... or just the dirt.
I'm having a little problem with Pit's sniffing during agility. He's very, very, VERY food obsessed and is easily lost to anything that smells remotely edible. Generally it's not an issue, it's a great motivator for training, except in class it's not working out so well.
Often when I have him in his down stay at the start line and try to release him, he'll simply get up and start licking and sniffing the ground (certainly someone that went before us left a little treat residue) and it takes a lot of effort and time to get his focus back on me. We can be running a course seemingly well only to have me lose him again, very abruptly, to another smell on the ground somewhere in the course. I've even had him trot away, mid-run, to the sidelines only to start doing sits and downs for someone else who was occupying her dog with tricks, waiting for their turn.
I have treats on me, and I try to make them incredibly high value so that hopefully he'd rather eat my treats over the ones he smells on the ground. There's no question he likes the treats I have, but he still finds it necessary to stop and at least check out the smell on the ground to decide whether he wants to lick it or not.
Should I be training his "leave it" more? After getting him to "leave" the smells on the ground every time he stops, should I expect him to stop to smell things less frequently or is there something else I should be doing?
Thanks.
I'm having a little problem with Pit's sniffing during agility. He's very, very, VERY food obsessed and is easily lost to anything that smells remotely edible. Generally it's not an issue, it's a great motivator for training, except in class it's not working out so well.
Often when I have him in his down stay at the start line and try to release him, he'll simply get up and start licking and sniffing the ground (certainly someone that went before us left a little treat residue) and it takes a lot of effort and time to get his focus back on me. We can be running a course seemingly well only to have me lose him again, very abruptly, to another smell on the ground somewhere in the course. I've even had him trot away, mid-run, to the sidelines only to start doing sits and downs for someone else who was occupying her dog with tricks, waiting for their turn.
I have treats on me, and I try to make them incredibly high value so that hopefully he'd rather eat my treats over the ones he smells on the ground. There's no question he likes the treats I have, but he still finds it necessary to stop and at least check out the smell on the ground to decide whether he wants to lick it or not.
Should I be training his "leave it" more? After getting him to "leave" the smells on the ground every time he stops, should I expect him to stop to smell things less frequently or is there something else I should be doing?
Thanks.