request for help with our 10 month old lurcher

[jacobs 0]

hi i ve got to a point with our lovley lurcher bitch on recall where she her instinctive prey drive has got so strong that her recall cammand which i trained her on whistle and liver treats is being completley ignored mostly and when she does make a catch theres no chance of her comeing back until she has finished with it or i find her first, does anyone have any ides on getting passed this point with her be so appreciated as this is extreamly frustrating when out with her many thanks warm regards Jacob

[clabby 14]

hold it out she is probably going threw the rebellious phase ware she will push and push to see how much she can get away with. my lurcher did that from 8 months till 10 months all recall & retrieving commands went out the window she soon got out of it when she figured that if she dint do what i asked she was on the lead. so just be firm but don't hit her. put on lead for not doing as she is told and treats and praise when she is good she will soon learn hope that helps a bit.

[skycat 6,173]

Yours is a very common problem in pet lurchers. Look at it this way: you have a dog which has been bred to hunt and catch stuff. Nearly every sort of dog will chase the odd rabbit, but many learn to give up when they realise they aren't fast enough to catch them. Lurchers are fast enough, so they carry on doing it, BUT without the proper training, you end up with a dog like yours which has had no direction from the owner. A working lurcher owner will train the pup to retrieve, first on rabbit skin dummies, then later, as it matures, on the real thing. Without that training, that moulding of the dog's natural drive which forges a working partnership, the dog will see what it catches as its own possession to do with what it wants, which is (naturally enough) to eat it.

 

A working lurcher goes out and catches stuff under the direction of its owner: we take them ferreting, lamping etc, and the dog learns to work with the owner. BUT if you just take a pet lurcher out for walks, and the dog isn't given any direction on how to behave, it will revert to behaving like the hunter it is, but doing it alone, not with you.

 

I don't have a problem with people keeping lurchers as pets just so long as people realise that they do need to do the correct training if they don't want to end up with a dog which buggers off, catches and then eats the rabbits it kills. More to the point, as your pup matures, you may find that she's going off and killing other stuff which might pose more of a problem with the laws being what they are in this country! Not to mention livestock etc.

 

There are a lot of good posts on here about retrieve training lurcher pups, or you could contact Jim Greenwood, who is a dog behaviourist and working lurcher man: he will help you to train your pup to bring back what she catches, and to come when called. He's an excellent bloke who does a lot of work with people in your situation.

 

The other thing to remember is that your pup's prey drive has really kicked in now, and she's going through the normal teenage stage where she wants to do her own thing. This is a stage which all dogs go through, and we have to ride it out, workers or not. However, if you don't want your dog to catch stuff, then I'd suggest that you exercise it where there is nothing to chase: seems a shame really, as that is what lurchers were bred for. If you want to carry on exercising the dog where there are rabbits, then get some help from Jim: at the very least, you can feed her on what she catches: but when you get home, not in the field!

 

Edited to add: Clabby: we don't know if the guy wants his dog to catch or not at this stage, and no amount of liver treats will be anywhere near as good as the nice warm, bloody rabbit that this pup has learned to catch.

Jacobs: what do you feed the dog on at home?

[fast dogs 51]

Edited August 18, 2011 by fast dogs