thanks for the great advice and suggestions guys - what both of you are saying makes sense -
dave & karen - i think youre right that one reason for the nervousness is that i'm going too fast, too soon. it might be dawning in Ringo's mind that he doesn't like this exercise. i guess i need to go back to a point in our training of the wait command where he was like, "ok, this is cool." that was around the 15 second mark. i thnk i gotta practice that 15 sec wait a little more - maybe for another week. and he could be anxious because of what you mention:
Dave & Karen wrote:just that he wants to do something else but he's following your command.
this is a helpful tip thanks for pointing this out. i need to be careful not to make him wait while he wants to do something else, becaues then he'll have bad associations with the wait.
marie - the playing with stuff on a foraging tree with him and then backing off gradually is a great idea - i guess I can click and treat then for increasing distances from the tree, and for him ignoring me while i do other stuff right nearby. and about training the wait command - i'm curious as to how one trains this command with a dog, as I have never trained a dog. the method i've been using for Ringo is basically, telling him wait, then click and treat, and then gradually increasing the duration between saying the word "wait" and the click. i let him do whatever he wants in the duration as long as he's not moving closer to me. is the dog-training method for wait different?
marie83 wrote:He can still be clingy at times but he is also very independant now, of course we can still guarentee he will be clingy when we are busy but independant when we want to sit down with him and give hm a cuddle
Ha ha!! this reminds me of my old Ringo - he used to be like this! something in the other side of the room would suddenly attract his attention just at the VERY moment that I'd get myself all comfortable to give him a nice little neck scratch.
but then the next minute when I'm trying to concentrate really hard working on the computer, he'll pester me clinging to the front of my shirt, staring up and trying to look as cute as possible so i'll stop what i'm doing to cuddle him.
i think they're all like this!
i'm noticing from just reading around that the "wait" command isnt used that much by bird owners -but people do seem to be using the "stay" command. anyone know what's the commonly understood difference between these two commands?