Encourage everyone in the family to give him 15-30 minutes each of dedicated play time between you, that means each day – on top of walks, he’ll be getting 1-2 hours of messing around in the house. Everytime you’re waiting for something, eg for the microwave to stop – play with him.

The family cockerpoo gets that – and she is obsessed with humans as opposed to chasing wildlife, because as others pointed out – we are more fun.

And as others said, make it interesting – one day I was throwing a ball up and down the stairs for her – she lay down at the top and accidentally dropped it down to me – I gave her a treat and made a fuss of her and now we play a game where she runs to the top of the stairs and I throw a ball up to her and she passes it back to me by rolling it down the stairs.

Honestly though, for other people who have never had a dog before – who are thinking about getting a puppy – just get a poodle as your starter dog or the offspring of a slow dopey lab.

I have a Pointer/Vizsla cross who has just turned one. We were wondering what the hell we had done when we first got him, as he was totally full of energy even though he was off his lead and roaming/chasing a good three hours a day.

He’s ruined the lawn with his wee, done a bit of chewing (nothing we couldn’t replace) woke us up countless times jumping on our bed at 3am wanting to play etc. and was very late at toilet training 😕

We were advised by other gun dog owners to buy a crate and it’s worked a treat. For a couple of months he was in it when we were at work (4 hours max) and at night (5 hours max) we now leave the gate open and he uses it as his bed/den. He’s never locked in anymore but seems to be a different dog because of it? might be worth a try?

We have a 13 month old Cockerpoo, her mother being a show cocker. There have also been times where we’ve thought why did we get a dog. I’ve found consistency to be the best way of training, especially out on walks. What worked well for us with recall was calling her name and holding a palm out for her to touch with her nose. Every time she comes back, she bumps her nose on the palm of my hand, we say yes, which is our confirmation word,and she gets a treat.
Holding a hand out works well, because if she can’t hear us, as long as she is facing us and she sees an outstretched hand, she’ll run back. Just to confirm what we want her to do, we also shout “touch” at her.. When we first started doing it, I would bring her back to me every 5 minutes or so, whether I needed her back or not, until she got the idea. I think we are lucky though because she is very treat focused, and I know some dogs aren’t.

We’ve had the wall of death, chewing shoes etc, but I just assume she will grow out of that.

Honestly though, for other people who have never had a dog before – who are thinking about getting a puppy – just get a poodle as your starter dog or the offspring of a slow dopey lab.

Sound advice. Our last dog was a Border Collie, and as you might expect from a working dog he was full of energy and hard work. We now have a Miniature Poodle, who is a bit dull in comparison and requires much more of a commitment for grooming, but she is a great dog, and much more suited to being a pet.

When we were attending dog training with the Collie we had to constantly work to keep him focused, and wondered what we were doing wrong when other dog owners were having no trouble. We now realise that we weren’t doing anything wrong, some breeds are harder work than others.

Best of luck Renton.

Plenty of advice here, most supportive of you and the dog.

Hope there’s a happy ending to both your grief.

I’ve skimmed the earlier stuff so sorry if this has been covered but if you fancy a new activity for all the family and the dog have you thought about agility training?

I have a 2yo rottie who was amazing till he was 12-18 months old and then slumped into a serious juvenile delinquent phase; aggro at other dogs, running off; losing basic commands. Like you I got to the stage where he was a pain to have around. We started the agility at the recommendation of a trainer at Dogs Trust and 6 months on he is a completely different dog. I can recall him away from anything and if he’s pissing about I only have to get through the first couple of syllables of “excuse me…?” and he’s sat looking at me sheepishly.

All of the foundation training for agility is about focus, and making the dog think and make the right choice for its reward – in the ring that means taking the line you’ve indicated but out of the ring that means not doing things you’ve taught the dog are wrong; mouthing/snapping/running off. The thinking bit is what keeps it fun or them and wears them out.

He’s only just, after a solid 6 months of daily training (just small snippets at a time – 10-15mins including time out play, a spaniel might be able to handle more but he mustn’t get bored), stepping up to full agility exercises so it takes time. There’s a video on my instagram which shows him running some speed-bumps if you want some aaaahhhh factor.

Persevere with the training, but it will take everyday dedication and several months.

PS. this thread is distinctly short on photos!

At 14 weeks:

At 2 years and a bit:

Sound advice. Our last dog was a Border Collie, and as you might expect from a working dog he was full of energy and hard work. We now have a Miniature Poodle, who is a bit dull in comparison and requires much more of a commitment for grooming, but she is a great dog, and much more suited to being a pet.

Poodles can be very playful, especially Standards – or cockapoo crosses – but I have found that on the whole, they are a lot more people oriented than Springers. Springers have more wolf left in them – somewhere.

What a lot of you don’t get, is that they should essentially be considered as humans – that means if they have **** all to do and you’re ignoring them watching tv – they’ll act out like a 4 year old kid would. Even if they have had three hours of walks, because that’s what they essentially are – toddlers on four legs.

Tom_W1987 – Member
they are a lot more people oriented than Springers

IME (have had working bred (but not worked) Springers pretty much all my life) they, and most Spaniel breeds are some of the most people fixated dogs out there. Admittedly, never had a Poodle…

OPs dog sounds like our last but one working Springer (right down to the wall of death around the lounge and the occasional snap). Brilliant dog, but really hard work to train and keep occupied. He didn’t calm down any until about 8 or 9. One point about recall and commands though – he never really liked working to voice or a whistle but was incredibly compliant to gesture and body language, so that might be an approach to consider too?

[url=https://flic.kr/p/Kasodu]Lakes 2013 12[/url] by Rob P, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/xJtEhC]2015 08 29 Pablo 01[/url] by Rob P, on Flickr

Agree with all of this about consistency, Chewie had the terrible twos with rubbish recall, blatant FU”s at Mrs M and totally ignoring commands. Had to be very persistent and on a couple of occasions properly top dog but now he is well behaved and only has the odd moment (at 9).

Unlike his partner, Ashoka whose default response to a command is to check what Chewie has done and assume it couldn’t possibly apply to her…….

Hi Renton. We have a 9 month retriever and yes have experienced some training regression to be expected at this age.
However we still take her to training classes and this helps a lot with any problems and suggestions. There’s a very good way of teaching the Stop command you can try with raising your hand as you say Stop and throwing the treats behind the dog, or you can start by throwing them against a door/wall behind, until they gets the idea a raised hand and Stop gets a reward. Do this say 5 times a day for a couple of weeks and progress into the garden, and soon they will learn to stop and wait while out walking.
Also a frozen Kong filled with baby food is a great way to keep them occupied while out and prevents any chewing of furniture.

Hate to say it but, is he getting enough exercise. Springers seem to have almost unlimited energy, at that age our first one would happily do a 5 hour walk off the lead (running circles the whole time), sleep in the car and then want to play ball as soon as the car door opened. We’d leave him with the local farm if we were away for the weekend and he’d outrun the sheepdogs.

We trained our first one with a mix of always carrying food, which meant he never went too far away. Then took him to an island (only about half a mile diameter) and let him run riot, which taught him to fetch toys as until then he’d run for them but not bring them back. After that, all he needed was a stick waving and he’d come back!

The second one came to us at 7 as an ex-prison dog. He’s either autistic or ate the drugs as he has absolutely no response to any command. He get’s a mix of walks on the lead and allowed to run only in the woods which are fenced to keep deer out. So there are workarounds for untrainable dogs.

So just to update this thread a bit more.

Cooper the Cocker has regressed even more since my last post.

We aren’t understanding him really.

One minute his recall is fine and he comes back to is no problem, other times he cocks a Def one and comes back at his own leisure.

A couple of times he hasn’t come back at all……

Today for instance we were up at Wendover woods and he was walking ok on his lead so decided to let him off and see how he would get on in a new environment he doesn’t know.

As soon as he was let off his lead he took off and didn’t come back for a good 5-10 minutes. Not a clue where he went ??

So he spent the rest of the walk on his lead.

On tonight’s walk again his recall was doing really well but them he spotted a bird and took off again. The wife and I stood there for 10minutes and he trotts back covered in shite where he has been rolling in it.

So we’ve give him a bath and he has just done a wall of death figure of 8 around the front room and garden. ..

Jesus Christ on a bike give me strength.

2 things.

Firstly, I’ve not really read read the thread so apologies for going over old ground. I can’t even recall if I’d posted before.

Two, this is just relating to the wall of death thing.

Have you tried impulse training? It absolutely exhausts our pup in a (relatively) short space of time. The goal is for him to develop patience for a reward. Further enabling his ability to switch off and relax, it just slows everything down.

Attempting to exercise his energy out of him is more likely to achieve a heady mix of fatigue and hyperactivity.

The thing with the wall of death is that 10 minutes earlier he was having a really long walk. S should’ve been knackered.

Our dog does the “wall of death” as you call it after a bath and he’s 12.

and normally looks like this

10 minutes earlier he was having a really long walk.

How long is long? I’ve walked my sister’s 3yr old border terrier 15 miles in the peaks and he’ll still want more.

Dogs are like perpetual motion machines.

Well he has had a 3 hour walk. A 45 min walk and another 45min walk today.

Are you still going to training/ obedience classes ?

Think about what would happen if Usain Bolt and Mo Farah had a love child….

Thats what happens when you over exercise a spaniel.

On a more serious note – really think about what you are doing re exercise – they need brain stimulation as much as physical.
And try catnip – really – try it.
You’ll be surprised the effect it has on dogs – especially spaniels.

My springer was a complete nightmare for the first 2 years. Started taking him out with me on the bike and he’d run for 10 miles no issue. We also joined a local shoot as beaters and he’d work for a good 6 hours on a Saturday and then tennis ball retrieval and then training dummy’s to get his interest. Excercise is the key. Once we upped it to extremes he finally started claiming down. He’s 13 now and the best dog you could ask for. Still fit as a fiddle and occasionally naughty but that’s springers. Stick with it.

First off What do you do when you let the dog off the lead? Read this post about free running and free hunting in working dogs. It perfectly describes your situation and what is going on (Scroll a little bit down to read it)
http://totallygundogs.com/category/gundog-training/

You have a classic situation of buying a dog from a working family and the prey drive will be beginning to go through the roof. If you have landed on a good gundog then you will be having a nightmare without directing his energy but not in a way most dogs need. This is one of the reasons a lot of working dog owners wont sell to non working or experienced families. The difference in spaniels can be night and day depending on where they come from.

Your recall is broken and the signal you are using is now useless. When I work spaniels they are kept close at all times until they are about 2 and I have bombproofed there recall. You need to start again and you either need to visit a gundog trainer or group (explain what the issue is and what you want out of the dog and they will help or point you in the right direction). Stay away from generic dog trainers.

If you dont want to do that get this book which was written by the same person who wrote the above article. It is brilliant and really works. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Total-Recall-Pippa-Mattinson/dp/1846891493

Finally the amount of excercise the dog gets is irrelevant. Your dog needs a job and needs to be mentally challenged. A 45 min walk which includes a 15 min training session will wipe your dog out for the day if done well.

Get this book from somewhere. Its written by a Spaniel owner and the first few exercises are brilliant to follow and really will help you and more importantly the dog.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gundog-Training-Made-Easy-Begbie-x/dp/1411670299

renton – Member
So just to update this thread a bit more.

Cooper the Cocker has regressed even more since my last post.

We aren’t understanding him really.

One minute his recall is fine and he comes back to is no problem, other times he cocks a Def one and comes back at his own leisure.

A couple of times he hasn’t come back at all……

Today for instance we were up at Wendover woods and he was walking ok on his lead so decided to let him off and see how he would get on in a new environment he doesn’t know.

As soon as he was let off his lead he took off and didn’t come back for a good 5-10 minutes. Not a clue where he went ??

So he spent the rest of the walk on his lead.

On tonight’s walk again his recall was doing really well but them he spotted a bird and took off again. The wife and I stood there for 10minutes and he trotts back covered in shite where he has been rolling in it.

So we’ve give him a bath and he has just done a wall of death figure of 8 around the front room and garden. ..

Jesus Christ on a bike give me strength.

Not a single mention of training 🙁

I have just stumbled across this thread and read the op’s post.

My two cockers do everything the same except the recall, they do come back when called.
But they also eat poo, their own and others.

Isn’t that just owning a dog?

Legend. We have been practicing his recall and staying etc and he is brilliant sometimes. Then he lets himself down by buggering off and not listening.

Spaniels are easily trained because they are intelligent. The intelligence also means they learn bad habits very quickly too. Between 1&2 mine became very wilful and if on a scent would completely ignore me. Much better again now he is 3. He is a Working Cocker, but is a pet not worked. Mine still does a small “wall of death” most nights about 8.

I’m sad to say it but I reckon WC spaniel doesn’t sound the right breed for you.

Sorry to hear you are having difficulties with your Cocker. If things don’t work out for you and your family (and I hope they do) I would happily take him. I am retired and live in an isolated cottage in SW France with my Cocker, Marmite. I’ve been thinking of rescueing another for some time now. As I said, I hope your situation improves, just offering an alternative in case it gets too much.

Our springer used to be much worse at recall – one time she just buggered off to chase some horses about a mile away (tiny dots in the distance), another time ran off to investigate a field full of rabbits and just wouldn’t come back.

But since turning three she’s generally much better. She’ll do anything for a treat, including recall. So we’ve done lots of training around that. Still not perfect.

Mental exercises helps. She does lots of games that involve waiting.

Persevere I would say.

But get a lab next time.

…he was walking ok on his lead so decided to let him off and see how he would get on in a new environment he doesn’t know.

This really isn’t a good idea if you don’t have a sound response to a particular behavior as you’re exposing him to a highly interesting/distracting environment and expecting to be able to re-gain his focus when you already know that you have problems doing this.

Whatever it is you’re teaching (sit/down/stay/come etc), you need to start off in a controlled environment, then once the dog is responding consistently, proof the behavior by increasing the level of distraction e.g. teach “sit” indoors (because it’s a familiar environment with minimal distractions/competing motivations), then once he’s responding consistently, up the level of distraction by moving outside to the garden where there are some new scents & sounds but he’s not overwhelmed.

You also need to be able to keep focus so that looking at you when you call his name becomes a reflex action so that you can then give the next command. Try something like this to get him looking at you and chasing after you: https://www.facebook.com/absolutedogs/videos/1307534942663331/ (can only give a FB link I’m afraid).

Look up the APDT or IMDT for a good trainer that uses modern training methods.

Legend. We have been practicing his recall and staying etc and he is brilliant sometimes. Then he lets himself down by buggering off and not listening.

Try looking at it from another angle – you’re exposing him to massive temptation, and then expecting him to come back to a not very interesting (sorry!) owner. Not really letting himself down, just doing what dogs do…

As soon as he was let off his lead he took off and didn’t come back for a good 5-10 minutes. Not a clue where he went ??

Probably getting his head kicked in by TJ because he was off the lead.

So we’ve give him a bath and he has just done a wall of death figure of 8 around the front room and garden

I wouldn’t worry about that in isolation, lots of dogs go nuts after a bath.

He does sound like a challenging dog. I can only suggest that while you are working it out, don’t let the challenging behaviour get you down, keep up the training with a view that you will end up with a less challenging, but still great dog.

renton – Member
Then he lets himself down by buggering off and not listening.

Yerbut… “he’s” not letting “himself” down at all.

He’s a Spaniel that needs training and guidance.

You’ve got this whole dog ownership thing the wrong way around, sorry.

Most of us on this thread have owned and experienced Spaniels, we’ve all been through varying degrees of your ownership issues and there is a very common theme.

I don’t want to be rude, but it seems like you are missing the point completely.

IMO you should seek another caring owner for the dog, then if you really feel you can look after another dog seek a breed more suitable for you and your family.

That’s a bit blunt, but truthful.

As stated before
Mental exercise is far better than physical.

We have two pointers, one from pup and went through the same thing. She can still be testing at times, But by carrying a ball on walks I now get total attention.

She has had a 24hr excursion/deer chasing incident. So 5 mins on a walk I consider normal!

Yerbut… “he’s” not letting “himself” down at all.

He’s a Spaniel that needs training and guidance.

You’ve got this whole dog ownership thing the wrong way around, sorry.

Most of us on this thread have owned and experienced Spaniels, we’ve all been through varying degrees of your ownership issues and there is a very common theme.

I don’t want to be rude, but it seems like you are missing the point completely.

IMO you should seek another caring owner for the dog, then if you really feel you can look after another dog seek a breed more suitable for you and your family.

That’s a bit blunt, but truthful.

Not blunt at all.

Its not our first Spaniel either, our first was a springer who was still mad but at least he responded well to training.

This Cocker we have now has been trained by the same trainer that our first Spaniel was trained by aswell.

The little bugger is so bloody minded though !!

Hi Renton. Your boy is pretty much the description of my Springer Alfie. The biggest problem I had was he was a massive food guarder and suffered massively with “Springer rage”. 13 years I had him for and for all the years of what your going through I would give anything for another day with him. You cannot wear a springer out, so I defenitly found long walks combined with mental training helped – “go find” in house was fun with cheese or ham. Suggest a bit of bonding wife your wife so he learns to accept that she too is above him, I found from experience that matching his behaviour with “firmness” (hands on) doesn’t work at all and only stresses you and the dog out. I really enjoyed taking him on the bike as well, give it another few months and then introduce him to the trails. Apologies if some of this has been covered, good luck with it and keep at it, it will get better!!

Thanks for the offer Bianchi boy.

I will bear that in mind.

Ones easy, try one of each!

https://www.instagram.com/p/BVZ442vHNIv/

I feel your pain however. The Cocker who is the oldest was absolutely great until she got attacked off two Great Danes. Pretty much unraveled every bit of training we had done outside and recall went totally out the window. The slightest thing would spook her and she would bolt, on one occasion nearly getting hit off a car she ran that far. Ended up putting her on a long leash which helped calm her.
Best thing for her was getting the Springer as she built confidence around a small but rapidly growing dog again. Not saying you should go get another but we noticed how quickly the Springer learnt through copying the Cocker (and vice verse helped the Cocker) is there no older dogs you can walk with that yours can hopefully pick up behaviour traits from?

I’m no expert and these were the first puppies we’d had after having rescue dogs before. Was just surprised how fast the Springer learnt (clever breed or not) just by following the cockers lead.

Hope you get sorted.

You are welcome. And the offer stands. I know how difficult working spaniels can be. And Marmite would love a playmate. So would I.