Celebrating our 10th anniversary in 2008 Montana Radio Program of the Year Award Winner     Jeff Smith's dog training tips Hershey enjoys some training. Training topics Traveling with dogs The whistle sit Joy to Christmas puppies To sit to flush? Or not? Puppy vs. Started Dog Teaching quartering Dog first aid General hunting etiquette Prepare your dog for upland birds Teaching a dog about boats Greetings from the tollers gathering Teaching the recall command Hunting just around the corner Working on multiple marks A bit more on marking More discussion on marking Don't get stuck at the line Keep in mind how dogs learn All about gun conditioning Getting your gun dog started Socialization of a pup is important What to do with a Christmas pup It's time to worm the dog Keep pets safe during the holidays 3-1-2008 Traveling with dogs I was reminded about about a few things as far as traveling with dogs after going down to Reno last weekend for the Elk Foundation's National Convention. Rarely do I every go anywhere without at least one of my dogs. I always enjoy having them with me and actually feel pretty strange if I don't have at least one along. The first thing you need to decide is if appropriate for a dog to go to the place that you are going. A prime example would have been Reno. If I was going down there for a non-working trip this might have been one of those times that I did not take a dog with me. I was in a hotel where I was up on the 25th floor and one that did not allow dogs. Everything is paved, so that is really no place to walk them at all and it did take some time each day to really tend to them. You can't take them along and then ignore them they do require some of your time each day. In this case having someone that you can trust take care of them at your home, or boarding them can definitely be the right decision. However, this was an unusual case for me and I do normally take dogs with me wherever I go. There is a little preparation that should take place if you are going to take the ol boy or girl along. Of course there are the obvious things like taking food and a dog bowl, leash and going to a more urban setting I like to carry a box of "Doggy Dooly" bags so that I can clean up after my dogs when I take them for a walk. But there are other things to think about depending in where you are going. If you will be staying in a hotel, it is good to check before leaving to see if the hotel you will be staying at will take dogs. Here in the northwest we are fortunate that most will. even if the hotel charges a pet fee it usually is less than a nights boarding at the vet or a kennel. However, I have found that usually pets can stay for free as long as you declare your pet prior to or at check in. Be responsible when you have a pet in a room. All my dogs are crate trained, so I normally take me crate right into the room so that I can confine my dog when doing things like going out to dinner. If I have a dog that I think might bark, then into the truck we go while I am out of the room. Leaving a bad behaved dog in a room unattended can not get you invited to leave but can cause a hotel to change their policy for everyone else. I am on a well here at my house and when I travel to a place with city water ie chlorinated water, I take my water with me. I find that this is probably the number one thing for me that causes problems on the road. even if I am going for a few days I will find a grocery and buy gallons of bottle water, which can normally be had for under a dollar each. It can really upset a dogs intestinal tract when they switch from non-chlorinated water to chlorinated. If you are going camping with your dog be sure to check and make sure that dogs are allowed in the camping area that you are going to. Many improved camping areas don't allow dogs and after a long days drive it is a pain to get somewhere with your pup and find that you can't have your dog. Some state run camp grounds are especially strict when it comes to dogs. The time of year is also a consideration, if this is a summer trip you need to be aware not to leave your dog in a hot car, ever. In the sun in 80 degrees the interior temperature of a care can exceed 100 in just a few minutes. Not only do you put your dog at risk of heat stroke, but more and more people are aware of situations like this and you could find yourself dealing with authorities, neither of which are good situations. If you are going to a friends or family house, which is often the case at during the holiday season, ask first. Don't just show up with a dog unannounced. When you are on the road try to keep your dog as close to it's normal schedule as possible, feeding, going out to "go" will help keep things on a much more even keel. Pay attention to your dog. Especially in places like rest stops and pet parks. If you are in a place where you are comfortable letting your dog run off lead it is amazing the things that they can find. I've seen everything from chicken bones to old diapers. Be careful about letting your dog drink from puddles, especially in parking lots, the run off from rain can wash, oil, antifreeze and other car related fluids into these and can be harmful to your dogs health. Be sure that your dogs vaccinations are current, especially bordatella and be cautious letting your dog interact with strange dogs. Not only because of the chance that the other dog might be a carrier of something that you don't want your dog to catch but also because dogs out of their normal territory can be a little more aggressive and dog fights are never a good thing. One of the other things that I like to do, especially if I am going to be staying somewhere for any length of time, say a few days or more is to have a local vets number handy in case I need ti quickly. I have found it a good precaution and have had to use that number more than once. Taking that special member of the family on trips can be fun for you and for the your dog, but a little preparation and forethought goes a long way to making sure things go as smoothly as possible. Till next time, The Dogman 1-25-2008 The whistle sit The whistle sit is one of the more useful commands that you can teach your dog. In normal training it is used quite a bit. It is one of the key components to upland work, being quite handy to stop a dog when a bird is flushed. When taught properly it can also be used to stop a dog in the field to allow you to move closer to the dog when flushing birds such as Huns and Sharptails. It can be utilized in an indirect way to stop a dog from chasing as well. For the duck dog it is the key to good handling and blind work. You need to be able to sit the dog and have it look at you in order to be able to cast the dog in the direction that you want it to go. In some circumstances it can be pretty handy when hunting two dogs together to keep control over one dog by simply making one dog sit. One place that I am always prepared to use it is when I am on the road. Many times I have to let my dogs out in areas where there might potentially be traffic, or other dogs such as rest stops or pullovers. The whistle is much easier for the dog to hear than your voice, especially in noisy situations. Because of the way dogs learn, through consistency and repetition, I have found that most dogs respond to the whistle sit, when taught correctly, much better than they do to the verbal command sit. In order to teach the whistle sit the dog already has to know the voice command. And when we then start to teach the sit whistle to the dog we tend as trainers to be much more consistent with it and not give the dog a command that it does not comply to. The whistle sit is relatively easy to teach once the dog is quite proficient with the verbal command "sit" I like to teach it in a progressive manner starting with teaching it from standing heel position. In order to teach this, the dog has to be quite good at sitting to the verbal command. If it is not you need to work on that first. It is not worth teaching the sit with the whistle until the dogs sits every time with the voice command. As I have spoken about before dogs are taught with Pre-Cues and Cues. The entire basis of Pavlov's response is based on this premise. The bell is the Pre-Cue to the food, which is the Cue with the response being salivation. In this case the whistle is the Pre-Cue to the voice command sit with the response being the sit. After a certain number of repetitions, which varies dog to dog the whistle ends up becoming the Cue, instead of the Pre-Cue. As in Pavlov's work he found that after enough repetitions the dog would salivate when it heard the bell without the introduction of the food. So having that in mind and assuming that the dog does sit well, I like to start by having the dog at the heel position and just giving a short tweet on the whistle and then saying the command sit. And we repeat that over several days for maybe 10 to 15 minutes at a time until the dog starts to sit with the whistle and no verbal command. As I mentioned each dog varies in the number of repetitions but usually after 4 to 6 sessions the dogs will start to respond to just the whistle without having to tell the dog to sit. Once the dog begins this then I continue to work the dog at heel for several more sessions just to reinforce what we have taught and get a good conditioned response built. Once we complete this phase of the training I then move on to a walking sit, which is no mare than heeling the dog around the yard and giving the dog the whistle command while you both stop. When the dog gets very good at this I then move on to the walk through sit. This begins the concept in the dog's mind of the remote sit, which is having the dog sit to the whistle when it is away from you. We accomplish this again be starting from the heel position while walking and giving the dog the sit whistle while the trainer continues to walk forward. Most times the dog will be a little confused at the change and continue to walk beside you. Just take your time and use patience, the dog will pick it up very quickly if you have done a good job of building a good response to the whistle. If the dog continues to walk forward with you just take the dog by the collar and put it back in the position where you first blew the whistle and sit the dog using the whistle. If the dog is confused you can back the whistle up with a verbal command "sit". However if you find that you are having to do this each time then go back to more repetitions of the whistle sit with he dog heeling by your side. It should not take long and you will be able to walk at a normal pace with the dog at heel, give a toot on the whistle and have the dog sit while you continue to walk away from the dog. Again just be consistent and patient and the dog will understand it. When we get to this point I then, like before, like to give the dog several sessions to build a good conditioned response. When the dog has progressed to this stage then we can move on to the remote sit, which is having the dog sit when it is away from your side using the whistle as the command to sit. Simply take the dog for a walk, and let it walk freely away from you but not too far. We want to start somewhat close so that if the dog does not sit to the whistle you can place the dog back in the position where it was when you first gave the sit whistle and make it sit. At this point you should not have to revert to any verbal commands and should be able to sit the dog with just the whistle. Again, consistency and patience cannot be over stressed here. Keep your sessions in the 10 to 15 minute range. And as the dog progressively gets better allow more distance between you and the dog. If at any time the dog does not comply with the whistle command, just shorten the distance a bit between you and the dog and continue to repeat the exercise. The more repetitions that you give the dog the better the dog will respond. When the dog is doing really well I like to add some distractions. Such as tossing a bumper then sending the dog, giving the whistle sit while the dog is en route to the retrieve and having it sit. I then like to walk to the dog's side and send the dog the rest of the way to the retrieve. As always with consistency and lots of repetitions you will build a good solid response in the dog that will give you a tool that can be used in many different ways. Till next time, Good Hunting! The Dogman. 12-25-2007 Joy to Christmas puppies Merry Christmas everybody, This is a piece that I wrote for the Show either last year or before. To be honest I am not sure. But I wanted to add a little to it since it is mostly written just for crate training. If you do have a puppy coming this week be sure to have all the things that you need for the pup, before it gets to the house. Dog food, Bowl Toys Leash and collar A baby gate if there are open stairs if there are open stairs or open place you don't want the pup going into. And the Crate mentioned below When you get that new Christmas puppy you need to ensure that the proper stepsto be sure that the puppy gets the correct attention. The most important and bestthing for the puppy is to get it on a solid routine right away. Pups under 6 months old needs to fed 3 times a day and you should do your best to have those feedingtime as consistent as possible. Also time outside should be somewhat consistent as well. Now that doesn't mean that you should not take the pup out any time you want but there should be some set times that are the same each day. A good example would be the first thing in the morning and the last thing at night. And then of course the puppy should go out side after each feeding time. You can start to house train your puppy right away And one of the best tools for that is a dog crate. Every dog that I get in gets crate trained even the older ones. Even dogs that do not like the crate in the beginning will come to find it a safe place where they can go and have their own space. However with a puppy they generally crate train quite quickly. Don't get a crate that is too big for the puppy. An 8 week old lab for instance should not be put in a crate any larger than an intermediate and a small would be even better. You don't want the crate so small that the dog does not have any room to move around but you also don't want it to big as the puppy won't feel as comfortable as the space is to big but it also give the pup a chance to go to the bathroom in the crate and not have to be in it. I like to put a cedar floor in my crates. You can make your own or buy them. the following link is an example of what I am talking about. These are not the ones that I use but very similar. They provide a solid floor the your dog and it also allows urine to flow to the floor below keeping the puppy out of urine in case it happens to go while in it's crate. http://www.diamondbacktactical.com/Cedar-Insert-P1656C257.aspx My first suggestion is to feed your puppy in his crate. That will help make the crate a "good" place. I am not a believer of "Free Feeding" a dog in other words just leaving food out all the time and letting the dog eat at will. This leads to two issues one is weight. Free fed dogs have more of a tendency to be over weight and then second I find that free fed dogs just don't eat as well. Most puppies like to eat so it is not that hard to use the food bowl to entice the puppy to get into the crate. And then I let the pup have about 15 or 20 minutes to eat and then remove the food and take the puppy out. By giving the puppy a set amount of time to eat he or she will learn quickly that they need to eat when they are fed. If you do this you will find throughout the life of the dog many times when this will come in quite handy. In addition you know exactly how much the dog is eating each day, which allows you to control weight and also to for see illnesses if a dog goes off his food. A crate trained puppy will also house train much quickly. As long as you are good about getting that puppy outside to go and watch it carefully when it is loose in the house (never unattended) you will be able housebreak the pup fairly quickly. Generally speaking a puppy can hold for one hour for each month of age. So you should expect that a 3 month old puppy should be able to go 3 hours without having to go to the bathroom. Now I find that many dogs can go much longer especially at night. One thing that you can do is to limit water after about 5:00 in the evening then if you take the pup out for the last time between 10 and 11 at night most pups should do pretty well until 6 or 7 in the morning. Be sure to take the puppy out immediately when he wakes up. Before you even grab for that first cup of coffee that pup needs to go out. You should expect that your pup is going to bark when it first starts it's crate training. There are a few things that you can do to help keep this to a minimum. First try to get the pup out as much as possible. Exercise is a key element of a puppy's development. If the pup cries when you put it in it's crate to be fed just ignore it. Let the pup have its 15 to 20 minutes to eat and then remove the bowl and take the pup out. Puppies need to sleep quite a bit upwards of 18 hours a day. So naptime is pretty important. After feeding and going out for a good play is a good naptime. Again I put the pup in its crate if it cries take a towel and cover the front of the crate. Try to have the crate in a place that is not too noisy. You can always move it later. But in the beginning while the pup is beginning it's crate training it is ok to put the pup in a little more secluded area. Nw it sounds like I keep my pups in the crate quite a bit but I really don't next week I will talk about the other side of the puppies development - Socialization. Till next time, Good Hunting! The Dogman. 9-15-2007 To sit to flush? Or not? That is the question Howdy everybody, The debate about how dogs should work in the field while upland hunting has been a long one. There are some very good points on both sides of the argument. I thought that now that we a couple weeks into the Pheasant season that I would give you my opinion on how it should be done. The main discussion is whether or not, upon the flush of a bird the dogs should be steady to wing and shot. Since I run NAHRA (North American Hunting Retriever Association) tests and there is an upland test my dogs that run those tests are trained to do this as it is a requirement for the tests. And in most situations I prefer my dogs to work this way. But there are some situations that I see where this could lead to loosing a bird. From my experience there is not doubt that a dog that sits after a flush or when a gun goes off, will do a better job in the field picking up birds. It is very hard for a moving dog to do a good job of marking the fall of a bird, especially if more than one bird is involved. There is no true reference point for the dog to mark from since it is moving and if multiple birds go down the dog may never get a chance to see the second or third bird. Granted if the bird falls right in front of the dog it will probably do fine. But if the bird goes long or lands in an area where there is complex terrain in between, what should be a mark can quickly turn into a blind retrieve. Plus I think that the dog is much safer sitting rather than chasing after the bird. Especially with less experienced hunters. There is nothing like trying to get a shot at a low flying bird with a dog trailing right behind. In those first few seconds after the flush many times there is not much distance between the bird and the dog and a shot behind the bird can put the dog at risk of being hit. I think that the sit to flush is especially important when hunting covey birds such as Huns or Sharp Tails It is virtually impossible for a dog to mark in this situation and might actually run right past downed birds is the dog continues to chase after the covey has when gotten out of gun range. So having said all that, I do think that there are specific times where letting the dog go is advantageous. The primary one that I can think of is when hunting Pheasants in row crops such as Corn or Milo. In these hunting situations it is easy to loose birds. We all wing birds from time to time, it is just part of the game. Pheasants are notorious for running. At the same time since they are a little longer legged bird they can move without leaving a lot of scent. When in grass, cattails or other thick cover they can't move as well but in rows they can really move quickly. The challenge is that you can't have the dog be steady one time that a bird goes up and then let it run the next. If you try to do this then in the end you will end up with a dog that runs all the time. So in these conditions I spend a little more time managing my dog. Generally, I try to get my dogs so that they will sit on their own so that I don't have to be one the whistle every time a bird goes up. But in rows I have found that the dogs have a little more of a tendency to want to run especially if they can see the birds running in front of them. That is just natural since they have been taught to flush and obviously they can't flush a bird when it is moving so they try to move with the bird till they can get it in the air. I tend to hunt a little faster in strip type agricultural land so that I can help the dogs and of course stay with them to try to stay in gun range. But many times you get that bird up and don't make a clean kill so when the birds gets back on the ground they can get going pretty fast. I want my dog to have a chance to retrieve that bird so I release me dogs very quickly once the bird is on the ground. After you have spent a lot of tine hunting things tend to slow down in your mind a little. Kind of like a batter trying to slow that baseball down in his or her mind to get a better chance at a hit. I still want my dog to do what it is trained to do which is sit but I may only have it stop for just a second before I release it so that a bird that is hit but runs does not too far out in front of the dog. It can be a little challenging and things tend to happen pretty fast but once you and the dog get the hang of it, it works quite well. If I lived someplace other than Montana where the majority of the hunting was for Pheasant and it was primarily in Strip type land I might very well have to rethink the way that I hunt my dogs. However, since I am not I have found that what I have described above to be the best all around way to hunt my dogs. Till next time, Good Hunting! The Dogman. 9-15-2007 Puppy vs. Started Dog Howdy everybody, Last week while I was on the radio I mentioned that I had a started dog for sale. I got to thinking about it and realized that many folks might not know what a started dog is, what it should be able to do and why someone would want to buy one. So I thought I would give a little bit of info for here on not only started dogs but also on what is called transitional dogs as well as finished dogs and a little on the pros and cons of purchasing one over a puppy. The important thing here is to know what you are supposed to be getting when you do purchase an already trained dog. As mentioned that are basically three different levels of dogs that you can find out there. The started dog is the first, and the one that most people decide to buy when purchasing a trained dog. Basically a started dog should be able to do a decent job running a Junior Hunter test as defined by the AKC (American Kennel Club). This should be a dog that has good obedience off lead. Can do a good job on single marks out to 100 yards or so on both land and water. Has been taught to retrieve birds to hand i.e. force fetched. A dog that is gun conditioned as well as collar conditioned. He or she should also have seen most of the equipment that a dog would see in a normal day of hunting, items like decoys, boats etc. This is a dog that is ready to go in the field for it's first year of hunting. The second level, the "transitional" dog is a much more capable dog. It will be able to do everything that the started dog can do but it should be doing good double marks in land and water in pretty much any condition. It should also be able to do a reasonable job with blind retrieves as long as they are not too complicated. This dog should be steady and able to honor, in most situations, the work of another dog. It should also be much more familiar with a more varied set of hunting conditions. Then lastly depending on what you are looking for and the trainer it should have some experience on the upland side. This is a dog that should be able to do a pretty good job running a senior level test under the AKC rulebook or an Intermediate test under the NAHRA (North American Hunting Retriever Association) rulebook. The finished dog or master dog as they are also called is the top of the line. These dogs are just what they are called, finished, capable of multiple marks, triples or quads. They should be able to run complex blinds in pretty much any condition. Be good and steady in the blind or the boat. Again depending on what you are looking and who is doing the training they should be able to do a nice job on a day in the upland field. This is a dog that requires no real additional training, nor should it require a lot of maintenance. This is a dog that should be able to run a master level test either under AKC or NAHRA. The cost for dogs like this should be about $3,000 - $3,500, $5,000 and $7,500 and up respectably. Some finished dogs, especially if they come with good pedigrees and a hand full of titles from competing can run upwards of $15,000 to $20,000 and sometimes much more. So why would someone want to buy a dog like this as opposed to getting a puppy and doing your own training? Well there are a few reasons. First even to train a dog to the started level takes a fair amount of time 5 plus months and some training skills. Like most things in life it is harder than it looks. Plus, for a lot of folks especially in today's world raising a puppy, having the time to properly socialize it as well as the training itself can take a lot of time that many folks just don't have. Again, like most tings in life it can be much easier in your minds eye than in reality. Most people when they decide to get a puppy have all the best intentions, life gets in the way. Building a good hunting dog takes a rather large commitment. What do you loose when you buy a dog that has been trained by someone else? Less than you might think. Yes you will loose that puppy time and all the hassles that go with it. Chewing up the furniture, going to the bathroom in the house, getting up at night for a couple months etc. One thing that you think you might miss, which you really do not is a strong relationship with the dog. Dogs do not bond with people. Dogs form relationships with people. My dog Nitro was purchased 6 years ago as a transitional dog. That I can tell you was a learning experience. First he had not been trained the way I would have liked so I basically took the skills that he had and rebuilt him. So that was a good experience for me as a trainer. However, he is has turned out to be one of the best dogs that I have ever owned. He is my best friend as far as dogs are concerned. He would lay down his life for me as I think I probably would for him. He is 8 now and I wish he could live another 30. He has been the best companion dog that I have ever had and he had never met me until he was 2. However, there are some things to be considered if you decide to go this route. First off I think that pedigrees are important. But I think that genetics are even more important. As I have said before there are a lot of nice lines of dogs out there that have never been to the competition line that are still darn good dogs. So this is a situation that you really have to judge the individual for what it is. Does the dog have a good a personality? If looks are important, is it a nice looking dog. Does the dog look healthy and well maintained? If the dog has a good pedigree all the better as you will end up with a dog that could be worth more due to it's breeding potential. The most important thing is the training and the ability of the dog. Now I have bought stated dogs sight unseen but I would not recommend that for most of you. I have been in the dog world a long time and I know what questions to ask and can tell many times from the answers that I get if the seller is giving me valid information or not and even I have been mislead. For an inexperienced buyer, you need to see the dog and you need to see the dog work. Also, you need to make sure that the seller is willing to take the time to work with you and the dog to ensure that you know how the dog works. If you have the time and the commitment to build a dog from a puppy then by all means I say go for it. However, if you want a good hunting dog and don't have the ability to really make the commitment required then I think giving some serious consideration to getting a started dog is well worth the investment. Yes you are going to pay a large lump sum of money. But if you consider the time and expense of raising a dog to this level then the cost is very much justified. And you begin with a dog that with just a few weeks of work, which is mostly just getting to know each other, you have a dog that you can go right out into the field and hunt for you. As always if anyone has any questions you are welcome to contact me. Till next time The Dogman. 9-8-2007 Teaching quartering with buckets and birds Howdy everybody, A few weeks ago I explained a method to train patterning or quartering a field for upland hunting. That training used a couple people as helpers. At that time I promised another way that this could be taught without helpers and so here it is. I would like to begin by saying that if you are lucky enough to have a dog that has a nice natural quarter then you can probably get your pup out and work it in the field, add the whistles at the dogs natural turns and just continue until he dog starts to respond. If you are doing this outside of hunting season or in an area where you know that there are no birds then you can plant either live or dead birds, either one will keep the dog working. Pigeons work quite well for this. However we are not all graced with dogs that have a nice quarter right out of the box. Especially true to this are many in the retriever breeds. So if your dog is like most then it will need to be taught how to quarter properly. The first thing that you need is to gather up a few white buckets. About 8 work pretty well. They don't need to be any special kind of buckets, about anything will work. These are going to be the visual indicators for both you and the dog as to where the turns should be. Just like in the other scenario what we are trying to teach is a nice, side to side quarter, Keeping the dog in good gun range both out in front and to the sides. You want to try to do this in a place that has decent cover but not so much terrain that you can loose sight of your dog. You have to determine for yourself how far you want your dog to work out to the sides. Personally I like about 15 years, no more than 20 as once that bird gets up at that distance and you get the gun up the bird can already be in the 30 to 35 yard range, which is getting out there. I think 15 yards is a good distance. And as far as the distance in front of me I like about 10 years, 15 at the most. What we are going to do is to place the buckets upside down in a staggered pattern about 30 yards apart side to side with each bucket about ten yards apart going forward. In other words you are not going to have the buckets opposing each other as you go down the field but are going to start with one say to your left and then walking at and angle forward you will place the next one about 10 ahead of the first about 15 yards to the right of the center line and then the next will be about 10 yards forward 15 yards left of center and you will continue to place the buckets until you have them all placed. If you use 8 buckets you will end up with a quarter that will have you walking about 80 yards till you get to the end of the line. Now unlike the way we did it before you are not going to walk straight up the field but are going to walk in a "S" pattern so you are moving with your dog. So you will have your buckets set up. You and your dog will be at the beginning of the line and you will kick off the dog down wind and he should naturally run to the first bucket as he gets to it you should give 2 tweets on the whistle and as you continue to walk forward you will angle off to the bucket on the other side. Encourage the dog with the hunt command or " hunt it up" as many like to use. Continue to do this until you get to the last bucket. Now this exercise will not be as exciting for the dog after a couple passes as having someone out in the field with you. Therefore, we are going to have to give the dog something to key on and help keep his drive up. Obviously the best thing is going to be birds. Dead birds are fine. But I would not have a bird at each station and be sure to mix the positions of the birds up. If you have say 4 birds and placed them at the same buckets each time the dog will not take long to figure out where they are and go straight for the birds. Keep him or her guessing. If you can obtain some live birds, that would be the best. I would use some of them as fly aways and you do not need to use a lot of live birds while doing this. One live bird per session would be plenty especially if it is mixed up with a few dead birds. And remember to mix up the locations so that you keep the dog guessing. While using birds when the dog finds one stop where you are have the dog retrieve the bird to you and praise. If you cannot get any birds then you can use bumpers with wings wrapped around them. After the retrieve kick the dog off again and begin moving down the field. After you have done the exercise several times and the dog is starting to work pretty well you can remove the buckets but place the birds or bumpers in a similar pattern as you were before. After several sessions of the course without buckets you should have a dog that is quartering pretty well and should be ready to go to the field. If after going to the field the dog gets a little out of control you can always go back to the exercise and reinforce the behavior that you are looking for. I will tell you right up front that this is not the easiest way to teach a dog to quarter but it does work. I know as I have built several nice upland dogs using this method. There are a couple of things you need to watch for. If the dog starts to get too far ahead don't try to keep up with the dog, instead try to keep the dog back with you. Try not to use the "here" command to do this. Try using something like "come around" or "far enough" and then you can say here. The other commands will be a pre-cue to the here command and in a small amount of time you will be able to drop the here part of it. Try not to let the dog come all the way back to you so once you get the dog to turn give the hunt command and continue to the next bucket. After you have done it a few times both you and the dog will get into the swing of things. It's a little bit of a dance so to speak and will require practice on both your parts. Just use some patience and let the dog work it out and it should all go fine. Happy hunting The Dogman. 9-1-2007 Dog first aid Howdy everybody, The Ability to provide first aid to your dog can mean the difference between survival and death for your dog, especially in situations such as hunting or recreational activities like boating, camping and hiking. I highly recommend that you keep a First Aid Kit at home. However in the field it can be even more critical as the risk factors go up considerably. There are some pretty good first aid kits that are available for purchase like the ones found at http://www.outdoorsafety.net/sportingdogkits.htm. I have one of the Pro Model kits and it is about as good as you can buy. However, it is pretty expensive. The following links not only have some very good information on Canine first aid but also contain lists of items if you choose to put your own Canine First Aid Kit together. I think that you will find that you can put a pretty good kit together for less money you will just have to weigh the convenience factor for yourself. http://k9forensic.org/k9firstaid.html http://www.dog-first-aid-101.com/ http://www.lowchensaustralia.com/health/firstaid.htm A good First Aid Kit is essential when you have dogs. But there is a little training that can go along with that kit that can make things go a lot smoother in case you ever have to provide First Aid for your dog. What you want to train your dog to do is to allow you to work on it. For those of you that have seen my seminars know that this is a main topic that I talk about. A dog that is not used to being handled in the manner that may be required is plainly going to be much more difficult to treat. So I like to get my dogs used to being touched all over. This is something that you can do in the house, on the floor or if getting on the floor is a bit of a pain you can do it on the bed or even have the dog stand while you sit in a chair. I prefer to do it on the floor though as it will simulate the normal position that you would have the dog while treating most injuries. This is one instance that I think a treat or two can go a long way to reinforcing the behavior that you are looking for., All we are trying to do is to get the dog used to being touched and examined all over. You want to be able to examine your dog's eyes, which include pulling the eyelids back to see under them. You should be able to look in both ears as well as have the dog willingly open it's mouth so that you can get a look inside. Your dog should let you feel between both its legs. Rub your hand up and down its belly. Grab each leg and run a hand up and down as well as doing the same with the tail. And while you are doing this a treat now and then and some good old praise will go a long way towards having a dog that can be treated in the field. If you are asking yourself, why this is necessary? I will tell you that if you are hunting alone and your dog sustains an injury such as a severe cut or maybe tangles with a porcupine it may be impossible or very difficult at best to treat the dog. If your dog won't let you work on it, even things as simple as removing ticks can become quite infuriating. Most of us carry cell phones these days and coverage has become fairly universal. So put your vets contact information in your phone so you have it handy in case you need it. If you are traveling to an unfamiliar location with your dog it's a good idea to locate a vet near where you will be and have that contact information in hand prior to leaving. I also think it is a pretty good idea to know the location of the vets office before heading into the field. Also be sure that your dogs immunizations are up to date, especially Bordetella and Parainfluenza (Commonly known as Kennel Cough) both of which are highly contagious. Even hunting close to home on public land your dog can come in contact with dogs that may not have been properly vaccinated. I have had this happen more than once with my dogs in the Nine Pipes area in the Fathead while hunting either Huns or Pheasants. Another suggestion that I make is that if you do not give your dogs preventative heart worm medicine and you are going somewhere that has heart worm present that you give the preventative medicine for a month or two prior to your trip. If you are going to an area that has a lot of ticks a good flea and tick collar is not a bad choice either. At the end of each days hunt check your dog over carefully for any cuts or abrasions as well as for ticks and treat accordingly. You would hate to see a simple cut become infected especially a staph infection. A little preparation goes a long way when it comes to first aid and dogs. With a decent kit and some good information and pre planning you can ensure that you can provide emergency care for your dog should the need ever arise. Good Hunting, Till next time, The Dogman 7-28-2007 General hunting etiquette Howdy everybody, Hope everyone has had a good week. I know that I have said it many times but with this heat be mindful of those critters making sure to keep them out of the sun as much as possible, especially in the heat of the day. And of course fresh drinking water is a must. Last week we talked about training your dog to do a proper job of upland hunting. I am going to come back to that again this next Sat. However, in the meantime I wanted to take a few moments to talk about what I consider hunting etiquette in dogs. There are some specific skills that I teach my hunting dogs that I think are very important both to my sanity as well as the dogs and my safety. As with most things with dogs much of this revolves around obedience but there is also a part of this that is anchored in socialization, which we will get to in a minute. We as hunters cross a lot of fences. And without dragging out a bunch of statistics I would bet that it is safe to say that a large percentage of gun related accidents happen during that moment when we cross that fence. It seems as though there is enough risk involved when there is just a hunter or two and the guns, however if we throw in an out of control dog I think the potential for an accident to happen goes up considerably. Therefore, I do not let my dogs cross fences, or any other thresh hold without permission. It is easy to teach in a short amount of time if you are just consistent. For my dogs and myself it starts with kennel training. Once my dogs are in the kennel they are not allowed out until given the OK. This is not just sometimes but every time. From the dogs point of view this is the same concept as crossing a door way or crossing a fence line. The way that I like to cross a fence even if there is another person there is to sit my dog, clear any ammunition that might be chambered in my shotgun and leave the bolt open and the safety on. Place my gun on the ground several feet from where either my dog or myself are going to cross with the muzzle pointed away from any people or dogs that are there. Cross the fence, pick up my gun and then call my dog through the fence. If it is a fence that I might have to help my dog get under I will get the dog across the fence first and then sit the dog and go pick up my gun. So really from the handlers standpoint all you really need to be able to do is to sit your dog and have him or her stay sitting till told otherwise. It is really quite simple. I can tell you that a good sit command is worth its weight in gold and really is a handy skill. As mentioned above I don't just let my dogs bolt out of their crates without permission. There are a couple reasons for this. First we are on the road quite a bit and I don't want to have to deal with the dog trying to get out if I am trying to give the dog water or feed the dog. I want to be able to open the kennel door and have the dog just stand there so that I can do what I need to do. In addition there are many times that I am not in a place that it is appropriate for the dog to be running loose, like a rest stop or on the side of the road. I want to pick and choose where the dog exits the crate. I have found that in most cases cars or trucks and dogs just don't mix well. And I will mention here that a dog is much safer in a crate then he is loose in a car in case of a car accident and of course there should net even be a thought of allowing the dog to be loose in the back of a pickup truck. I just saw a dog get killed several weeks ago, north of Missoula on Highway 93. It was a Malamute or a Husky that was loose in the back of a small pickup. The driver had to swerve because the car next to him tried to change lanes without looking. The dog was thrown from the back of the pickup and was then run over by two cars that were behind it. This was all at about 60 miles an hour. Needless to say the dog did not survive. Had the owner had the dog in a crate in the back of the truck the worst that might have happened would have been that the crate might have tipped over in the back of the truck. Why people want to risk the lives of their beloved dogs is beyond me, but anyway enough of that. Having your dog be steady in a crate can also come in handy when you are in a parking area next to public hunting grounds. I am always pretty careful about letting my dogs out if there are any strange dogs around. I always worry about a dogfight even though I know my dogs don't fight, you never know about the other dog. Plus I am pretty careful about letting my dogs have physical contact with dogs that I do not know. Though it is hard for most diseases to be transmitted to a dog that is properly vaccinated the one disease that I do worry about is Kennel Cough (Bordetella). There are many strains of it around and even a dog that is vaccinated can get it. And this is where the socialization that I mentioned above comes in to play. Though you never do know how another dog will react to your dog it is comforting to know how you dog reacts to other dogs. If you have not had you dog around many other dogs you should do so. If you are getting a puppy one of the best places for socialization is in a puppy class either taught privately or by a place like Petsmart. Dogs are not born with a high level of social skills. They have to be taught. It is much easier to teach a dog these skills when it is young but even an older dog that has not had a lot of dog to dog contact can learn to behave him or herself in the presence of other dogs. Of course the best etiquette that a dog can really have it are your three basic obedience commands, Here, Heel, and Sit. Take Care, The Dogman 7-21-2007 Prepare your dog for upland birds Howdy everybody, Well it looks like fire season is well under way now. We have a couple pretty good ones burning up here in the Flathead. Dang dry thunderstorms are not helping. And talking of thunderstorms man have we had some hum dingers these last two weeks. We could have done without that storm last Wed. I am still cleaning up after that one. Hopefully, it is not a sign of things to come for the rest of the summer. Last week we talked about hunting out of a boat. But as we get a little closer to the opener of upland season we need to talk a little more specifically about hunting upland birds and a little less about ducks. We can come back to the ducks later. I am guessing that by the number of birds (Pheasants and Huns) that I have seen this summer as well as the conditions that we had earlier this spring, coupled with the mild winter in many areas of the state that our upland bird numbers should be pretty good. However to do a respectable job getting them in the bag we have to do more than just a little scouting. We have to prepare our 4-legged partners and ourselves and for the job at hand. There are really three areas as far as the dog is concerned that are important to getting the job done. I think the most important is that the dog is able to work a field within gun range, is willing to take some direction from its handler and will work cover. Second, is the ability to stop the dog on command, there are several reasons for this. First you don't want the dog chasing after game that is unwanted, a hen pheasant for example or maybe a deer. Second, you don't want the dog running in front of the hunters for the dog's safety and last it is nearly impossible for a dog to mark the fall of a bird or birds if it is running focused on something that it should not be. Now, we can discuss whether the dog should sit to flush or be allowed to chase in case we knock down a cripple. However, I am pretty set on this one though I do understand the argument from the other side and I admit that it is valid but I feel that you will loose less birds if the dog is steady to wing and shot and then is also well trained to trail a crippled bird. Additionally, there is no doubt that it is safer for the dog. So the first thing that we need to accomplish is to teach the dog to will stay in gun range with proper patterning commonly called "quartering a field". The training method that I am going to describe here is what I consider the proper method to train a flushing dog to work a field and react to birds. You will need the help of a couple people to do this properly. This is really where a training group really comes in handy. Hopefully you introduced the dog to the sit and the recall whistle as talked about in the last several tips. However, if you have not we will still be able to get through this part of the training. Now this is an area where birds will really work the best, pigeons are my favorite choice. However, pen raised chucker or quail will work just as well. Each of my two helpers needs a bird in hand and the birds need to be clipped wing so that they cannot fly, dead birds will work ok too. The helpers for this exercise represent hunters and you and your dog are the guides. You will need to have your whistle. You will need a field that is fairly large, about ½ the size of a football field or maybe just a little larger if at all possible. As I said earlier each of your helpers is going to have a bird in hand. If you cannot find birds then wings or bumpers will work, but birds are the best. What you are going to do is to place a gunner (helper) on either side of you about 15 yards away. That is the distance that I like for my dog to work out to the sides as it gives me time to get a shot off while the bird is still well within gun range. Anything much further that and you might find yourself taking a lot of long shots, especially with Chuckers or Sharptails. So you have your hunters on either side of you with you and your dog in between them. Start off with the dog in a sitting position. When you tell your dog to "hunt" or "hunt it up" all of you will start to walk forward at a slow steady pace. Do not get in front of the hunters, it is OK however if the hunters are a stride or 2 in front of you and the dog but no further. We want the dog working side to side. When you kick the dog off, one of the "hunters" are going to start to call the dog's name, and wave the object that they have in their hand so that the dog can see it. This will draw the dog over to that person. When the dog reaches that person you are going to give the turn whistle, 2 tweets, and at the same time the opposite person will start to call the dogs name and the person that the dog went to first will stop calling. When the dog reaches that person you will tweet, tweet again and then the opposite person will start calling again. Be sure the 2 tweets of the whistle come before the opposite person starts to call the dog back over. You will continue this as the 3 of you walk down the field. Try to have your gunners that are calling sound as excited as they can it will keep the dog more upbeat and moving faster. Make it fun for the dog this will keep the dog working longer. At some point the dog will start to get tired of the exercise. When you see that the dog is slowing down have to next gunner that that the dog will turn to go to, without the dog seeing it, toss the object that they have straight in front of them just a couple yards so that when the dog comes across on the next sweep he can find and retrieve the object. When the dog picks up the object, have everyone stop moving forward and call the dog to you in the center and take the object. Sit your dog in the center again. Give the object back the gunner that threw it and start again. When you reach the end of the field then everyone turn around and repeat the session. Try to be aware of the dogs desire to work. If the dog really starts to slow down and the excitement of finding the thrown object starts to wear off then stop the training for that session. You need the dog hunting at a decent pace to get any work done. You are better off with a good short session than a poor longer one. The dog will tell you when it is finished. Obviously, if you are able to use real birds and the dog really likes them then you will be able to go longer. What we are doing here is two fold. We are using the dogs natural place orientation to build a habit of distance to the side while minimizing the distance the dog is working out in front of you and the other "hunters". At the same time we are teaching the dog to turn on the whistle, remember that is two distinct tweets. This is now the third and last whistle command that the dog will ever have to learn. One whistle to sit, two whistles to turn and three whistles to recall. Repeat this exercise over several days until the dog really starts to get the hang of it. Once the dog is working pretty well we are going to introduce the sit whistle into the exercise. You will be doing everything just as normal but every few turns that the dog takes you will give a good strong sit whistle. Assuming that you worked on this prior to beginning this exercise then the dog should have at least a rough understanding of what is expected of it. Now don't expect a moving dog to just stop on a dime, it can't and it won't, it will need a yard or two to slow down and stop maybe longer if it is really going fast. If the dog does not stop to the whistle have your gunners stop their movement and you go gather up the dog, take it back to the position that it was when you gave the sit whistle and give the whistle sit followed by the command sit. Let the dog sit for a few moments, you go back to original position and then tell the dog to start to hunt again. Just repeat this until the dog has a good solid quarter coupled with a good whistle sit. Expect this to all take several sessions as this is not going to happen in a day or two it will take some time. Just be diligent and keep at it and your dog will figure it out. Now comes the true test and this is where real birds really put the icing on the cake. Again I think pigeons work well and are probably the easiest to get. However, if you can't find any pigeons then find a local preserve or bird farm and purchase some birds for training. What we are going to do is to proof the dogs work on everything that we have done up to this point. We don't want to do this until we know that the dog is working at a high level of proficiency. We are going to this the same way that we have worked up to this point however, now the gunners are going to carry real shotguns and birds that are able to fly. You will probably need about 12 birds minimum to get the dog through this part of the training. You will start off just as you have up to this point however unlike before your "hunters" will each be carrying a shotgun and one or both will have live birds. Now if you have practiced the sit whistle with clipped wing birds as you should have prior to this then you can move right to the fly-aways if not you will need to work a little on practicing the sit whistle with live birds. You will begin the exercise just as before but by this time the dog should be hunting pretty well. After a turn or two by the dog, when the dog is traveling away from say the right hand hunter heading to the left so he is not looking the right hand person will toss a non clipped wing bird, this bird is going to be allowed to fly away and just as the bird is released the person releasing the bird will shout something like "there goes one" to get the dog to turn so it can see the bird. It is at this point that the handler will want to blow the sit whistle. The reason that we are going to let the bird fly away at this point is that it is easier to stop the dog on a flying bird then it is on a shot bird. If the dog does well and sits to the whistle then we can maybe give the dog one more of these and then move on to the next phase of the training exercise. If the dog does not sit well to the whistle correct the dog by repositioning the dog back the position that it was when you gave the sit whistle. If you have taken your time up to this point and made sure that the dog was progressing well as you moved from step to step then you should have not have much problem with this. After the dog is introduced to a couple fly-aways it is time to shoot a few birds for the dog or at least try to. Everything will be just the same except that this time one of your "hunters" is going to try to shoot the bird when it is released. If everything has gone well to this point then the dog should be pretty steady. You will start off exactly the same, let the dog do a couple turns, then have one of the helpers signal the dog with some verbal call as before and when the birds is released the helper is going to do it's best to hit the bird. Be sure to keep all safety issues as well as state regulations in mind while doing this. It the bird does get hit and falls and assuming the dog sits on the whistle then the handler should move to the side of the dog (the heel position) and release the dog for the retrieve from there. When you have graduated to this point you have a pretty darn nice dog to hunt behind. I know that all this sounds like a lot of work and in fact it is, but if you will take the time to train your dog in this manner you will end up with a dog that is an absolute joy to hunt. This is how I train my duck dogs to upland hunt and when I take a friend hunting, at the end of the day they usually can't stop talking about how wonderful the experience was. You end up with a dog that knows his or her job in the field, is very well under control. Also, a dog trained this way does not need a lot of verbal commands, which I find, lets the bird hold longer because we are making much less noise as well move through our hunting area. This disturbs much less cover and allows me to maximize the grounds which I do have available to hunt. I know this one is a little complicated, if you have any questions please don't hesitate to email me. Till next time, The Dogman 7-14-2007 Teaching a dog about boats Hi Everyone, Hope everyone has been enjoying this ridiculously hot weather that we are having. If you remember back to 1986 when Yellowstone burned we had a big snow year that next winter. Then again in 1996 when the Bitterroot had the huge burns again we had a big snow year that next winter. Wonder if we will repeat that pattern this year? I know that I will be giving the winter gear a little extra attention this fall just in case. Last week we talked about jump shooting ducks, which is one of my favorite ways to hunt waterfowl. But at the same time I also really enjoy hunting out of a boat. My choice for watercraft for this purpose is a canoe. I hunt by myself a lot and a canoe is easy for me to handle. It also allows you to get into smaller bodies of water, is easy to camouflage and makes a nice blind too shoot out of if you decide to stop somewhere and put out a spread of decoys. If your dog has never hunted out of a boat then this is another skill best taught in the yard and not on the first actual boat-hunting adventure. There is really not a lot to this one but there are a several things that we can do to get the dog used to the situation, like getting in and out of the boat, the feel of the movement and where you expect the dog to sit. Also, this is one place that the dog needs to be well gun conditioned, as the shotgun will be very close to the dog, so be sure of that prior to shooting right behind the dog out of the boat. The first thing that I like to do is to teach the dog to get into the boat and then do some retrieves from the boat. If you have a canoe or a smaller flat-bottomed boat what I like to do is to actually put it in my yard on grass and start there. Though it is not in the water it still has some side to side movement and we can teach a lot of the concepts ( skills) that will be used when we do go to water. The first thing we need to teach the dog is to get in the boat. The command that I like to use for this is "load" the same command that I use to put my dogs up in the back of my pickup, on a grooming bench or force fetch table or on a platform for hunting in flooded timber. In each of these situations the dog's feet leave the ground. So I drag the boat into the yard and I get in it and I tell the dog to load. Be patient, as many times the dog will run around the boat as opposed to getting in. Sometimes I will use something to entice the dog to get in, like a bumper or a bird or even a treat if need be. When the dog loads, praise him or her and then let the dog check out the interior of the boat. After the dog has had a good look around and settles down a bit which usually just takes a few minutes then you can begin to position the dog in the spot that you would like the dog to be while hunting or traveling. I always want the dog in front of me where I can see it. Many flat boats have center steering consoles, even some of the smaller ones. I want the dog in front of that, really for two reasons, one it is safer. Dogs and props don't mix well and if your dog decides at some point to jump in the water when not expected and you have a motor running you will have a much better chance of avoiding running over the dog, at the same time he will have a much better time seeing the birds as they come off the water and hopefully drop back down again. Get the dog into this position and tell the dog to sit. Then take your position behind the dog in the spot that you would be driving and hunting from. It will take the dog a bit to understand all this as you being behind the dog my cause the dog to get up and come rearward to get to you. Just put the dog back up where it should be and sit it. It may take a several times but he will get it in short order. Once you have this part down it is time to have the dog make some retrieves from the boat. If you have a "retriever trainer" this works pretty well as you will have a shot when the bumper is thrown. If not then just work on the retrieve first you can get to the gun later. With the dog in the sitting position tell the dog to mark which if you have trained with this from the beginning it should cause the dog to look out in front of it. If not don't worry about just proceed with the execise. Toss the bumper over the dogs head out in front of the boat and make him sit for a few seconds, don't let the dog leave until released. If the dog does go without a command stop it and bring it back. Load the dog back into the boat and go get the bumper your self. And just repeat this until the dog is steady and can be released on command. Then let the dog make the retrieve. Now this is once place where things will be a little different then when in the water as many times if the dog is good and comfortable getting back in the boat it may just come right back and jump in the boat to bring you the bumper. Don't discourage this as we want the dog getting in the boat freely but understand that in the water you will take the bumper or bird from the dog while the dog is in the water and then help the dog get in the boat. If the dog does come to you at the side of the boat with the bumper or bird just take the object and then tell the dog to load again and put it back up in it's spot in the sitting position. Repeat this for a few sessions until it is all going smoothly. When we get to this point it is time to head for the water. Now if by chance you don't have a boat that you can easily put in the yard then you will have to do all this in the water anyway. That is not a problem I have just found that getting some of the early work done on land is a little more controlled as you can work on the load and steadiness without having to deal with water. But we have to get in the water sooner or later so either way it will be the same in the end. I like to start when I go to water having the boat partially on the shore. This might have the dog get out of the water and on land to bring you the bumper which is OK for now as I still like to get quite few repetitions prior to having the dog work solely in the water. You will build much better habits doing it this way. OK so now that we have the dog working well it is time to get to the most challenging part of this. Having the dog enter the boat from the water. If you hunt out of a canoe then most likely your dog will be able to enter the boat (with a little help) without the use of any kind of platform. However, if you have a boat which has gunwales higher than 10 or 12 inches and even this might be a little high for a smaller dog then you will have to give the dog something to get on prior to entering the boat. There are several good products out there that are made just for this purpose which can either be found at a larger local sporting good store or a good outdoor sports catalog. However, if you are in a canoe or flat-bottomed boat that sits low in the water the dog will be able to enter without such a device. If you use a platform then it will not take the dog long to figure out that it can get on the platform and just hop in the boat. And if you practice this with the boat partially on shore it will make the transition to open water much easier. However, if not, this is a skill that the dog will have to learn. It might take some time for the dog to figure out it's own technique but I have never had a dog that did not figure it out in a reasonable amount of time. This is the way that I handle my dogs in the water. First I always take the object from the dog while the dog is swimming at the edge of the boat not after it has gotten back in. When training with bumpers the dog will probably be able to enter the boat but when the ducks become involved the size and extra weight will make it tough so the bird needs to be taken from the dog while it is in the water. If by chance I knock down more than one bird at a time, which is often the case, I send the dog out for the second or third bird while the dog is still in the water. Swimming for a large portion of the day especially in moving water can tire a dog out over time and the added energy used to enter the boat will just add to that. If your dog runs blind retrieves and I have a bird down that the dog didn't mark then I run my blinds with the dog in the water also. Only after the last bird is in the boat from each volley do I have the dog enter the boat. This is how I teach the dog to enter the boat. After the birds have been picked up from a particular volley I take the dog by the collar and help it to get its front feet up over the gunwales and then instead of just hauling the dog in the boat I let the dog brace itself and use some of its own leverage to pull itself into the boat. Once the dog gets its feet over the gunwales if you brace the dog on the top, back part of its neck it will be able to pull itself in using it's front legs. Most dogs ( not all but most) after a period of time learn to come to the boat and get their front feet up over the edge so that you can help it in the boat. However, for a young dog in the beginning you will have to help it get its feet over the top of the gunwales. Again be mindful of the height of the edge of the gunwales of your particular boat. It will not take you long to determine if they are too high for a particular dog and if so you will need to go to a platform for the dog to enter the boat from. I don't recommend, especially in a canoe that you just haul the dog in by the collar of the scruff of the neck. More than likely this will cause you to stand up so you can get the proper leverage and with the weight of the dog you risk capsizing your boat. I always help the dog in from a sitting position, which is why I want the dog to learn to help itself in so we don't end up in that potentially dangerous situation. We have some great rivers and slews to hunt from a boat. If you have never hunted from a boat and don't have a suitable craft you might consider borrowing a friends boat and giving it a try. One or two days hunting out of a canoe or flat boat might find you more birds. And I think that you will find it quite enjoyable. Till next time, Go work the dogs - the Dogman 7-7-2007 Greetings from the toller's gathering Hi Folks, Sorry to miss the last couple weeks, I know I'm bad. However we will get caught up here in short order. Also sorry that I missed the show this last Saturday but I am up in Canada at the Canadian Nova Scotia Duck Toller's National Specialty. For those of you that have never heard of a Toller it is one of the 6 retriever breeds and one of the older breeds that we have. They look a little like a Golden Retriever, but are a little smaller and have white marking on their feet, chest, head and the tip of the tail. They are "Canada's Breed" being the only breed to come out of Canada that has no outside breeding influence whatsoever. I have a pretty nice boy named Merlot and we are up here doing some work. They are great dogs for both water and upland but are rarely seen as there we just 529 registered in the US in 2004. If anyone would ever like any information on them I am quite familiar with them having owned 2 of my own and I have also trained 3 others for clients. Tollers were not recognized by the AKC until 1996, so for us here in the US they are a new breed but for those folks north of the border they have been around for well over a hundred years. Anyway, hopefully ya'll have been working on all this obedience that we have talked about so far as again it is the most important thing that we can do with our dogs. So now that we should have a decent Heal, Sit and Recall so we can start working on skills that relate directly to the field. One of those skills is what is called the "walk through sit". Up here in the NW part of the state as in many areas of Montana we have a lot of irrigation ditches and slews. And one of my favorite ways to hunt ducks is to jump shoot. For me it is exciting, just as pheasant hunting is and the dogs love it. In fact when Pheasant season open I always make sure that I carry a few duck loads in my pocket so that when I am working the field for upland birds and run across a ditch with water I am ready to switch over to my duck loads and work on taking a mixed bag home for the day. However, we need to teach the dog a simple skill that will make things go much better and much safer for you and the dog. And that is the "walk though sit". When I jump shoot I, for one need my dog to be able to stay at the heal position so that it does not get out in front and jump the ducks before I am ready for them to fly. Secondly as I approach the water where the ducks might be I need to be able to sit my dog as I continue to move forward so that the dog does not end up between the birds and myself while I shoot. Just as important I want the dog sitting so that it can do a better job of marking the fall of the duck or ducks as they are knocked down. It is easy to loose birds when hunting in this manner as they normally end up on land, not in the water and many times it is in moderate to heavy cover. If your dog has a good solid sit then teaching this part should be very easy. It is just a matter of getting the dog used to you telling it to sit while you continue to move forward away from the dog. Many of you might think that it would be just as easy for the dog to do the flushing as you would in an upland hunt but it is really not. If you let the dog do the flush then the dog will end up in the ditch, which many times puts the dog below the line of sight to the birds so that the dog never has a chance to mark the fall of the birds. If your dog runs blind retrieves well, then this might work out OK as long as you mark the fall of the birds yourself but if not you run a high risk of killing a bird and then never seeing it again. So we are going to teach the dog to sit on command while you continue your forward momentum. This will be foreign to the dog at first since more than likely when the dog has been at the heal position he has always been told to sit at the same time that you stop and then heal when you start to move again. It just takes some practice and patience and the dog will get it in no time. We are going to start doing this in the yard and after we build some proficiency then we will go out and practice it in the field. So all we are going to do is to have the dog in the normal heal position walking along and give the command sit while you just continue to walk forward. Normally, during the first few times the dog will not sit and will continue to walk with you at heal. When this happens just take the dog back to the position that it was when the sit command was given and sit the dog and then walk forward in the original direction that you were going. If you have taught the dog to sit remotely ( sitting away from you ) this will come easier to the dog but if not, no worries as we are going to teach it now. Now we are going to repeat this until the dog understands what is being commanded. Once the dog starts to get the idea we are going to do a few things that will be important in the field. First we are going to start to practice this with a shotgun in our hand. If your dogs are like mine when that shootin stick comes off the shelf my dogs go into over drive as they associate the gun with hunting and birds. So we are better practicing this in the yard to get good compliancy prior to taking all this to the field. This is especially true for those dogs that upland hunt as the dog is used to being in front of you while you have a gun, not behind you. The other thing that we are going to work on is starting to whisper to the dog. It is hard to keep the ducks in the ditch if you are being loud. So if you have the habit of giving loud verbal commands we are going to have to tone that down a bit. Once your dog is good and steady with your normal verbal command, then start to work on lowering your voice to the point that it truly is just a whisper. Also, be very consistent with using one-word commands. You don't want to have to tell the dog 10 times to sit while you are trying concentrate on a couple nice mallards right in front of you. The last thing we are going to work on is giving this command from both a crouching position as well as a belly crawl. Now this one will be a little tougher for the dog and you will have to show some patience, while being very consistent. From the dogs point of view when you lower you body position you are putting yourself in subordinate position to the dog which will more than likely cause him or her to move towards you. Again just some patience and consistency will help you work through it. Start this exercise in a higher crouch and don't use the gun in the beginning. Then as you are able to get lower into a true crouch as you would be while actually sneaking up on some ducks then you can add the gun back into the exercise. When you are using the gun carry it the same way that you would if you were in a true hunting situation, believe me the dog will know the difference. If you are one to crawl into a jump shoot then work your way to the ground and practice this also. If not don't worry about it just do what you would normally do while hunting. When you do go to the crouching exercises you might find that you have to add a little volume to your verbal commands but once the dog starts to get the idea work your voice back down to the whisper so he or she is used to that level of volume from you. Work on this till the dog is doing pretty well. Then you can take it to the field. One of the best times to practice this in the field is during those couple weeks after the September upland opener but prior to the opening of duck season. Take you gun but don't take any shells so that if you are checked by the game warden you will not be in jeopardy of a violation. This is a great skill for a dog to have and if you are a jump shooter as it will lead to many more ducks in the bag and a much more enjoyable to for you and your dog. The Dogman 6-21-2007 Teaching the recall command Hi Folks, Last week we talked about obedience, specifically heal and sit. Hopefully you have been working on those two commands. This week we need to talk about the recall which would be the command "come" or "here". I know that I have said it before but I cannot stress how important these three commands are. They are the basis of everything else that we do with the dogs. If we don't have a good handle on these commands then it is just about impossible to get much else accomplished with the dog. First we need to define what the command should mean to the dog. The way that I like to define the recall is that when I give the command to my dog, I expect that the dog is going to come all the way to me until it makes physical contact with me. It may not be that way forever but you will find that if you train your dog to do this in the beginning that you will have a much more solid recall with your hunting partner. What I see in a lot of trainers is that they will call the dog and let the dog return to within several feet and call it good. What you will find is that over time that distance becomes further and further away from you until one day the dog starts to act like it can't hear you any more. I am very consistent with this just as I am with sit and heal. You will find that if you do the same you will end up with a dog that recalls very well. Also, unless I am going to make the dog sit or heal when it gets back to me I release the dog after it has made his or her way all the way back to me. The release that I like to use is "OK" and again I am very consistent with this. I liken this to a command as I use it to released the dog from the heal position or the sit as well. Though I have said it many times I cannot over emphasize the consistency part. Dogs learn by association through consistent repetitions. So having said that, let's move on to the recall itself. As with the first two commands that we have talked about, if we have allowed our pup to become sloppy with the recall we may have to go back and do a little remedial training. Again the collar and a lead work very well. If you have trained you dog with an e-collar then you can start here but if you have not then your only viable recourse is a flat or prong collar and a long lead. One of the best leads that I have found for this is vinyl covered clothesline. It is very inexpensive, does not kink easily, is light, and does not get hung up in brush or cover like a woven rope will. You can buy it in 50 or 100, foot lengths for under $10.00. We are going to go out and work the dog just like we did when it was a puppy. Go for a walk in an area that has things the dog is interested in so that it will forget about you and start to do it's own thing. Now in the beginning you might need to get a couple sessions just to get the dog used to having this length of a lead on it. If the first time you go out and the dog is more concerned about the lead than it is about anything else then just go for the walk and give the dog time to get used to the lead. Once the dog has gotten used to the lead and is willing to go out and start working on it's own then you are ready to start the training. So again go for a walk. A short cut pasture is a great place to do this. And they should be easy to find now that the first cuttings of hay are in the barn. If you do not have access to an area like this then a park or school ground will work just as well. There just might not be as much around to take the interest of the dog off you. In that case we can always take a bumper with us to toss to get the dog away from us so that we can give the recall command. So we are on our walk and as the dog becomes interested in anything but you, which normally does not take long on a periodic basis give the command that you are going to use, either here or come. When you give the command and the dog does not respond immediately, then reel the dog in. Though we are going to strive to build the recall with one-word commands, in the beginning you can use your command word multiple times as long as the dog is making positive progress towards you but the end goal is to use the command once and have the dog respond. So as soon as you believe that your dog understands what you are telling him or her to do then just give the command once and then reel him or her in all the way to you. Make sure that you praise the dog when the command has been complied with. If your pooch has had lots of opportunities not to comply to the recall then it may take many repetitions to fix that. If you use an e-collar in your training then this part of the training will go much faster. Remember from earlier tips that the collar is not to be used as punishment, it is to be used to reinforce your verbal commands. Even if you use the collar I would still do some work with the lead to make sure that the dog completely understands the command that you are giving. After you can give the command and the dog responds correctly without having to reel it in then switch to the collar but still use the lead. When you give the command stimulate the dog simultaneously with the command and continue to stimulate until the dog is making positive progress in your direction then end the stimulation. If the dog starts to mess area on the way back repeat the command. Again, this is not a correction it is reinforcement of the command therefore the stimulation must be low level. Once you have good compliancy then you can remove the lead and this off lead. However, if your dog disobeys the command then you must deal with it and repeating the command over and over is not going to fix the problem. This is one place where the command "sit" works well. If the dog, upon being given the command to recall does not comply make the dog sit, walk calmly out to the dog and by the collar walk the dog back to original position that you were when you first gave the command. This requires that the dog be able to do a remote sit, in other words the dog needs to be able to sit on command when it is away from you. This is why all the obedience work is so important. This is also where the ability to sit or recall your dog with a whistle is very useful. We have not talked about this yet so we will here. After that first week of reinforcing "sit" and "heel" it would be a good time to add the sit whistle. This is really quite simple if your dog sits well on command. This is where the concept of Pre-cue/cue comes into play. In the beginning the whistle in nothing more than the pre-cue to the command sit. When you are doing your obedience work, when the dog complies well the to the verbal command sit then you can add the whistle. While you are doing your obedience give the whistle one "tweet" and then give the verbal command sit. Just repeat this, over and over. Since dogs learn by association through consistent repetitions after several sessions the dog will begin to sit on the whistle prior to you giving the verbal command. When that happens the whistle now equals, in the dogs mind, the verbal command. You need to teach the same thing for the recall. When your dog is recalling well to the verbal command then you can add the recall whistle. The standard is three blasts of the whistle, "tweet", "tweet", "tweet". And you teach it in the same manner. You blow the recall whistle before the verbal command is given. So the drill would be "tweet", "tweet", "tweet" then the verbal command here. Again, after repeating this for several sessions the whistle will then equal the verbal command as far as the dog is concerned. Once the dog learns to respond to both versions of the command then in each training session mix the two up. I think that gives us plenty to work on for the next week or so. Next week we will talk about how we start to use all this obedience in our training as we progress towards the upcoming hunting season. Have a great week and Happy Fourth of July to everyone out there. The Dogman 6-21-2007 Hunting just around the corner Hi Folks, Well it is June 21st and summer has finally arrived and that means that Upland season is just 9 weeks away. Yes just 9 short weeks and it will go fast. Now don't get me wrong, I like summer and hope to do as much of the usual summer activities that I can, fishing for one. But another thing to do this time of year is to start getting that four legged hunting partner of yours in condition for the upcoming season. Waiting until the week before season starts to get the ol hound ready is not the best plan. First you can't get your dog in condition in a week and I am talking about your dog's physical condition and at the same time you can only do so much training in that short amount of time. Even for the "well seasoned dog" opening day will go a whole heck of a lot smoother if we begin now. It will also make your first day of the season much less frustrating and therefore more enjoyable for both of you. Where do we start? Well the simple answer is obedience, obedience and more obedience! Everything that we do in the field in some way or another is an extension of basic obedience. The three basic commands being; Here (or Come) Heal and Sit. Unless you are the exception and make your dog comply to every command that you give, every day of his or her life your dog will understandably be out of practice. And don't think that I am the same way with some of my dogs because I am as well. Not my dogs in training, but with my housedogs, which are also my hunting dogs. We are human and they are dogs, we each have our traits, one of ours is complacency. There is nothing wrong with going back to the basics from time to time even with a well-trained dog. That means back to the lease and collar. Even if you work your dog with and electronic training collar, a little time on the lease is very good for the dog, for the both of you really as it has a way or reconnecting you as a team. And it just might get you a little well needed conditioning as well. So get that leash and collar out and spend a week or so once or twice a day for a half an hour or so doing obedience. Reinforce that sit and heal first. Since I am talking about dogs that are already trained and have just gotten out of practice a few times around the yard healing and doing a few sits is really not what you are looking for. We are not working a puppy and your dog will have a much longer attention span so you can do 30 minutes with no problem. Take your dog for real walks, if you can. If you can't do that during the week and working in the yard is the best you can do it is much better than no training at all. However, when you can, go for real walks in similar conditions that you might hunt in or another good choice are the many bike and walking trails that have been developed in most of Montana's larger towns, even here in little Ronan we have a trail system that goes for over 3 miles at this point. In these situations you can get good distractions, like people running and riding bikes as well as other folks talking their dogs for a walk. When you are healing, make the dog really heal, keeping his or her head just a touch in front of your knee. If he or she wants to lag behind encourage the dog to move up to you and be sure to praise when he does. Keep the mood upbeat, in other words make it fun. If the dog wants to be out in front of you then correct it and praise when it gets into the proper position. Don't let your dog keep its nose to the ground when healing. The dog can't watch you if it has it's head down. If your dog wants to do this on a regular basis then make right or left turns when the dog's head goes to the ground. It will make the dog keep its attention on you instead of what it wants to do. If you are able to do this work outside of the yard then you should find that there will be plenty of times that you will want the dog sit and be steady. For example when I am walking on the trail system and I am going to have a jogger or someone walking, or a bike rider etc pass me I like to turn 90 degrees to the path and have the dog sit and stay in the sitting position while the distraction goes by. I do the same if I have to walk past another person with a dog. If I have to cross a road then I make the dog sit for a few moments while I make sure that we are not going to get hit by a car prior to crossing. Basically anytime that I have to stop for any reason the dog should also stop and sit. I also like to do this when I have to cross a fence. Teach your dog to sit while you cross the fence and then call your dog under the fence. In a hunting situation when there are guns involved this makes things much safer for both of you. I like to do this for the first week or until the dog is healing well and sitting well on command. Only after we get through this first part do I move on to the recall; the commands here or come, whichever you happen to use. If you do happen to work your dog with an e-collar then during this period as the dog becomes more proficient then you can transition to the e-collar. But even then I still keep the dog on lead and mix up the tools that I use for reinforcement. So in this situation I would still use the lead and collar to reinforce the heal and use the e-collar to reinforce the sit. Another tool that I like to use is a healing stick. I normally use a standard healing stick that can be found in most dog catalogs but a plain old stick works pretty well. Now in no way am I advocating being harsh with your dog, but instead of the normal habit of pushing down on the dogs butt when given the sit command when the dog is slow to sit. I find that just a light tap on the top of the butt is much more effective. Also, when healing if the dog wants to be in front of where he or she should be I will tap or even just touch the dog on the front of the chest to help it get back in position. And I am talking a tap not a hit and make sure to use the command simultaneously with the correction. In this way we mix up the tools that we are using which works much better then just doing the same thing over and over. If you do use a healing stick I like to keep it out of the dogs sight until I use it. Usually I slip in my belt on the backside of my hip on the same side that the dog heals on. And again I am not using the stick to punish the dog so when I say "tap" that is just what I mean. Next week we will talk about the recall as well as some other things that in the end will lead us to a dog that is ready to really go hunt, under control when the season arrives. Take care, The Dogman 5-5-2007 Working on multiple marks Hi Folks, OK, we left off having talked quite bit about single marks. and as I said in one of the earlier pieces on marking singles are extremely important. If the dog can't do a decent single mark it will not be able to well with multiple marks. However, at the same time we want to introduce the dog to multiple marks as soon as we can in our marking drills. Now I understand that might sound like conflicting statements but let me try to explain. We do want to strive to teach the dog, good solid single marking skills, in all types of conditions and terrain. However, at the same time we have to as early as possible start to challenge the dog's memory skills. Dogs are born with pretty good long-term memory. They remember places you have been, people and dogs that they have come in contact with. However, it is the short -term memory that we need to develop, the ability to remember 2 or more things for a period of say, 5 to 60 minutes. That is where the challenge is because we want to begin to develop this skill as early as possible. The older we let the dog become before we teach multiple marks the harder it will be. When we are developing a dogs memory skills what we are really is happening to the dogs brain is that it is growing more cells, just as we do in human children by challenging their little minds. It is the whole basis for programs like "Kindermusic" which is for basically newborns through 7 years old a critical time in children's brains. In dogs that period equates to about the dogs first year of life, maybe up to two in some dogs but in my experience once a dog has reached the age of about 18 months, memory skills become much harder to develop. This is one of the main reason that I like to start working my dogs at such an early age so that we can get a lot of the line manners issues, and experience on single marks under the dogs belt so that we can move into doubles and more as quickly as possible. There are several ways to introduce a dog to double but while doing this we want to make sure that we don't fall into bad habits. The worst of those in my mind is called "switching" which is when the dog is sent for a mark hunts for it for a few moments and then runs to the area of a second or third mark prior to picking up the first. Or the second type of switch is when the dog picks up the first mark of a multiple and then goes for a second mark hunts for that one for a time and then goes back to the old fall area of the first mark and hunts that area for a second time. I introduce doubles in a couple different ways depending on the dog at hand. However, for most folks I think the easiest way is to introduce doubles is to use the corner of a building or dog proof fence line. When I say dog proof fence line I mean a fence like Chain Link or panel type fencing. What we are going to do is to use that physical barrier in the beginning to separate the marks and help keep the dog from being able to switch. I think the corner of a house or barn is really the best. Using a fence corner or fence line is a good second step. What we do here is stand at one corner of the structure that you have chosen so that you can see down 2 sides of the building. I usually work at a distance from the corner of maybe about 20 feet or so. You don't want to be too far away, as the marks will be longer at first than you want and of course you don't want to be crowded right up against the building. This gives the dog an automatic 90-degree separation of the marks. That is a good angle for the dog. While there is good separation of the marks they are still close enough together to not force the dog to have to get up from the sitting position and move in order to see the second mark. After the dog learns the concept of doubles then we will teach both wider angles where the dog does have to move, angles up to 180 degrees and then also much narrower angles but the latter we really have to work up to slowly so we don't promote switching. So to teach this drill we get the dog at the corner of the building in a sitting position. We have our two bumpers in hand and the dog and we queue the dog just as we have up to this point we say the word "mark" and we toss one of the bumpers down one wall. I think 10 or 15 feet away from the wall is fine. And we are not going for distance here. This drill can easily be done with a building as small as 20 feet by 20 feet. This is truly just a concept drill to teach (develop) the skill to be able to go get one item and come back with it while remembering that there is one or more still out there and the relative position of "line to" the second or third marks in relation to the position of each other as well as the point of origin. In short - they have to remember where everything is from where they were sitting. So we say "mark" toss the bumper down one wall, your choice. We want to give the dog a moment to register that first one say 5 seconds and then we will say "mark" a second time and toss the second bumper down the opposite wall. Try to keep the distances pretty much the same and they don't have to be long 30 - 35 feet is fine to begin with. Just so we get our terms correct we call the first mark thrown the" memory bird" as that is normally the second item to be picked up. The last mark that we throw is the "go to bird" as that is normally the mark the dog will go to first. I will also mention here that open grass is just fine. We actually don't want cover in this situation. We would like both marks to be visible to the dog from the point of origin. So we toss our marks and we send the dog to the go to bird. But when we send the dog you want to be lined up with the mark the dog is going to pick up. If the dog is at heal on your left side then you will have the toe of your left foot pointing at the Mark the dog is to go pick up. Since we have been doing singles there will be no problem with the dog going to get the first mark. Every once in a while I will get a dog that will try to go get the memory bird first. Don't let the dog do this. You don't want to be too firm as we don't want to have the dog hesitating at the line but the dog needs to get where it is sent. Just take your time and if it all goes haywire the first time or two then just pick them up and repeat it. One thing that you can try if you are having some trouble is to throw each mark as a single at first and then put the two together. When the dog picks up the first bird and is going back with it you want to "line up" for the second mark. That mean you will turn and point you left toe at the second mark prior to the dog coming back and you receiving the dummy. This way the dog is already lined up for the second mark. Now don't be discouraged and in fact you should expect that when the dog comes back with the first mark and you get the dog back in the sitting position at heal for the second mark that it will not remember it. You will know by watching the dog. If he comes back and sits and does not look out to the second mark with the obvious intent go get it then the dog has forgotten it. This is normal. Don't think your dog is any lesser for it. Just repeat it and take it slow. As you repeat this drill you will start to "see" the dog begin to remember the second mark. For most dogs it is like a light switch, you will be doing repeats of the drill and the dog will all of a sudden just remember the second one. You need to be mindful of two areas here. The first are the line manners. Before the dog gets to go get the second mark it needs to be sitting and focused on the second mark. If you have a dog that is a little unruly then put your emphasis on that aspect of the drill in the beginning. The second thing that can start to happen is that the dog might begin to drop the first mark prior to getting back to you as it remembers the second mark. If this happens then go back and run the first mark as a single to build the habit of getting that first mark beck to you. Just take your time and be patient and it will all come together in a short period of time. In the next tip I will discuss where we go after the dog starts to become somewhat proficient with this drill. Have a great week and since this is the opener or fishing season please for the sake of sportsmen everywhere - take a dog fishing! Take care, The Dogman 5-5-2007 A bit more on marking Howdy Everone, Hope everyone has been enjoying the nice, almost summer like weather. Except for whatever that was yesterday. A little more like winter. Had at one point about 2 inches of snow here at the house. It was gone by sunset but for a while there it felt like we were back in Feb. Ok we left off in the last part of our discussion on marking with talking about walking singles. You will hear me talk a lot about singles, as they are the most important part of a dogs training from a marking point of view. Most of the top dogs in the country spend most of their time on singles. Normally about 60% to 75% of the marks thrown for a dog throughout its life are single marks. However, that is now way means that we are going to ignore teaching multiple marks. However, doubles or multiple marks triples and quads are really more memory work then marking work. I will explain that more in a bit. Hopefully, I have explained the walking singles well enough to understand. Again, If there is any confusion, please email me your questions. I do a lot of walking singles with my dogs. Even my older more experienced dogs, get walking singles on a pretty regular basis. They are just plain good practice. When you first start your dog out keep it simple! What we want to do in the early stages is build, confidence and good habits. I think that I have spoken to this in the past but line manners are critical. Being able to heal to the line under control is the first part and then having the dog be able to sit to watch the marks is the second part. Though the healing to the line may not seem that important in a hunting situation but it really is. As your dog advances, especially if you are going to train the dog to run blinds then the ability to heal and be under control is highly important. If your dog won't heal well then you will have a hard time lining him up for blinds and to see marks, especially multiple marks. Then I think the fact that the dog needs to be able to sit and watch the marks is self-explanatory. If either of these abilities are lacking then they need to be worked on. Now as far as doing the marks themselves the sitting part is the most important. Patience! If you have a dog that is high desire and that is just what we want then in the beginning expect that when the mark is thrown then the dog will likely fight the collar or lead and try to go without being released. Just take your time and let the dog settle down and then send him. If the dog fights you long enough that it has forgotten the mark. Just get him settled down and repeat the exercise. If after several tries of this the dog is still fighting you then just end the session and put the dog up for a bit. Maybe 10 or 15 minutes and repeat the session. It won't take long if you are consistent and patient the pup will get it pretty quickly. The other side of the equation is the recall. You have to have your dog coming back to you after a mark in order to get any productive work done. This is where the e-collar really comes in to play. However, it has to be used very carefully in this stage of training. This is where very low-level stimulation is very effective. However, during marking drills is not the time to reinforce this aspect of your training. You don't want to put too much pressure on the dog at this point or you will end up with a dog that either won't go or worse a dog that sees bumpers or birds as a bad thing. So we need to do a lot of this recall work out in the field and in the yard not related to picking up an object. Be sure that when you are doing your recall work that you introduce the whistle early in the dogs training. The reason that the recall is important is that at some point in your marking drills your dog will decide that he will not b ring back what you threw for him. You need to fix that potential problem prior to it happening. Ok so we have talked about a lot of things that relate to marking so now back to marking itself. I didn't mean to get away from the marking itself but these obedience issues are the foundation for the work to come As well as the help that we talked about in April 14th Dog Tip. And hopefully we also have a better understanding of how the dog see the world as talked about in the March 31st Dog Tip. Ok so we have talked about walking singles from the mechanical point of view but not so much from the practical point of view. When we first start doing more formal marking drills we need to start slow. First keep the distances reasonable. Even to the point that the dog can see the mark in plain view after the mark is thrown. This will just help the dog get the idea of what the drill is all about. Once the dog is doing well picking up these simple marks we are then going to start to make it harder for the dog. We will start to make the marks more difficult as we go. Now we don't want to make big jumps in difficulty but we do want to progress the dog. So as the dog gets better we will make it harder. As we move the mark from being in the open to having it land in cover think about the wind direction. Even rubber bumpers smell and the dog can pick up that scent from some distance. Use that wind in the beginning to mark finding the mark easier for the dog. Keep your marks separated by some distance. Even when doing walking singles as it will help avoid the dog going back to the area of an old fall ( the place where a mark has landed before ). Start to vary the length and the placement of the mark in relation to the thrower. The length of he mark is easy to understand, just don't increase the distances too quickly. It you have been working at say 40 to 50 yards don't just jump up to 100 yards all of a sudden. Work up to that distance. Go from 50 to 60 then 60 to 70 until you get to the longer work. As far as the placement relative to the thrower, what I mean by that is don't just have the thrower throw at right angles. We don't want the dog getting use to (in the habit of) going to the same position in relation to the thrower each time. After the dog starts to get the routine, then have the thrower mix it up. Angle back throws or throws tossed at 45-degree angles will help the dog understand that he has to run past the thrower. This is hard for the dog if it has always picked up the throw, just to the right or left of the person throwing. And then also increase the cover so that the dog has to hunt harder for the throw. As the dog progresses start to ad element to the session to make them more realistic. Set out decoys, even on land and have the dog run through them to get him used to it. Also as the dog gets better start to hid he thrower. Using a man made blind or natural cover and put the thrower in camouflage. We want to introduce the dog to what we call retired gunners (the thrower). After the throw have the thrower get behind cover like a bush or tree and sit out of sight while the dog does the retrieve. These are the situations that the dog needs to see that will make it a better hunting dog or test dog. Whichever situation the dog is going to into the training is the same. Next week we will talk about the last element of equation, which is Terrain and then we will also introduce the dog to double marks, a simple but sometimes challenging task. Till next week - Good Training! -- Jeff Smith The Dogman dogman@montanaoutdoor.com 4-14-2007 More discussion on marking Howdy Everyone! Hope everyone has been enjoying the bit of spring weather that we have been having. We are going to continue our discussion about marking but first I wanted to just mention the Pet Food recall just to make sure that no one misses this very important recall. For those of you that, are not familiar with this recall. This is the largest pet food recall in history. It affects almost 100 different brands of pet food, mostly canned and soft pet foods. The problem with the food is the Wheat Gluten. Apparently most of the pet food companies buy their gluten from one single supplier; Menu Foods. Wheat Gluten is used as a protein source in most of these dog foods and when they are testing the Gluten for Protein levels what they test for is Nitrogen. Generally the higher the Nitrogen level, the higher the protein. Melamine is high in Nitrogen even though it has no real protein in it. Apparently what has happened is that prior to Menu Foods buying the gluten some added Melamine to the gluten in order to make the gluten look like it was higher quality then it really was. Of course higher quality Gluten sells for more money. The amount of Melamine added to the Gluten is about 6%. This is what has been making the dogs and cats sick. If you feed canned dog or cat food please take the time to check to see if the brand that you are feeding is on the list. The most current information can be found at the following link. http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/02/recall.links/ Ok now on to our marking. If you take a look back at the tip for the week of March 31st you will see where we left off. I was going to continue here with some tips on how we can make our marking drills more productive for you and your dog. The first thing that I can tell you is that a good helper is invaluable. Someone that can help you in the field that really helps is worth their weight in gold. There are many situations in a young dogs life that having help in the field will save you a ton of time training and will also help the dog progress faster with less confusion. The first rule here is that you the trainer needs to k now what is and what is not a good helper. If you have any questions in your mind go seek help from a local training group or even better go be a bird thrower at a local test. Ask to throw for one of the lower stakes. Good birds throwers are made not born. So we will assume for discussion sake that you have a helper that is somewhat trained in what to look for when working with the dogs. The first thing we need to be sure of is that the person that we put out in the field knows exactly what we expect of them for each mark thrown as the reaction of the helper will not be the same in each situation. So communicate and remember that we all make mistakes so be patient. Unlike our dogs our help can make the decision to leave and not come back. So work as a team. The most obvious thing that a helper brings to the training is that we have some one that can throw out in the field. You have heard me say before that we can't throw everything for the dog from the line (Point of Origin-POO). We have to teach the dog to look out in the field. Hopefully we started this when the dog was very young but if not don't fret we will just teach it now. So with your helper out in the field we will line up our dog for the mark and when you and the dog are ready for the mark you will signal your thrower to throw. You must have an attractor out in the filed to draw the dog's attention to the mark. This is where a duck call comes in handy or a goose call. So the whole situation should go like this. Your helper is in his or her designated spot. With birds or bumpers, whichever you are using. You walk your dog to the POO. You sit your dog and let the dog have a moment to take in its surroundings. When you are ready you will signal for your thrower to begin the mark. This begins with the duck call. Right when you signal for the call you should cue your dog by saying, quietly, "mark" and your helper should start the call immediately. The helper needs to be aware of the dog. Throwing a mark for a dog that is looking away will not help the dog. Many times when the call starts it can echo off of some object that you have near you. That echo can actually pull the dogs head from the person in the field. We need to make sure the dog is looking at the mark when it is thrown. We don't want the thrower to blow the call too long either. IF we do that the dog can loose interest in the sound and start to look around. You can start to see here that the helper is a training team member not just a helper. Be sure to talk about these things before going out in the field. Not in the middle of the session. If things get confusing then stop the session for a bit and discuss your expectations. Anyway back to the throw. You have signaled for the throw, you have told your dog to "mark", your caller gives a few crisp blows on the call and then throws. Your throwers job is now to watch the dog. Not talk or make noise or move around. You don't want the thrower to distract the dog in any way. But you need for the thrower to really watch the dog. If the dog runs out does a little hunt and finds the object - great. But if the dog does not you don't want the dog to come back into you. You need the dog to stay out in the field and hunt till it finds the bird. Prior to the session define in your mind how much of an area you are going to let the dog hunt before helping the dog. I try not to help the dog unless I think it is going to leave the area of the fall. And the size of the area of the fall is going to change depending on the circumstance. If the throw is pretty close, say 30 or 40 yards, then the area of the fall is going to smaller then if the mark is at 100 yards. If it looks to you like the dog is loosing interest and is going to leave the area of the fall you then need your helper to help. They can do this is a couple different ways. The help can simply blow a call or two on the duck call to remind the dog of the fall. Or you might need for the thrower to walk part ways towards the area of the fall.. Or the dog might need to have another object thrown for it. This is where you have to make some decisions on the fly based on the situation at hand. If you have your helper carry more than one object out in the field have them in a bag or a bucket. Not loose in your helpers hands. A hunting vest works pretty well also. What you don't want to have happen is for the thrower to put an object on the ground while he or she trying to help the dog. It makes it too easy for the dog to pick up that object at the throwers feet. You can't let that happen as then the dog will look to the helper for the birds to the point where if it gets bad enough many dogs will just run out to the thrower and sit waiting for the thrower to basically give the dog the object. I am sure that at this point that you are beginning to understand just how important good help can be but also that the thrower out in the field has some real responsibility when it comes to training. OK so you should now have a better idea of the throwers roll in training. So now we need to talk about a couple simple marking drills will really help the dog out as far as progressing it's marking ability. As you know I like to do a lot of singles. Multiple marks are certainly important but you will find that the dog will do a better job of moving to multiple marks if it has had a lot of singles in a variety of situations. One of the drills that I like to do on a regular basis is called walking singles. It is just as the name suggests. You have your thrower out in the field and he throws singles while he walks in a semi-circle around the dog and handler. The thrower goes out into the field with 5 objects if there are going to be four throws. The thrower can start on either side and it is good to mix that up from day to day. The drill is quite simple. You decide where you are going to have the thrower walk. And we want to think about what we are doing when you go to the field. These are not just four arbitrary throws. You need to think about terrain, cover, etc when you are doling this drill. Each mark should be thrown for a reason. If the dog is gun conditioned then the thrower should have a primer pistol or shotgun as well as the bumpers or birds to be thrown and of course the duck or goose call. Try to do everything with as much consistency as possible as far as how you handle your dog. Getting them lined up to the mark. The timing of the commands should be consistent. For example try to use the same timing when you say the word "mark" and call for the birds. If the dog is gun conditioned then when you signal the thrower will call for a moment and then throw and shoot. And whether the thrower has a shotgun or a pistol I like to have the thrower point at the object as if it were really being shot at. Then of course after the mark is on the ground then you will send the dog. It is important that the dog be ready for these drills. For instance the dog should have pretty good obedience. A dog that will not sit still and look out will have a hard time marking. If you are worried about the dog not sitting and waiting for the object to be thrown then run the dog with a lead or a collar. This is a marking drill so you want to remove as many distractions from the situation as you can so that the dog can concentrate on what you are trying to teach. Then the drill is simply having the thrower start in one position and then as each mark is thrown and picked up then the thrower walks in a semi circle around the dog and handler and continues to throw singles. I usually like to do about 4 or 5 marks per session. I might do more than one session in a day but I keep the number of marks to no more than 5 throws. If the dog has trouble with one of the throws just repeat it until the dog gets it right. If your dog does something that is unexpected, stop and think about it. Try to see the situation from the dog's point of view. Did the dog see the mark? Was there a distraction in the field? Is the dog running over a type of terrain that it has not seen before? Really think about what is happening as you do the drills. This will help you learn to read your dog and it will help you understand what to expect from the dog in different situations. I thought that I would get this in 2 parts, but it looks like we will go for part three next week. If you have any questions please feel free to email me. dogman@montanaoutdoor.com And don't be bashful. I am sure some of this sounds complicated and some of it is. So if there is anything here that you do not understand ask me about it. Till next week - Good Training! -- The Dogman 2-10-2007 Don't get stuck at the line! Howdy Everyone! Hi everyone, When it comes to marking drills for our dogs it is important to teach the dog to look out and scan the horizon. One of the most common mistakes that I see individual owners make with their dogs is to throw everything from the line or "Point of Origin". This is perfectly natural on the owner's part. You want your dog to be steady so you have him by your side so that you can control him and you throw your bumper or shoot your retriever trainer from that position. Now don't get me wrong you need to do plenty of these kinds of drills. However, it is important that your dog also learn to look out in the field. If all you do with your dog is upland hunt then you might get away with just training this way. But if you are a waterfowl hunter, throwing everything for the dog from the line it will limit your dog's ability to find birds in the field. This will happen from two different points of view. First since dogs are place oriented, if you throw everything pretty much the same distance each time, your dog will get in the habit of going out that distance and will begin his or her hunt. Most folks can toss a bumper about 30 to 40 yards. A retriever trainer will throw further but it throws pretty much the same distance each time as well. Your dog will very much get in the habit of going out that distance and that is it. If you have been picking up everything at 30 to 40 yards and you toss a 70 yard mark the dog will have a hard time getting that far out as it will begin it's hunt at that 30 to 40 yard distance and then for a young dog the tendency as they don't find the object is to work back towards the line until they either get help or give up and come back to the trainer. Do not fault the dog here. It is the training that has caused this. Also, for a dog that has everything thrown from the line that dog never learns to look out at the horizon for incoming birds. So when that dog gets to go the duck blind it will not have the ability to see birds that are coming in which will make it much harder for the dog to mark those birds. All of this really puts the dog at quite a disadvantage. So what we need to do is to mix things up a bit during training. That means that you will need to have some help from time to time. You need someone out in the field throwing for your dog. But we need to be sure to do a few things while we are doing these drills. First I like to use a command associated with the throw. Over a short period of time this command will cue the dog to look out into the field. I like to use the "Mark" for the command. So I will have the dog next to me with my thrower out in the field. Since the dog needs to have some help looking out I like to use some type of attractor that comes from the thrower. My personal ch