Introduction
A STAY is one of those essential life skills which all dogs tend to master at some level. A STAY is like putting the handbrake on in the car, it means you are parked. It is different from a WAIT which is when they are actively waiting to be released. WAITS are covered elsewhere.
Stage 1 – Showing your dog what a STAY is
The first stage to teaching a stay is by staying right with your dog! Don’t try to move away at all, instead just keep praising them and feeding them treats for doing absolutely nothing apart from staying still!
It’s best to start when they are relaxed and in an environment free of distractions. It is also best to start with a position they find naturally quite comfortable often a down but some dogs find the sit very comfortable. It’s also helpful to start in a confined space i.e. in the kitchen with the doors closed or work on a lead. You can then start to introduce a hand signal of a flat hand outstretched like someone trying to stop the flow of traffic and the verbal cue ‘stay’. Once they hold the position for 10 – 15 seconds with a trickle of treat rewards you can then work to reduce the treat frequency so that one ‘stay’ of 10 seconds earns one treat.
Throughout the STAY training you should always reward them in the STAY and not recall them out of the STAY for a reward.
Stage 2 – Showing them how to hold a STAY in a range of scenarios
Once they’ve understood the first stage you can introduce a little bit of movement from you. This makes it harder so you will need to go back to a higher treat frequency to start with. To start with you might stay almost in one place and step slowly from foot to foot using the same handsignal and verbal cue and rewarding them where they are. With a stay the reward should always be where the dog is, if they are in a down stay you can place the treats between their front paws so that they can easily eat them while staying laying down. If you are working with a sit, then make sure you come back in to your dog before reaching for a treat and rewarding them otherwise they may stand up to reach for the treat. If they stand up or move around, ignore the incorrect choices and reset the exercise, but start at an easier level with a higher treat frequency.
Once they’ve understood their e.g. down stay then make sure to generalise the stay to a sit stay. If you’ve asked them to stay in a sit and they drop into a down make sure to reset and start again at an easier level with a higher treat frequency. If you go ahead and reward them for dropping into a down they may become confused as you’ve asked for a sit and a stay.
I like to introduce a stand stay too even if you can get no distance between you and your dog, it just helps to generalise that stay means stay no matter what position you are in.
Once you’ve got a sit and a down stay for about 10 seconds and about 2 meters away practice this in the garden and in different rooms in the house before practicing on a walk somewhere free of distractions.
It can help to make sure that you can ask your dog to stay with a verbal cue alone and a hand signal alone. It can also help to make sure that they can execute a stay whether you are facing them or side on to them.
Stage 3 – Proofing your STAY against distractions
Once your dog can hold a 10 second sit OR down stay in a variety of locations with you at leads length THEN you can start adding in distractions, on purpose. Start with distractions which are manageable and at a distance and then gradually increase the distraction proximity and/or intensity.
This is the stage most people want to skip but it is essential.
If your dog breaks their stay it is important that they can’t inadvertently get rewarded so your setups need to be done carefully with a lead or barrier to limit their options if they do find your setup too difficult. Typical stimuli to proof your stay against would be you walking past them or behind them, dogs walking past them, other people walking past them, you answering a phone call or breaking eye contact with them or talking to another dog owner. When you start adding in distractions you may need to initially increase your treat frequency or switch to higher value rewards. The point about the phone calls or conversations is important – these are distractions however many owners completely forget they’ve asked their dog to stay so the dog learns to ignore the stay cue because the owners have ignored their dogs!