How to Train My Dog to Come When off Leash

Ever wondered how people let their dogs free when outside even without any leashes? Well! The secret to do so is no more a secret, which essentially means you can do it too.

The curiosity over ‘how to train my dog to come when off leash’ is an essential part of the overall off-leash training and getting your pup’s attention is key to success. This is because off-leash training is incomplete until and unless you cannot get your puppy’s attention when you call him.

So, is there any way out to get my dog’s attention when I call him? You may think.

And the answer is YES.

Explore these 5 simple yet easy-to-follow steps to train your dog to come when off-leash.

Addressing Your Dog with a Name is the First Step in ‘How to Train My Dog to Come When off Leash
Train Your Dog with a Long Leash
Try Calling Your Dog from a Long Distance
Practice off Leash Training at Home

Practice off Leash Training in Less Crowded Area & Time

1. Addressing Your Dog with a Name is the First Step in ‘How to Train My Dog to Come When off Leash

If you do not name your dog, then how would he know that you are talking to him? So, naming your pup is the first thing you would do when starting a training of any kind.

After you have chosen a good name for your dog, make sure you use the same name whenever addressing your puppy. And reward your dog whenever he gives his attention upon calling. This will result in the following benefits.

The dog will remember his name
He will respond to you whenever you will call him
A classy name would increase your status
Training will become easy

Remember, the points mentioned in ‘how to train my dog to come when off leash’ would often require you to reward your dog when you think he acted as per your wishes. This is because, with continuous positive reinforcement that act with then result in a habit.

2. Train Your Dog with a Long Leash

Remember, training of any kind starts with simple steps and proceeds further towards advanced steps. So, in case of training dogs, people usually train their dogs to walk on a leash, and then they start training for the off leash.

That is pretty understandable. This is because first you would make sure your dog listens to you and that is possible with a leash. Then you would want your dog to listen even off leash, and for that you would make sure your pup listens to you from a long distance and obeys you.

So, how would you do that? That is possible if you use a long leash.

Using a long leash with proper training will minify your concern of ‘how to train my dog to come when off leash’.

Here is what you will achieve after using a long leash

You will be able to call your dog from a long distance
You will be able to let your dog move freely away from you
It will ease your efforts for an off-leash training

3. Try Calling Your Dog from a Long Distance

Moving further from the previous point, now is the time to start practical steps towards off-leash training. To get maximum benefit from the blog post ‘how to train my dog to come when off-leash calling your dog from a long distance would do the maximum part and that is not possible without a long leash.

After you have arranged a long leash, try to order your dog from long distances. If he obeys, reward him, if he does not obey, try again until you successfully condition your dog.

Initially you would face certain challenges which you have to overcome by the time. Few challenges can be listed here for your ease,

Your dog will follow you wherever you go
He will pay attention to your hand movements, and if you act like throwing something, he will go and catch it.

He will not listen when you call him

To overcome these challenges, train your dog in the following ways, to make sure your pup comes when you call him from a long distance

Order your dog to ‘stay’ and move backwards. Try it many times until your pup is conditioned to it
Throw something away from you and order your dog to leave it. This will break the conditioned attention of your dog to your hand movements
Finally, move away from your pup, stay there for a while, so that your dog’s attention is diverted, and then call him to get his instant attention

If you follow these steps with proper rewards and patience, you will start noticing the positive outcomes of the tips in ‘how to train my dog to come when off leash’

4. Practice off Leash Training at Home

The next step in how to teach my dog to come when off-leash would be removing the leash altogether and calling your dog to perform various acts as it was conditioned earlier.

The wise step to do so would be practicing off-leash training at home. This is to make sure that you do not risk the lives of other people while training your pup.

Practicing off-leash training at home would make sure the following things,

That the dog recognizes his name
That the dog recognizes your voice
That the dog understands your commands

While you are doing this, make sure you never miss rewarding your dog whenever he performed well or got your command right. This will further enhance the conditioning and make it a habit.

However, the process of how to train my dog to come when off leash is not finalized yet.

Remember? we said it requires patience and time. So, the next thing you would do is to go out with your dog without a dog leash.

5. Practice off Leash Training in Less Crowded Area & Time

So, are you ready to go out with your pup without a dog leash?

Are you excited or Worried?

Well! If you have gone through the process of how to train my dog to come when off leash step by step and practiced enough with patience and rewards, you should be excited.

However, before you move freely in crowded places playing with your dog without a dog leash, you should start going out in less crowded areas and timings to further strengthen the chances of successful training.

This is the last step towards successfully training your dog to come when off leash. If you still find it difficult try repeating the process each time rewarding your dog upon getting the command correct.

And when you are done, you are good to go as everyone else does.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, if you want to successfully implement the process of ‘how to train my dog to come when off leash’, you must give time and have patience for getting the most out of following easy steps.