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Right Back To How To Use Your Voice to Train Gundogs
If you look at gundog training in its basic form, then voice seems very important and it also seems like the only way to show a dog what you want it to do. Thankfully, however, that is not usually the case and as most sportsmen and women will know, dogs in the field cannot always hear their handlers, especially if they are working out in front of their handler.
Voice training goes so much farther than simply giving a command and how you use your voice can help you not only train your dog but also build a sustainable bond with him, which will only benefit you when you are out in the field.
When we look at voice training, we are actually looking at the tone of voice. This is something that you should be aware of and you should think in terms of several tones.
• Conversation Tone: I have found that everyone talks to their dogs and will usually use the same tone that they use with adults in a give and take conversation. This is a relaxed tone, the tone that tells the dog that they can relax and don’t have to be on their toes and ready to obey a command. It is important that you train yourself to never use this tone when training or giving a command because it has more of a “maybe” to it and the dog may decide that maybe is good enough and he doesn’t really need to do something.
• Harsh Tone: This is a hard tone for a lot of people to pull off but a harsh tone is not a yelling tone. Actually, yelling does not accomplish anything except negatives. A harsh tone has more growl to it than pitch and it is a tone that you will use to correct the dog’s behaviors. If the puppy is chewing something, a firm growl “No,” with a gentle correction will teach the dog that they are doing something wrong. This is a step in training that can be done very early with a dog and will continue through your dog’s life.
• Command Tone: If you are going to use this tone than you really need to train yourself to follow through on it. This is the strong tone that tells the dog there will be no arguments about things. Commands should be given once and should be delivered in a clear voice that is commanding.
• Praise Tone: When your dog is doing something good, a chipper voice that is filled with pleasure is the perfect way to let your dog know that they are doing something good. It is important to mention that praise should never be bouncy and it shouldn’t make the dog break from a command. If a dog is sitting and holding and you praise him for holding, “Good dog!” it shouldn’t be done in a manner that makes him jump up and break the hold. Instead, he should remain in position and only a small tail wag is evidence that the dog has heard the praise.
• Play Tone: The last tone is the tone that you can lavish praise or play with your dog with and should never be done during a training session. It can be done once training is done and it gives your dog permission to have a little fun after a hard training session.
As you can see, each tone has its set time to use and it can go a long way to training your dog. Not only does it make it clear to your dog what he needs to know but it also alerts your dog to when he needs to focus and when he doesn’t.
If you want to know more on training your Gundogs using your voice or have a new dog to train you may be interested in our weekly video training course which will be starting within the next 3-4 weeks, click here gundog training to and get 4 pretraining videos for free,