How to Train your Dog

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Teach your dog to Sit & Stay

Carefully choose a spot where there are no distractions for this exercise. Later you will need distractions to• test your dog's reliability, but they will be stage managed ones which you can control.

Start heeling on the lead for a minute or two to get the dog concentrating. When you are ready for the 'sit, stay', halt in the normal manner. Your dog will then be sitting beside you on your left side.

Your commands must be simple, firm, and unmistakable. It will be no good shouting 'stay, stay, stay,' to your dog if he does not know what stay means. This particularly applies if, in his ignorance, he has already got up from his original position.

Neither the distance you move from your dog, nor the time that he stays sitting until you give him permission to get up, are important at this stage.

Dogs will often recognize positive gestures, so when your dog has sat down, raise the right hand palm towards the dog's face, in the manner of a policeman stopping oncoming traffic, and say 'Spot, stay', in a firm, clear voice. Holding the sign, back away one or two paces in front of the dog, carefully watching him for the slightest movement. A tip on this. If the dog is going to move he has. to tense the muscles of his back legs and, at a pace or so away, this should be clearly visible to you.

At a sign of movement, or after two or three seconds, move back to the dog, place one hand on his shoulder to keep him in position, and praise him.

Do not call 'good boy' before you are back to him and he is held in position, or his previous training will bring him running to you, and he will have learned nothing.

If he manages to get up before you reach him, bring him back by the lead and as nearly as you can, sit him in the same position, and restraining him there, praise him. Do not reprimand the dog which breaks away at this stage of training, and never praise a dog unless he is actually sitting down in the position you chose for him.

As the lessons progress you may increase the time, but do not increase the distance you move away from him until you are quite certain he will stay in position. The dog must not be allowed to stand up, move away, or to lie down.