Are Your Greyhound(S) Recall Trained?

[Guest Swifthounds]

The "touchy" subject of off leash walks got me wondering...

 

My dogs are all recall trained. Every time I've been involved in the recovery of a lost dog it has been one that was not recall trained (a fair amount of those were dogs new to homes that slipped out doors or from the car to the door).

Edited April 17, 2010 by Swifthounds

[JAJ2010]

Mine are! If they want to.... LOL Or if I have food for Sunshine.... they are never going to be off leash dogs, but that's ok since they are perfect just the way they are. well... we're still working on Sunshine!

[GeorgeofNE]

Your question and poll omit an important variable: that some of us TRIED to train our dogs, and were not able to! I know how to train a dog. I've been doing it for over 35 years. I failed utterly to teach George to come when he is called. I learned to sit, lay down, heel, but he does NOT come when he's called, and not for lack of trying to teach him.

 

Sure, I probably could keep trying, and eventually find what it takes to get through to his kiwi-sized brain, but standard tried and true methods did not work!

[Guest Swifthounds]

At Susan's suggestion, I've added two more choices. By all means, if there isn't an answer that reflects your situation, feel free to comment to that effect.

[Guest smarthound]

We actually took Bruce to a recall class. The objective was to learn the best method for training recall in case of an emergency. I enrolled us in this class after spending Thanksgiving weekend 2008 searching for a lost greyhound.

 

Some of you may remember the Amber Alert for Tammy. She was found, injured and hiding in a culvert, after many days of searching with a large crew of volunteers. The vet said she would not have lasted another day without medical attention.

 

So we teach recall to our pups in the event that one of them gets loose. I would never assume that recall would be 100% reliable.

Edited April 17, 2010 by smarthound

[Guest FastDogsOwnMe]

Yup, they are trained. Some are reliable, some I am still working on it. All are good enough to run on the beach and in the woods.

[robinw]

sometimes

[RobinM]

No. The only one I would remotely take a chance on is Elsie but that is only because she is so far up my butt, the only way to get her to run is to take her to an enclosed field where DH holds her while I walk to the far end and I call her, she runs to me! And then stays velcroed.

 

The others take off like banchees and we have to go to them to get them.

 

And the votes for "yes, all" should really read "for now".

 

Nothing is fool proof.

Edited April 17, 2010 by RobinM

[Guest happygrey]

What exactly is meant by recall training? A response to a called name? (Which he often does in our house and enclosed yard.) Response to some kind of whistle or special sound? Response to the command "Come!"?

 

I don't understand this completely.

Edited April 17, 2010 by happygrey

[gazehund]

I voted reliable. The "always" put me off from voting yes. Are they recall trained? Yes, they are. The 2 long time kennel hounds began re-call training with their racing trainers and continued here by me. We work on it every day. The spook was "trained", by me only. Of the three hounds I have now Pearl (the spook) has the best re-call of the three of them. Might be because she has been here the longest and it might have something to do with her trust in me. Dunno, I ain't no trainer.

To this date, I have never had a problem with re-call with my hounds. Just as I never say never, I also never say always. Good poll and topic.

[Guest Swifthounds]

I voted reliable. The "always" put me off from voting yes. Are they recall trained? Yes, they are. The 2 long time kennel hounds began re-call training with their racing trainers and continued here by me. We work on it every day. The spook was "trained", by me only. Of the three hounds I have now Pearl (the spook) has the best re-call of the three of them. Might be because she has been here the longest and it might have something to do with her trust in me. Dunno, I ain't no trainer.

To this date, I have never had a problem with re-call with my hounds. Just as I never say never, I also never say always. Good poll and topic.

 

I meant for the poll to allow folks to essentially answer two questions in one. I originally asked whether people did recall training with the answer options of: "Yes, always." and "No." I added the options on reliability so that folks could indicated whether their training has resulted in reliable recall in response to a post indicating that the posted had tried training it, but that her dog wasn't reliable.

 

I probably should have split the two questions up instead of adding the options and allowing folks to select more than one option. It's my first poll, sorry.

[GreytNut]

Their recall is pretty close to 100% in the house. In the yard that drops to 80%, as sometimes they're fascinated with something or stalking a critter and will completely ignore me. I haven't had a chance to work with them in a large confined area like a baseball field, but would guess the percentage would drop further as there are more stimuli and things to investigate in a larger area. I wouldn't trust them off-lead in an unenclosed area for all the tea in China.

 

Of the two, Tiny seems to be more reliable, probably because he's a velcro dog. He behaves a bit like Elsie in that it can be hard to get him to run or play sometimes because he just wants to stay glued to my leg. Raven, our spook, is more likely to take off and not come back.

[Guest TBSFlame]

NO. Most will come when I call them (if they want to come). Do you want a cookie works and I use it but I'm not kidding myself.

 

 

[Guest GreysAndMoreGreys]

Over the many years of greyhounds I have worked on recall with each and every hound.

Sometimes with success and sometimes with no success but it was not due to effort on my part

 

The one thing I found that seemed to almost always work was having another dog that had very good recall and for the hounds to learn from that dog.

It started with Willow my GSD and then Willow basically taught Cassie with my coaching.

Along came Weenie and well lets just say, no way, no how could that little brat be trained decently with recall

 

Brookie learned from Willow and Cassie. Augie learned from Cassie and Brookie.

The first Dave was in the process of learning.

Duck, Pooh and Dave are all in the process of learning.

Kevin taught Momma and Pup

 

Each and every hound is taught not to bolt out doors (home or car) with the "wait" command. No exceptions to that one

[gazehund]

I voted reliable. The "always" put me off from voting yes. Are they recall trained? Yes, they are. The 2 long time kennel hounds began re-call training with their racing trainers and continued here by me. We work on it every day. The spook was "trained", by me only. Of the three hounds I have now Pearl (the spook) has the best re-call of the three of them. Might be because she has been here the longest and it might have something to do with her trust in me. Dunno, I ain't no trainer.

To this date, I have never had a problem with re-call with my hounds. Just as I never say never, I also never say always. Good poll and topic.

 

I meant for the poll to allow folks to essentially answer two questions in one. I originally asked whether people did recall training with the answer options of: "Yes, always." and "No." I added the options on reliability so that folks could indicated whether their training has resulted in reliable recall in response to a post indicating that the posted had tried training it, but that her dog wasn't reliable.

 

I probably should have split the two questions up instead of adding the options and allowing folks to select more than one option. It's my first poll, sorry.

 

Ahhhhhhhhhh, I see. Still a good job and a good poll.

[Guest FastDogsOwnMe]

I said Yes, Always because I thought it meant, "Do you teach a recall" and the answer to that is yes, I always teach my dogs a recall.

[Guest Swifthounds]

I said Yes, Always because I thought it meant, "Do you teach a recall" and the answer to that is yes, I always teach my dogs a recall.

 

That's what I meant. Though I probably should have had my second first!

[Batmom]

I always teach recall. We practice virtually every day.

 

My dogs are reliable.

 

I wouldn't count on their recall to be of any significant help if they got loose under most circumstances. Under some circumstances, might be useful, but if somebody was on the hunt or badly frightened, probably not.

[Guest Drumhellergrey]

What exactly is meant by recall training? A response to a called name? (Which he often does in our house and enclosed yard.) Response to some kind of whistle or special sound? Response to the command "Come!"?

 

I don't understand this completely.

To answer the Poll question, YES, ALWAYS. See my opinions in I'm Starting A Touchy Subject

 

To answer the above question. All of the above, plus, hand signals, small gestures, and tone of voice. You have to have 99.9 % percent success,(100% does not exist in all reality)

[Guest FastDogsOwnMe]

Well if my 13 year old Whippet I have been running off leash since he was 8 weeks old dies some day of natural causes not related to going off leash, I can claim 100% reliability

[TheFullHouse]

I try with all my dogs, some are good and some not so good. The one who shocked me the most was Valentino. He got out one way and when called came right back and not to me, to someone else which was an even bigger shock! My little boys are hard headed though. Some will come when called and some will look at me as if to laugh in my face and say no way.

[gazehund]

What exactly is meant by recall training? A response to a called name? (Which he often does in our house and enclosed yard.) Response to some kind of whistle or special sound? Response to the command "Come!"?

 

I don't understand this completely.

To answer the Poll question, YES, ALWAYS. See my opinions in I'm Starting A Touchy Subject

 

To answer the above question. All of the above, plus, hand signals, small gestures, and tone of voice. You have to have 99.9 % percent success,(100% does not exist in all reality)

 

Oh right, I forgot about hand signals. We work on that every day as well. Hand palm up facing them means wait / stay. I train and reinforce verbal WAIT on a daily basis also.

[Guest Drumhellergrey]

Well if my 13 year old Whippet I have been running off leash since he was 8 weeks old dies some day of natural causes not related to going off leash, I can claim 100% reliability

Thats what I'm getting at. ... you don't have 100% in the present, and that is where I and my dog lives...

[gazehund]

Well if my 13 year old Whippet I have been running off leash since he was 8 weeks old dies some day of natural causes not related to going off leash, I can claim 100% reliability

Thats what I'm getting at. ... you don't have 100% in the present, and that is where I and my dog lives...

 

Agreed.

[Guest Jubilee251]

I have a related question - I've been thinking of getting a longgggg leash to work on recall training and also so Molly has more freedom to roam in an unfenced, grassy park. But I can't help thinking that if she takes off in a sprint, reaching the end of the longer leash would hurt or even break her neck.

 

Would this be a bad idea?