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Comment by Teresa on July 21, 2010 at 3:49pm

The only way Baron will do the lay down command is on the grass. Even then he only does it about 50% of the time. He won't do it on a hard surface. Good Luck.

Comment by sheila hatcher on July 21, 2010 at 2:01pm

M y Bailey can ,lay down ,stand up but can not get her to roll over have tried everthing that I can think of but nothing works.

Comment by sheila hatcher on July 21, 2010 at 1:57pm

I GET DOWN ON MY KNEES BRING A TREAT UP IN MY HAND THEN LOWER IT WHEN I say downshe learned it very fast.

Comment by Stephanie on July 21, 2010 at 8:46am

Bear struggled with it, then they taught us the hand signal used when dogs are off leash - and he nailed it! Not sure why he liked that better, but it worked.

Comment by Jane Christensen on July 21, 2010 at 12:04am

Sage is 6 months and does the same thing! She can do this but choses to wait for a treat also...so you're not the only one!

Comment by David on July 20, 2010 at 10:48pm

I have the opposite problem. Yoda only knows how to down on command but not sit. He thinks down and sit are the same thing.

Comment by Beth on July 20, 2010 at 10:15pm

Oh, one other thing I thought of! Smart dogs hate repetition, and if "down" is not going well you probably don't look forward to it, so without realizing it you are quite likely giving off some unintended body-language signals to your dog, and Oscar probably thinks something like "Here comes the part we don't like" and it can become a battle of wills.

Have you tried just mixing it in quickly with other things? Throw in two or three commands that he likes and does well, in quick succession, then just mix in the "down" using your same upbeat, cheerful tone, and if he does it then move on to a couple tricks he really loves to do.

Sometimes we don't realize we've fallen into a rut with our dogs. For example, Jack is a lagger on a walk because he likes to dawdle and sniff. Sometimes I'll start grumbling at him and tugging his leash and saying "Come ON Jack, let's move" and he just plants his feet and is stubborn. But if I take a deep breath and use my (faked) cheerful, happy voice and say "Jack! C'mon, heel Jack!" he will smile and prick his ears and start trotting right along.

Comment by Beth on July 20, 2010 at 9:39pm

Ah. Nine months is a tough age to teach down. Honestly, if it were me I would either train it when they are 3 or 4 months and still think you are great, or wait until the dog was about 18 months and no longer testing you. "Down" is a submissive, vulnerable position. Because it's submissive, stubborn dogs don't like it. And because it's vulnerable, many shy dogs don't like it.

If you think he does not really get it, you can try luring him as described. However, my girl Maddie gets so excited by a lure that it does not work for position training, so what I did to her was sat down in front of her, put her in a sit, give her my hand signal and then pulled her front legs out in front of her (she's very submissive and so does not resist this as many dogs would) and told her "good" and THEN gave her the treat. I repeated this until finally after many repeats, I would sit he down in front of her and give manually put her down bunches of times, then I would give her the hand signal once and she would do a down (after I waited for what felt like ages) and as soon as she did she got a huge praise party and we stopped there. After she was doing it reliably I attached the verbal command to it.

If you think Oscar actually knows what you mean and is being stubborn, what you can do is get out a yummy, yummy treat, something he does not get usually like cheese or hot dogs. Give your command, tell him down ONCE and only once, and if he listens he gets the yummy treat. If he does not listen, you put the treat quietly away with no correction or even a glance at Oscar, and you go and sit down and do something else. That can sometimes sharpen up a dog who just does not really want to do the command, but you can ONLY do this if you are absolutely sure that he gets it and is just ignoring you. Some behaviorists recommend doing this with their normal meal and if they don't listen, they don't get fed but I don't have the heart to do that, and also wouldn't do it with a growing puppy.

Comment by mel g on July 20, 2010 at 9:32pm

Oscar is 9 months old. He does do the command when he feels like it, which is about 5% of the time. Thanks for all the input

Comment by Porter on July 20, 2010 at 9:13pm

The Corgi-L listserv just had some discussions about teaching the "down" command... some advice was to teach it on stairs - with Oscar on the top of the stairs, put a treat one stair below him, when he bends his head to get it use your clicker or "good boy" to praise the wanted behavior of the 'down'. I was never able to teach my first corgi this command, but am going to start working on it with Porter. (I think they figure, hey, we're so short, sitting is "down" enough).

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