Dog Health Questions: Lead Sled dog training question?

I am trying to train my dog to go right on cue. We are out walking on a trail with 90 degree right turns. I have one leash on his harness to teach him to pull and one leash on his collar that's slack unless he does it wrong. I am using a clicker. Whenever we near a turn, I give him the command "Gee" and instead of turning, he turns his head and looks back at me, expecting a treat. What am I doing wrong?

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Guten Abend, Yo LO, and thank you again! :)

Sounds like a couple of things:

1. You're moving a little too fast in your training, allowing him out in front of you when he doesn't have a clear idea of what the command means.

If he stops to look back at you, keep walking right up to him, past him, "gee" him around that corner (repeating the command the entire time), praise him as he comes with you. Once you are moving in a straight line again, slow down and urge him out ahead of you once more. I do a lot of running to catch up and correct, and then falling back behind when I'm training individual dogs to pull -- it's a good workout! 2. You need to work to "wean" him off getting a treat for responding to you, so that he is no longer expecting it.

Frankly, I've never used a clicker to train my sled dogs, and I've never given them treats for gee-haw...for this exact reason. I don't want the leaders on my 8-dog team turning the team back to me just because they think they'll get a treat after they turn a corner.

Give the command (from either beside or behind him) -- even if he glances right, praise ("good gee!"), if he leans right, more praise, if he goes right, more praise, pats, etc. Encourage him to keep moving the entire time. You don't want him to stop for a pet or a treat. The goal is to keep moving ahead of you regardless.

This would be much easier to demonstrate in person. I hope I haven't confused you more than I've helped!

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• You are not doing anything wrong you see it takes about two years to train a dog to mush but he will soon get the hang of it


• I've trained both lead dogs and agility dogs with this method:
  
  Toss something the direction you wish the dog to go... giving the command as you do it (add the clicking if this is something your dog responds to). Even the SLIGHTEST turn of the head that direction gets rewarded.
  
  While actually running I found it useful to very my tone and repeat the command depending on the degree of the turn (sledding in Minnesota can mean crossing lakes and you may need only a couple degree turn or a REALLY big turn).
  
  FWIW: I used "right" and "left" as I found my dogs didn't listen to others sledding with their dogs (my son ran sprint races with them) and I remembered it better for agility.


• I'll star this and hope Loki sees it...