by Janet Farricelli CPDT-KA

Created on: December 16, 2011   Last Updated: December 20, 2011

There are many advantages when it comes to asking a dog to wait for its meal. The most notorious, is obviously the fact that you will not have a dog pushing you, potentially causing you to fall or drop the food bowl full of goodies. It is not a surprising fact that some dogs are so eager to get to their meal, they will do what it takes to get to their food fast. A little bit of self-control will teach your dog some basic manners and keep your dog from being in the way. Best of all, training a dog to wait for its meal will emphasize your position as the provider that controls resources.

Commands Needed  to Train a Dog to Wait for the Food Bowl

In order to teach your dog to wait for the food bowl, three precise commands need to be polished: ''stay'' ''leave it'' and ''ok''. Stay is basically telling the dog to freeze in place, and it can be taught with the dog standing, sitting or laying down. A solid stay is taught when the dog is capable of staying into position despite distractions. With food being one of the strongest distractions for dogs, a solid stay is therefore a must. ''Leave it'' is a command that literally tells a dog ''you can't have it'' and it will turn out helpful in many circumstances. A  good ''leave it'' will warn your dog to stay put until you give a release command which can be ''ok'' or ''go''. The release command tells the dog it is OK to get up and eat the food.

How to Teach Stay, Leave it and OK

Stay is a command requiring three elements: distance, duration and distractions. You start off by having your dog sit next to you. Next, you tell the dog  ''stay'' with the palm of the hand wide open in front of the dog. As you say this, you take a step forward and turn so as to be in front of the dog. You wait a second and then turn next to the dog, praise and give a treat. At this point you say ''ok'' and lure the dog to get out of the stay position by inviting him to chase you or play. ''Ok'' is the release command which tells the dog literally ''you are free now''.

Once the dog grasps the concept of ''stay'', you can increase distance and duration. This means you can go in front of the dog and move a few steps back increasing distance, and start making the stays last longer and longer. Distractions, are generally added last, once the dog is getting good at staying. Distractions can be other dogs nearby, people, noises, toys, food and different places. The more you generalize the command by asking it in different scenarios,

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