It is very frustrating when a dog doesn’t respond to the come command. I hate it when he stands there just looking at me. In fact it’s even dangerous with cars running by and children playing around. At time he just wanders of, or chases a squirrel and I have no means of controlling him. I know I shouldn’t take him off leash until he obeys the command perfectly, but how will I know if that moment has arrived when I never let him off the leash?

I looked for advice online and found many methods that should have worked very well… on a normal dog.

I read somewhere that by laying down on the ground a dog would come to you. I’ve tried it and it worked on occasions, but it’s not a very practical method especially when it rains. Besides, I think he’s figured me out. I have made the mistake of putting on his leash every time he would come to me.

I tried other things as well. Another advice was to run away from your dog, calling him like you’re having a really good time and hoping he’ll want to join you. I did this in broad daylight four days in a row. At first, it worked pretty well. Yet by day three he started to lose interest. Unfortunately, my neighbors got all the more interested. They were actually making fun of me saying that my dog was smarter than me.

It worked, sort off. But I’m pretty sure that in a week or two a squirrel will be more interesting that my private party, so I figured that enough was enough. It was time to get serious.

I finally learned that actual training works much better than any of these little tricks. I found that working seriously, my dog responds much better. All it really takes are two 15 minute sessions per day. Since I have stopped punishing him for showing up and started rewarding him for coming to me things have gotten much better.

The funny thing is, we get along much better these days. I give him a treat randomly for showing up when he’s called for. I found out that I just needed to invest some time and use the correct reward system to motivate him.

Dog expert Daniel Varena writes articles on dog behavior and dog training in general. For more information go to pienso para perros and alimento para perros.