Advanced Recall

At this level, we are now looking for your dog to recall over longer distances and with a variety of distractions present.

A truly reliable recall is one of the most important skills your gundog can have. Whether you are out walking, training or working your dog, you need to know that they will respond to you, even when there are exciting things happening around them.

At Advanced level, begin to introduce recalls from different scenarios and environments. Remember that the environment itself can be a distraction. A new location, exciting scents, game, people or other activity can all make a recall more challenging.

You can also introduce specific distractions such as:

• Dummies
• Toys
• Food
• Exciting areas with increased scent
• Working environments

The aim is for your dog to learn that your recall cue always means the same thing, regardless of what else is happening.

However, always set your dog up to succeed. Do not introduce a level of distraction that your dog cannot cope with. Build the difficulty gradually and allow your dog to experience success.

If your dog struggles, simply go back a stage, reduce the distraction or decrease the distance and rebuild from there. This is not a step backwards — it is how you create a reliable response.

Get out there and practise in as many different situations as possible. The more positive experiences your dog has of choosing to return to you, the stronger your recall will become.

Remember, an advanced recall is built through patience, consistency and hundreds of successful repetitions.