How to get a Sheltie to catch treats/balls/frisbees in mid air?

[AusnAsh]

Thanks for all the great tips everyone! I'm also going to try to teach Asher. What I'd trying first is to teach her "Jump". That way she can get used to being airborne. How often does she jump in the air so far?

[Trip]

Originally Posted by AusnAsh

Thanks for all the great tips everyone! I'm also going to try to teach Asher. What I'd trying first is to teach her "Jump". That way she can get used to being airborne. How often does she jump in the air so far?

Lol I am not there yet, by mid air I mean just throwing the treat to her, not her jumping to meet it lol

[AusnAsh]

Oh! Haha oops sorry. Well, that's definitely a start. Any progress is great. I don't really remember how I got Asher to jump. It was kinda a while ago. But I think that it was when I over-excited him with the ball. Maybe try to get her motivated enough to want what you have, treat, ball, ect. She'll get it!

[Shelby's mom]

Shelby was a natural and will catch anything mid air. She is very good at it and we didn't teach her. Our previous sheltie we had to teach. I had a plastic lid from a coffee can. I started by getting her to play with it. Then I would hold it higher to get her to jump up and take it from my hand. I then slowly progresses to tossing it and then extending the throws.

Hollie loved frisbee and it was her favorite. She didn't jump very high though. Shelby likes frisbee and jumps unbelievably high in the air but her favorite is her tennis ball. She likes to let it bounce and jumps up to catch it.

[2GoodDogs]

A little competiton goes a long way, the Lhasa learned how to catch a treat pretty fast. If she wanted one, she had to be ready for it - or the shelties would snatch it.

[Justme]

We used to play a game I called Frisbee Roll. I threw the disk, vertically, on the ground, and my boy tried to grab the moving disk before it tipped over. (I used one of those soft disks.)

[Trip]

So my continuing to ping her in the head with treats has finally ended, she finally decided to start trying to catch them. She gets it about 30% of the time, but I am proud of her for finally trying. Lol

[mbfrench]

No two dogs are alike,believe me. From the very early months with Trapp,it was very apparent he had some serious drive to fetch. I just went with it,wathed alot of videos,and took loads of tips that were offered.

One being,start with rollers on the ground with a soft frisbee. I also rubbed chicken on the rim,to make things a bit more enticing. It did not take him long to run after it,and to bring it back...Chicken = happy dog!

So I just kept building on that foundation. We gradully started short throws,even though he was'nt catching yet,I knew once he did make the connection with mouth on frisbee,it would be clear sailing.

I have to say,that first time Trapp caught his frisbee,the light licked on in his head..and he was one proud puppy. He could not wait for the next throw.
We gradually threw longer & higher,and he kept up with going longer & higher.

So I had the drive,I just needed to start working on simple fundementals. His first thing he learned was "go around". That gave him the incentive to go out to anticipate the length of the throw,he learned to keep his eye on it,and mainly judge when it was time to jump & catch.

Look for videos on youtube,Zak George has some fantastic vids.Good luck..remember to have fun~

[JacqueZ]

Honey taught herself to catch the ball, we got an extra bouncy one and one day we wer stuck at a car shop so I couldn't throw it far and was bouncing it short distances instead. She started catching it on the bounce, after that we worked with it in the yard, she'll catch it on a spin, bounce for it...and sometimes let it smack her in the face when abruptly deciding she's bored with the game

I'd love to teach her to catch a frisbee, but in order to do that I'm pretty sure I have to learn how to throw one