Playing

Think i may have ask this before but here we go again

Bruno is 8 months on wednesday coming, and he's still not let go of his toys when playing, he invites you and you try to get the toy but he seems to grip on to it even harder. I tried to train him with drop in a firm voice, tried treats too but neither have worked so far. Anyone else know how to get them to drop, a friend has a staffy down the road from us and he said you will never get a toy off a staffy .

Any advice welcome

I taught Clover to drop by just prising open her jaws and taking the object while saying 'drop it'. Didnt take her too long to catch on. Ive started to do the same with my new boy Diesel. Hopefully he'll pick it up soon as he has a habit of grabbing things (my shoe, the remote, my other dogs lead etc etc lol) and running away with it! lol

I'll have to try that, thanks

Do u mean the leave it command? I wouldnt try the pulling jaws open thing it be honest lol. To teach the leave it command hold a bit of cheese in you hand and let him nibble it etc then as soon as he turns his head or stops nibbling say "leave it" and give him the treat and praise then repeat. Then hold the treat infront of him and say "leave it" before he starts nibbling, then give it to him when he leaves it. Then intoduce the toy and a treat hold the toy infront of him and tell him to leave it, then treat him. Then let him have the toy, hold the treat by him and tell him to leave it, when he does treat him. The more times u do it the more he will get used to it. If i tell Ty to leave it he absolutley refuses to even look or glance at whatever it is he has been told to leave haha. I can even balance cheese on the end of his nose x

Just out of curiousity why wouldnt u take it out of their mouths? My leave it command is different from drop it. Id say 'leave it' if I saw them eyeing up something for instance. Id say 'drop it' if they already had it in their mouths.

Ooh, by the way Anne. You could always try distracting him with something yummy so he lets go of the unwanted object to eat the yummy snack? He might catch onto the 'drop it' command that way?

Thank you all, i try everything

It's perfectly possible to teach a staffy to leave it/drop it, there are many ways to get to that point and different circumstances might make some methods better than other.

- a way that deals with both resource guarding (protecting their stuff, maybe even growling) and being happy to give you anything they have is to trade it for something better. Giving up your yummy food, fun shoe, nice toy or whatever gives you a BETTER deal, which tends to make them very willing to do it. (Use whatever your dog likes - food, treats, toys etcetera.)
- while playing with a tug toy or similar go completely passive. Be patient, it can take a LONG time initially, but when your dog lets go of the toy start the game again (you might choose to use a cue like "get it" to show the dog it's gotten permission to play again) and after a while of tugging go passive again. I was surprised by how fast Gummi caught up to this and he's now gotten really good at it. For now I always ask him to release (rather than going passive and him "voluntarily" releasing to make me play with him) and reward with another toy or a nice treat when I'm removing the toy completely.
- I think a lot of the "it's yer choice" game has helped, too, as he's learned that I'm really controlling all the fun You can find a video on youtube showing the different levels.
- when he held toys I would take hold of the toy and offer him a treat and saying "thank you" when he dropped the toy to take the treat. Then he would get the toy back or another toy back depending on whether it was actually something I wanted him to play with. As often as possible I'd give back the same thing, though. Didn't want him to associate giving up something fun with me removing it. Even with inappropriate items I'd often give them back at least once while still having him under control and then trading for something appropriate. And I never yell or chase him if he steals something (which would in effect teach him to keep the fun stuff away from Mom), I run the other way and make him chase me instead (he'll automatically come investigate if I run off to do something fun and secret) and then we'll tug with the toy or he'll get a treat or something and I'll get the item he had.

.. and I'm sure there are plenty of other ways, these are just the ones I've used.

I use leave it command for drop it as well, no i dont see a prob with taking something out thier mouth its just u said in the first post u prised his jaws open, that just doesnt seem a nice experience for the dog and isnt the kind of positive training methods i use

I meant it more in a jokey way. If either of them really didnt want to give up what they had I very much doubt I'd have the strength to actually prise it from their jaws. Normally if i put my hand in their mouth to take it they open it easily. Thats all I meant

Plus when he plays with his toys and brings them to us to play, he won't let go and he play growls,and when we do get it off him on the rare occasion he will try and get it back and sometimes he catches our fingers/hand, he is quite rough but i take that is part of his play as staffy's do play rough. Or could it be that is kinda guarding his toys.

Also when you tell him off he bears his teeth and makes as if he's going to nip but doesn't actually do, its just like teenager chatting back, like my son does

Also when he greets people he is still mouthing which we tell him no with a firm voice, but it doesn't help when people say its ok, but i tell him we are trying to train him not to do it as he might do it to the wrong person. Its seems like we're going through the teenage stage :S

Aniemother wrote:It's perfectly possible to teach a staffy to leave it/drop it, there are many ways to get to that point and different circumstances might make some methods better than other.

- a way that deals with both resource guarding (protecting their stuff, maybe even growling) and being happy to give you anything they have is to trade it for something better. Giving up your yummy food, fun shoe, nice toy or whatever gives you a BETTER deal, which tends to make them very willing to do it. (Use whatever your dog likes - food, treats, toys etcetera.)
- while playing with a tug toy or similar go completely passive. Be patient, it can take a LONG time initially, but when your dog lets go of the toy start the game again (you might choose to use a cue like "get it" to show the dog it's gotten permission to play again) and after a while of tugging go passive again. I was surprised by how fast Gummi caught up to this and he's now gotten really good at it. For now I always ask him to release (rather than going passive and him "voluntarily" releasing to make me play with him) and reward with another toy or a nice treat when I'm removing the toy completely.
- I think a lot of the "it's yer choice" game has helped, too, as he's learned that I'm really controlling all the fun You can find a video on youtube showing the different levels.
- when he held toys I would take hold of the toy and offer him a treat and saying "thank you" when he dropped the toy to take the treat. Then he would get the toy back or another toy back depending on whether it was actually something I wanted him to play with. As often as possible I'd give back the same thing, though. Didn't want him to associate giving up something fun with me removing it. Even with inappropriate items I'd often give them back at least once while still having him under control and then trading for something appropriate. And I never yell or chase him if he steals something (which would in effect teach him to keep the fun stuff away from Mom), I run the other way and make him chase me instead (he'll automatically come investigate if I run off to do something fun and secret) and then we'll tug with the toy or he'll get a treat or something and I'll get the item he had.

.. and I'm sure there are plenty of other ways, these are just the ones I've used.

Excellent advice I've resorted to prying Suki's jaws open myself but only when she gets ahold of something that could be dangerous to her or is valuable to me