It's Yer Choice/Clamshell Game (Patreon)

Game Basics:

• Dog leaves food alone, you mark, you take your other hand, pick up a piece of food, and give it to the dog.

• Dog goes in for the food, hand closes.

The goal of this game is for the dog to be able to sit with an open hand full of treats nearby and not dive in for the food. The level up of this game is for the dog to see the hand full of treats and look up at handler (similar to the game from Monday! - see how we can explain concepts in lots of ways to our dog so they start to generalize?:))

I think the most important part of this game to remember is that the default position of your hand is "open" or flat. The hand only closes when the dog tries to put their nose on it. When you first start, you may need to close your hand quite a bit, but typically dogs catch on pretty quickly, like Denver did here.

The hand is also stationary. You do not pull the hand away - simply open or close it. I do move my hand closer when Denver offers a down, as the goal of the game is not position (i don't care what position the dog is in) but the that dog can leave nearby food alone.

This game builds on previous impulse control games like the food in the bowl game that I started really early with him, and the game from Monday.

Eventually, we can put the food on the floor and have them auto-leave-it there as well.

I do have a few other videos explaining this game with a GSD if you search Clamshell game :0)

Happy Training!