Does Your Dog Chase The Ball But Not Return It?
And you find yourself chasing him all over the park? Frustrating, right. Well, I discovered a fool-proof correction for that problem totally by accident recently, and it seems to have a 100% success rate!
My little sidekick Bandit is super focused and insanely driven about his Kong toy, and he used to fetch it like a champ. But somewhere along the way, he decided it would be really cute to make me chase him instead of returning the toy to me like he had once been doing so well. I’ll admit it was cute, but for only a minute. I didn’t want to fall into that bad habit, so I tried to correct him right away to reinforce the right behavior. But Bandit wasn’t having it.
The Back Story.
A few months ago, Bandit hid his Kong ball in the house so well that neither of us could find it. After spending too much time searching, I thought it easier to just go buy a new one. So I did. A few days later, we found the original Kong toy.
That afternoon, I took Bandit outside to place fetch, and I took along both Kongs. He went after the first throw with a vengeance as usual. But, instead of bringing the Kong back, he sat down where he was at the other end of the yard, and totally teased me, little scamp, expecting me to chase him. Instead, without moving, I held up the second Kong and said “Look what I’ve got.” Oh boy, did that get his attention fast! He came flying back across the yard to me, first Kong still in his mouth, jumping up and down to get at the second Kong in my hand.
Score!
I told Bandit to “drop it” and he laid his first Kong at my feet, then jumped up and down to grab the second Kong in my hand. I threw the second Kong, and he beat it to the other end of the yard. But then he laid down again instead of bringing it back to me. So I repeated again what had just happened a moment before — I held up the first Kong in my hand and said “Look what I’ve got.” Here he came, roaring down the yard again with the second Kong in his mouth, to get the first Kong in my hand — a relay, or trade-off of sorts. And that was all it took — only two times to make the correction and reinforce it. Problem totally solved, and in a positive, happy way for him.
Out of simple dumb luck, I had discovered how to “fix the fetch.” 🙂 And it works for us every single time. If your dog is as toy-driven as my Bandit, you probably can expect this trick to work for you as well. Happy Fetching Like A Rock Star!
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God Bless and Happy Pet Parenting!
With love and good wishes,
jeannie. ?
About jeannie: I’ve been pro-actively involved in pet rescue all of my life. I founded Milagro Senior Pet Refuge© (Phoenix) in 1998, and BareFootPets (TM) in 2008. Animal welfare has always been and will always be my heart’s work. If my only legacy is that I save a handful of precious souls that would not survive otherwise, I’m good with that.