Help, I have a 9month old doberman called Jezz.
I have been training him at home and he knows how to sit, down, stay and go to basket etc on command, the problem is he will not do the commands unless he knows I am angry with him. Th rest of the time he just walks off and does his own thing. If I am angry with him he does exactly to the ltter what I tell him.
I dont like being angry with him, but I would so love him to react at all times.
Any suggestions?
I have tried clicker training and treats, he is not really excited by food (even cheese/meat) and the clicker training was ok but I kept loosing the clicker.

Also, probably part of the same problem, when we are out walking he really does pull, he is so eger to get where he wants to go. We have put a halti on him and this has been a godsend, but he is still pulling even though we have tried a variety of ways to teach him to heel.... and now he is getting bigger and bigger he is starting to pull hard even in a halti..... again any ideas would be very helpfull......

Many thanks

Jason

p.s. a few months ago I asked about him eating his poo..... just to let you all know, as I am sure you are interested.... about 6 weeks ago he stopped eating it. I am not sure if it was because we put him on less rich puppy food or if he just realised his dinner tasted better from the bowl. So many thanks for suggestions.

I think the key to this is finding what motivates him - obviously on the one hand you have his dislike of you being 'angry' - so how about taking the opposite and when he does the tiniest little move towards what you want going overboard with the praise? Some dogs who aren't 'foodies' will also work for a reward of a game (such as tug of war with a ragger or similar - but you must make sure it's a game you can control - i.e no ball throwing where he can tank off with the ball)

Re the poo eating - I think the change of food very probably had a good deal to do with it as a dog will pass a portion of the unneeded protein out of the other end if a food is very rich - and this can be as appealing as a normal meal :(

Hi Jason, have you thought of getting him to work for some of his food? We have a dog of 10 months who pulled like a train and was difficult to motivate because he dosent play outside and had a poor appetite. We used a clicker and put half his day's food into 2 bags which we took out on walks. If he pulled we stood still and only went on with a loose lead - looking at us or walking beside us on a loose lead got a click and food thrown. Any surplus in the bag was binned, and the other half fed as normal. He learned to pay attention sharp and his appetite improved 200%, but we used dry complete which is easier to chuck about than tinned food ( concussed dogs can't pay attention:D) If you keep the clicker in the bag with food and poop scoops you wont lose it.

Another thought - do you use hand signals or just words? Dogs understand body language better. If give a command with your back to him and he complies he knows the words if not he dosent and needs the gesture to cue him in. Give him lots of praise whe he gets it right and give BIG rewards for best responses. It takes a lot of time to train a dog and things do go up and down but itll all pay off. Good luck.