The last lab that Zora and I attended was ‘Hold It, Get It, Bring It’ with Michele Pouliot. The goal of this lab was to learn the duration hold portion of the retrieve. This is the part that I have been having difficulty teaching Zora. We re-taught the entire thing from the beginning, the RIGHT way! I loved all the amazing feedback from the audience and from Michelle. Step 1 was to ‘love the article’, so we went back to nose touches with really yummy treats.

Step 2 is waiting for the dog to open their mouth. Step 3 is closing their mouth on the article. We progressed to stop 3 really fast. Now we’re working on the duration hold. I have to delay the click slightly, so she knows she has to hold on to get the click. She knows that closing her mouth on the article will get her a click (and a treat), The next step may take a while, but know that I know how to get there, I know we can do it!