I am currently in the process of training a pup. I am not a pro by any means but over the years people have seen my dog work and have asked me to train theirs. I have followed all of my usual steps with FF.

With a leather glove on I put my hand in the pups mouth and told her to hold and wouldn't let it out until I said "leave it". She had no issues with this.

After a few days, I moved on to a paint roller. Giving her a ear pinch, commanding fetch, putting roller in the pups mouth and releasing pressure off her ear once the roller was in. This took quite some time for her to figure out but she finally did. After about a week I finally had her lunging at the bumper when I commanded fetch, and she was picking them up off the ground.

We then moved on to multiple bumpers on the ground with her at heel I would walk by and not let her pick one up until I said fetch. She did fine. But I noticed her hold was getting sloppy. But when I reminded her she would tighten it up.

So after about 3.5 weeks (maybe this is normal but I have never had one take this long) we finally got to get back to retrieving. Now I cannot get her to hold the bumper. She will drop it on the way back to me because it's hanging so loosely out of her mouth. The times she does get it back to me no matter how many times I remind her to hold she just will not tighten up. I have tried everything except start FF all over. Is that what I need to do? Any other suggestions would be extremely helpful. Thanks

Is she collar conditioned? try nicking her as soon as she drops it. Work on her hold in between retrieves. The nick with the ecollar when dropped on the way back worked for me, have to time it just right. And when holding sloppy i will reinforce hold before letting her release it. Are you doing water retrieves? My dog also seems to hold much better and never drop when in water which carries over to land. Still a work in progress but these work for me. Now time to transition to birds.

Your pup may be loosing her baby teeth. Give her a couple weeks and try training again. This is a big mistake a lot of us do when first training pups. The pups teeth/gums are very tender and hurt to pick up things when going through this stage.

Thanks for the help and please keep the suggestions coming. She is 10 months old so it is not her puppy teeth.

You did not properly teach hold. Once you were done with the glove you should've moved on to hold with the paint roller. Once that is complete then move to a bumper. After that you need to do "walking hold". Walking hold is making the dog hold the bumper while doing obedience. Once the dog is proficient with that (not dropping the bumper) then you move on to the ear pinch. Take a step back and redo hold.

I am not saying it is her baby teeth and at 10 months, probably on a 10% chance it could be. But, it still could be. Just like humans, all dogs don't loose their baby teeth at the same time.

Just like suggested, I would go back to teaching hold. Still not a bad idea to give the dog a week or so break every once in a while. I always go back to something my dog is doing correctly after each session...kind of always finishing on a positive note. After finishing on a positive note, I always give my dog the "Play" command and let her go nutz after the bumper. I like the book Ten Minute Retriever. I worked my pup for ten minutes each day and then let her play for 20. I would work her 7 days a week for 3 weeks straight and then give her a break for a few days. If things started progressing slowly, we would take more breaks. My dog was fully finished at 7 months (or very close). She was on hand signals and would fetch the decoys out of the water for me, but only after I was done hunting and gave her the command. There were weeks that she mastered 3 or 4 new things and times it took 2 or more weeks to nail something. Teaching your own dog is very gratifying. Keep up the good work!

I agree with the strengthen hold command. All the programs I'm aware of utilize obedience commands with hold before FF.

If that's been done, a dropped bumper gets a pinch/correction to the bumper. Hit the bumper to make sure they have a god hold, and if it's dropped, result is a force retrieve. Pup will catch on that they better hold or they'll have to go through that again.

*disclaimer: I'm no expert, but just happen to be going through FF with my pup and have been emersing myself with as much info as I can, hopefully offering helpful information.

This is what I would go with.
Also if I hit a stumbling block, I take a couple days off.
It gives me and the dog a fresh start.

agree 100%

Thanks for the help guys. Sounds like I am going to go back and reinforce hold. I appreciate the help!

look at the ff procedures in "10 minute retriever"

Will do

It wouldn't hurt to go back to hold, but if your force is good you should immediately be able to command "fetch" with a correction and the dog pick up the bumper.
I personally don't worry about it in the field until I'm finished with force to pile. This way there is a separation between marks(fun) and yardwork (pressure), and I know the dog is conditioned to the collar.

Robby

I agree with Robby. There are some dogs out there that you can work on hold ad nauseum and they are still going to have a loose hold. The way to fix the problem with this type of dog is with pressure. Normally the problem is created when you have an enthusiastic young dog that just seems to do the work. In cases like this sometimes we can make the mistake of moving on before the dog really learns a "pressure responsibility". Part of the purpose of the program is to make sure the dog understands what the pressure is for, that they can turn it off with quick compliance, and that they can avoid it altogether. A key read that the dog understands this concept is a dog that gets "sticky" on the bumper. This tells you that the dog understands the getting the bumper in his mouth will turn of the pressure and that when it is in his mouth he is in the "safe zone" and cannot receive any more pressure. As you can imagine, when your dog gets to this point you will no longer have hold issues.

Good luck.

tag

Exactly..
1.Hold.
2. hold to here.
3. hold to heel before you ever pinch an ear.

x2 on this. That book has been a great supplement to formal programs for me.

Key word here is PRESSURE. This is really the ONLY way to make FF work. It is so hard for us as dog owners to really put the amount of pressure needed to REALLY reinforce this crucial part of retriever training, Yes it's old school but sometimes there has to be a great amount of pain inflicted , re; toe hitch, channel lock pliers, cattle prod. to make "some" not all dogs hold the bumper no matter what!! Sometimes this part of training needs to be done by a true PRO trainer. This is mostly for field trial dogs and some hunt test dogs. Go back, re-enforce. Good luck on this crappy part of retriever training...