My French Mastiff Seems To Be The Stupidest Dog . Not Quite The Sharpest Tool In The Shed. I Thought All The De Bordeaux Breeds Were Supposed To Be Intelligent. What Is Wrong With My Dog?

Too much inbreeding will cause this. If they were brother and sister in order to get pure bred, there is your problem . Too many people think inbred dogs are superior. Not true, look at humans and what effects it has on them

Is your dog full grown or a puppy? Did you get him from France or previous foreign speaking owners? If so, he doesn't understand English. My AKC French Mastiff is a 4 month old puppy (cost $2500) sits, stays, shakes paw, and lays down on command. He is truly delightful. Best of luck! Watch what you pay for.

First off, intelligence and trainability are two different things. If the dog has no obvious reasons for lack of intelligence (inbreeding, malnutrition during growth stages and the like) then try dumbing down the training. Start slowly, go step-by-step and make sure they understand what you are asking of them before you correct them from doing it wrong or not doing it at all. Something to know is if you are basing this on clumsiness giant breeds are a little goofy sometimes and will trip and run into stuff. I think that is our fault for breeding them so big.

I have a 4 yr. Old male Dogue de Bordeaux. He is not very enthusiastic about training, but has done well in basic and intermediate obedience, a basic agility class and is a therapy dog. He is very slow to respond to my commands, but does listen. I joke that he has a built-in 5 second delay. He never did well with harsh training (which I originally thought was necessary for this "tough" breed). Find out what your dog is motivated by...squeaky toys, a ball, food, lavish praise...and use that as his training reward. How old is your dogue? What makes you think that your dogue is stupid?