Anutta Blog

Life With Poodles

Training Video: Back Up

by | Aug 24, 2011 | Training Tips | 0 comments

Why would you want to teach a dog to back up?  There are many reasons.

1.  It teaches a dog to pay attention to where they put their feet.  Important in Agility work.

2.  It allows you to move your dog in a small space.  Sometimes there isn’t room enough for a large dog to turn around.  Teaching them to back up gives them another tool to deal with our society.

3.  Extremely useful in competition obedience or freestyle.  There are so many things you can teach once the dog understands how to back up.

You would think backing up would be natural.  It isn’t, but it is very easy to teach.  The dogs go “OH, well this is easy!” and pick up on the concept and start using it before you know it.

TRAINING VIDEO: Teaching BACK UP,  Step One – Demo Dog Lincoln!

I will build on this concept later, showing you how to teach the dog to back up without moving towards the dog.  This is simply the first step and after a day or so, once the dog is popping back from you as soon as you say the command, you can add in distance.  You always want to teach new things in steps.  First we teach the behavior.  Then we teach distance.  Eventual goal is to get the dog to back up across the room / yard without the handler moving.