Skills

Arlo has never been one to fully embrace a fetch... he'll go get it, but drop it short of coming right back to you, then wait for us to go and pick it up and throw it again. Sometimes we'll walk to get it and he'll pick it up and move it somewhere else... everything in it's place and all that. But recently I decided to tackle it a different way, that is, "get it" and "come here". Sometimes he'd get it, but drop it so he could come to me, so I have to send him back to get it. But repeated practice at this now gets him to return with the stick, drop it, and if you wait, he'll pick it up and drop it closer, which he'll repeat until it finally comes to my hand or dropped at my feet...  I don't need to ask him to do anything. 

The question is, when will he realise just bringing it straight to me and cut the earlier drops... I am sure he will get closer to that point, but it's fascinating to see him work out things, which to most other breeds is probably second nature. 

It may be because of collie eye, where they self reward themselves by eyeing an object, in a classic collie down position, focused and watching it, and that's just as important as chasing after the stick. So for him to interupt that eyeing is probably a big mindset change for him. 

Who knows, he won't tell me :-)