is there a separate retreive drive??

[Lilliam]

Originally Posted by Lilliam

Some are. The field lines very often have a natural retrieve.
Max retrieved and brought me a stuffy when I met the litter, at seven weeks. His first day at home he retrieved anything I threw. By the second week at home I'd trained him, with a clicker, to place the ball in my hand.
I've heard of the pinch the ear method to get retrievers to pick up an object. I trained Max to pick up a tiny dumbell that was lying on the floor as a young pup using a clicker.


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[GSDElsa]

By no means are all field trial retrievers taught a forced retrieve.

And yes it is a type of drive. The most important one for those dogs

[doggiedad]

i think that's what i'm saying.

Originally Posted by x11

that training can compensate for missing instinct/unprounced traits, at least to some degree in some traits?

>>>> most puppies won't do weave poles either but can if trained properly, is that the same thing as what you are saying.<<<<

[doggiedad]

i see mutts retrieving.

Originally Posted by GSDElsa

By no means are all field trial retrievers taught a forced retrieve.

And yes it is a type of drive. The most important one for those dogs

[Liesje]

Originally Posted by x11

i was actually just asking if retreiving could be considered as a separate drive as chasing the ball is clearly prey - why do some puppies run it back to the human?

Maybe they value the chase rather than possessing the object? My more possessive dog needed more help with retrieving, and even now when he gets tired playing fetch he will take the toy, walk away from me, and lie down. My insane retrieving GSD will just do it over and over again, probably until he dropped dead from exhaustion. The object itself has no value to him, only when it's in motion.

[ayoitzrimz]

it's funny. My dog will grab the toy and come right back and punch me in the stomach with it to play. If I let him have it, and we walk around a bit he will quickly drop it and leave it there, so it has lost its value but if I get him excited about playing he'll grab whatever toy we throw and encourage me to play...

Some dogs, at our club, value possessing the object more than playing with it. So when they get the reward they just hold it in their mouth, chew a little bit, but have no interest in coming back to the handler to play...

Now, how much of that is training and how much of that affects training? What I mean - I taught him the game. Grab the reward, come right back to play. I don't know if we ended up working this way because of training or because of his personality. But my reward event has to be animated. I give it, and we need to play a little bit.

If I just give reward, let him hold it for a bit, out him, and repeat, his drive will come UP because it wasn't satisfied (no playing), but I can only get away with it so much before the drive starts coming DOWN after each reward, because it's getting extinguished... it's a good tool for me to extend drive, but I always need to be careful not to overdo it...

The owners of the more possessive dogs (who are also more dominant, not sure if it's related and I don't want to make a conclusion that it is), simply need to give the dog the toy in order to satisfy them and reward them and the dog will hold it for a bit and work just as hard for another chance to "own" the reward...

Just some musing, I don't know if I'm asking questions or just babbling on but... it is interesting just how much training needs to be adjusted to fit the dog's individual character...


Funny, and interesting to think about...