A very common concern among dog owners is the lack of an effective recall,
or come command. This command is very important to maintain proper control
of your dog as well as for safety reasons.

Many times we have an expectation that the dog "knows" what you want when
you say "come here" or "come" when in fact, they have no idea what it is
you are wanting from them. Before we can correct a dog for failing the
"come" command, we must first ensure that the dog knows the command and
what is clearly expected from him.

The way that we start to teach the dog the "come" command is like this.
Start very simple by calling him by name and adding the come command with
it. As he starts to look at you, act very excited and verbally praise him
while backing up and continuing to say "come". Once he gets to you, simply
give him praise and a treat. Make this a game to him and he will want to
come to you. Another way to make this a fun game for the dog is to have a
partner help you. Each of you should have treats and play the same game
and have the dog run from one partner to another with this same command.
After doing this for a few days with a lot of repetitions, you should begin
to see the dog understanding a little better what the come command is.

Another exercise to practice is the leash controlled form of teaching the
come command. Use a regular choke chain training collar along with a long
leash. Take your dog outside for this exercise. Call the dog by name and
say "come" then immediately apply a leash correction towards you, in other
words, pull him to you while you are saying come. Once he understands that
his name plus the come command results in you correcting him back to you,
he will begin to voluntarily come when called to avoid the leash
correction.

Many times a dog will not want to come to you because it can remember that
in most cases that you call it to you, you put it in an unfavorable
circumstance such as confinement or removing it from a play area. To
offset this, practice calling your dog to you with positive rewards and
then allow it to continue what it was doing. This will diminish his idea
that you have other motives. We want the dog to understand that this is a
REWARDING behavior so that he is more likely to repeat it!

I know what you are thinking, "this all seems great, but what do I do when
he fails this command or it doesn't work quite the way I want?". Once the
dog clearly knows the come command and fails it, then we will correct the
dog.

Enforcing the Recall

We discussed the importance of the recall and how to teach your dog to come
when called. Now we need to talk a little about what to do when your dog
fails this command.

Often times we find ourselves chasing after our dog when he has ran off or
wondered away from where we are. By the time that we catch "Pookie", we
are tired and angry and often times we will correct in the wrong way which
can send conflicting signals to the dog.

Assuming that the dog has demonstrated to you under normal training
circumstances that he knows what you expect when you say "come", we can now
correct for failing this command.

If your dog has left your side and you want him to come to you, clearly
call his name and say "come". He will do one of several things at that
point. He may stop and stare at you as if to say "what?" and at that point
you really want to act happy and continue to call him and praise him as he
starts to come to you. When he just stands there and looks at you, that
tells you that he is thinking about what you said and is trying to make a
decision. He MUST ALWAYS BE PRAISED when he makes the right decision.
This applies no matter HOW MAD YOU MAY BE AT HIM for running off.

The other behavior that he may do, is completely ignore you and continue
running off. As he is running off, call his name and say the command of
"come". Obviously he is ignoring you, but he still needs to hear it. Once
you catch him, you want to let him know that he made the wrong decision.
What I like to do is to apply firm leash and collar corrections as I am
walking back to where it is that we were. Every third or fourth step, I
will apply a leash correction and state the command of "come". It is very
important that he be corrected using the word of the command he FAILED.
Next time he is out and hears "come", he will begin to remember the
corrections he has gotten in the past for failing that command. Any time I
have to chase a dog down and bring him back, I like to put them into a
period of "time-out" if you will. I will put them into a crate or some
other small confined area with no form of entertainment. Doing this will
send a message to the dog that he made the mistake of running off which led
to correction and loss of freedom.

These methods are very effective and I have trained a lot of dogs using
this method. The key is to be consistent with your training. Once your
dog understands that you will enforce the rules EVERY time, he will begin
to pay more attention to you and will be more obedient.