Teaching Your Greyhound to Sit

Anyone who's tried to teach a greyhound to Sit knows that it can be a bit of a challenge.  Although you will occasionally find one that pops its but down on the floor with your typical "lure its head up and back with food" approach, for the most part, greyhounds need a little more finesse when training a Sit.  Some greyhound owners use a "hug and fold" method where they use a treat at the greyhound's nose and and put an arm around the back of the greyhound's knees to "hug" him into a sit.  I couldn't ever get this to work on my guys - they just freaked out and got all panicky trying to figure out what I was doing back there.

Here are some alternative tricks to teaching your greyhound to Sit.

1 - Don't.  Well, not right away at least.  When I'm working with a new greyhound, I usually don't work on Sit right away for a number of reasons.  It's frustrating for them and for me.  I think it can also be confusing for them.  Instead, I like to teach easier commands like targeting my hand or Lay Down so the dog learns how training works before trying to teach something more difficult, like Sit.  I think this also tends to build up a bond more with the dog so that when we do tackle Sit, it's not quite as stressful and frustrating for the dog.

2 - Capture and Click!  Although this method is slower than luring a dog to Sit, if your greyhound ever sits on his own, you can use clicker training to mark the behavior and then reward it with food treats.   Your greyhound will begin to catch on and offer more sits, at which point, you can label the behavior by saying "Sit" just as your greyhound begins moving his butt towards the floor.  This is my favorite way to teach Sit to a greyhound - it's low pressure and will only serve to build the bond between you and make training fun.

2 - If your greyhound doesn't seem to sit on his own, you may not be able to capture and click the behavior.  In this case, you'll have to do some luring to get it.  You can either lure from a standing position or lure from a down.

               To lure from a stand, take a high value treat, like a piece of hotdog and hold it just above your greyhound's nose (try to touch the nose with it like it is a magnet) and move your greyhound's nose backwards - as he tries to reposition himself to get the hotdog, gravity should push his butt down.  If he's backing up instead, which many greyhounds do, try standing in a corner if that doesn't make him panic (remember, training should be fun!).  When his butt goes down, give him the treat!  Once he's doing this fairly readily, begin to label the behavior by saying "Sit" just before you lure him with your treat.  Then, fade out the treats and use a mixture of rewards (treats, toys, a walk, petting and praise, a game of tug).

               To lure from a down, use your bit of hotdog and place it on your greyhound's nose when he's laying in a Down and lure the front of his body up to a Sit.  Follow the instructions above for labeling the behavior and fading the food lure.

3 - If luring doesn't work, you can Shape the behavior using a clicker.  First, read more about clicker training and shaping and then shape a sit by using a modified lure/shaping method.  For example, you might lure a piece of hotdog over your greyhound's nose, but instead of waiting for him to sit all the way, you could click and treat if he just lowers his butt a fraction of an inch.  You would do this until he is lowering his butt a fraction of an inch about 80% of the time and then begin to click and treat if he lowers it an inch, then two inches, and so on until you get the butt all the way down.  Don't add the label until he is putting his butt down to the floor when you present the lure.

4 - Last, consider whether your greyhound really needs to Sit.  When I first got Chance, he was having a hard time with Sit, but he didn't really need to learn it.  Instead, I taught him to Stand by my side on command and to Lay Down on command.  He eventually learned Sit but it was over time and we still don't use it very often.  I think one of the only reasons I eventually taught him was because I was tired of saying "Oh, he doesn't do Sit" to strangers when they would tell him to Sit (not sure why strangers really felt the need to tell him to Sit anyway!).  So, step back and ask yourself whether your greyhound really needs this skill anyway.  That was one of the best things my favorite dog trainer told me when I took him to a class with her - I told her what trouble he was having and she shrugged and said, "Let's teach him a nice stand instead."  That was some of the bet advice I got!

Cara, Austin Dog Training, Pet Sitting, and Greyhound Spoiling!