Trying to teach "Down"

So we mastered Sit a couple of days ago, I decided we should progress to lie down.

I get him sat in front of me and with a treat in my fingers so he can see it I go from his nose down to the floor and he follows it. Then I go out away from his feet to get him to come forward but his bum comes up pretty much straight away. If i put my hand on his bum he just lies down...is this gonna be a problem?..ie will he only do it if I keep my hand there forever?

Also after Down, what else can we try? we are already learning "Off" where he leaves a treat till I say "Okay" with mixed success!

TF

He's doing really well! Lots of sit wait stay lay down search, anything really stimulates there minds Xx

just repeat what your doing and he will soon get the hang of it

I was tempted to just push Loki over and teach him that way took him forever to learn down. Puppy classes taught me a good way. Do what you're already doing, but as soon as he looks down for the treat, praise him and give him the treat. Keep doing that, and very gradually get him to go lower for the treat, praising him at each stage. If you do it by putting your hand on his bum, eventually he'll understand what down means and you can do it without your hand helping him.

You are on the right track

Thanks for the encouragement. Just out of curiosity whats the difference between wait and stay?

we managed two downs today without putting my hands on him so I guess i was just a bit over cautious!!

I think stay is like your dog has to stay in the same position ,same place until you come and release him. When wait it's like ,something else will fallow,another command.

I use 'wait' and 'stay' but a lot of people don't.

For me, 'wait' is something I use when I'm stopping at the kurb before crossing - it really means 'hang about a minute, we're going to be moving again soon!'

'Stay' is "Whatever position you're in now is the position you must stay in until I tell you to move!"

However, some people just use the word 'sit' or 'down' or 'stand', and that's all - in other words, if you say "sit" then they sit immediately & stay sitting until you tell them to do something else. In that case, "Stay" would only be used in an emergency, such as if your dog suddenly took off after something or was about to run over the road.

I always wondered that too. I just use stay for all of it, but since dogs don't stay in the same place forever, I've always assumed it's more or less the same. I tend to use stay in the context that you'd use wait though, so I guess it isn't too important.

When I was competing in obedience I only used sit, down, stand. That was it - no stay or wait!

I use wait and stay with Pixee. When I say 'wait' at a curb, she will sit down too, bless her knowing I will say 'over' when its safe to cross. Stay means just that.

Seems pretty sensible, the curb thing. Been just using Sit with Blue at curbs. Will see if I can get him to respond to wait

A tip I got yesterday whilst training for down is to remove the lure as early as possible and use a high hand to associate with down. The idea behind this is thet the dog can see the high hand from a distance in the event of need for instance from the other side of a road or track etc and you should be able to drop your dog immediately

A high hand as in your hand straight up?

Were pretty much there with down now by the way guys. Just trying to make the transition to without a treat. It's proving tricky!

Well get there i guess. He just learned sit so quickly its a bit frustrating.