed bird, I am cautious about playing tug of war with a youngster as it MAY translate into chomping on birds(so called hard mouth). Any toys, like kongs and such are fine as long as the puppy brings them to me when I call them. It is OK if they leave the toy to come to me. If they play keep away...the toy is gone.

I use treats all the time with youngsters...and oldsters too.

RayG

That makes sense! We really want to avoid chomping down on the birds. Is it possible for dogs to discriminate between objects for play vs for work? Or is it best to avoid anything that might translate into undesirable behaviors?

[oregon woodsmoke]

Tug is great for training a drug dog or a personal protection dog.

It's not so great for training a gun dog. Always if the dog brings something to you, his only correct behavior at that point is to open his mouth and give it to you, very gently, preferably shoving it nicely into your hand and waiting for you to grip it and take it. If you teach him to tug, then you are going to have to un-train him, so why teach him a "wrong" behavior to begin with?

You can use food treats, clicker training, praise, fetch the toy, ear scritches, just about any reward system, but not tug. On the food training issue, I only use cookies for the very most basic of obedience exercises. I don't want the gun dog to think that hunting birds means food for himself.

Myself, I don't want my gun dogs spun up. They are too much gung-ho, high energy, and I want them to settle and work, not be encouraged to go crazy. Calm and focused, not ready to do battle.

[oregon woodsmoke]

Coming back to say this: if the gun dog is well bred, the very best reward for him is to find the bird. That's what is hard wired into his brain. Focus your training on helping the dog to find the bird, not on teaching him to wrestle and get rowdy or to look for other distractions.

[marysburg]

+ 1

[hippocampus21]

Coming back to say this: if the gun dog is well bred, the very best reward for him is to find the bird. That's what is hard wired into his brain. Focus your training on helping the dog to find the bird, not on teaching him to wrestle and get rowdy or to look for other distractions.

That makes sense- an innate reward. Thank you all.

[JAY]

I use toys to exercise and train my GSP; nevertheless, he gives preference for hunting birds, his instinct.

To exercise him physically and mentally indoors we do tug-of-war, searching for a specific named toy via “find ball”, retrieving a thrown toy, and his playing catch-me. The “drop” command makes him drop the toy our anything and he readies himself for retrieving. He knows my routine and body language and therefore switches readily from one play mode to the other by observing me. With tug-of-war where my hands are very close to his grabbing mouth he has never accidently touched my hands. (I think pups learn to avoid such accidents during their first 2 months with siblings.) Outdoors he learned retrieving (with a “wait” or “fetch” command) with a frisbee and then by my launching dummies. His completed retrieve for me is to lay the object at my feet. At 8 months of age I gave him the quail scent and hide the bird and gave the command “find it” wherein automatically he sought the bird and froze to point (instinctively).

My GSP will bring a specific toy to me and “ask” me either to throw it or play tug-of-war. Since in the field he clearly demonstrates wanting to please me I reciprocate for him indoors.

I think the question of toys depends on the breed’s inherent drive (eagerness to please, interest in retrieving or herding, etc.) and on training the dog to switch from one mode to another (play, work, rest, etc.)