How to Make Your Dog More Obedient

Obedience is very important when it comes to dog ownership. Your dog doesn’t necessarily have to be a slave to your command, but it should definitely listen to you when it’s important. Obedience doesn’t come naturally to any creature. 

Here are a few ways you can make your dog more obedient.

Develop Your Method, and Stick to It

There are many ways to train your dog for obedience. If you do some research, you will come across a tremendous amount of advice and techniques. Find what works for you, and stick to it.

Mixing methods can confuse your dog rather than train it. In almost all cases, the style of training you adopt will boil down to a few basic premises.

• Reward behaviors you want
• Don’t reward behaviors you don’t like
• Stay consistent
• Change the setting from time to time
• Stay calm and patient
• Keep practicing and improving

It’s really as simple as that. You must put in the time and effort, or you won’t see any results. Just understand obedience doesn’t happen overnight.

Don’t Forget Dogs Have Personality

Your dog has a mind of its own. Some of the simple obedience techniques may not work well for your particular breed or your dog’s particular character. Getting professional UK dog training services may represent the best option for teaching your dog obedience. It’s also ideal for any advanced obedience training you would like your dog to have.

Start with the Simple Stuff

It’s best to start your obedience training off with some of the simpler commands.

Sit – The “sit” command is one of the most basic. It can help you to keep your dog under control when excitement tries to get the better of it.

• Hold a treat before the dog’s nose
• Raise the treat so your dog’s bottom lowers as it raises its head to follow the treat
• When the dog’s bottom is firmly on the ground, say “sit”
• Allow the dog to have the treat, and show some love
• Repeat this process each day until the dog will do it on command.

Down – The down command isn’t as easy as the sit one. It goes against the basic nature of many dogs, since it’s a submissive position. However, once you have it…down, you will have an effective way of keeping your dog from lunging forward, or from moving around when you need to get something done.

• Hold a treat in front of your dog, make sure it’s a good treat
• Move the treat down towards the floor
• Move the treat along the floor, allowing the dog to stretch and lay in order to follow it
• Once the dog is fully down, let it have the treat

You can repeat this each day. Your dog may give you some difficulty with this one, but don’t give in and release the treat until your dog does what you want. Also, do not force the down position, let your dog do it on its own.

Stay – The stay command will stem from other commands where your dog must stay in a particular position. So, before you teach your dog to “stay,” you must first teach your dog to sit. Once you have your dog sit, say “stay,” and back away. If the dog stays as you back away, even for a few seconds, give your dog a reward.

There are various other simple commands you can train your dog to obey. The more your dog learns, the easier it will become to transition to more complex commands.

While many of these commands start with treats, you will want to gradually fade the treats out as you teach the dog to obey. This will help your dog to understand obedient behaviour is generally expected at all times.