"Easy" to train breeds

Oh god, Corgis can be EVIL. Indy was (at one point) ALL ready for his CD- proofed, doing great in matches. We tried a few times- every show, he'd come up with a new variation on things (usually during the SFE, HF, or recall). He's 7 now and still has no title, and I've let his training slide to work on my other dogs, who have a bit less of a sense of humor.

Mal is close to ready for his CD - hopefully this fall. (Hi other-Malcolm's mom!) Lizzie is doing well for her age, and frankly, she's my fastest learner. But she's the most distractable too- her heeling si AWFUL. Kaylee is doing great- I've had her two months and some stuff is excellent. Other things are still very much work in progress. The collies don't learn quite as fast as Lizzie does, but they're also less inclined to try and think up new ways of doing an exercise.

Cait

No offense taken.........my couch potatoe Jrts (lol they love to lounge when nothing is going on), love to work (real earthwork (hunting) and do performance events at trials. My heart is with working dogs, regardless of size or breed although obviously I prefer my little white breed (as long as they work )

But all joking aside, I really do think it depends on the dog and who has it.
What is easy to some maybe a nightmare for someone else to train. And it always amazes me how some people can really mess up a dog on the other hand, it impresses the **** out of me when someone can take that same dog and make a star out of it.

I tend to think most of the herding and working breeds fall under the category of highly trainable...minaly because they love work and work is what makes them happy.

My White Shepherds are both puppies, but they are doing some training in SchH (which has a Protection, Obedience and Tracking Phase), Conf (trotting properly and standing) and Herding...mainly because they enjoy learning new things

It makes life really easy sometimes

~Cate

I would agree that many of the herding and retriever breeds seem to be very willing to learn(which is to me what makes a dog easy, if they lack drive and interest, it is much more difficult), and do catch on quickly. I think, for the herding breeds, they are so willing to learn because they were bred to work beside humans as a team.

My two collies are very smart, but are more independent. They will do what you ask only a few times, and then they lose interest. You can't just keep repeating the same thing over and over again. They are easy to train, but you have to make sure to keep the lessons interesting and different...or they get bored easily.

Aspen is a bit more stubborn then Riley with the training. Riley will do just about anything.

Shetland sheepdogs, in my opinion, are very very smart. My little sheltie peaches is the 'little human' in the pack. She learns things that I didn't even mean to train(I.E. you can tell her to pick up something and she will get it...even if it means running around the house looking for it, she is fantastic at problem solving etc). She seems very aware of her surroundings, and always seems to be analyzing situations. She was by far, the easiest dog to train, as she is a huge people pleaser.

Yea, I hear ya. I think my fave with Ares was when we were doing open and he tried to walk out of the ring - with the dumbbell. He first tried to bring the dumbbell to the judge. When she moved, he headed for the gate. The stewards blocked him. He tried to step around them, they moved to block him again. He went back to the judge. She moved again. He tried the gate again. Finally, with no where left to go, he brought it to me. He never let go of it.

I agree...Megan has been a breeze to train for the most part.

Heh. That sounds like the Indymonster.

I was mostly trying to draw a line between 'easy to train' and 'reliable in performance' because they are SO not identical. A lot has to do with the trainer's ability to make stuff fun, too. I know a number of absolutely BRILLIANT terriers- who are SO not trusthworthy off leash and would probably not even manage to qualify in rally novice. But they learn new things INCREDIBLY fast- just not in a way that may be easiest for a trainer to channel in to competition (or otherwise useful) behaviors.

My father jokes around. He had a bunch of hunting dogs (pointers and retrievers) and he taught the papillons to retrieve faster than any of the retrievers.

Our lab was probably the hardest to train- field line dog. But he was by no means hard at all.

Shack was easily trained- half retriever, half shepherd.

The shelties are really smart. I totally agree with RoughCollies. Though mine seem more food motivated than anything. If you have food, you can teach them just about anything.

The papillons, though, just learn things almost too easily. I guess this makes training harder in some ways because when you mess up, they remember. Summer is so easy to direct. You can point and get her to pick things up. She experiments until she figures out what you want. I think other than the fact that they're really smart, what helps them is that they're so attached to their people and so driven to pleasing them. With paps, you don't need any other motivators (though food certainly can help) other than yourself and your affection. they want to work with you and they want nothing more than to please you.

I've thought about this a lot in trying to decide what my next breed of dog will be. The conclusion I've come to? The easiest way to figure it out is to look at what kind of dogs have the titles - the top agility dog in the country (probably BC), the top obedience dog in the country (probably golden? at least a few years ago it was), the best assistance dog (lab), etc. A LOT of it depends on what you want to do with your dog, but you can get a general idea by researching some of the "winners."

Also, there's a very important point to make: If a dog's easy to train, it probably learns fast - sometimes faster than you anticipate. I've seen dogs learn how to turn deadbolt locks to let themselves out of the house. Some dogs get very creative in finding things to chew on. So just because a dog is very trainable, doesn't necessarily mean it will be an easy dog to live with - actually, probably the opposite. I train service dogs, and we always have to watch out for the dogs that we really love to train.... because the people we match them with will probably have a much harder time living with that dog.

I would probably get along with Paps very easily(you know, you have really made me interested in the breed)!

I have to say, Peaches is not food motivated at all. During all her obedience training her 'reward' was a tennis ball. In public, she does not like to eat(really odd thing about her, ever since she was a pup), so I resorted to tossing her tennis ball as the reward. Worked wonderfully for agility with her, after she did a run(no competition, just fun classes) I would toss her ball. Of course, she loved agility so much...there were times she couldn't handle watching other dogs do their run so she would dart in and start doing the course herself:yikes:. She sounds like your paps. She does everything because she wants to, she has no interest in food or any real reward other then being told 'good girl' and being praised.

i find the question difficult to answer. training any dog is extremely simple but not easy. it depends on how complex the behavior is, the owner's demand on the dog, and the dog's own needs. i mean if we're teaching a bloodhound to lure course, how successful can we be?

My border collies learn fast. They perfect new behaviors quickly and have a good understanding of what is expected of them, but they also pick up bad habits with astonishing haste. I'd say they're fast learners, but they'll keep trainers on their toes.

I actually find it easier to train the dogs that don't try to analyze -everything- that happens around them. Scenthounds are really easy for me to train.

Grace!? You live?

Kinda!

Awww... it's good to see you!

Emma - So smart. Knows exactly what I am saying and wanting her to do, but being in independent hound breed, she tells me were to go or to do it myself. She is verry stuborn. If she doesnt want to do something, there are days were god himself couldnt make her do it. She knows the command she just doesnt want to do it.

Jazz- Verry smart and wants to please. Although she is easily bored and shuts you out when she gets bored.

Shar peis- I have never seen another breed of dog house train so fast and they really pick up on things.

My dobe byron wanted to please but house training still took forever!

Regis was actually extremely easy to train. Never had such an easy time training before. He learned everything really fast, including potty training. Did not take much!

Yuppers, my corgis learn things very quickly. It's the getting them to do those things that gets interesting.

Morgan is the type that - when training - if you do it once, she starts to think about it, if you do it a second time, she understands it, if you do it a third time, she figures out a way to not do it.

Most dogs are easy to train, it's just figuring out what style of learning fits with your style of training the best.

Personally, I love training hounds because most hounds I have worked with were smart and independent. Training usually meant spending five minutes actually teaching them the command, and then spending the next several days/weeks/months convincing them they want to do it when I ask them to. For me, that's a learning style I really enjoy working with and will probably stick to the hounds because of it.

Other dogs, like herding dogs and gun dogs have the desire to please right there because they were bred to work with a human handler. Just like any other dog they are all individuals though, so you get varying levels of intelligence, and it takes varying levels of effort to teach the commands, etc. Some are super keyed into it and just "get it" right away, and others take a few repetitions.