Chopper's Page

Chopper with Jeremy at the Agua Dulce, California Aiport. Chopper is about eight months old in this picture.

Frequently Asked Questions About This Dog

  Chopper comes from Majestic Knights Shilohs

He is very well behaved. Have you spent a lot of time training him?

Chopper has had very little formal training. I have never taken him to a training class and I have spent very little time training him myself. It just hasn't been necessary.

Shiloh Shepherds are unusually intelligent dogs. He came when called, sat, laid down, and heeled automatically -- without any training -- when he was three months old. He passed the AKC Canine Good Citizen test at one year old. The only training he required was for the “stay” command. When we go for a walk, he stays near me even without a leash. When I stop, he automatically sits or lies down at my feet. If I move more than one step away from him, he will move again to be near me. He does all of this, and more, without any training, and without a single command. He also responds to either hand signals or verbal commands. Teaching him new behaviors has never required more than three training sessions. 

If we go to the park and I let him run around off the leash, he will never get more than about fifty feet from me. If I sit down, he automatically stops whatever he is doing and comes to lay down beside me -- without a command, and without training.

I have trained him to come to me whenever I clap my hands, or snap my fingers. He responded to both signals the first time I tried them. He just seemed to know what I wanted and did it. If he is outside, all I need to do to get him to come in and lay down beside me is to snap my fingers and point to the floor. I don't even need to look at him. 

When he was young I tried to train him in the "clicker" method. As you may know, the clicker method requires training the dog to recognize a toy clicker as a sign that they have done something right. You train them to associate the clicker with a food treat. It didn't work with Chopper. The reason was that the only thing Chopper wanted to do was to be with me. As long as he was sitting beside me, he really didn't care about food treats and, therefore, didn't care about the clicker. I discovered it didn't really matter because he did nearly everything I wanted without training, anyway. 

While Chopper is extremely intelligent and learns new commands almost immediately, there are some things that it is difficult to teach him to do. These are generally any command that requires him to be away from me.

For example, I had trouble teaching Chopper the "stay" command. He would not stay because he didn't want to be twenty feet from me. He considered it punishment and would whine the whole time he was staying. Also, he will not learn to fetch because fetching a stick or ball would require him to leave my side.