Sit, Stay, and Lie Down

[Emiley]

Teaching your dog to do tricks:

Sit: At the begining I had to push my dogs rump to the floor. As I was doing this I said Sit and snapped my fingers. Now everytime I snap she sits!

Stay: I told her to sit. Then I held my hand up and said stay over and over. Slowly she got it.

Lie Down: I told Rainbow (my dog) to sit. After that I made her stay. I put a treat on the floor in front of her. She scrunched do to get it. All the while I was saying Lie Down. Eventualy she got it!

Do you have any tricks? Please Private message me! Along with answering this poll and thread!

-Emiley :D

[Cincy'sMom]

Our Sadie does so mant tricks, sometimes she gets confused and tries one after the other til she gets the right one. In addition to sit, stay, lay down, shake, high 5, wave, roll over , play dead and some other the other "common" tricks, she also twirls, crawls, watches,goes through legs and is working on back upand relax. If anyone wants suggestions on how to teach some of these, I can try to help :D

[RachelJ]

I would be interested to know how you taught the high five. I think that would be cute to do. In teaching tricks to my dogs, I have noticed their they learn much faster if I use a hand signal in addition to the command. Then later I have noted that when using one or the other, the hand signal is often more reliable than the verbal command.

I noted that in the above poll both *down* and *lie down* were used. It is my belief that using similar sounding commands for different directions can be confusing to a dog. I use *down* for asking my dog to lie down. I use the term *off* for everything else, meaning off the chair, off of me (for a dog with his front paws on me), off the table, etc. Essentially off means, you are not to be where you are at at this point in time.

[yorkster]

My dog knows 'the basics', but I am not sure how to do more.

She also has one special trick- it's something she did already when we got her: she crawls like a seal, with her back legs dragging behind her. She is double-jointed in her hips I think, so they are out to the side of her like a frog. We say "do your seal!" and she jumps down and crawls around with a big smile on her face.
She also does this when she is happy to see us, or when she wants something (like walk or ball)
It's very cute. :D :rolleyes:

[Rottie]

Besides the ones listed (except for the last 3), Carl can

wave goodbye
discriminate scents (pick out something that has MY scent on it)
come when called
drop down while coming (this is a life saving trick for when your dog is about to run across a busy road to you)
sit from a down
stand
perform all the agility obstacles (if you can consider these 'tricks')

PLUS he can do every single one of the tricks listed in the poll (except the last 3) on hand signals & verbal.

[Cincy'sMom]

High Five was one of the easiest tricks to teach Sadie and Cincy is getting pretty good at it too. We first tuaght them to shake, mostly by having them sit and then lifting one paw, saying shake and click and treat. Once they learned shake, we raised our hand higher. they put their paw up to hit our hand, and we then taught the cue high five. With Sadie I can hold my hand at eye level and she will jump up and give me a high five. Cincy isn't quite their yet, but we only tuaght shake a week or so ago :D

[Hbrika]

Gully likes to stretch her front paws on the floor.
So I said 'Bow' and treated her.

Now when we say bow she slides her front paws along the floor and bows :)

Its really cute.

[RachelJ]

My two at the RB were more the trick dogs. I had this one trick I called *Leap Dog* and Tizzie would jump over Bailey. Also I taught Bailey to *Say your prayers* where she would put her front legs up on the seat of a chair and then lay her head down on the seat. When I would ask them *Show me where the cookies are* they would run to the location of the cookie jar. Bailey also knew the concept of *Look out the window*, and she would fetch the morning paper in each day.

Hannah and Tucker can both *jump* and go *under*. Yorkster, that *do your seal* trick sounds wonderful. Wish we could see it, and Hbricka, I like the bow one Gully does as well.

[Logan]

I had to answer even though it is a bit embarassing that our brilliant Goldens don't know more tricks! LOL!!

Honey, is not treat driven at all, so she is a challenge:
Sits on command
Goes "down" on command - but we rarely use this due to her submissive nature
Doesn't come when called - does things on her own terms! LOL!
Refuses to shake, speak, etc.
BUT, she is an excellent retriever, provided that Lilly is no where around

Lilly would do ANYTHING for a treat:
Sits on command
Goes "down" on command
Shakes hands
Does the "high five"
Will not retriever...just likes to chase Honey

Rachel, when we taught Lilly the high five, I think we cheated a bit. She learned to "shake" first. Just a little change in my hand movement lets her know to slap it, rather than put it in my hand. I hold my hand up, palm towards Lilly and she "slaps" it for the high five. For "shake", my hand is lower and palm up. I think the key is to get on her level. I am always bending over to do these two tricks. You'll end up on the floor probably if that's how you have to do it!! LOL!! :) good luck and kiss Hannah and Tucker for me.

Logan

[carrie]

Logan, that is not cheating on the High Five - that is smart training!

[slleipnir]

Jo knows a few tricks :]
Like sit, stay, lie down, give me a hug, high five, paw, sit pretty, speak..etc...My moms friend's lab is the smartest thing!! She can talk to it like a human kinda thing. its cute!! If the dog goes in the a room it shouldn't, she says Hunny, I thought I told you yesterday not to go in there?? Or Give me your right paw, and the dog give her the left..she says now thats not the right paw! and she'll swich them..this dog knows like EVERYTHING...-wishes Jo was that talented- lmao!

[mary_jsn]

Leika just knows how to sit 'cause I just started training her. Now I'm teaching her to beg and walk with her hind legs. It's really cute!

:)

[RachelJ]

Originally posted by Logan
I
Rachel, ....You'll end up on the floor probably if that's how you have to do it!!
Logan

No problem, I'm pretty much down there most of the time anyway!:D

[Logan]

:D :D Somehow I knew that, Rachel!!

[Cincy'sMom]

Rottie, How did you teach Carl to drop down when coming? Ralph and I were just talking last week that we wanted to teach something like that to Sadie and Cincy.

[aly]

My dogs know several tricks but my favorites are Lolly's 'high five' and 'high ten', and Reece's 'circus dance' and 'prayers'. Here's a bad pic of Reece saying his prayers. I took it when I was standing up so it looks weird.


http://www.photogra.com/galleries/35076/curr/5713406_20020129_173057_20020129173057.jpg

[mary_jsn]

That is SO cute!

[Chris J]

Holly is able to do 7 of the 10 listed in the poll.....

[slleipnir]

Aly, thats so adorable!!! Your dog looks kind of like my grandmothers dog

[Rottie]

Originally posted by Cincy'sMom
Rottie, How did you teach Carl to drop down when coming? Ralph and I were just talking last week that we wanted to teach something like that to Sadie and Cincy.

(Assuming your dog reliably knows sit, stay, down, come, & heel. If not, then work on these first before you start this)

Put your dog in a sit stay and go out about 6 feet. Tell him "down" while you sweep your arm up and over your head and then back down, grabbing the leash on your way down. If the dog is already laying down before your hand gets to the leash, praise - good dog! If he's not yet down, then give him a quick pop towards the floor with the leash. This is to teach him to lay down when you say down, not in a couple seconds or in when he feels like it. This is extremely important!!! (how long does it take for a car going 60 MPH to zip by???)

Keep working on this until you can get out to about 15-20 feet (go slowly in small increments). Don't let him creep forward at all, he has to stay in the same spot!

At the same time you're teaching this part, you can also do this: While you're heeling, suddenly run backwards and call your dog to you, once he's turned around and coming towards you, tell him "down".

Finally, when he is doing well in both of the exercises above, you can do a "formal" drop on recall. Put him on a sit stay and go out no more than 15 feet. Call him and about half way through tell him down. If he doesn't drop immediatly bring him back to the spot where you told him down and pop him into a down position.

You may need someone to stand behind the dog and hold a long line (attached to the dog of course). Then call the dog, and when you tell him down, if dog does not do it, the 2nd handler stops the line from going further and braces himself so the dog can NOT go any farther (because of course, dog is attached to the line.)

If you're not planning on showing him then NEVER call him again after you drop him. Otherwise he'll learn to anticipate that as soon as he drops, you're going to call him again, so he won't wait for you to call him, he'll just get right up after the drop.

Yes, this takes a lot of time and effort, and heck you may never need it. But I think it's worth it.