Originally Posted by
troutbum
When I would get the dog close with a command, I'd just say sit , and lower my hand downwards .
That is exactly the way my DD is trained, although if/when I lower my hand it means for him to not only sit, but also to lay down. He's almost 11 and don't believe it when people say you can't teach an old dog new tricks. I didn't decide to use a whistle to get him to come back to me until he was about 7-8 years old. It was always just hollering the word "Here". When they are out a ways or out of sight in heavier cover it's much easier to blow the whistle and not be hollering. All I started doing was blowing the whistle along with that command and it didn't take long before the verbal command wasn't even necessary. He only has the verbal commands of "Fetch", "Sit", "Over" with a directional finger point, "Here" if he's very close and the whistle would be overkill, and "Kennel" with a finger point of where I want him to go, regardless of whether it's to come in the room where he stays, to the truck, into his cage when we're out hunting or camping, etc. This dog is a lot smarter than a lot of people, probably including his owner!!!