Curious Hunter Needs HELP!!!

[jballa34]

Okay so I my fiance and I just got a new puppy who is a mix, however I believe he is mostly lab and possibly some sort of pointer. He obviously has hunting in his blood but I'm worried about training him. He's incredibly smart and only 5 months old. I think that for both mine and the puppies sakes it would be best to train him in retrieving and not so much in pointing or flushing birds. I mostly hunt ducks and geese with both decoying and jumping ponds, lakes, and rivers. I had a few basic questions about training since I'm a first timer. Any information would be very helpful.

1. When should I introduce him to a gun? I'm on a very limited budget since I'm a college student so training aids aren't really an option.

2. I know I need pigeons but when and how exactly do I use them?

3. What should he know and how old should he be before I take him into the field?

4. He has some issues with focusing on me while we are training, is this normal and how can I teach him out of this?

These are just a few of the main questions I have and any response is greatly appreciated!

[kninebirddog]

As for what to work on since you have a mix breed you first need to determine what traits your pup took on. Being a mix the dog may not have any real hunting instincts in him and may make just an awesome pet to being an awesome bird dog...that would be where i would start

I would probably say your best bet is to find a preserve or a training group of some kind and get some hands on help ..this way you can get proper exposure to birds and even get proper intro to the gun and also some guidance of how to get your pup to grow up being the dog you want him to be

[jimbo&rooster]

I was where you are about 3 yrs ago. Farmer down the road had an oops litter out of his lab and I got a pup. I know that they say these dogs get one set of traits or another, and to some extent that is more or less true. Think about it this way..... That dodg of yours doesnt know that he isnt supposed to be great. If you take your dog out in the field and expose it to all of the things that you would a hunting retriever then their is a good chance that you will at least get a passable hunting dog. That dog of mine came from a litter of 13 and she was the only one that was exposed to anything other than a couch or a back yard. She picks up about 200doves, 100sh ducks/geese, and flushes/retrieves 50-75 pen raised pheasants a year, as well as some wild quail working with my GSP.

I will say that she didn't have the natural drive to retrieve that most labs have but was one of the easiest dogs I have FF'd. Once she figured out what I was looking for it was like a light went on in her head. Just be patient and understand that things can go either way but if you put in the time and read and learn eveything you can then chances are you should have a dog that will work.

As far as pigeons i wouldnt get to worried other than a quick intro, for a retriever you can do 90% of your training with bumpers.

get that dog out in the field yesterday. let him run and explore and see whats out there. if you want to use him as a flusher start now on keeping him in range. if he gets outside of where your comfortable call him back then let him go again.

the attention thing is normal for a pup that age keep formal training short maybe 10 mins or so.





Good Luck
Jim