Dachshund Repeating a command six times in a row feels like the natural thing to do when a dachshund ignores you. "Sit. Sit. Sit! Siiiiit." By the fourth one, your dog has quietly decided the word means nothing, and honestly, she’s right.
That single habit undoes more dachshund training than any stubborn streak ever could.
Here’s the good news. Dachshunds are not disobedient. They are negotiators, and once you stop giving them room to negotiate, obedience comes faster than you’d expect.
Below is a step by step plan you can start using in the next ten minutes.
Why Dachshunds "Don’t Listen"
Before the steps, you need one piece of context, because it changes everything about how you’ll approach this.
Dachshunds were bred to go underground alone, corner a badger, and make life or death decisions without a human anywhere nearby. Independence wasn’t a bug in the design. It was the entire point.
So when your dachshund pauses and stares at you before doing what you asked, that’s not defiance. That’s a working dog running the numbers.
A dachshund doesn’t ask "what do you want?" A dachshund asks "what’s in it for me, and are you actually serious?"
Your job is to make the answer to both questions obvious, immediately.
The Three Things That Break Obedience
Repetition. Saying a cue more than once teaches your dog that the first one was optional.
Inconsistent payoff. If sitting sometimes earns a treat and sometimes earns nothing, your dachshund will test the odds like a tiny gambler.
Bad timing. Rewarding three seconds late means you rewarded whatever happened three seconds later, which was probably standing up.
Fix those three, and half the problem disappears before you’ve taught a single new command.
Step 1: Pick One Word and Say It Exactly Once
Choose your cue. "Sit." Not "sit down," not "c’mon, sit," not "sit, buddy, please."
Say it one time. Then close your mouth and wait.
Waiting feels unbearable at first. Five seconds of silence with a dachshund staring at you can feel like a full minute, but that silence is where the learning happens.
If nothing occurs after about ten seconds, don’t repeat yourself. Reset by walking away for a moment, then try again fresh.
Silence is a training tool. Every extra word you add is a discount on the command.
Step 2: Load Up on Currency Your Dog Actually Wants
Kibble is not currency. Kibble is a salary, and salaries don’t inspire urgency.
You want something that makes your dachshund’s eyes go wide: tiny slivers of chicken, freeze dried liver, a smear of cheese on a spoon. Pea sized pieces, because you’ll be handing out a lot of them.
Test it. Offer the treat with no strings attached and watch the reaction. If your dog takes it politely and wanders off, find something better.
Some dachshunds will work harder for a squeaky toy or ten seconds of tug than for any food on earth. Pay attention to what your particular dog considers valuable, not what the training article says she should like.
A Quick Note on Portion Control
Dachshunds gain weight easily, and extra pounds are genuinely dangerous for those long spines.
Subtract training treats from her daily meals. A dog who trains for fifteen minutes might eat noticeably less dinner, and that’s fine.
Step 3: Catch the Behavior, Then Name It
Here’s the shortcut most owners skip. Instead of commanding first, wait for your dachshund to do the thing naturally.
She sits on her own? Mark it instantly with a sharp "yes!" and pay her.
Do this a dozen times over an afternoon. Your dog starts sitting on purpose, hoping you’ll notice, because sitting has become a slot machine that keeps paying.
Now you add the word. As she’s lowering herself into the sit, say "sit" once, then mark and reward.
The word gets glued to a behavior she’s already offering enthusiastically, which is enormously easier than trying to install a behavior and a label at the same time.
Step 4: Get Your Timing Under One Second
Marking is the whole ballgame. Your marker word ("yes," "good," or a clicker if you like them) has to land the instant her rear touches the floor.
Not when you reach for the treat. Not when she looks up at you. The moment it happens.
Practice without your dog if you need to. Toss a ball in the air and say "yes" the exact moment it peaks. It sounds silly and it works.
Late marking is the single most common reason people think their dachshund is untrainable.
Step 5: Train in Ninety Second Bursts
Long sessions kill enthusiasm. Dachshunds have a short window where they’re sharp and eager, and pushing past it teaches them that training gets boring.
Set a timer for ninety seconds. Do five or six quick repetitions, then stop while your dog still wants more.
Five of these little sessions scattered through the day will beat one twenty minute marathon by an embarrassing margin.
When to End a Session
End on a win, always. If she’s struggling, ask for something ridiculously easy that she’ll nail, pay her generously, and walk away.
Ending on failure teaches your dog that training sessions feel bad. That association is much harder to undo than any individual command is to teach.
Step 6: Change One Thing at a Time
Your dachshund now sits perfectly in your kitchen. Take her to the sidewalk and she’ll look at you like you’ve started speaking Portuguese.
Dogs don’t generalize the way we assume. "Sit in the kitchen" and "sit in the front yard" are two separate skills until you teach both.
So change one variable at a time. New room, same everything else. Then new room with a distraction. Then outside, quiet street, no distractions.
Each time you raise difficulty, make the payoff bigger. Harder work, better wages.
Your dog isn’t being stubborn in a new place. She’s genuinely never done this before, as far as she’s concerned.
Step 7: Fade the Food Without Losing the Behavior
You don’t want to carry chicken forever. But quitting cold turkey (pun acknowledged) is how obedience collapses.
Start rewarding intermittently. Pay for every sit, then four out of five, then three out of five, unpredictably.
Unpredictable rewards are stronger than guaranteed ones. That’s the same principle that makes slot machines addictive, and it works beautifully in your favor here.
Keep praise constant even as treats thin out. Your voice becomes the reliable signal, and food becomes the occasional bonus.
Step 8: Guard Against Backsliding
Obedience isn’t a destination. It’s a maintenance habit, like brushing teeth.
Ask for a sit before meals. Before the leash goes on. Before you open the back door.
These moments cost you nothing, take two seconds, and quietly reinforce that your words carry weight all day long. That’s what "instant obedience" actually looks like from the inside: a hundred tiny rehearsals nobody notices.
If Things Fall Apart
Every dog regresses. Adolescence hits around seven to ten months and your beautifully trained dachshund may temporarily forget her own name.
Don’t escalate. Don’t get louder. Go back three steps, shorten the sessions, raise the treat value, and rebuild.
Regression is normal and it passes, provided you don’t respond to it by repeating commands and eroding your cues all over again.
Your First Week Plan
Days one and two: build treat value and practice marker timing. No commands yet.
Days three and four: catch and mark natural sits, then start adding the word.
Days five through seven: three or four ninety second sessions daily, one new location, generous pay.
By the end of that week you won’t have a robot. You’ll have a dachshund who’s figured out that listening to you is the fastest route to good things, which is the only kind of obedience that actually lasts.