Hey everyone,

I am sure this question has been asked numerous times in this forum but I am new to dog training and will be getting my puppy sometime in February, the pair of dogs I put money down on should be due sometime in the late part of December. I am diong a lot of research and have a question concerning Force Fetch.

I have watched a lot of different videos of reputable trainers teaching force fetch, I know all of these trainer have trained hundreds of dogs using there techniques. Is this something an amature trainer can try to tackle on his own? I have helped train hunting dogs that are successful but never my dog and obviously I want to best dog I can as I would assume anyone would if they are getting a dog.

any input would be great! Thanks

That was a question I had with Eli, and in the end I decided to let a pro force fetch him for me.
I am sure you or even I can do it, but the same answer I got from different people was if you mess it up, it can take a long while to reverse it.

I would STRONLY agree with Richard that you should absolutely find the best trainer you can find in your area...and GET REFERENCES of his/her clients with living dogs trained by that trainer.

I think you can successfully accelerate the FF process before taking the pup to the trainer by teaching the HOLD part of it yourself. Get Julie Knutson's book and just follow her procedures to the letter and BE PATIENT...limit your work on HOLD to SHORT SESSIONS and joyfully accept ANY AND ALL SMALL AMOUNTS OF PROGRESS as you proceed.

Doing so IMHO will make the pro's efforts that much easier and therefore less time-consuming and COSTLY than otherwise would be the case.

But I would avoid the more aversive parts of the FF process like the plague and leave that to the pros.

Of course, you need to wait for the adult teeth to come in so you won't even be starting the program until next summer.

Regards,
Jim

I say do it yourself at one time all had there first dog to ff get your ob down and take your time and don't get mad 10 min 2 time a day. Good luck

Believe me I thought long and hard about doing this myself, but with my schedule it is not fair to Eli and I didn't want to mess things up, so a pro will do it. I will do everything else.

If you can do everything else you can ff been helping hunters do it their selves start with hold move to ear pinch as soon as it is in mouth let go of ear not cruel or hard. pm me if you need help

Boy your persistent. I am not going to FF Eli, I am going to let a pro do it. Yes I have all the stuff to do it, and Eli even holds on command, Yes did that, but that is as far as I went. The pro will FF him and I will pick up with walking fetch when I pick him up.

Sorry just trying to help.

Gum,
No problem, Some folks don't have time and want to make sure the dog doesn't pay for their learning curve.
Thanks for trying to help others on here.
We can all learn and that is part of why this site is so good.
Pat

Pat, Thank You for saying that, probably should have in the first place.

Gum, I didn't mean no disrespect, I just do not have the time in my schedule to do the FF with Eli, But I will as much as I can be there with the pro participating.

Looks like I will get to spend 2 weeks in the upland field working with Eli on his pointing, and letting his Dad have fun out there also, Got an order in from HQ for Pheasant for Christmas dinner.

IMO, FF isn't rocket surgery or brain science.
It takes a good FF program and only 10 minutes, twice a day.
If a person doesn't have 20 minutes a day for FF, how are ya going
to have time for all that "other stuff" ?


.

THANK YOU DOC !

Posted By Doc_E on 21 Nov 2011 09:57 AM
IMO, FF isn't rocket surgery or brain science.
It takes a good FF program and only 10 minutes, twice a day.
If a person doesn't have 20 minutes a day for FF, how are ya going
to have time for all that "other stuff" ?


.

Doc, I fully agree that 10 minute sessions are MAXIMUM for the FF procedure and maybe 1 session per day is optimum. But the issue is HOW MANY SESSIONS are required?? That will vary DRAMATICALLY from one dog to the next. And while the process isn't "rocket science" it is nevertheless pretty easy to screw it up...especially if the "trainer" doesn't have a LOT of patience. Also, the degree of pain that the trainer is willing to impart is a MAJOR issue. We have all seen videos from TOP trainers who use an empty shotgun shell to "dig in" even deeper than a finger/thumb press or even finger nail pinch can cause. So, I think it is perfectly understandable and acceptable for those (like me and others in this thread) who elect to let a pro do the FF. Hey, there are those of us who have trained their own dogs for DECADES...but if that is only 1 dog at a time...even guys like me who have owned hunting dogs for a half century, have only trained a half dozen dogs or so...and therefore are TOTAL ROOKIES compared to pro trainer who have that many dogs...or more...in their kennels EVERY DAY OF THEIR LIVES!! Best, Jim

I picked up the DVD series sold on the Poudre River Gundogs site and thought the force fetch disk was very well done. Gary Buys uses a toe pinch rather than an ear but the concepts are the same.

It's worth checking out, in my opinion. Good luck.

I think owners should take the opportunity to force fetch their dogs themselves when ever possible. You will learn a great deal about your dog and your self that you wont any other way going through the process. It is a misconception that it needs to be this grinding painful thing for your dog. In fact a trainers job, a good one anyway, is to teach the way a dog learns and get into the gray matter not their hide. I actually don't like the word force fetch. You should not force your dog to fetch you should teach your dog a conditioned fetch response. Big difference.

I have many dogs that wag their tails most of the time on the table. Why? Because they are being taught the way they learn and they receive a lot of praise for effort. They experience success virtually every day. Many will jump up on the table without telling them to because they want to go to work and learn the next step in the process. It does require some patience. But so does all training.

Your dog should want to work with you if you are doing your job right as a handler or trainer.

Good Luck!

Gary

PRG

I definitely agree with Gary.



.

The condtioned retrieve process, sounds nice !
The Ultimate Hunting Dog Reference Book by Vickie Lamb (a Rex Carr student that summers in N.MI.) - Page286 The trained retrieve - yes or no (a nice read to help your understanding and maybe deciding)

A place some may want to check out.....Tera is another Northern Mi. Trainer and has been tutored by some of the best.

http://www.forchfetch.com



ps; I wish more people would learn about and then FF their own dogs, it isn't my favorite piece of training, in fact it's my least favorite, but how it goes might foretell a bit about that superstar you think you own !

I've done all mine and more, the first one I had no idea what FF was until he just kept making me learn more about this training stuff . Not that he was bad and needed more training, quite the opposite, he was very good and so needed more of a trainer.


..........paco

Thank you Gary if you can do everything else you can ff.

Hey guys I appreciate all the input, I have to agree with everyone here. I think that if you are doing all of the other training for your dog why cant you attempt the FF yourself? you more about your dog than any trainer out there and depending on where you are with your obedience training I definitely think you can tackle the FF monster. On the other hand if you dont have the time to put into your dog for all of its training i dont think its a bad idea that you bring your dog in yourself. I think after reading some of the these posts and watching a few videos online and boughten videos that I am going to tackle the FF training myself, what an amazing accomplishment if you complete this task and have a dog the fetches for you with out dropping the birds.

A great video to watch is Chris Atkins DUCK DOGS! this a great video of obdience training, FF and steady to shot training even though it labled Duck Dogs its a great video for all parts of the training process.