by: Tom Dokken

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0:47 Hey, you know introducing your dog to a boat can be a pretty intimidating experience. All you have to do is have one bad experience and your dog won't forget it for a lifetime. I'm going to show you some easy training tips on getting your dog not only used to the boat but actually enjoying being there.

1:01 Hi, Tom Dokken from Oak Ridge Kennels in Northfield, Minnesota. We're at our test facility for Dokken Dog Supply today going through some training tips. Now one of the easiest ways and I'm talking about either an adult or a puppy regardless of whether they've been introduced or not. If you've got a dog that will take a treat out of your hand, you're half way there.

What I'm going to do is I've got my boat on dry land. That's the key. All I'm going to do is I'm going to get in the boat myself, here, and we're just going to make this a positive place to be. Come on, Rookie. And I'm going to come in and out of the boat several times. Right here that treat would come as soon as he's got in the boat. This really works great for any dog. In and out, making that comfortable. But you can see he's getting used to jumping in, coming back in the boat and out. Very comfortable. Very comfortable. And
he's going to follow you in and out. That's the key.

2:00 Now once we've got the dog comfortable after a few days, we can eliminate the treat and gradually get the dog back in the boat.  Now really our main goal is going to be getting our dog to retrieve out of the boat. So I'm going to throw my retrieve onto dry land first. We're going to go to water later. So, here  Rookie, short and fun. All we're working on is getting the dog out of the boat and back in.

Rookie. Out. Come on Rookie. Come on (claps hands), kennel..  And back in. Nothing formal at this point in time.

Rookie. Out. Here. (claps hands) Kennel up. And I like using that kennel command because for most people they've used the travel crate as their kennel command and this gradually is going to turn into the same thing.

2:48 Now once I've got the dog going out on dry land, my next step, and this is really important, is to have the dog go from the boat, have it pulled up on shore far enough, dry land and then into the water. What we don't want, initially, is the dog to jump out of that boat into water that's over his head. Too intimidating. So I'm going to make a throw that's going to boat, land, water. Natural progression from there then as we move a few farther
days down the line is go boat, into the water and make a retrieve. Let's see how this goes.

3:25 Sit. (splash) Rookie. (dog in water)

3:32 Now you can see that transformation is relatively easy because he's used to jumping out of the boat on land. Transition back onto land into the water. Once again, when he comes out of the water, we'll give him that kennel command. Rookie, here. (claps hands). Kennel. Take the retrieve and you've got this problem solved. It take so little time to do this right that you need to put this into your training program, make sure your dog sees it
before the hunting season.

4:00 [Closing]

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