Some dogs just aren't big fans. I do believe a dog can be trained to enjoy toys, or fetching though. It's just a matter of putting in time and training and having patience.
Jackson would not play fetch for the first year of his life... now I have him diving in the pool after toys, Lol... so it's possible. He still won't play everywhere, i.e. he's not super motivated by most toys, and would rather sniff around in a big field than fetch a ball. But if you make it rewarding enough (if food motivated, use food), it can be done.
With frisbee, I used treats in the beginning, and put him on a long line. I encouraged him to go get the frisbee, and it took a couple of times for him to leave me (since I had the food) but then he figured out what I wanted. Sometimes I had to give him a gentle tug on the leash to remind him to bring the frisbee BACK... but it's still a slow process, but he know loves playing and gets very excited when I bring out discs now, which he NEVER used to do.
I was actually going to make a thread on this soon, as I'm really wanting to train him to catch a frisbee in the air. |