# How many of you use non English command words to train your dog?



## Rua (Jan 2, 2012)

Dime The Sheepdog Only Understands Irish

I came across this article today and it got me wondering: 

How many of you dog owners out there train your dogs with command words that aren't English or are maybe different from the norm? ie: ("touch" instead of "come", etc.) Do you feel it gives you better control over your dog?

Share with us!


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## VonKromeHaus (Jun 17, 2009)

I use German for the competition field and english in the house!


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## NewbieShepherdGirl (Jan 7, 2011)

I use Russian and English. Mostly English right now because I want her solid in the English commands so that my family can get her to do things, but will be reincorporating Russian back into her training soon.


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## mysweetkaos (Sep 20, 2011)

We use mostly English. The only exception is release words and their "safe" word (letting them know to stop whatever they're doing NOW). Kaos' words are in German, and Sherman's words are Spanish. I like their release words especially to be non-English, because I don't want it to be anything we use in daily life....and with 3 kids there are a lot of words flying around here.


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## GregK (Sep 4, 2006)

English, French and German.


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## TimberGSD2 (Nov 8, 2011)

Mine right now are all trained in English, Spanish and hand commands. I am very grateful for having taught hand signals since my 2 shepherds got older and deaf (TJ is gone now) but it has helped greatly when the hearing goes. 

My new pup will most likely be trained in German and hand signals. And my husbands version of English commands.


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## DunRingill (Dec 28, 2007)

One of the poll choices should be "multiple languages." I use German and English, and expect my dogs to respond to both because.


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## NewbieShepherdGirl (Jan 7, 2011)

I forgot about hand commands. All of her verbal commands come with a hand command.


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## GatorDog (Aug 17, 2011)

I use German for my GSD. But he also responds to English. My other dogs only know English, (although they seem to be picking up on the German commands as well!)


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## FG167 (Sep 22, 2010)

I use German, English, hand signals and facial expressions LOL They are expected to comply to all.


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## Rua (Jan 2, 2012)

FG167 said:


> I use German, English, hand signals and facial expressions LOL They are expected to comply to all.


I use facial expressions too. LOL - In fact, sometimes my wordless "disapproval scowl" gets a better response from the dog when she's doing something naughty than if I repeatedly give a verbal command.


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## N Smith (Aug 25, 2011)

For my competition commands my two Shepherds are trained in Hungarian, my Leonberger in German. All of my dogs will respond to hand signals.

All house commands are in English - mostly so my husband has an easier time...LOL


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## Jason L (Mar 20, 2009)

No it does not give me better control of my dogs.


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## Freestep (May 1, 2011)

I use English for informal communication, and German when I'm serious. For example, "Platz" means "lie down RIGHT NOW". "Go lie down" means "find a spot and get comfortable".


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## Falkosmom (Jul 27, 2011)

My pup is being taught czech and hand signals. 

My older dog was taught in english and hand signals, learned czech himself just watching me and the pup.


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## DanielleOttoMom (May 11, 2010)

I use German during training/ on the field. I use german at home as well but will use english for more relaxed commands at home.


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## Stosh (Jun 26, 2010)

I use only English words and hand commands, but some commands are not actually human words but noises like eh and uh-uh, shh shh means move along in herding, stuff like that. To make a point of how much we communicate with our body language and placement, my herding trainer had me stand perfectly still and give Stosh some commands to see how well he responded, then the reverse- no words but only my body. It's interesting


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## lhczth (Apr 5, 2000)

English in both competition and in the home except for the blind search in SchH where I use a German word.


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## Liesje (Mar 4, 2007)

Most of my commands are English (sit, search, look, watch him, down, touch, speak, whisper, bang, rollover, take it, hold, bring, hit it, plus all the agility obstacles to name a few...) but a few of my SchH commands are German (aus, platz, voran, voraus, revier, heir, steh, fuss).


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## Cschmidt88 (Nov 24, 2010)

Most of Dakota's main commands are in German, but his fun commands, for the most part, are English. It's nice to know both because we have different "versions" of different commands if you can call them such. Such as "fuß" is a tight, precise, competition heel, and "heel" is a leisurely command that just means to walk close to my left side.

Alice is trained in English because she was originally just a foster. I wanted the commands to be easy for folks to say, but now she shall be learning a few German commands as well.


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## FG167 (Sep 22, 2010)

Rua said:


> I use facial expressions too. LOL - In fact, sometimes my wordless "disapproval scowl" gets a better response from the dog when she's doing something naughty than if I repeatedly give a verbal command.


EXACTLY what I meant! 



Freestep said:


> I use English for informal communication, and German when I'm serious. For example, "Platz" means "lie down RIGHT NOW". "Go lie down" means "find a spot and get comfortable".


Here too - I kind of like the distinction


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## JanaeUlva (Feb 5, 2011)

With Minka, I use a combination of czech, german, english, hand signals and a big smile  cuz she is so much fun to train.


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## Chicagocanine (Aug 7, 2008)

Bianca was previously trained in German before I got her, but she was 'rusty' on a lot of the commands and I re-taught her in English because it was easier, I was always forgetting the German words or mixing them up (kinda funny since I'm half German and my dad used to be a German teacher!)
I also use hand signals and other gestures like pointing where I want her to go.



Freestep said:


> I use English for informal communication, and German when I'm serious. For example, "Platz" means "lie down RIGHT NOW". "Go lie down" means "find a spot and get comfortable".


I do this a bit too, but only with "platz" and "aus", if Bianca is not paying attention I will give the German word instead. 
I also never taught her an English "potty" command so I still use the German one for that but I only use it if I need her to hurry up and go.


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## doggiedad (Dec 2, 2007)

my dog understands english and hand signals.
dogs can be taught any word, any language,
any words made up, sounds to follow any command.


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## Sherry (Mar 2, 2012)

We hope to be getting a GSD in the future. I had some questions about using German commands instead of English. Someone told me they were concerned about their dog being more easily stolen so they only use German commands (is this a valid reason?). I am concerned if the dog only knows German and accidentally gets away that it may be more difficult for someone to help them return the dog to us. 

I can now see the benefit of using some of the German commands that may give a more direct command from some of the posts here. I guess I want to do the best for our future dog and my question is whether all German commands is the way to go?


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## elisabeth_00117 (May 17, 2009)

Formal training I use German, and the rest of the time it is a combination of German and English (with a little French).


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## technodog (Dec 31, 2010)

I use Arabic and English, but mostly the latter. I use Arabic in loose commands or in praise. I guess everybody's dog is multilingual


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## ayoitzrimz (Apr 14, 2010)

I use a mixture. For SchH commands I use german (that includes commands that *would* be used as SchH command at one point or another like bring, platz, hier (?), etc) but for informal stuff I use english command.

Ex: heeling
Loose leash walking - "let's go"
heeling - "heel"
attention / schH heeling - "fuss"

Recall:
just come to my side - "come"
come to front - "heir" / "hier" whatever you spell it 

I think most people do the same no?


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## martemchik (Nov 23, 2010)

My dog "understands" Russian but he's trained in English. If I were going to train in any other language it would be Russian but my SO doesn't speak it so we couldn't do that. But he has figured it out when my family comes over and what they want from him so he's pretty good with Russian commands.

This isn't really towards the SchH people, but I find people that casually train their shepherds in German really funny. Not just because most of them can't pronounce the word correctly, but also because it just seems forced...like you're doing it to show your friends how cool you can be by training your dog in German. I like the whole strict/casual thing that some people are doing, and its not a dig at anyone that does it here because I don't really know what your obedience goals are.

But for the most part its because as a foreigner (you wouldn't be able to tell if I spoke to you) its funny to hear them say commands in German, and then correct in English. I know the dog doesn't care, but to me you sound like an idiot since you're not fluent in the language and its clear you're doing it because you read it somewhere. We even have a German guy at our club, and he teaches his dogs in English, kind of funny.


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## Manny (Feb 6, 2012)

I use German (or my version of German) and hand while the rest of the family uses English and hand.


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## Emoore (Oct 9, 2002)

Sherry said:


> We hope to be getting a GSD in the future. I had some questions about using German commands instead of English. Someone told me they were concerned about their dog being more easily stolen so they only use German commands (is this a valid reason?). I am concerned if the dog only knows German and accidentally gets away that it may be more difficult for someone to help them return the dog to us.


My dogs don't listen to anyone but my husband and me, no matter what language that person is speaking. 

That said, I mostly use English commands, but I use "platz" instead of "down" because "down" is heard so much in daily life. (down off the bed, down off of me, down off the couch) I do confess I think that, for a native English speaker living in the U.S. or other English-speaking country, who doesn't compete in Schutzhund and who doesn't speak a word of German, using German commands is a mite silly. Especially when you don't pronounce it right. I know that's going to offend some of you, but there it is. 

My dogs also obey hand signals.


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## RileyMay (Aug 6, 2011)

Sherry said:


> We hope to be getting a GSD in the future. I had some questions about using German commands instead of English. Someone told me they were concerned about their dog being more easily stolen so they only use German commands (is this a valid reason?). I am concerned if the dog only knows German and accidentally gets away that it may be more difficult for someone to help them return the dog to us.
> 
> I can now see the benefit of using some of the German commands that may give a more direct command from some of the posts here. I guess I want to do the best for our future dog and my question is whether all German commands is the way to go?



I posted a thread with all the German commands, and how to pronounce them. I hope it's able to help!!`


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## cliffson1 (Sep 2, 2006)

German or Czech on the field and mostly English in house and in yard.


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## ColoradoVDGS (Mar 16, 2012)

This is a great question. Although I don't have a GSD yet I fully plan on training in German (or Irish if i want to torture my husband) especially since we plan on Shutzhund and protective work. It just seems smart. 
It also seems an opportunity to learn about other languages and maybe a little about culture. that and german commands are fun to say! 
We'd incorporate signal/sign work as well. To my knowledge humans learn better when more senses are involved...why not dogs? We already know they are sensitive to our body language anyway so I think we should use it to our advantage...and it's a exercise in our own self awareness! bonus.  
I don't know that English/native language versus a 'command' language is necessarily better for any reason. just another tool.


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## ColoradoVDGS (Mar 16, 2012)

**I guess really the point is that it doesn't matter WHAT communication system you use! As long as your dog and yourself get what is going on, and it's healthy (no abuse/harsh corrections or implimentations) and the method is consistent...dog doesn't care what you do. 
The concern should be for their safety first and your amusement second.


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## pfitzpa1 (Apr 26, 2011)

ColoradoVDGS said:


> This is a great question. Although I don't have a GSD yet I fully plan on training in German (or Irish if i want to torture my husband) especially since we plan on Shutzhund and protective work. It just seems smart.
> It also seems an opportunity to learn about other languages and maybe a little about culture. that and german commands are fun to say!
> We'd incorporate signal/sign work as well. To my knowledge humans learn better when more senses are involved...why not dogs? We already know they are sensitive to our body language anyway so I think we should use it to our advantage...and it's a exercise in our own self awareness! bonus.
> I don't know that English/native language versus a 'command' language is necessarily better for any reason. just another tool.


I dunno, I think german is more commanding and carries better over long distances. "Platz!" at 100 paces is much more effective than "Lie Down!" IMO.

Secondarily I think it's good to have both english and german. German for formal on field use and english for around the house. There are times for example when our dog is bugging us and I want her to go lie down. In this case I will use the english command because she may see the situation negatively, on the field "platz" is a fun command and I want her to slap her body into the ground in a happy mood.


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## ColoradoVDGS (Mar 16, 2012)

pfitzpa1 said:


> I dunno, I think german is more commanding and carries better over long distances. "Platz!" at 100 paces is much more effective than "Lie Down!" IMO.
> 
> ha True. sound does make a difference.


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