Roading Harness

Post by **grant** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 7:31 pm

Does anyone have a recommendation on a roading harness?

Post by **grant** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 9:44 am

anyone?

Post by **Greg Jennings** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 9:49 am

Lion Country has several.

I had a hard time adjusting their leather version down to fit my V. I think it's more pointer-sized. Bell shouldn't have a problem and Kage isn't old enough to road in harness yet.

Best,

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 11:04 am

I think we talked a little bit about it on that "conditioning dogs" thread where you and I discussed our friend Richard Simmons. I bet the picture I posted there is gone now, because of changes at www.hunt101,com, where it was posted. so will try locate and post it again. Are you looking for a recommendation as to type of harness, or a particular brand and model?

It depends a little on what type of roading you are going to do. The "pulling chain" system I described on that thread requires a harness with two "O" or "D" rings on each side, along the dog's chest. If you are going to have the dog pull against an elevated position (the "thing" being pulled is higher than the dog), such as roading from a horse or from an ATV, then you want a harness with a single ring at the top, that sits on the dog's spine. You can get harnesses that have both. The one I use for chains, for example, also has a center top ring I think. But the design of that particular harness itself is more for pulling an object that is at or below the dog's level. It has a strap across the chest that takes the pull load, and that strap is oriented fairly high on the dog's chest. The leather harnesses meant for roading from a horse are more designed to pull a higher object, that is, the whole orientation of the harness is meant to pull down. Most of the leather harnesses meant to road from a horse, have a leather cushion in the lower center of the dog's chest, to take the "down pull" effort, and cushion the dog's body.

Lastly, if you are going to try the "dog scootering" thing, you could consider a sled dog harness. They are well designed for pulling at just a slight down angle. The only thing I do not like about the one's I have, and the one's I have seen in catalogs, is the dog is not securely buckled into the harness. It can wiggle out.

So ... what type of roading are you planning on doing.

PS that pic is at home on my other computer, so I will have to post this evening.

Post by **grant** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 11:47 am

Thanks Greg and John,

I haven't looked online for them yet. I was going to get input first...

I'm looking for one that my bunch can use to pull weight (chains)

Grant

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 12:26 pm

that's the one i have in that pic that i will send you tonight. my harness is 30 years old (still works good) and the company that sold it is gone. but i saw one very similar if not identical on the internet, and will try to find. the webbing is nylon, and the horizontal strap across the chest is padded with lamb's wool, which made it very comfortable for the dog. it has the rings on the side, as well as one centered in the back. i use the one centered in the back to hook a lead to, just to keep control of the dog if needed, but usually let the lead go slack. it also has a strap that goes across the dog's back behind the neck, and buckles under the chest. no need to buckle it tightly, can be loose. but the combination of straps works like a collar - the dog cannot get out or get away.

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 12:39 pm

this looks like it. http://www.dresslersdog.com/harness01.html called the coastal wagon pulling harness. don't remember anymore if that is the brand, but it looks identical. mine has lasted forever. you can see from the description and picture that the strap that bears the pulling load are nice and wide and padded. the scotts padded harness on that same page looks nice too, but i can't find any pictures or description of the padding or where it is, so not sure about that one.

hunting season must be coming if you are thinking it is time to get some conditioning in.

good luck. watch the heat.

Post by **grant** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 8:52 pm

John, this isn’t actually what I had in mind!? =)

Just kidding =) The costal one looks nice. I’ll probably get one soon. I’m not planning on using it too much now. Like you mentioned, its HOT! Matter-O-fact Lins and I took the pups to the lake this last weekend. The fish finder said the water was 89 degrees. Lord knows what the temp was. About the only time I can find cool weather for the pups is early in the mornings.

BTW, I sure hope they look like your pup when they start pulling…

Grant

Post by **ezzy333** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 9:45 pm

Grant,

Nice looking Shorthair! How is his range? Bet I could keep up with him!!!

Ezzy

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 9:45 pm

Yeah, I saw that picture on the site. Reminded me of our friend Richard.

Here are the pics. I posted them back on the hunt101 site, because they are too big for the album, and I was too lazy to resave them to reduce the file size.

Thanks for the comment about the pups, but neither is in great physical condition right now. The female in the pics is at home, and I had big plans to road her and break her STW&S this summer, but the breaking process was slower and more time consuming, and the heat was bad, so have not roaded her much. She is pretty much broke now though. Just working on backing and some polishing things. She does get to free run outside quite a bit.

The trial dog, her brother, came down with giardia and lost a bunch of weight, but is fine now, and is putting it back on. I will see him in a couple of weeks at the NGSPA Region 8 Championships.

TAK · Post by **TAK** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 10:27 pm

I know I got my harness's from Dressler dogs but I don't see the same model listed? I will cry if I can't get the same one for my third dog!
Besides being leatherand the top ring, mine looks like Wagonmasters.

Post by **Ayres** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 11:49 pm

Ok, the only stupid questions are the ones left unanswered, right?

So..

Why, precisely, do you road dogs? If a dog is maintaining a good weight and physique, do you still road it? Is roading necessary on all dogs? Does roading require the dog to pull, or just run his legs off?

sdgord · Post by **sdgord** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 4:40 am

Steven, we use roading to build stamina, we dont look at roading as the dog running its legs off but more of a pull to build the rear for more drive. Dogs that are conditioned through roading seem to have more drive and staying power. Its probably not so important on a hunt test or a thirty minute stake, but in the field during the season a dog that goes the full day hard is the one that gets the nod.SDGORD

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 6:14 am

FT pros do it for the stamina and rear end drive. Mind, we are not talking about weight lifting here. But roading builds a very strong rear end. I have had FT dogs live to 15 with no arthritis or weak rear end. It is usually something else that gets them. Pros do it partly because they have a big string of dogs to train and condition, and it takes quite awhile to free run a dog in the field. You can road several at one time from an ATV, or two or three from a horse. So a particular dog might be free run twice during a week, and roaded once or twice. Four workouts in less total time for the pro. Also, roading can be delegated to the pros assistant.

I do it because we have practically no places to train in the open field anymore, without traveling. So I condition by roading, and I work on planted birds in my back pasture, and then whenever I get the chance and have a day or two I travel to spots where I can run off horseback, or at least can turn the dog loose and foot handle. The roading helps me condition when I can not free run. It is also a great help in conditioning a dog to deal with heat during the hunting season. Our first trip is normally to the Dakotas for sharptails in early Sept., and it can be HOT. They are way better off if they have been roaded all summer.

Last, it is more time to spend with the dog.

The one caution I give everybody is not to overdo. Three or four times per week is ok when you are just starting up and the runs are short, 5-15 minutes. At 15 minutes or more, three times per week is max. When you eventually get into the 30 min. to hour range, two times a week is plenty and even just once is fine. It is easy to overdo if you get "goals" in your mind, and aren't observant of what is going on with the dog as you march the dog toward your goals. If you overdo, you will actually slow a dog down, and you will take too much of the edge off that excitement that makes for style. You will have a bored, overworked dog.

markj · Post by **markj** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 8:32 am

use roading to build stamina

I never thought of having a dog pull stuff other than some pit bulls I had long ago. I do this tho, fetch up hill, run them up hills. Used to work for the race horses Dad bred and raced. I have lots of hills where we live and my dogs free run on 4 acres of hill.

I see where some people are using rolling carts and GSPs like the old gladiators. I might try this next spring/summer.

Anyone swim their dogs for exercise? I do this a lot, they love it and get a strong workout in very high heat with no ill effects. Well other than they dont want to stop

and go home.

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 8:40 am

Yes, I used to swim my first trial dog quite a bit. Had one of those retriever trainers that fires a dummy with a blank cartridge, and the large cartridge/small dummy combination would go well over a hundred yards. have to make sure the dog will do a long water retrieve first though. also would just take him out with a rowboat and have him swim behind the boat. maybe it was just the particular dog, he would do water retrieves with a hand thrown dummy all day and love it, but he did not seem to relish the swims that were long enough to have any conditioning effect. He liked running more.

Dogs are like humans in this regard: short burst exercise is certainly exercise, but has limited aerobic value. It takes some duration, like over 15 minutes, to start to build athletic aerobic capacity.

ohiogsp · Post by **ohiogsp** » Fri Aug 26, 2005 12:12 am

Wagon master I was just lookin at this post and seen the pics of your female. I thought I was lookin at mine. I will have to get a pic and post it here. Does she have any Ohi shamless in her?

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Fri Aug 26, 2005 6:34 am

no Ohi Shameless. Much Dixieland's Rusty. Would like to see the pic.

ohiogsp · Post by **ohiogsp** » Fri Aug 26, 2005 7:35 pm

Mine has alot of rusty also but was sired by Ohi shamless so I thought maybe yours had some in there. These dogs look alot alike.

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Sat Aug 27, 2005 5:57 am

I can see some minor differences, but mostly you are right, they are twins. Coat color and pattern are virtually identical. Cool.

Mine is three, and I am breaking her this summer. Ordinarily would have done that a couple of years ago, but hip surgery caused the delay. How old is yours?

ohiogsp · Post by **ohiogsp** » Sat Aug 27, 2005 6:45 am

She is 7 mo. old I have just started working with her. Yesterday was the third time she was on birds. I had a checkcord on her and she was holding point good enough I could flush birds in front of her. She is a retrieving machine also, so I am very excited about this dog. You had hip surgery on you or the dog?

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Sat Aug 27, 2005 7:15 am

Me. Kind of a long story, but got in a race with a brown in Alaska and won the race but lost the hip. Not as dramatic as that sounds. Just was not able to work dogs much for about a year and a half. She is taking the training fine, just slower maybe than a pup would.

I have hunted over mine quite a bit prior to this year, though. She stands her birds and picked up the retrieving by herself pretty much.

ohiogsp · Post by **ohiogsp** » Sat Aug 27, 2005 11:43 pm

Your hip is what we around here like to call a bad deal'e'o. It sure is nice when they start retrieving on there own. This is my first dog I might not have to FF. I think they either have it or they don't. Well good luck.

Casper · Post by **Casper** » Tue Aug 30, 2005 11:35 pm

John,

Can you give some more detail on roading w/ the chains?

How long a chain?

Where can I get chain big enough that would not have to be shipped?

Starting a dog out the first time? What to know and what not to do.

Anything else one might need to know

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:02 am

Casper-

Sorry I almost missed your post. There is a discussion with more detail on a thread started by Colleen on May 18 at Health and Nutrition: Hard & Lean Field Condition. You have to put up with Grant's sense of humor to read it though. Actually, I was egging him on a little.

You can buy chain at most hardware stores. Length is not so important. You are mostly looking for weight. But as that thread says, you set the rig up so the dog is not lifting the chain, he is pulling or draggin. Get a medium heavy link that can take some wear. If you want to start with, say, 8 lbs., you can buy connecting links at the same hardware store, so you could buy two 4# pieces (total 8 #'s) and two 2# pieces. The 2# pieces added on to the 4# pieces would give you two 6# pieces = 12 lbs. Working up in weight, though, is not as important as working up in duration and number of days of exercise per week. I have found that most dogs in reasonable condition in the 45-55 lb. weight category, can pull 12 lbs. pretty quickly, if not right away. I do not even bother working dogs up in chain weight anymore, unless it is a young dog I am just training to pull chain.

More important is the duration. Would start with maybe just 5 - 10 minutes and three days a week. As you go up in duration you should watch the dog and make sure he is not getting discouraged or over stressed. If you are thinking of doing this to get the dog in shape for this coming season, I would think if you could get to 15 or 20 minutes, that would be plenty given the fairly short period of time left. If you do this long term, once you have worked up to a half hour or more, it is a good idea to drop back to 2 days a week.

Watch the heat, and watch for signs of overtraining, such as the dog running slower during exercise. You want to think like a good athletic trainer, and not break the athlete.

If you have any other questions after reading that other thread, let me know.

Wagonmaster · Post by **Wagonmaster** » Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:40 am

I read over that other thread and it did not have all the detail I thought it had. Maybe we were talking about it somewhere else. But just to make sure it is all covered, her is "the rest of the story."

You need to be in or on some kind of vehicle that will let you go 12-15 miles an hour. Can be a bicycle, ATV, car or truck. You also need to find a good gravel or clay base, or short mowed grass, to run on. Pavement will slip pads right away quick, and is too much of a pounding on the dog's legs.

The area I live in used to have lots of gravel roads with light traffic, so that is where I did the most of the this. I would attach a long lead rope to the center ring on the dog's harness, run it out the window of the truck, and drive. I would pull all the way over to the left side of the road and put my flashers on. No one ever gave me a hard time, and I got a lot of smiles and waves as people went around me. The dog would run on the left shoulder or far left side of the road. If a car came along and did not seem to know what to do, I would just pull over and stop while they figured it out and went by, but that did not happen much. Never had a dog that was dumb enough to run close to the truck. Should be obvious that you want some slack in the lead, but not a big bunch of slack that could get the lead under the truck tires. I never found it hard to adjust this.

I could hit 12-15 mph and track it on the speedometer.

Now, all the roads are paved and there is too much traffic, but we have some good long public trails that are packed clay, so I do this with a bicycle. We also have some private roads that are paved, but with a nice grass shoulder. They have virtually no traffic, so I still use the "car window" method on those roads, but mostly just to start a dog, because the roads are not long enough to get in a full half hour. The bike paths are plenty long.

If you are in a rural area, you should be able to find plenty of roads that fit the bill.

Always bring water, and watch the heat. If you can contrive to have a pond or stream near where you stop your roading, the dog will love it. If they have any water shyness at all, they will not after they have been running for a half hour and are hot.

Not much more to it than that.