Dog training come when called - how to remove help. More advanced strategy to remove the helpers that you used in the previous examples. 

You are helpless as you watch your 2-year-old dog repeatedly steal a tennis ball from a Labrador Retriever and his person while they are trying to enjoy a nice day at the park.

You apologize, go through the social gestures of telling your dog that he is “being bad” and you sheepishly walk him to the other side of the park, only to see him race after the ball and do it again. You leave well before you planned on leaving, but you don’t want to face the wrath of the seemingly nice person, and would not blame him if he blew up after the tenth time of your dog’s thievery.

I frequently get questions about dog play, whether it is between two siblings in the same home or about a dog that frequents the dog park and plays with other dogs. The questions might pertain  to my client’s dog and if their play style is too rough or worries about the behavior of other dogs at the park.

Performance is something that changes moment to moment. When you are training your dog, you need to always pay attention to how well she is doing. If she is consistently distracted by something in the environment which causes her behavior to fluctuate, you have a few options.

"Come on guys let's go for a walk."

Blank stares . . .

"Ranger, Trooper, Linus, Come."

Three furry friends come running.

I realized that I never taught my dogs what "Come on guys let's go for a walk" meant. That was many years ago, and since then I have taught them that, but it reminded me of the importance of consistent teaching and that . . . dogs don't understand synonyms!

On Friday I met a client for the first session and met his wonderful 1.5 year old Labrador Retriever named Riley. Our session ended after some fantastic leash work, placement cues and some work on Stay. As I was leaving, my client opened the door for me just as a delivery man was opening the door on the ground level. My client immediately saw the worst. The door was open, the gate was open and Riley ran through both.

We immediately raced after him and, thankfully, Riley did not make it to the very busy street one block away.