New hound is only 9 weeks old so a while yet before I can get her out with the bike, and I know I need to build things up slowly, but what are the STW top tips for training a trail hound to run with the bike? The main thing for me is making sure she is running where I can see her and not squashing her under my wheels.

She is a sprocker.

anyone?

Get her to avoid other bikes, not chase wildlife and clean up her own crap… none of which you can really control whilst on your bike.

I have no idea but how adorable is she!

Get her to avoid other bikes, not chase wildlife and clean up her own crap… none of which you can really control whilst on your bike.

We don’t all ride at trail centres, believe it or not it is possible to go out to areas not full of other bikers.
The wildlife thing will hopefully be addressed when we go training at the local gun dog place (she won’t be worked)
I’m perfectly capable of cleaning up her crap.

Thanks anyway for your constructive advice.

She is gorgeous!

teach the basic on foot; heeling, return on command, stop at a distance on command. if these are good then the transition to bike should be easy.

My brother started with basic control training off the bike, be careful not to run them too much too early as their bones need to develop.

Once they understand basic control and recall then just take them for slow rides on the bike to start with and go from there. His Springer is just past 1 and is great on short rides now, rarely heading away from the bikes.

She is cute! you are right she will not be able be a trail dog until fully developed, but you can and should start her training now before she becomes independent. You must become the centre of her world and then she will do anything. Do not be harsh with her and always reward her when she does it right ie. lots of praise and treats. Start with her normal feeds, put the bowl on the floor and make her WAIT till you say go. She will soon learn. You now have a dog that will wait when out on the trail. Similarly when you open the car door make her wait to get out. Recal is another necessary one, when she comes to you reward her with lots of praise and a treat, but make sure she comes all the way to you not six feet away, do not go to her, remember you are in charge. Animals are very good at giving you just enough to keep you happy, you must insist on 100%, then a reward.
My whippet/pointer is a trail dog and is usually ahead of me but always keeps an aye on me. I use a whistle attached to my camelback, 1 beep to stop,2 beeps to recal.
Sorry to go on but love riding with my dog .I will post a picture when I work out how.

Lovely pooch, I ride with our Weimaraner, albeit only disused railway, local nature reserve, canals etc, I rode with her saying ‘side’ and giving her pieces of roast beef, this was enough to get her to run alongside, she barks and jumps up for the first half mile or if we go too slow but on the whole she’ll run like that all day, she can drink from my camelbak too which helps if there’s no rivers etc to drink from. Also been out with my kids in the park on bikes and told them if she runs in front they are to ‘run her over’ which works and she avoids the bikes now rather than them falling off trying to avoid her.

Just because she’ll run after you for miles does not mean she should, especially when young. You may think she’s enjoying herself but she’s just trying not to lose you.
Been there done that (with a working cocker) and started feeling bad about the effort she was putting in.

The single most important things to teach are:
1) Get her to come back to the whistle 100% guaranteed. Start now.
2) Get her to sit and stay for as long as you want.

Do the above and you’re life will be easier.

Great looking pupster 🙂

I used to ride with my dog but he’s 8 now and seems to be suffering from arthritis. So if I could go back in time I’d just stick to the slower pootles especially downhill and save his joints from a lot of punishment. Definitely not saying don’t do it, but tread carefully.

I started with training off the bike, make sure you’ve got doggie (so damn cute!) on recall and a stop on command – “wait” is mine – jolly useful when crossing roads!
Then I’d take dog and bike in the car to the walking area and have her on the lead – lead held in left hand, so I Could steer with right. Lots of praising when she’s running in the correct place and not pulling on the lead – wants to pull cos knows she can go faster when I’m on the bike.
After a few goes at that, started letting off the lead. She learnt pretty quickly that tyres don’t feel nice on the rump, so only got in the way once or twice! Now she is the. most superb trail hound and will only drop poos where people walk, not where I ride (thats a joke for the prat up there (no offence, like)) 😀
Oh yeah, and it’s not a bloody competition “my dog did 10 miles nah ner blah” !

Rock ape +1.
Reilly (our Springer X Lab) loved coming out on rides but at 8 yrs old with hip dysplasia, collapsed discs, arterial stenosis and the canine equivalent of copd while our vet (& the cardiologist we see) don’t think the trail hound antics caused any of his ailments They and I do wonder if it exacerbated them and I feel very guilty about it.
I’d urge you to consider whether you want him to come out with you because he will enjoy it more than a nice walk, swim or ball chase; or because it makes you feel good.
Deep down I think it was the latter for me and I reckon both me & him are paying for it now.
Him in restricted mobility, chronic pain and having to be on handfuls of medication for the rest of his life and me in giving Petplan & various vets loads of cash plus the niggling feeling I **** him up for my own selfish reasons.
As you may be able to tell I am not a great proponent of the ‘trail hound’, just not for the usual STW anti dog reasons.

Shame for your mutt mattbee. Is there a possibility the rides were too long, at the wrong pace or too often?
Not implying anything, just wondering.

Regularly ride with my dogs on the moors and they love it. Best tips I can give you are –

1) Keep the dog off the lead as much as you can when they are young. 95% of recall problems are caused by people failing to do this. Play hide and seek with it over the next few months and it will learn never to lose sight of you.
2) Buy a acme gun dog whistle 211.5. Before you feed the dog blow the whistle three times quickly then take a step back and give the dog the food. This gets them acclimatised to coming towards you and good things happening during their sponge like age before 16 weeks. Gun dog class will teach the rest.
3) The stop whistle will be your best friend. Easy to teach the basics but you will need to reinforce it for about 6 months before being consistent.
4) Don’t be boring when you walk the dog. Continuously change direction, interact with the dog and walk in different areas will mean they will have to focus on you more.
5) Find out what obsesses your dog i.e. food or a ball. Use that to get them to walk by the side of you off lead without being distracted and reward them for it. You can then use this on the bike.
6) Dont even think about taking the dog out on the bike until they are at least a year old. They will damage themselves as they are still growing. They get used to the bike in about 5 mins and one buzzed backside means they wont run in front of you.

The only thing I will say is that I have seen loads of people knacker their dogs by using them as trail hounds. Problem is the dog goes for gentle walk every day sniffing things and chasing balls and then at the weekend is expected to hurtle after a bike for 10+ miles. Their bodies just aren’t used to it but dogs don’t know when to stop. Dictate your bike ride around their fitness and experience not yours.

tbh just a very good level of basic training. Recall, heel, wait, safe around wildlife, other dogs etc ie general control that everyone should do but few people do properly.

then move onto specific cycle stuff.

Familiarise her with bikes and make sure she doesnt try and chase them. Maybe try riding round your garden and get her to follow the bike and not try and jump up etc and just see bikes as a normal thing. Our spaniel will happily sit on my back wheel if she can’t get past. If I am faster she will also pull over to the side and let me through. I used to be able to ride down the road and she would follow on the pavement/grass verge completely off the lead.

You may want to start by getting her to run on the lead while you ride and then progress to off the lead but that is MANY months away. And when you do build up slowly.

As for getting out riding she needs to be over 1 year old. Small bits round the garden and then the park before then but no way I would take a dog out properly before a year, maybe 18 months. You will then have several years to enjoy rides with the dog before you have to retire her at about 7. No point in going out too soon or keeping her doing it too long or you will regret it when she is older.

We mainly did a lap and the odd extra bit of QECP, with a few trips to Swinley, FOD & the like. Never did more than about 10 miles and tried to slow him down by taking lots of breaks but he’d sprint off like a nutter every time the trail headed downhill, round the berms, over the jumps which seemed quite cool at the time but may have exacerbated his hip & back problems. The heart and lung issues will have likely made it harder for him than we realised, but admittedly aren’t something most dogs will have.
If I had the time over again the only rides he’d have done with me would be bimbly down at the beach type of stuff rather than quick (even short) blasts in the woods. Much kinder for the dog I reckon.

One of my dogs got it fairly quickly, need to learn to stop on command so you can get them behind you. I just did shout at for over taken praise for going behind understood it fairly quickly. New rescue dog goes mental as soon as I get on the bike and starts barking at me, not really sure where to go. Tried giving treats praising when close to bike.

I’m in a similar position with our pup.

Recall not going brilliantly, it has to be said – he’s ok until there’s another dog about and then he just gets fixated.

Main thing at the moment is also getting him exposed to as much noise/distraction and as many new experiences as possible.

Met someone with a brolly for the first time yesterday – he was quite agitated by it to start with.

Pictures you say? Oh, ok!

8 weeks ago;

couple of days ago;

they don’t half grow quick!

DO NOT ride with your puppy until it is at least 1 year old, you will screw it up for life. Even if it is at a slow pace, don’t do it, you will only be pleasing yourself at the cost of your dogs/puppies health.

Go to training classes, get your citizen awards. Once you and the dog have been trained to communicate between each other you will find it pretty easy making the transition from walking/running to riding.

I’m not sure what age, but you can get your dogs hips checked which will show if it will have any issues later in life. There are more n more Cockers which do have these problems and a lot of people are trying to make it mandatory to have the test done before breeding and to only breed from a good one.

Yeah, milkie, first line of the OP’s post “New hound is only 9 weeks old so a while yet before I can get her out with the bike”. Think he’s got that.

I think 10 miles is FAR too much for a dog. Mine’s a pointer, built for running, but I’d never go out for more than an hour (or 2 at a push), probably 4 miles round the local thicket. Lots of water available in the stream that runs through it too, which I think is very important.

I taught mine on the local canal towpath so he could only run forwards or back not left or right. They stop very suddenly so I taught mine ‘behind’ so I didn’t ride straight into him again as it’s like hitting a brick wall. Mine responds well to food when flagging, over fill the camelback and take a dish if you don’t have streams or pools to drink from.

1) Keep the dog off the lead as much as you can when they are young. 95% of recall problems are caused by people failing to do this. Play hide and seek with it over the next few months and it will learn never to lose sight of you

^^this^^ Cockers and springers like to run in front of you – originally to flush game. We trained our cocker by walking her off the lead and when we got to a junction deliberately taking the option that the dog hadn’t. She quickly realised that we were in charge and learnt to wait at junctions for a signal which way to go.
Spaniels also like to quarter the ground so it may be a challenge training your dog to run alongside the trail without zigzagging across it and to the sides.

DezB – Member
Yeah, milkie, first line of the OP’s post “New hound is only 9 weeks old so a while yet before I can get her out with the bike”. Think he’s got that.

Why? Very little attention is paid to the fact (& the numerous thread on here about trail dogs) that over training a dog too young can cause issues, and being as he’s the 1st person to mention it on this thread, a very good point worth highlighting. 18 month’s before our the agility class would accept dogs

Thanks everyone for all of the advice. Obviously we are keen as mustard to get her out and about for walks, swims, runs and rides but points about building up slowly to do no no harm all valid and taken on board.

Interesting Mattbee that my dog too is a Lab/springer cross that came from working parents. He has been generally very sound but definitely struggling with a shoulder currently. The rest of him seems fine and frankly most of it is because he used to run and run, wherever I was, so don’t think my occasional 10mile rides did much. He doesn’t just chase a ball, he has to try and catch it mid air, so lunges at it when bouncing up. So balls/sticks are now banned much to his disappointment.

As others have said, they will run through walls to stay with you, so just try to keep a lid on some of it.

He’ll be 9 in Sept so its all damage avoidance now.