Gun Dog Forum

Trekmoor

you're heretofore a Scottish RedNe-c! (That is, unless you prefer to be a Brexit RedNe-c!) MG :lol: So that's what I am ….and here was me thinking I'm just another Haggis basher with a whistle and a dug ! :lol: Many of my family emigrated to the States and to Canada and to S. Africa and Australia.....

Trekmoor

Now I really will be confused Robert ! :lol: It took me ages to learn what all the various descriptive letters and other gundog jargon meant and now you want to add another one !? :lol: As a dyed in the wool technophobe I don't even have a cell phone and using gundog sites on computers really strain...

Trekmoor

I have always enjoyed the "eyewipe" experience. You feel on top of the world when your dog pulls it off , especially if your dog has been the third or fourth dog the judges have tried on a bird ! On the other hand you feel a right numptie when someone else's dog pulls it off on you ! I've had both e...

Trekmoor

Since I have never been in the States I do not really know whether the standards of dog work in your tests and trials are the approximate equivalent of those in Britain or not. I can, however, say with some confidence that "gundogguys" last post on here is correct. In Britain dogs are trained to win...

Trekmoor

Brad, why do you think a dog needs to get a bird in it's mouth as a reward ? What I took from the video was that the dog knew birds were likely to be found in the magic brushpile from previous experience so the dog went there and "bumped" a bird . I see this fairly often if one of my dogs often find...

Trekmoor

Welcome to the forum. I completely agree....you do not need to use pen raised birds if you have access to wild birds. You don't even need an awful lot of wild birds ! I train mainly on public land that allows no shooting but which does have a few wild birds . All of my dogs for about 35 years have b...

Trekmoor

I can only agree with Robert (Polmaise), I wouldn't let a dog hunt out 3 to 400 hundred yards away from me in thick cover. I probably wouldn't let it get much more than 60 yards. I don't use GPS or an e-collar…. too complicated for my non-techie brain but I do put my whistle to good use whenever it ...

Trekmoor

The handler would have to find the partridge and that would be far from easy among some kinds of cover. A kick into the nearby cover will send an unshot bird into flight but probably not a wounded one. Unless the dog was allowed to investigate further that bird would maybe never be seen never mind "...

Trekmoor

To me that doesn't make much sense. If in your field trials a dog had held it's point on that lightly wounded partridge and then , because the bird could not fly or be found by the handler, was never even seen by the judges then wouldn't the dog be eliminated anyway for false pointing or unproductiv...

Trekmoor

My Brittany was eliminated from a field trial once for pointing and then moving in on and catching a live partridge. The local gamekeeper saved me from "the walk of shame" by examining the bird closely and finding pellet marks on one of it's wings. My bitch was allowed back into the trial. She'd poi...

Trekmoor

I am far from being certain about this as I have never been to the States but to judge from what I have read on this forum I have a feeling we, in Britain, use our whistles considerably more than you lads do when working pointing dogs and maybe spaniels too ? I use a whistle to turn a pointer if it ...

Trekmoor

Yup ! I am wondering if Jon is "pulling our chains !"

Bill T.

Trekmoor

Labs do have a dollop of hound in them. They have a dollop of pointer too and probably a few other breeds too. When the breed now known as the Labrador first arrived in Britain it tended to be the wealthy landowners who bought them. They did as dog fanciers have always done ….they added "a little bi...

Trekmoor

I once spectated at an Open Retriever trial on a warm day near to the start of the shooting season. A covey of partridge was flushed and one bird fell stone dead on to fairly short stubbles about 40 - 50 yards behind the line of trailers. It looked like a very easy retrieve as we could all see the b...

Trekmoor

English coonhounds are another really nice breed. Well that made me sit up and pay attention ! I thought for a moment that them there sneaky English had been keeping their coon hunting secret for all these years ! :lol: Until I read this I had no idea that this breed of dog existed, however, I have...

Trekmoor

Quote …"Bill also "touched" on the contact between Handler and dog (when judged) ...Yup ..No contact what so ever No verbal Heel, No verbal here,No verbal praise or Good Boy ,and Definitely No Touch Praise or correction ..all Non Slip. " end quote. Yep, the above quote from Robert is absolutely corr...

Trekmoor

I feel sort of dismayed after reading these posts. I'd always imagined game shooting/hunting was easy to get in the States ….or certainly by comparison to Britain ….easy to get. I got "priced out" of two little syndicate shoots I once belonged to here. Then the farm I'd trained my dogs on and shot o...

Trekmoor

Polmaise or Trekmoor, can you elaborate on retriever trials in the UK? I was told that they basically are expected to walk quietly at heel in a line of other dogs, til game is put before the gun, shot, and each dogs "turn" goes down the line. So Dog 1 gets the first bird shot, dog 2 gets the second...

Trekmoor

It does.

Bill T.

Trekmoor

I'm going to get flamed for this...But I'll say it anyway. If they're UK Natives, and have connections to bring back Nice, well bred labs and are decent trainers, they'd do well. Is it the perception among some N. Americans that British bred labs are better trained by British trainers JONOV ? By th...

Trekmoor

I get a keen "natural" retrieve going well first using bumpers Bill T. I agree that a dog or a pup that has done a lot of hunting and little if any retrieve practice may well be a reluctant or even a non-retriever. That's why I said the above. I greatly prefer to balance out the hunting and the ret...

Trekmoor

I don't do force breaking of any kind but my dogs still retrieve game.Perhaps the switchover to freshly shot birds was a bit too abrupt for your dog ? Perhaps it just isn't used to being asked to pick up still very warm birds ? I get a keen "natural" retrieve going well first using bumpers and then ...

Trekmoor

If this question had been asked of me just a few years back I'd have said I would not hand over one of my pups for someone else to train. Time, however, has caught up with me and so my present springer and my lab were given to another trainer to train but not until I had done the fun, early stuff wi...

Trekmoor

I'm another one from Haggisland but I think we are all Jock Tamson's bairns whether we come from Scotland or not. There is nothing worth arguing about that I've read in this thread and I haven't ever noticed any heavy handed moderating ….but maybe I'm not the sensitive type ? I do like to have some ...

Trekmoor

Hate to say it, but I don't think there is much you can do. Like Sharon I don't think there is much you can do about it. I have a 3 years old springer spaniel here. When he was 5 months old he got a fright when he met a perfectly friendly but much bigger dog and ran off into a wood. It took me 4 da...

Trekmoor

Retrieving separate from Hunting . Then put them together . . I completely agree. I have always done this and I have done it so often with so many dogs, always successfully , that it never even occurred to me that other people might not be doing the same. When I read the original post I was a bit p...

Trekmoor

Eh ? That's too deep for me Robert .

Bill T.

Trekmoor

Although I often hunted HPR's on shooting estate pheasants I also did a great deal of hunting , mainly for pheasants, on the public land within a few miles of my house. The few pheasants living on that land were all wild bred and just one find on them was worth dozens of finds on the easy birds rele...

Trekmoor

I'm not a dog trainer, so I would like to know what method you use to get a dog, when released from a point to flush or relocate? Oh Dear ! I was hoping nobody would ask that question ! :lol: There is no one and only answer and that question, or the variations of it, are often discussed/argued over...

Trekmoor

It makes little sense to me either. When I first read that American hunters went out in front of their pointing dogs in order to kick up the birds I at first thought there must be a reason for this . I have now read about it for nearly 40 years and I still have never read a good reason for it ! :lol...

Trekmoor

It has been my experience that Pointing type dogs are edge dogs flushing dogs thrive in the thick brushy stuff. I'm inclined to agree. I expect a pointing dog to take an easier route through thick cover than a spaniel would ....after all most pointing dogs are considerably larger than a spaniel and...

Trekmoor

I'm another one that thinks taking the pup to where game hides among thick cover is the best approach. It is true that some dogs make better cover dogs than others but the "others" will hunt cover …. if they believe game will be in there. In Britain we are lucky in one respect. Our shooting estates ...

Trekmoor

I agree with the others that "Here!" is the first command to teach. It should be taught with no strong distractions around to begin with and then with increasingly strong distractions. It should also be taught in as many different locations as possible. Dogs that "Do it fine in the garden or yard" t...

Trekmoor

Has any one You know that has a program with PR teaching a Pointer dog to point without Game ? ..Just asking for research . :wink: Hi Robert, that's quite an interesting question ! I've certainly never trained a dog to point without using live game but why would anybody want to train a dog to point...

Trekmoor

I much preferred the film clip from "Only Fools and Horses" --- the one in which Batman and Robin come charging out of their Reliant Robin to do battle with the baddies . That scene was one of the funniest things I've ever seen ! :lol: Betcha oor Haggis's are bigger than your's though ! :lol: Bill T.

Trekmoor

I don't disagree with the O.P.'s post . I think that when advice is given not to "train" a 5 months old puppy , I and others who have advised against this are just giving cautious advice due to the fact that when someone asks about training so young a pup ,that person is likely to be an inexperience...

Trekmoor

With a 5 months old pup or even a 7 month old pup, I wouldn't be doing any serious training. I'd just get the recall to voice and whistle well under way. Train it to sit to voice and to whistle when it is close to me. Give it some run-in type retrieves and try to have it find and probably chase a fe...

Trekmoor

I've just watched the video and quite enjoyed it. I was not overly impressed with some of the work I saw though. The dog did not "go" well enough to suit me when hunting but then I tend to like the "slash and burn" sort of hunting dogs ! :lol: I did not like the very close approach of the dog to the...

Trekmoor

A good question ! I sort of took it for granted that the O.P. meant not holding a point.

Bill T.

Trekmoor

Ye'd huv me in jail, you bleeper ! :roll:

Bill T.

Trekmoor

The bleeding tail would have me worried. Some dogs lash their tails as they hunt and if the tail is a long one then it can be battered to shreds near it's end. That can put a dog out of action for a long time and it can also cost a fortune at the vet ! It is why spaniels have their tails docked and ...

Trekmoor

I've just googled searched the size of British robins ...they are only 12 -14 cms in length. Your "bleep" birds are bigger than ours !

Bill T.

Trekmoor

That thing about the size of American woodcock made me think the size stated must be a mistake too. As Polmaise says our woodcock are many times larger than a robin.....unless you have huge robins ! :lol: A robin is smaller than a snipe , the smallest of our British gamebirds and I always feel a bit...

Trekmoor

I agree with the other folk, your dog "knows too much!" Something very similar sometimes happens in our retriever field trials over here. A dog will come to realise it is in a "no handler contact" situation and will run -in although remaining perfectly steady during ordinary shooting days ! In days ...

Trekmoor

Thanks for that video.... one of the best I have ever seen. That's what I call a fun day out !

Bill T.

Trekmoor

In Britain no game is shot during pointer/setter trials , just a shot fired to "salute" the departing birds following a point. Game, both feathered and furred (rabbits and hares) is shot in our H.P.R. (hunt - point - retrieve) trials for the versatile breeds. The dogs have to be steady to flush, to ...

Trekmoor

I really enjoyed that video ! Well done. What a terrific piece of ground to hunt a dog over but it did look very difficult to keep in touch with the dog among all that cover. Can you tell me how long that run was time-wise ? In Britain we very seldom get more than about 15 -20 minutes to find game i...

Trekmoor

While I would not play tuggy with a pup for fear of causing a problem later on I do know some good gundog trainers who say it does no harm at all. Personally, I will continue to play safe by not playing tuggy because If there isn't a problem then I don't want to make one.

Bill T.

Trekmoor

It sounds a bit like a submission widdle to me . My daughters 9 months old GSP pup does this when she visits us . The pup widdles in submission to my own dogs and he widdles in submission to my wife and to me. He has done this since he was very young but it is a behaviour that is fading as he gets o...

Trekmoor

When I read this threads opening post I thought your pup was probably a good bit overweight. Now I have seen the pup's photographs I no longer think so. He does not look particularly fat to me. He is probably just going to be a big lab. I have seen and trained a very fit and muscular adult lab male ...

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