Curious on Send Out Techniques - Page 1

I am curious on how others are teaching the send out (varous).  I teach with a toy always out on the field.  I place it on the field prior to taking my girl out to the field so she doesn't know its out there but she thinks it is always.  I down her right at the toy and give lots of priase and release her to get her toy.  Then a session of play.  Then we do it again.  After sending her out a couple of times I let her see me take the toy and throw it down the field and take her off still wanting the toy.  I do the send out at different lengths but nothing short of the 30 paces.  Usually closer to 50 or 60 and sometimes longer.  I don't want her to get used to only going out so far and then downing on her own.

I just like to learn different methods of training to aquire the same goal because every dog is different and having more than mone technique in your bag of tricks is always helpful so please share with me and everyone else who would like to add more techniques to their bag of tricks.

Thanks in advance.

I have seen ring sport trainers using touch pads to teach the send outs. I am thinking about trying it with my next pup.

send out is the next item on my list of training for Sita........have no idea how to even get started.............

Well, I was hoping to gain some insite on teaching the send out but it seems like most are afraid to share the techniques with others.  There are some on here that do not have any idea on how to start or even teach this.  I wanted to start a thread that helped out others on this site instead of always bashing on each other.  Please help those that need it and share your knowledge.

Get a real dog,

Please share with us on how this is taught and how well it works for you.  All the best.

Well I can't really offer too much opinion because I have yet to try it myself. Just saw it at a seminar and it makes alot of sense.

My understanding of it.........

You teach the dog to touch a pad with it's feet to gain a reward. Started young with food. Once the dog understands it has to touch the pad to get a reward, the distance is increased. What I saw the guys doing at the seminar is using a fence as a barrier/marker, the touch pad is placed at the end of the fence. The dog runs to the fence, touches the touch pad, and is then recalled for the reward (tug)

Some ring trainers just teach the dog to run to the fence. They do this by placing a tug on the ground, using a send out command, then increase the distance to the fence at the end of the field. So after awhile, the dog is conditioned to always run to the fence to find their tug or ball.

So these guys were combining two techniques. The touch pad and the fence. The touch pads are also using to teach directional sends. So it made perfect sense to me and seemed like a good idea.

One thing of note, there is no position command (that I know of unless rules have changed) in the ring sports. It is a send out and recall. So for Sch people who wanted to try this, you would have to teach the down in motion seperate (I imagine most do this anyway) and then encompass it in your send out.

There you have it, myunderstanding from limited exposure but it really peaked my interest on not only the send out but for directional sends as well. I just have not attempted it yet. I probably will play around  with it with my next pup.

i use a toy at the end of the field.  whatever direction i throw the dumbell, will be the direction of the send out (its actually a rule that the dumbells be that trown in the same direction as the send out,,, works for me).  at the end of every dumbell workout we end with a send out.   if done correctly, the dog will learn that the send out is a release from whatever pressure may come from the retrieve exercises.

personally, i like to hang the toy.  keeps the dog from trying to sniff the ground for its toy, food, or placematt that would normally be down low.

john

jletcher18,

Thanks for your input.  I am just wondering how the dog will still go out without the toy hanging?

My dog won't go out if she doesn't know their is a toy out there.  That is why I throw it out prior to leaving the field so she thinks it is out there when I send her.  I always have a toy out on the field until trial in order to trick her.  I did have the toy elevated a little off the ground to start but once I put it on the ground she wouldn't go out and had to start over with the toy on the ground.

Any thoughts on teaching her to go out no matter if she sees a toy or not?

I hang the touch pad on the fence, and reward with the ball for the touch.
Then you can add the down & reward, and so on, then remove the target.

Seen a ball on a rope, hung from a clip off a "bird-feeder" pole, this way the dog rewards itself.
Like this idea, nice fast down the field, but does not complete the exercise.
Also seen a dog food bowl used as a target, with reward inside.

I have a toy out there on some sort of send out stake.   

For my guys they already knew what "go"  meant more or less.  They learned "go" in herding while they were on a border through somewhat partial avoidance/positive method.   Basically when the dog is taught go on the border, it already knows very very well to stay on the border, so that leaves only one of two directions to go on the border.  By calmly blocking the border with your body and crook the dog now only has one direction to go.  It is taught kind of two ways, one is happy, ie:  Let's go!  The other is with some very calm pressure walking towards the dog.  Once the dog has gone just a bit at first the dog is then called back to the handler for praise.  In herding you use the go in a few different situations.  The dog has to be sent to a cross border to set up for the placement.  The dog needs to be sent to an opposite (or third border) in the narrow graze.  And also it is used while moving the sheep to go along the flock. 

So translating to a toy, worked out pretty well.  They also knew a down at a distance as well.  To keep the speed on my male I rarely downed him, as he anticipated it.  And breaking the down was not an issue.  So for him he was sent to the toy then came back to me for praise.  As I said, for him, when I did down him, breaking it was not an issue.   So I could have him come back to me for play.  It's pretty much the same for my female.   The were also pretty easy to get to move away from me, away from sheep and a toy by just telling them GO.  

As John said.  I always do the send away after the retrieves as a reward/release for a job well done.  I don't always pattern train the routine, but it works out well to do the send away after the retrieve. 

I'm still learning as we go too, and I'm sure our methods will change as we go along.  

Kathy

I have also seen the sendout taught via negative reinforcement. This was for a showline dog without much food/prey drive.  He was taught with an e-collar.
They'd put the mat down and teach him over several sessions that when he's told to "voraus," the only place the stim from the collar is removed is on the mat.  He did pick it up pretty quickly, then the mat was gradually moved farther away.  Eventually the correction was phased out, unless he did not go out as asked.
It's not the "nicest" way to do it, but it was a big $$$ dog that they just needed to get titled.

I trained my own dog with a ball and sendout stick.  Her sendouts are PERFECT.  When we did her Schh1 the judge was very impressed with her sendout.  I have not gotten to the point yet where I've done a lot of practicing on strange fields, but I have done a few and she does get the idea.  But I have never seen a dog pick up new things like she does - it's like she learns the first step and then understands the rest, lol.

I also was advised NOT to down while training the sendout, so it wouldn't slow my dog down.  But her down is 100% reliable, she will drop the second I say it regardless of what's going on, so that was not a huge concern in the trial.

In training, the ball should ALWAYS be out there, so the dog always thinks there's a ball waiting for it when it goes out.  I always put the ball out before ever taking the dog out of the car.  If you are having problems with that, maybe try moving closer so the dog can see the ball on the stick, then gradually move back until she can't see it and has to trust that the ball is out there.