Last weekend Freighter was entered in a Master Hunter Test.  He had an excellent first series despite the heat.  Unfortunately he had some confusion on the walk-up and was out on the second series.

If you have been following along with the blog, you know that Freighter has struggled with steadiness or not leaving to retrieve before he is sent.  He seems to have it under control when he has to sit and wait for all the marks to be thrown, but he is still struggling with walk-ups.

For a walk-up, the dog should walk at heel while a bird is thrown in a surprise situation and then sit when their handler says “sit” or blows a sit whistle.  Hubby has been using the verbal “sit”.  It worked great when Freighter was testing for his Senior Hunter title.  However, it seems to be causing Freighter some confusion at the Master level.

At the test last weekend hubby said “sit”, but Freighter did not sit.  He looked at hubby like he was confused and continued to walk slowly.  We call that a creep.  Some people may say Freighter was just being disobedient, but we are not so sure.  It seemed more like Freighter was confused about what he is supposed to do.

Once the marks start going off, you cannot talk to your dog until the judges release you to send your dog other than to say “sit” once or blow the sit whistle.  Hubby could have waited to see if Freighter stopped creeping on his own, but instead he recalled him which meant he was out.  At a test you have to decide ahead of time what you, as a trainer, will allow and creeping is not something that Freighter will be allowed to do.

The question now is how to fix this problem.  Freighter did almost the exact same thing at the May test.  He kept walking, despite being told to “sit”.  He looked back at hubby and just kept going.  He was out that time too.  It was like the “sit” did not register.

When you are training a dog, it helps if you can put yourself in the dog’s shoes so to speak to try to figure out why they are doing what they are doing.  We think that maybe Freighter has in his head that if hubby talks to him once the marks are going off that he is supposed to do something.  He knows that hubby will say “sit” or “heel” at the line, but there is so much going on at a Master test that perhaps he thinks he needs to do something once he hears the shots and sees the birds and ends up confused.  That is our theory anyway.

So the question is how to fix it?  Freighter understands a sit whistle.  He knows that if hubby blows a long blast on the whistle that he is to sit.  So hubby is going to start using a whistle blast on the walk-up to see if that is clearer for Freighter.

Time will tell.  He is entered in another test next month.  We will practice a lot of “in your face” walk-ups with him between now and then and hopefully lessen Freighter’s confusion.

How do you fix your dog’s confusion when you are training?