Between the hot weather and the rain it’s hard to get time to train. Even on the hot days we have been doing a little work. I, usually at least, take the puppies for a walk each day. Annie still doesn’t want to come to me when she knows I’m going to put her up. Like a young kid not wanting to go to bed. A few days ago she ran from me making a big circle. I called her a couple of times then went after her. She decided I was angry so she stopped running. I went to her without saying anything, took my belt off and hit her one time. Then put her up.
Annie pointing a pigeon.
Annie pointing a pigeon.
Stormy pointing a pigeon.
The next day she came right to me when it was time to go back to the pen. A couple of days later she went to the chain gang when I called her instead of coming to me. I have a chair by the chain gang so I sat down. She came to me and I had her jump onto my lap. I petted her for a while but she was stiff. After a few minutes she softened and laid her head against my chest. I put her in her kennel. We will see how long this lasts or which works the best.
When I work them I clean all of the kennels, put bark collars on the older dogs, turn the puppies, Annie and Stormy, out and attach them to the chain gang. I have the release traps in the bed of the side by side so I just need pigeons. I use the side by side to hide the pigeons then work Annie first.
She’s on the chain gang so I stand close to her until she quits jumping around before I reach to take her off and put her check cord on. I don’t release her right away. I drop the chain from the chain gang and pet her for a few seconds telling her what a good girl she is. I don’t like for the dogs to take the chain hitting the ground as a release. I tap her head and say, “okay”. Then she can move.
On these training days I have a hot dog cut into about 20 pieces in my bag. I put her on the whoa barrel and hook her collar to a rope that hangs down. This rope just keeps her from jumping off. Neither of them try but if they slip I want something to catch them. I style her up saying, “whoa, whoa” over and over. I click a clicker and give her a chunk of hot dog. Annie is doing pretty well on the whoa part. We will get more serious with the whoa command soon but even now I can set her on the scales to weigh her and say, “whoa” and she doesn’t move until I set her off. We do the whoa on the barrel 4 or 5 times then I set her on the ground and say, “whoa”. I style her up on the ground, click the clicker and feed her a chunk of hot dog. She stands until I tap her head and say, “okay”.
There is 4 pigeons hidden on the training grounds. These pups know there are birds there and they don’t wait for me. The last few mornings I have been holding their check cord until we get to the first pigeon. After the first one I can usually keep them in sight.
Stormy pointing a pigeon.
The last morning I worked the puppies Annie pointed her first 2 birds on my side then crossed over to the neighbor’s side. When I finally saw her she was on point about a hundred yards ahead of me. I took a couple of pictures then started toward her. I cut the distance in half but I was keeping an eye on her. Sure enough she decided since I was a way back she would take another step. Just wanted to get a little closer. At her step I flushed the pigeon and said, “what did you do, what did you do”. It didn’t seem to bother her but she didn’t get to point for very long. She can’t catch the bird so the only fun she’s having is pointing. This should make her hold for longer periods of time.
Annie’s last bird she held for a long time. Even if they hold without moving I only let them stand for 30 to 45 seconds. In young puppies sometimes making them stand for a long time can cause a flagging problem, in my opinion. They are rigid for a while then start wanting to see the bird so they start wagging their tail.
Annie from a long distance.
On the way back we pass the retrieving bench and I set her on it. I style her up, make her hold for a few seconds then click and give her a chunk of hot dog. We do that in 4 or 5 different places on the retrieving bench. I set her on the ground say, “whoa”, style her up, click and give her a chunk of hot dog. I tap her on the head and say, “okay” and let her run. I put her back on the chain gang.
After reloading the release traps I went back to the chain gang to get Stormy. She is more hyper than Annie so I have to stand on the main chain of the chain gang and wait for her to stop jumping. Usually, the first time or two I bend over she goes back to jumping. I stand back up and wait. She’s getting better but she’s not there yet. When I can take her chain off and connect a check cord to her collar we go to the whoa barrel.
Both pups try to jump onto the barrel and do with a little help from me. As they jump I say, “up”. Because she’s hyper I have to hook her collar to a rope hanging down from the cross bar on the whoa barrel. I style her up saying, “whoa” over and over. When she stands still I click and give her a chunk of hot dog. We do this 4 or 5 times then I set her on the ground and whoa her again. I click and give her a hot dog then say okay as I tap her head. I hold the check cord until the first bird.
Stormy a long way ahead of me.
I tried to run her with a GPS collar but right now they are too big. The one time I tried she got her front leg through the collar and was not happy when I caught her. She will have to grow into the GPS collar.
A few days ago she pointed her first bird and did a good job. I got a few pictures then flushed the bird. She chased over onto the neighbor’s side. She was quite a ways ahead of me when I heard her making a terrible noise. When I got closer I thought she was fighting my release trap. Some dogs take their frustrations out on the traps. I went to her and then saw what the problem was. With the trap closed she had grabbed the top and some how it released. When the trap spread open her top teeth were hooked on one side and her bottom on the other. This had her mouth spread wide open. She was happy when I grabbed the trap and released her from it.
At her age, 4+ months old, something like this can cause a fear of release traps for a while. We still had a couple of birds out. She worked them both without showing the least bit of fear. She’s tough. Nothing bothers her.
When we got back to the retrieving bench I set her on it and checked her over. No lasting marks. I styled her up, clicked the clicker and fed her some hot dog chunks. After 4 or 5 times I set her on the ground and styled her up saying, “whoa” over and over. I clicked and gave her a chunk of hot dog. I tapped her head and said, “okay”.
Stormy.
I released Annie from the chain gang and let them play for a while as I sat in my chair. A lot of my dog training is just sitting letting the puppies play. I still scatter some dog food on the ground so they are rewarded for using their nose. The chain gang is close to a barb wire fence where they learn to cross and recross by going under the bottom wire. Most of the cuts in the field from barb wire is caused when dogs try to jump it. These puppies are around the fence before they are big enough to jump them.