2-year old GSP problems retrieving pheasants

myersc · Post by **myersc** » Sat Oct 11, 2014 10:53 pm

Hi - I just took my 2-year old GSP out pheasant hunting for the first time yesterday and she did great. It was my first time bird hunting but the guy I was with has alot of experience and he was very impressed with the dog. She pointed very well, zig-zagged lots and was very birdie. The only problem we had is she wouldn't retrieve. In fact the first bird we shot landed on the edge of water and she practically stepped on it and we had to show her the bird. The second bird came down wounded but she got on him quick but didn't bring it back to us. She is pretty good with dummies and my command is basically 'fetch', 'here' and 'drop'. Does anyone have any suggestions on what I can do with her? I kept two of the wings thinking there is maybe I could do something with them. Any help is appreciated. She is also collar conditioned. Thanks.

DonF · Post by **DonF** » Sun Oct 12, 2014 9:59 am

Pretty good with dummy's pretty much say's what's wrong. You never worked on retrieving a dead bird. Guy I knew in Montana many years ago taught his lab to retrieve using duck decoy's. He figured the dog would do great. Took it hunting, shot a duck, sent the dog and the dog brought back every decoy, left the duck!

Get a dead bird, pigeon is fine. Freeze it. When you got out to work on retrieving, take that dead bird and thaw it long enough the head won't break off when you throw it. Start over with short retrieve's first then go longer, won't take long. Ya get through that, get several and kill them for her. She'll come around fine. You taught her to retrieve dummy's and didn't send her for one!

Neil · Post by **Neil** » Sun Oct 12, 2014 11:32 am

DonF wrote:Pretty good with dummy's pretty much say's what's wrong. You never worked on retrieving a dead bird. Guy I knew in Montana many years ago taught his lab to retrieve using duck decoy's. He figured the dog would do great. Took it hunting, shot a duck, sent the dog and the dog brought back every decoy, left the duck!

Get a dead bird, pigeon is fine. Freeze it. When you got out to work on retrieving, take that dead bird and thaw it long enough the head won't break off when you throw it. Start over with short retrieve's first then go longer, won't take long. Ya get through that, get several and kill them for her. She'll come around fine. You taught her to retrieve dummy's and didn't send her for one!

That

Fun dog · Post by **Fun dog** » Sun Oct 12, 2014 3:36 pm

Sounds pretty normal. My dog with lots of bird retrieving experience will often run over a new kind of bird the first time out. I like to let her figure it out. The second bird she will be retrieving like normal.

GoBeavs85 · Post by **GoBeavs85** » Sun Oct 12, 2014 8:25 pm

My gsp did the same thing her first season. I spent that whole year picking up my own roosters. I'm just a weekend warrior so it did t bother me too much. At the end if the season we went to a preserve that releases hens. After a couple hens she finally started retrieving even the roosters. I have a very submissive dog and I think the big roosters just intimidated her for the first exposure to dead birds. Sounds like I needed DonF's advice a couple years ago.

Superhawk · Post by **Superhawk** » Mon Oct 13, 2014 4:53 pm

I have always force fetched my dogs...even the ones that retrieved well in the yard as pups. I had a GSP years ago that I swore would fetch a dead bird on command and he made a liar out of me as dogs can do at the wrong time. He was "bleep" good with bumpers too.

If you are not going to FF your dog then at least freeze a hen Pheasant to use instead of bumpers. I always use a frozen bird in my last phase of FF. If they will run to retrieve a dead frozen bird then they will retrieve just about anything including dead critters they find hunting. This is also a great tool for teaching them to find down birds in thick cover. I throw a frozen bird in thick cover and have the dog search. You can have a lot of fun with this too. After some practice you will be surprised at how you can't lose the frozen bird because no matter what the dog finds it!

myersc · Post by **myersc** » Tue Oct 14, 2014 9:31 pm

I took the wings from the bird and secured them to the dummy. I've been tossing that for and initially she only wanted to bite at the feathers. But after a few tosses she eventually caught on. On day 2 of doing this she was very excited to retrieve the dummy - more than she has ever wanted to. I hope to get her out hunting again this weekend so will see how she does.

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