Murphy came to us very underweight and as a result he is terribly greedy. (doesn't help that hes also a spaniel!) He is better than we we first had him, where he would just jump up and steal anything on your plate, although he probably would given half a chance. We've worked on the "leave it" command using clicker training and i can now drop a bit of food on the floor and he wont touch it, and am progressing to getting him to walk past the food in return for something else, but as soon as movement is involved the food disappears. We are working for the silver good cits, which involves walking past someone with food in their hands and not trying to take it! (very much a work in progress!) Someone with a goldie in class has trained brilliant food manners, the dog can walk off lead among lots of bits of food on the floor and wont touch it. When i enquired what she did she told me that she had taught her dog not to take food by placing the food bowl on the floor and making her wait for the command to eat. I have heard of others who do this. I must admit i have never bothered, mainly because with 3 dogs to feed its not worth the hassle. I tried it tonight, with something very low value in their bowls (a bit of rice) and both the girls could do it but i had to physically hold murphy's collar and he was still trying to get the food. Now i'm willing to work on this if you agree it will help with his general control around food, but i'm a bit concerned as he resource guards, usually things like bones and chews, but used to try it on over stolen articles (and still will do if we don't do a swap.) Hes never challenged us over the food bowl because i've always been careful not to take it away and approach to put things in so he sees people around as a good thing, but i am very aware that it wouldn't take much to start food bowl guarding. Do you thing making him leave his bowl will help this or make it worse?

Hiya,

I think a strong leave is really important especially for dogs prone to guarding.  In my opinion you should never take a guarders food bowl when they're eating as that's just encouraging them to guard.  I would work with him on his own with this so he doesn't feel that by waiting for his food the other two might get in ther first.  Ask him to sit and wait and then go to put his food bowl down, keep your hands on the bowl, if he moves at all, just bring the bowl back up off the floor and repeat with the sit, wait and putting the bowl down - he will get the message pretty quickly.  If you don't react quickly enough and he starts to eat his food then don't take it away - but if when you ask him to sit and wait you walk a few paces away to put his bowl down then that shouldn't happen.

Karen

My dogs know the "wait" command.  I use this for many things including waiting before crossing raods, etc.

When I put their food bowls on the floor, I tell them to wait.  They do until I say "good pups" at which point they fly at them!  I can remove them at any time though, they just look a bit disheartened though.

I think that making him wait for his dinner until told to eat it will only help you establish that you are in charge.  This can surely only be a good thing in the long run...

He needs to understand that you are in control and if you tell him to do something, he should obey.

Reading this back, it does sound a bit dictatorial, but I think dogs need that hierarchy to be happy in their environment and to know who they should turn to.  i only ever use commands, never any other methods to assert my authority, in case people think I'm a bit mean...

I know the whole "alpha dog" idea will get some comments, but it works for me!

My dogs have always done the Wait before eating, I just like manners so train for this -however, unless taught separately to walk past food in other environments/areas would still want to try out what was being held out as temptation.

I've been helping at classes and teaching this exercise. What we do, is get someone to sit on a chair and hold biccies, get the owners to walk past with dogs on loose leads, and click and reward for response to Leave it. If the dog tries to lunge for the food (and so many do!! :P ) then the person with the food simply closes their hand over it so the dog gets nothing.

Leave it taught in this way means that lunging, grabbing etc is never successsful. I've seen it taught in some classes and they let the dogs get the biccies - not so good, as then the dogs have some sense of "mayb this time it will work..."

Lindsay
x

With Bonnie 4 months old today !!!!! I have taught her to "leave" her food until I say "OK, Good girl" since we had her at 8 wks and now she just sits looking at the bowl until I give the signal-- doesn't even attempt to eat. Anyway after reading the posts so far I thought I'd move on a bit today. I can't believe how quickly puppies can learn at this age!--with minimum effort on my part I can now throw a treat down on the floor near her while saying "leave" and she sits waiting for me to say ok--- I just can't believe how easy it was. Just have to keep practising now
Any suggestions of what useful training to do next in the scheme of things
By the way-those of you who may have seen my toilet training post I'm pleased to be able to report that "be quick" seems to be having an impact but then it's early days yet!!

I have all 6 of my big dogs sitting and waiting before they touch their food (and the 2 little ones -they are separate, little and large) -doing more than one is not a  problem at all, but you need to teach them one at a time. I don't even need a command for mine, then just automatically sit and wait when they see the bowls and don't eat until told -including the 6 month old puppy.

It's very easy to teach. You simply tell the dog to sit, put the bowl down -if he goes for the food, immediately pick the bowl up again. It doesn't take long before they realise they will only get the food if they sit and wait. No need to physically hold them like I used to in the past.

As for resource guarding, you could always give him a treat whilst you hold the bowl and he waits.