We have a rehomed failed sniffer dog called Bailey. He`s a 20mth old Collie/Spaniel cross. he is a very loving and mainly obedient boy. He loves to play ball and frisbee but on catching them and coming back on recall he wont give it to us. We have tried  sit and give even tapping his nose but he just wont give or drop the toy. He wants you to pull it from him. We dont take him on. Brian tried using 2 frisbees yesterday thinking he will give us the first one when we throw the second but no he ended up with both. He gets very exited and when he does put the frisbee down while doing his buisness Brian went to pick  up the frisbee and Bailey grabbed it at the same time unfortunatly biting Brian in the process. Bailey is not an aggressive boy he was just over exited. We have only had him 5weeks.  I am looking at taking him to obedience classes in the near future and presume that might help. Any help would in the meantime would  be appreciated
Lesley

Is he interested in food would he play swop for a treat ?

Teach the GIVE quite separately and formally in the house with no excitement. Use a boring thing --like a piece of carpet-- and offer it to hold. Say HOLD then after a second or two take it and say GIVE. I am not very good with clickers but saw it taught from start to finish with clickers. That is something like the process --a proper trainer will keep you right.
My Della likes to play Tug with the retrieved toy which I do for a while and always let her win, then I put her in a SIT and say GIVE. sometimes she is reluctant but a treat always works as she is greedy.
Louise

Thanks for the tips. We have tried treats but most times he prefers the toy or drops the toy takes the treat and grabs the toy again!!!  Will try the GIVE inside the house  as suggested Louise thanks.
Lesley

Most sniffer dogs are given a ball as a reward during their training and it is highly prized by the dog. Have you tried a variety of words to ask him to release the ball as it may be he was trained to drop the ball for a different command than the one you are using - could you contact the organisation he was trained by to ask them what command was used? I don't use the word "heel" with my dogs I use the word "close" instead so if someone else was to ask my dogs  to "heel" they wouldn't do so because it's not the word they know to produce that required action - it's not that they don't know how to walk to heel it's because they don't associate that particular "heel" word with the action - say "close" to them and they know they need to walk next to me at heel.

Maybe he was trained with a ball on a rope and pulling the toy was a big part of the reward - I know many dogs who have a game of tuggy as a reward in the agility world - so the pulling is an integral part of the reward and not him just not wanting to give up the ball.

You have 2 very active breeds in one there so he is going to need to be kept occupied with different activities.

The highest value treat I have found is cubes of very mature cheddar cheese, never found a dog yet who has preferred something else to the cheese, what you are offering has to be of higher value or the dog won't comply.

Does he connect you taking the ball/frizbee as the end of the game? Would he be happy carrying it home as his reward at the end of the game?

It can be hard when the dog has been trained using different commands to what you are used to giving.

but on catching them and coming back on recall he wont give it to us.

LOL, you call that a problem?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GRSbr0EYYU
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