I'm enjoying this thread !
I got lucky while I was still young enough to make some use of the luck . I seemed to attract "mentors" from among the old guard of gundog trainers. I took all of their often forcefully given criticisms and came back for more but I did not always do as they had told me to do. I was "panning for gold" among the gravel of all the well meaning advice.
My first mentor and the one I remained very good friends with until he died was a cantankerous old sod called Harry Mc Tier. He kicked off our relationship during the very first field trial I ever entered. It was a novice retriever trial and he was one of the judges.
He asked me , " Are you (insert swear word here) stupid or something ?" as I was attempting to handle my bitch. She was working on a pheasant runner and I thought I knew better than she did which way to go to find it !
I took the hint and left her alone and she came back with the pheasant.
On her next retrieve (we were in a very large and muddy turnip field with, it seemed, a pheasant hiding behind every second turnip ,) she went out of control and began to deliberately find and flush literally dozens of birds. I tried the stop whistle and I tried the recall whistle and they had no effect so I resorted to shouting at her. That didn't work either and the judges very forcefully told me to get out there and catch her ! I began to chase after her but have you ever tried to run in a muddy turnip field ? :roll: I tripped and fell time after time before I finally managed to get hold of her.
I began to trudge back towards the judges, other handlers and spectators who were all utterly silent as they witnessed my walk of shame. I'd had dreams of impressing all those people but I got the opposite.
Harry got hold of me later and told me a few home truths and I entered another trial after a bit more training with my bitch. This seemed to be approved of by the old timers who then knew I wouldn't easily be put off. They all began to give advice, they liked my attitude of taking my licks and still coming back for more.
That same bitch won a few trials and got to the retriever championships where I got eliminated ....but only after achieving the distinction of telling the Queen to move out of the way and having her do it ! But that's another story.
My advice to beginners is to listen to advice offered but to think for yourself too. There will be more gravel than gold in the prospecting pan. Find your own "method."
Bill T.
