Teach Your Dog "Hide Your Eyes"

The goal is to have Rocco put his paws on the ottoman and hide his eyes!

We're starting the last week of K9 Kamp, and we hope you all have had as good a time as we've had finding new twists on the game of "Doggie Hide and Seek."

The last two weeks we played "Find It" and "Go Hide" and this week we are working on "Hide Your Eyes."

Once Rocco has this trick perfected, he can hide his eyes while I hide something for him to find! It's yet even another twist on Doggie Hide and Seek!

You can't see them, but Rocco's
front paws are on the book!

How to teach Hide Your Eyes

Teach Hide Your Eyes (or some folks like to call it Say Your Prayers) in two steps.

Step #1: First teach paws up.  I started teaching Rocco to do this on a phone book.

I shaped the behavior by rewarding him every time he touched the phone book with his front paws.  In no time, I could send him to the phone book and he'd place his paws there!

We started this when Rocco was a little pup, so we used a small phone book covered in Scotch Colors and Patterns Duct Tape (the duct tape made the book more stable and the colors made it pretty!)

Rocco performs paws up on the ottoman!

You can train this on any object that your pup can easily reach with his paws.

Next, I taught Rocco "paws up" by encouraging him to place his paws up on everything from the side of a sofa or ottoman to placing his paws on my arm.

To start, I lured him with a treat to get his paws in position.





Step #2: Once we had "paws up" we could start training "hide your eyes."

Rocco shows how he hides his eyes on my arm!

I started training it on my arm, and used a treat between his paws to help lure his head down. Rocco's legs are pretty short, so this was a bit of a challenge at first!

Then we started transferring the behavior to the side of the ottoman.

Rocco hides his eyes on the ottoman!

Here's a look at how we trained Hide Your Eyes…

Tip: Treat low, between your pup's legs to keep his head down.

We just starting training the trick on the ottoman this week, so we'll continue to perfect it until Rocco can hold the position longer.

Remember, next week is the final week of K9 Kamp. We'll gather round the Kampfire to see how you all have been playing Doggie Hide and Seek at our February 21 Blog Hop!

We'd love to hear what you've been working on and if you've taught your dog any version of Hide Your Eyes! Please let us know in the comments below.

The fun and games continue every Friday with FitDog Friday, the weekly Blog Hop brought to you by To Dog With Love, SlimDoggy and Peggy's Pet Place to promote a healthy active lifestyle for pets (and their people, too!). Join in every Friday by linking up your FitDog story or visiting the blogs in the Hop.

And, from now through February 21, FitDog Friday will co-locate with K9 Kamp. So we'd love for you to link up all your FitDog AND K9 Kamp posts here!  And, don't forget to enter our K9 Kamp giveaway! You'll find it in our FitDog Friday post from last week.