Lessons Learned

[grant]

Does anyone have any lessons learned they want to share. Here is one of mine.

Ok, no making fun here, as I was extremely new to training when this happened.

I was working Bell on some birds and she was wanting to creep on the birds. I was loosing patience, so I bumped her with the e-collar. BAD IDEA. She instantly associated that bird with a shock and did not want anymore of that bird...

I new I had really made a BIG mistake, so we took a rest, and then went out for more birds. Luckily she was fine from then on.

Solution:
To stop Bell from creeping, I would set a bird in a launcher and let her hunt. As soon as she caught wend of the bird she would point. If she creeped in toward the bird, I would flush it. Within 2 or 3 birds, she knew that if she moved, the bird would flush...

The Logic:
When you try to swat a bug, whats the first thing you do? Most people freeze so the bug won't fly away. If you move to fast the bug will fly off. In the same manner, by flushing the bird on Bell, she realized that if she is not extremely cautious, she loose the bird.

Make Sense?

[Duane M]

Biggest lesson I have learned over the years is avoid a cookie cutter approach to training dogs. What works like the bees knees for 1 may well be like the bees sting for another. Like your example that nearly caused blinking I have used many times with no ill effects ever. No two dogs are the same.

[Country-Side Breeders]

How about introducing both the bird release and gun in the same breath????

I have a guy come in for work with that one. Messed the dog up big time. She had been a rather high strung dog to start and doing that put her over the edge.

Gradually is the key to training. Everything is due time. The dog's going to be around for a long time and is constantly learning, no need to rush everything at once.

[raven]

one thing I have learned is not to expect things to fast take training slow don't rush