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Stay Skills

Stay is a valuable cue to teach our dog to keep them safe; you might ask them to stay if the gate/door is left open and you want to prevent them from running onto the street, when they are in the car and you want to swap their lead/harness out and want to prevent them from jumping out. 

What you need 

  • High value treats 
  • Calm environment 

Teaching stay 

  1. Start cue 
  2. Cue your dog into a sitting or lying down position
  3. Give a visual (like a stop sign) and verbal cue ‘stay’, wait for 1-2 seconds and then say ‘yes’ and reinforce in such a way so that your dog does not move
  4. Gradually add movement after you ask for a ‘stay’ by moving on leg backward and then forward, say ‘yes’ and reinforce if your dog does not move
  5. Add more movement away from the dog, gradually, if your dog moves before you get back to them you are going too fast

Tips 

  • Try somewhere comfortable like your dogs beds as the location for them to stay 
  • Practise, practise, practise - its normal for your dog to be curious and not want to stay in one spot, allow them time to learn 
  • Use high value treats like meats & cheeses 
  • Continue to reward the behaviour

Disclaimer:

Be mindful when you train and interact with your pet to avoid all aversive & balanced training techniques. When animals are hurt and scared, they may stop the behaviour but they won’t learn the right thing to do. 

Aversive training consists of: yelling/scaring pets, leash jerking, hitting, using choke collars, e-collars, prong collars or slip leads, using water such as spraying cats, 

Force-free training focuses on positive reinforcement which promotes trust, confidence and consistent behaviour with our causing harm or stress to our pets. This is the most up to date, science backed Humane method of training.