Building Fuller Grips and Forward Aggression With Guillame

Working dog development is built through repetition, clarity, and helping the dog understand how to work through each part of the picture. In this training session with Guillame, we focused on rewarding full grips, encouraging more forward aggression, and teaching him how to turn off stick pressure by countering deeper into the bite.

Rewarding Full, Committed Grips

One of the main priorities in Guillame’s development has been improving how he uses his mouth during the bite.

Rather than simply rewarding contact, we want Guillame to understand that a full, calm, committed grip is what earns the win. Each repetition gives us another opportunity to reinforce the correct behavior and help him become more consistent.

The confidence is not created by overwhelming him with pressure. It is built by teaching him the proper technique, allowing him to succeed, and giving him repeated opportunities to win while using his mouth correctly.

Encouraging Guillame to Come Forward

When Guillame becomes uncertain or mentally overloaded, one of his default behaviors is to sit back and bark.

While barking can be part of the aggression picture, we want him to understand that moving forward and engaging the decoy is the behavior that creates progress.

Throughout the session, we worked on encouraging Guillame to push forward instead of remaining stationary. The moment he commits, closes the distance, and gives us the behavior we are looking for, we reward that decision.

Over time, these repetitions help replace the old pattern of sitting and barking with a more confident and forward response.

Teaching Him to Turn Off Stick Pressure

We also continued using the stick as controlled pressure during the bite.

The purpose is not to simply apply pressure and expect Guillame to tolerate it. We want him to understand how his behavior controls the interaction.

When Guillame counters deeper into the grip, the pressure stops. This creates a clear relationship between the action and the result. Instead of becoming frantic, chewing, or allowing the grip to become shallow, he learns that pushing deeper and staying committed is what makes the pressure disappear.

That clarity helps him remain active in the bite while continuing to improve the quality of his grip.

Making the Most of the Working Dog Board and Train

Our working dog board and train program is approximately a month and a half long, so we make the most of every day.

Guillame and Osi are receiving daily repetitions across obedience, bite development, environmental exposure, confidence building, and the different skills required for their individual training plans.

That volume of work allows us to make small adjustments from session to session and build on the progress made the previous day. Not every repetition is perfect, but each one gives us more information and another opportunity to help the dog understand the work.

Guillame has already put in a tremendous amount of effort, and we are continuing to see improvements in his grips, forward aggression, and ability to work through pressure.

The process takes patience, consistency, and a lot of quality repetitions, but Guillame continues to move in the right direction.

To learn more about our working dog development and board and train programs, visit www.primalcanine.com.