Brand New to Puppy Training (for the 4th time)

[Lemonpointer]

New to the forum, So hello to all.
I just finished reading a post regarding the training of a 4 month old GSP. It was a well needed shot in the arm
I have owned 4 puppies in my life (2 hunters and 2 pound pups). Why is it then upon picking up my new pointer on 2/28 I feel as though I have never done it before? I am stressed, nervous, worried -- you name it. This is the first truely hunt bred puppy I have owned and I want to "do this one up right". I have myself worked into a mess. The post about the GSP had one common idea....Let the pup be a pup and let the training happen when the pup is ready. I needed to hear that. Sometimes we want something so badly that we wind up screwing it up. That's ok if it is only you that is affected, but I sure as heck don't want to take a solid promising puppy down with me. Thanks for the shot in the arm

[tn red]

Welcome and lots of good folks with great advice on here

[ezzy333]

Welcome aboard and hope we can help. My advice is always do the manners type training and take the pup out for a free run once a week and that is about all that you need to worry about for the first few months. It's just a puppy for now and will become a bird dog puppy when it gets older and decides it wants to point a bird.

Ezzy

[snips]

[AzDoggin]

Congratulations!!

There is a saying that the more educated a person becomes, the more he realizes how much he has yet to learn. I think that is some of what you are feeling, and it's a great sign.

I'm reading Ben O. Williams book right now - Bird Dog: The Instinctive Training Method and it is mostly about bringing up pups. I think the book is outstanding. Basically he says other than shaping to form good manners, let the pup teach himself how to handle birds through lots of experience with them. Lots of times, we get in pups way and slow his learning when if we just let him have some varied experiences, he'll learn faster on his own.

There is an amazing wealth of knowledge on this forum, and folks are kind enough to share their expertise freely.

Have fun!

[Lemonpointer]

Thanks for the well wishes. Looking forward to many fun years ahead with my new hunting buddy.

[Shadow]

can you put a picture up

[AzDoggin]

can you put a picture up

Yep. we need pics. You could just be making all this up.

[Lemonpointer]

Tried to post pics but having a hard time. Pics came out too big and avatar size is too many KiBs. Still working on it

[dakotashooter2]

I'm glad I'm not alone. Training my last dog (my first attempt) was like the blind leading the blind. I really hadn't done my homework yet she turned out much better than she should have. My training consisted of what "seemed to be common sense". I suppose that is why it worked. Fortunately I learned as much from her as she learned from me (probably more). Now I'm doing my homework and am more aprehensive than when I knew nothing. Still I'm looking forward to it.

[Ryman Gun Dog]

LemonPointer,
Its hard for me to relate to this because at any time we have a min of 6 hunting dogs here at the home kennel, the people here on the forum have given you good advise and you have had experience enough to handle training your own hunting dog. If you need further help there are a lot of people who can help you right here, if you need additional advise drop me some e-mail at pine-creek@live.com we train Grouse dogs here all the time, and always have time to give training advise.
Pine Creek Grouse Dog Trainers
RGD/Dave

Advising a client during one of our training hunts.