Groom Training: Sit
This may be starting to look like a basic obedience course at this stage of our groom course. You might be able to see why it’s important to teach your dog how to walk on a loose leash, enter and exit a kennel, or stand to have their butt brushed—but why would a dog need to sit?
Sit is a practical cue you can give your pet while waiting in line to check out or to make sure they are being polite while waiting for you to pay. It’s also a useful cue your groomer will use often during grooming.
Sitting exposes the dog’s chest, which makes it a lot easier to trim up chest hair (particular important for dogs who get scissor cuts) and to blow dry the chest and belly. Sit will be a more important cue for a long-haired chihuahua over a short-haired one, but in general it’s a good cue for every dog to have.
There are three methods to teaching your dog to sit, but before we go into that, I’d like to first talk about a method you should never use on a chihuahua.
Never Force a Sit
When I was growing up, dogs were taught to sit by yanking up on their collar and pushing down on their butt at the same time. Usually “Sit!!” was hollered over their ears at the same time. This did cause the dog to sit, and with enough repetition, they learned to sit when their butt was slapped.
While it did work marginally well, there’s good reason not to use this on your dog. Chihuahuas have a fragile neck prone to a condition called a collapsed trachea. Chihuahuas can develop a collapsed trachea just from pulling on their collar during a walk. Training a chihuahua in this way would almost certainly cause their trachea to collapse.
On the other end, chihuahuas are also prone to slipping patellas. Crushing their butt to the floor puts added stress on those delicate knees, potentially causing physical injury.
Chihuahuas are not a dog that stands up well to this sort of training, so please do not try it.
Instead, here are 3 different methods on how to train sit:
Method 1: Luring
One of the easiest methods for teaching a small dog like a chihuahua to sit is through luring them into position and then rewarding them. You can use a clicker to reinforce this or simply praise each time.
To lure your dog, take a treat and hold it above your dog’s nose. Your dog will likely tip his nose up to sniff it. If you drag the treat above his head, from his nose to between his ears, the dog will most likely try to follow the treat by tipping his nose up and back. The easiest way to maintain balance for this is to sit.
Reward your pet with the treat and praise if they sit. If they back up or jump around to get the treat, simply try again—no negative reaction or treat.
It’s also important not to tell him to “sit” verbally until after he is already performing the motion. If you say “sit” before he knows what it means, he may end up pairing that word with wild prancing, backing up, or trying to gobble a treat.
When your pet sits nearly every time you lure, he’s ready for you to add a voice command. Start pairing the word with your training sessions, and after one or two repetitions with the voice command, start fading the lure.
To fade the lure, you simply use the verbal command without making the motion once out of every 10 attempts, then 8, and so on until you no longer use the motion or treat to get him to sit.
Common Problems
It’s normal for your dog to try literally everything else besides sitting down to get the treat. Backing up, rearing to reach the treat, and attempting to snatch it from your hand are all normal responses to this luring method.
Remember, your dog doesn’t know what you want. He simply spies a treat and is trying to get it. Dogs are not robots, and while luring in this way frequently works, it’s not a guarantee.
If your dog constantly backs up, try practicing in a corner of a room, where there is less room to back up.
If they’re constantly snatching at the treat rather than sitting, the next method is likely to be more helpful to you. We’ll talk about that more next week.
Similar Posts:
- Teaching Your Chihuahua to Sit, Part 1
- What is Luring in Dog Training?
- How To Fade The Lure
- Dog Vocabulary: Capturing
- Teaching Your Chihuahua Down, part 1
