Roll Over – Teaching the behaviour
You are now going to work on teaching your dog to roll over, first with luring and then on verbal command. you will also be teaching your dog to roll over in both directions and have a different command for each direction.
When teaching the Roll Over you will find that your dog has a preferred side that it will Roll Over on; this is common. It will mean that it may take a while longer to teach your dog to roll over in one direction than the other.
You will be using the Luring training technique to teach the Roll Over, so will need a good supply of treats to hand.
- Have your dog lie down in front of you.
- Entice your dog to tilt its hip in the direction that you wish your dog to Roll Over. To do this, lure your dog’s head towards the opposite side to the hip you want it to tilt. For example, to tilt your dog’s left hip, turn its head towards the right.
- Once your dog has tilted its hip, move your luring hand lower to the ground so that your dog lies on its side.
- When your dog is lying, begin luring your dog’s head in the direction of the roll. You may need to lure the head back towards your dog’s shoulder as you do this.
- As your dog follows your hand with its head, the shift in weight will naturally start to roll the body.
- Some dogs will roll naturally, some may need reward at various stage of the roll over.
- With dogs who are struggling to roll, make sure to move your luring hand head from the first shoulder to the other one
- Once your dog starts to roll, keep moving the reward to maintain the momentum of the roll. This will help your dog complete the full roll over
- Reward your dog low so it is not encourage to stand up but stay in a lie down position
In the following video, Emily demonstrates these steps with Mozzie.