How To Teach Your Husky To Play Fetch

Teaching your husky to play fetch can seem like a difficult task and if you haven’t taught a dog to play fetch before it can feel quite overwhelming. This post is going to try to show you how you can teach your husky to play fetch in an efficient manner.

This method will break the training process down into a number of small components. Doing this will allow you to teach fetch more quickly and easily since your husky will only need to learn one thing at a time.

The first stage will be to teach your husky to hold the toy in its mouth.

To do this do as follows:

1. Get some treats and find a toy that your husky likes and bring it to your husky.
2. Reward your husky for showing an interest in the toy. The interest can be anything from simply looking at the toy to mouthing the toy
3. Gradually increase the level of interest that you require from your husky to get the treat. The goal is to get it to mouth the toy when you show it the toy.
4. Once you’re able to get your husky to mouth the toy when you show it start to introduce the verbal cue “take it” and to introduce new objects.
5. Now start to increase the amount of time that you require your husky to hold on to the toy. Start by rewarding it for holding the toy for a tenth of a second and then gradually require more and more time. Be careful not to make a large jump in the amount of time that you require your husky to hold it you don’t want your husky to fail.
6. Now start moving the object closer to the floor and eventually physically drop the object on the floor. Continue to say “take it” and to reward it for holding onto the toy.

Related: how to calm your husky down.

The next stage will be to teach your husky to give you the toy. This stage is important because it’s common to get your husky to fetch the toy but not to give it back to you. 

To do this do as follows:

1. Get some treats and a toy that your husky likes and get your husky in front of you.
2. Now get your husky to take the toy out of your hands or off the floor when you say “take it” and reward your husky when it lets go of the object. You may need to encourage it to let go of the object by holding your hand, or a smelly piece of food, out. You’ll probably need to be very patient for this step.
3. Repeat the above until you’re able to get it to let go of the toy straight away when you say “give”. Make sure not to say give as soon as your husky picks up the toy otherwise it will begin to forget to hold the toy.
4. Repeat but only reward it for giving you the toy by placing it in your hand.

Related: How to teach your husky the “down” command.

The next stage will be to add distance between you and your husky.

You can do it as follows:

1. Get a toy and some treats that it likes.
2. Drop the toy on the floor say “take it” and then quickly take a few steps back and say “give” so that it needs to take a few steps to come and give it to you. Remember to reward it when it does it successfully.
3. Repeat the above and gradually increase the distance that your husky needs to go to give you the toy.
4. Now, instead of moving yourself, when you drop the toy, you’ll make the dog fetch the toy. Do this by beginning to toss the toy a short distance. When you toss it say “fetch” and reward it for bringing the toy back to you and placing it in your hand.
5. Repeat the above and gradually increase the distance that it needs to go to fetch the toy.
6. Once it gets good at it start to introduce new objects for it to fetch

Once your husky is able to do the above easily then you can start to do it in a new environment such as a park. Start by getting it to fetch over a short distance and then you can gradually increase the distance.

Watch the video below to see how it’s done

Why To Teach Your Husky Fetch

There are a number of benefits to teaching your husky to play fetch that I will mention below.

The first benefit is that it will help you to give your husky a lot more exercise. Huskies are a breed that was bred to pull sleighs over long distances so, in order for you to exercise it properly, you’ll need to be able to get it to run without needing to yourself otherwise you’ll tire soon before your husky does. Fetch is a great way to do this since it can be done at a local park and it doesn’t require a lot of effort on your part. By giving your husky lots of exercise you’ll be able to properly stimulate it and to reduce unwanted behaviors such as attention seeking or destruction.

The next benefit is that you’ll be able to teach your husky to listen to you. This is beneficial since you’ll be able to get your husky to listen to you more easily when it’s misbehaving. This can help you to reduce stress on yourself and to keep your husky safer.

The other benefit is that it is rewarding for you as well. Teaching your husky to play fetch is something that can take a lot of time to master and once your husky can do it you’ll feel good about yourself and your husky for your achievement.

Things to consider

When you’re teaching your husky to play fetch there are some things that you’ll want to keep in mind.

Patience is important

Teaching your husky to play fetch is unlikely to be something that you’ll be able to do in one training session. If progress is slow don’t get discouraged and just continue to go through the steps. If you don’t seem to be getting anywhere then go back a few steps and take it from there.

It’s important to keep your husky interested

When your teaching your husky to play fetch it’s important to keep its interest. You can do this by using toys that it really likes, using treats that it likes and by having a lot of energy about yourself when you’re training it.

Related questions

How to teach a husky to come? An effective way to teach your husky to come is to do it in three stages. First, you’ll teach your husky to sit. Then you’ll teach your husky to stay. Finally, you’ll teach your husky to come. You can read about how to do it here.