Gun Dog Forum

As I read it, you have already acquired the pup so all the genetics/health clearances are now history. As for the wing-on-a-string-thing, I tell folk to get their camera, get the pup to point or flash point that wing, take the pic and then put the wing away until you get your next pup. You can get a...

Max2, that box is a piece of furniture not a dog box. VERY nice job! I have been there and back at least 3 times re dog boxes. I had a dog box (nothing as nice as the one shown above) then a double dog box. Mine were made of wood too. They worked fine but I was constantly loading and unloading so it...

Gonehuntin', I'm with you. I keep dogs, especially young dogs away from frigid water for obvious reasons especially since our winters are colder than a mother-in-law's kiss! The resolve as suggested by Gonehuntin' makes sense too, as long as your dog is entering the water but failing the retrieve. I...

Sharon, you're right on!
I agree Trekmoor. The key here is that whatever you want to call it, it drives the dialog for conversation/clarity.

Timewise/GrayGhost, you obviously understand and try to do the due diligence but I guess what we are overlooking are those do-gooders that have no reticence throwing their McDonalds bags and coffee cups out the window as they drive down the road but think that busting your car window somehow makes t...

I get it...the heat and all that. I drive a p/u truck and hardly ever take my dogs in the cab with me. My dogs travel in crates anyway, for their safety AND mine or others either in my vehicle or sharing the roads. I know, I know, you love your dogs more than I do so they jump around from side to si...

Timewise, I don't see how you possibly think that leaving a dog(s) in a secured or locked vehicle is cruel? I'm sorry but I just don't get it?
I could offer that hunting my bird dogs can bring with it a greater risk. Perhaps I shouldn't do that either?

There can be a wide variety of definitions for started to finished. At the end of the day, your opinion of what "started" is counts only as much as what the seller is willing to agree to. In-other-words, a conversation between buyer and seller to accurately determine what the pup is capable of, what...

I think yellow is OK on a gloomy overcast day perhaps. The selection of colors is vast today so, try some on before you buy. They are a tremendous investment! Ask anyone here that has rushed to get to a standing grouse or woodcock find only to have a small branch whip back and whack your eye!! Man.....

Hey Gonehuntin', I got a very noticeable improvement in a guide's young pointer female by the end of day1 this past January! The guide was actually a model dog handler but got frustrated with the new addition's yo-yoing. (Previous owner fried the pointer to try to get a NAVHDA dog.) We just did what...

Hey BR, just as an aside, what is the breeding on said dog?

Deroid, the "trained retrieve" does not have to be the aversive approach it used to be. It has come miles! The reason I mention it is because your dog could at any given time elect not to retrieve if not properly trained. Some guys don't really mind but if you drop your shot bird on the opposite ban...

Dogs in general are great discriminators and lousy generalists. My dogs in the past ran (and competitively) in horseback trials. I conditioned them off of horseback but more often from an ATV. Those same dogs were exceptional woodcock dogs and hunt club dogs (biddable gun dogs). They know/learn the ...

Thank you. The young male I don't have a picture of. He has that typical Elhew (jowly) head too. VERY capable dogs for their age. By year 2 the owners will be having a blast with their young prospects. They bird hunt together in KS, OK, TX, NV, in Canada and Argentina. Lucky "dogs"!

This is the Nitro beatch. She was ~10 months old.
Sorry....not great resizing pics, etc.
If you click on the pic and scroll around you can EVENTUALLY see the dog.
Hmmm.....???

I've just developed 2 nice dogs out of Nitro Kennels (Missouri). At 14 months they are handling with an absolute minimum of intervention from their owners, steady for the most part, retrieving to hand and backing (needing a little more reliability/consistency on backing, but they are young so....eas...

I have experienced exactly that Gonehuntin'. Some of my toughest days afield have been in high winds. It really puts a damper on things. Birds need their hearing as an integral part of their survival strategies. Wind compromises our hearing AND theirs too. On the prairies, the birds will go into low...

I get it Cj. Everybody has a budget. My first dog (1/2 Britt & 1/2 springer) cost me $80. That was in 1974.
Peoples palate along with their budget can change and not always for the better .

Wow!!!! Congrats on such a nice pup! ..........I want one.

gonehuntin', you and I agree on this, whistles do have their place. I used to do what you do now Fishvik, for many years with success I might add. In fact, bells are integral part of cover trials. I found them VERY effective. Somehow, I could still triangulate on where she/he last was and find my do...

Excellent question fishvik. There are two pieces of technology that play a part in my remote grouse hunting specifically. One is the GPS unit. I sometimes couple this with a beeper but I have it on the point-only mode. When I hear the beeper, I remotely turn it off as soon as possible then navigate ...

I think you are being far too hard on yourself Mountaineer. Back to the point, I have used whistles with Springers and Labs. They do have their place - just not with pointing dogs, again in my opinion. I have heard the incessant blast of whistles at a couple of the local hunt clubs on too many occas...

Perhaps I was unclear about the fact that I was being specific to the pointing breeds. I do recognize the value of a whistle for the flushers. Mountaineer, your post becomes more of an attack than a matter of fact. I leave it with this. All my bird hunting outings are based on one goal, which is to ...

Mountaineer, I thoroughly enjoyed your response. My hunting experiences on wild birds have no place for a whistle. To answer GSPONPONT, they are allowed which is a good thing if you're a conservationist. I feel that range is not a reason to need a whistle. Independence is, and as such reflects 2 dyn...

I won't use a whistle. They are invasive and in my opinion have little place in my wild bird hunting venues.
Can someone share with me why you would want to use one when wild bird hunting - and I don't mean for safety sake in the event that you get lost.

The most I have ever spent on a dog was 2 years. It was a tough go....aside from the $$$.
He couldn't run more than an hour or he'd be laid up for three days. Further to that, he got a lump on his chest. It was cancerous.
He was such a nice dog...........

GREAT subject! The variables are SO many, aren't they? I personally put very little value on chokes. For-that-matter, I prefer fixed choked guns over screw-ins. That said, I'm not a BIG waterfowler. Most of my gunning is done over pointing dogs and wild birds. The shooting technique I personally dep...

There are shooters and there are impassioned bird dog connoisseurs. The shooters see a dog as a medium for their true passion, which is providing birds within gun range. Their motto might be, "If it flies, it dies." Competent pointing dogs are not supposed to work "within gun range" they are suppose...

If you want to make a lot of money, hang with those that have lots of money. If you want to learn to train well, learn from those that have a rich history (and just not a 1 hit wonder) of well-trained dogs or successful competitors (assuming they are willing to share). Lastly, keep in mind that the ...

I have always found the feel of a Ruger to be bulky/chunky. It's weight supports my perception and not what I enjoy in my forays afield. In my estimation, I believe you are misinterpreting feel for fit. A gun should fit you however if both a Ruger and a Purdey were made to the exact same specs, they...

Fausti makes wonderful shotguns and they are great value when you keep in mind price-point. They can also develop a custom SxS for you. A friend of mine did exactly that. It is a 20 gauge SxS with a very nice piece of wood, tight wood to metal, and the engravings are stunning - the bottom one is of ...

Karlk, while you may have done something that has contributed to your dog's current situation, the main thing is to get things back on track. You aren't, nor will you be the only person to get something wrong....assuming you did. To begin with, I believe you need more current reference material, but...

I hunt my dogs on the open prairies, dense grouse bush and just about everything in between. My personal experience especially when grouse hunting is that the odds for success increase the more my dog distances itself from me - within reason. Hard as I try, I make too much noise negotiating grouse r...

Although I have the telemetry, I like the Dogtra 2500 on point mode only (depending on the terrain I'm hunting). The incessant ping of a bell drives me crazy and somehow after a certain period of time, my mind shuts it out anyway.....thankfully. Finally, bells don't work when you need them most. In ...