Am i right in thinking...
one long whistle means stop

two short ones mean come back to me

Because as soon as my two hear the one long whistle they race back to me so blummin fast, whether i have treats or not. and i burst out laughing.

Dogs have no inborn instinct that tells them what whistle signals mean. It is for you to decide and teach them. Of course the signal gets their attention, and they might react with running back to you.

This is what I did: I decided on a signal, then gave it and immediately followed it by the well known corresponding verbal command. Do that often enough and the dog will start to anticipate the verbal (or visual, for that matter) command. Give him super rewards if he reacts before the verbal command, and Bingo! you have it!

BTW: For Rhian, immediate recall is a short - long whistle blast; three short pips mean "sit wherever you are".

Just read the page on gundog training. how embarrasing - i got it wrong big time. oops! so...
3 pips to call dog.
1 pip and raised left hand to sit.

Ok, will start again when i take them out in a couple of hours.

Somehow i got to thinking one long pip of 3 seconds, dog should come back or sit. Hmmm, poor dogs i must have confused them. (At least they came back to me (recall?), from the other side of the field (7acres of steep hills and flat bits).

Should this be in the training bit or here?
Thanks x

Most people use one pip to stop/sit, repeated pips (pip,pip,pip,pip,pip,) to recall and two pips to turn a dog when quartering.

Steve

Edit: But you can use any system you like as long as you are consitent and use the same command for the desired effect EVERY time

Steve

as steve says, if it works for you, use it! so what if its not the "norm" so long as the dog knows what each one means thats fine

I agree with Steve and Sparky, I was told you can say any thing as long as consistent

I use 1 pip for sit, repeated pips to recall and 2 to turn

I use 3 pips on the boys.

Which changed to several 3 peeps, a long peeep a peeppty peepp peeeepp peeep as J shot after a rabbit with Sweep in toe.

Can't right remember which peep he came back to

You can do whatever you want, as long as you are consistent.

I use one blast for stop/sit, two pips to turn, continuous pips for recall.

Helen

this is what i use as well

I thought I'd give the whistle training another go and see if we could make it part of our normal walking experience.

Well we got down on the beech this evening and feeling inspired by this post I waited until all three were heading away from me and at a distance and all focused on some mischief towards the dunes (let's make it really hard eh )....whistle to lips I gave a loud confident series of pips and....... ........back they all come at full tilt too . Now they all got rewarded and sent out again..........I thought ok lucky break then (ever the pessimist ) gave it a few minutes and tried it again and yipee same response . We continued on the walk and I thought give Julie a go on the whistle (especially as she takes them for walks more than I do) and she got the same response too .

Now if we finish the tale here it would be great..........but.......... nooooo.....after sending them off again the little wonders flushed a couple of phessies up on the dune/cliff sides and could I get them back??.....not on your nellie . As they didn't respond first time I put the whistle away and waited for their return. I believe that to continue pipping the whistle without the desired response would have reinforced a wrong behaviour.

We are not giving up on this and will continue with it but it didn't half surprise us getting such good positive response from them so soon

Steve

Thats what i thought too, so i put my whistle away and tried again the next day. But then another time i also tried whistle, call and crouch in a repetitive manner, so to keep their attention (once i had got it), and that worked too. I only needed to do this the once, and now its every time with ben, chelsea has a 'deaf spot' occasionally.

Ideally, in the situation where your dog flushes game you should not use the recall whistle. Better to use the stop/sit whistle.

But, and there is always a but, this is only when the dog becomes 100% on the stop whistle.

The reasoning behind this is if the dog flushes, you whistle "stop" then the dog should stop and look toward you for rurther commands. This could be to carry on hunting or to come back or even stay.

Now I've got to go tell Jago what he should be doing

ha ha, you should see my nutters hurtling towards me. Stop? Cant possibly do that! We have no brakes till we reach my feet!
I dont work them, but have the great challenge at the moment for training them to stop and look for the next procedure. Hmmm, may get it when they are too old to move,

It's a good jpb no-one has videoed me trying to teach Ailla the stop command.

The view of me chasing her round the field trying to catch her to take her back to the spot where she was when I blew the whistle must be quite a sight.

And we are still trying

Thanks Steve....I can see the good reason in what you say about the "stop" command.

I've just realised that now I get a very good "Wait" from them, that now I could use the "long whistle blast" for "wait" because I suppose that is our "stop" command. I'm just now puzzling how to do this. This is usually what happens on part of one of our walks: We head out of a field and as they approach a style (which they could easily pass through) I'll shout "Wait" and they will stop and wait for me to catch up and will normally wait for me to give "go on" then they will continue through the style. So at what point would it be best to add the stop/wait whistle command? What would you do if the whistle didn't get the response you wanted?

Your help as always much appreciated

Steve