Kimbas_mum Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Hi all, just thought I would write down how I am getting on with my mission to get Maddie the beautiful lurcher to retrieve. I took her to her first flyball practise on Saturday with Kimba and she had no problem with the jumping and running bits, it is just the whole ball idea that didn't really work!! I am now on a mission as she will be really good at it if I can convince her it is a good idea!! I have started clicker training her and have got as far as her touching the rolled up socks (what she chose to look at when I threw a load of stuff in the air for her!!) to ask for a treat. I will now put something tasty inside it to try to get her to get closer to picking it up. Any ideas would be welcome for helping on this mission. Thanks Katherine & Maddie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sophie Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 I'm on a similar mission with Sophie, also a lurcher. We're working on retreive at training classes, and I want to try and get her interested in retrieving a ball. It's proving difficult though since she doesn't like anything in her mouth. I have never seen her put anything other than food in her mouth. Don't really have any suggestions - we're doing very similar to you. Started off with her nose targetting to a ball, and are now at the point of delaying the click so we get her opening her mouth. She absolutely refuses to close her mouth over the ball (and dumbell as well) though, so might need to change strategy. Oh yes, something else we found with Morse (also a lurcher) - he loves playing with dimpled rubber balls (to a point where he can become obsessive), but will actively refuse to put a tennis ball in his mouth, and is not keen on smooth rubber balls - he seems to hate the texture of them. So if you get a bit stuck when you move from socks to balls, maybe try different types of ball. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gooster Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 If you can get her fetching anything, it's a start. However if there is something that really really motivates her, you can use that to jackpot her when she makes a huge leap in progress. Eddie just learned from watching Charliegoo do it, and with the extra motivation of a food reward. It helped me that I had the box at home though, so could do some training with him there as well Don't just leave tennis balls around on the floor at home, but make them appear at really exciting training times. Get her on her own and get her all excited, throw food about, roll around on the floor, do whatever it takes to get her in a playful mood. Then pretend to roll the ball across the floor, if she's in a looney mood, she might playbow and bounce around. If the does that, then roll the ball on the floor and if she makes any attempt to chase it, heavily reward her. She'll soon learn that the ball means fun and bouncing around (hopefully ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kimbas_mum Posted January 30, 2006 Author Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 She does have the odd mad moment with any toy around really, she willplay bow and pounce on things and even pick them up and carry them round with her, but only to get the boys to chase her (she is a proper tart!!). I will keep working on her to see if I can get her to think holding stuff is fun, we will get there in the end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnasher Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 We had a very imaginiative family once come to flyball with a non-retrieving Jack Russell. They started with a hollow rubber ball which they put food in and they rewarded him with some of the food when he bought the ball to them. When he had got the hang of this they carefully peeled a tennis ball and put the skin over the hard rubber ball and from then they were able to move onto proper tennis balls I did manage to get Gnasher to retrieve with clicker training so hopefully slowly but surely you will get there. She is very pretty Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gooster Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 She is even prettier in the flesh and such a gentle girly!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lucyandmeg Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Murphy wasn't very interested in tennis balls to start with but he did have a passion for squeaky toys, so when i found a airkong squeaky tennis ball he got hooked. It looks like an ordinary tennis ball but it squeaks and he goes mad for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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