When we teach new lessons, we're always concerned about three huge variables: Distance, Duration, and Distractions. We can never forget those 3 Ds. When we begin to teach *stay,* we start with duration before we add distance and distractions.

Therefore, while your dog is in the down, simply stand right next to dog and feed, feed, feed little  treats (kibble, or Quaker Honey Nut Oats, for example), and you may  use the hand signal -- which looks like a stop sign -- or verbal cue, "staaaaay." 

As with all positive-reinforcement teaching, build the new skill in  tiny increments. Aim for a one-second stay, and then gradually work up to a three-second stay. No click needed at all. Your release from this behavior may be a verbal, "All done" and a big smile. Some people use a hand signal: begin to bring both open hands a bit close together and then up in the air a few inches, then swoop the hands apart as an "All done" gesture.  That's it.

Over a period of a week to two or three, extend the duration in tiny, ever-increasing increments, depending upon the dog's age and  maturity. With a puppy, aim for a 30-second stay. With an adult dog,  continue working for a full one-minute stay at least).

Puppies by six months of age should be able to do a relaxed down stay for a half an hour with you sitting down beside them, but that's another whole post!

Let's continue with this one. A next progression for this skill, will be to step in front of dog during the stays. Gradually start to fade the food treats, but not too soon. Simply extend the period between food treats from delivering one every second, to one tiny treat every three seconds, etc. The whole idea is to obtain error-free teaching and error-free learning. We're setting up the dog to succeed at this, not to fail.

I'm paraphrasing Janet Smith's technique to feed treats during the stay, rather than to reward at the release of the stay with treats. This method gets those little furry pups planting their butts in a very solid stay.

Next progression will be for owner, who is still facing the dog, to take one step back,  and hold, then step forward and feed treat.  Hradually owner is able to step back two steps and hold, and then step forward and feed treat. With adult foster collies, I even do this while they're sitting at the fenceline in the yard, me on the
other side of fence -- and I step back ever increasing distances. Note, for this progression, owner is still facing dog rather than facing in the opposite direction.

Now along come some variations. Some people prefer to step to one side, hold, walk back to right in front, hold, step to the other side of dog, hold, back to front again. That helps dog hold its tiny stay even while watching the owner's slight movement.I think it's a very important part for building the dog';s confidence while it's in a vulnerable position.

Notice that we still haven't walked all the way into the next  room yet! <smile>  Possibly you were attempting to give the verbal cue for stay, and then walk away from the dog while it was outdoors, subject to all kinds of distractions, before the dog had progressed  that far. Puppy didn't have a clue what the word even meant.

Build duration first, in the house, in one room, and then in other  rooms, before you take this outdoors. before you even think about adding distance. 

Then build distance very gradually, in the house, in one room and  then in other rooms, before you take this outdoors. But, when you first start to add the new criterion of distance, it's important to reduce the duration criteria to a lower level, which means a shorter time period.

The build distractions next, in the house, in one room, and then in other rooms, before you take this outdoors. But when you first start to add the new criteria of distractions, it's important to reduce the other two criteria of duration and distance to a lower level.

When teaching new skills, our dogs will succeed more rapidly if we remember not to raise more than one criteria at a time. That's all I  have time for at the moment. You'll find great help for teaching the down-stay, and help for the other stationery skills, in Andrea Arden's excellent book, "Dog-Friendly Dog Training."

It's truly a gem!  Good luck. Let us hear about your progress.

Barbara D. Brill
Copyright November 8, 2001. All rights preserved.
Barbara D. Brill, North Chili, NY Email address: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it