Hunting Gamebirds > Bird Dog Topics

Dog Training on Live Bird....

(1/4) > >>

kmk75:
Just wondering if anyone has an experience with training a dog to retrieve live quail that are restricted from walking and flying by the use of a harness.  I was hoping to try this with my lab but I am a bit hesitant due to the fact that i don't really want to loose too many quail to shock or what not.  I would like to use the 8-12 quail I will have over and over again for training.  But I guess if I do lose one or two I will have a good meal for dinner! 

Anyone?....

Bird Brained:
A dog can be taught to do anything (almost).  It comes down to how much time and patience YOU have.  If you want the dog to retrieve live birds without being hard mouthed to the point it kills the bird or the dog "chomps" the bird to kill it knowing it's alive, then that's what you need to train your dog to do by focusing on that outcome in your training lessons.

If you're doing this (reusing birds) because your too cheap to buy birds for a "bird dog" then you should have thought hard about that BEFORE you bought or got the dog because it's truly unfair to the dog.  Sounds harsh, but it literally kills me how tight @ss dog people can be by giving bird guys a hard time over a nickel or dime price difference.  I usually tell those guys to go to the other guy because 1) they don't appreciate the product I sell and 2) don't know or care what it really takes to raise the bird for minimal profit (poverty level living is what it gets you if doing it full time) and 3) I don't need that type of customer because they gripe more than anyone else and buy the least amount from me anyway - Not worth my time and effort.

Anyway, back to your question...The stress on the bird is not any more than you put on it yourself to begin with by catching it, transporting it, tethering it, planting it.  The dog won't add much more to the whole stress factor as a whole once it's trained right.

One last thing...I understand times are tough right now for everyone.  A couple options for your retrieval training since you didn't mention the lab being a pointing lab which eliminates the need for using the birds to point off scent.

1) Buy a bird dummy and a bottle of bird scent of choice.  The make dummies that look like quail, chukar and pheasant and they last a long time.

2) Kill what quail you have, freeze them whole and intact and use the frozen quail for retrieval training.  They last much longer this way.

kmk75:
WOW!  A bit harsh....maybe reusing my birds has nothing to do with being cheap or a tight @$$.  Unfortunately I do not have the property to raise and release  birds at my own free will.  Wish I did.  And the only way I can get birds is to have them shipped.  So to pay $120 for 12 quail is a bit steep.  Not the fault of the seller.  Just the fault of the govt. making shipping live birds so damn expensive. 

And if times are so bad than maybe you are in the wrong business.  Fortunately I can educate myself to breed and incubate my own birds from the start if need be.  That would keep me from running into these guys that overprice their product because they feel they have the best and need to pinch every dime out of every sucker that walks in the door.

As for not being fair to my dog....She was not bought for hunting in the first place.  I only started hunting this year because I saw that she has shown the potential to be a great hunting dog even at 2 years too late maybe.  I am not only training my DOG to hunt but training MYSELF  to hunt for her. 

Now back to your more usefull advice.  I do have a training dummy (pheasant) and pheasant scent.  I am also going to use a couple of frozen birds to start her off on the retrieving.  She does great retrieving now but only with bumpers and the dummy pheasant.  I may try training her how to point, but first things first.  I am also going to use the harness that I can attach a string and weight to allow the bird to fly a bit.  Hoping to excite the dog and so she sees that her job is to make the bird take flight on my command.  We have some work to do, but the training is half the fun for both her and I.

Vrex:
Hey kmk, have you let your dog retrieve a wounded or tethered bird? I am a novice dog training and quail raising.  Both my 2 year old and the 1 year old will retrieve a live bird without killing it.  Birdbrain is right, to train correctly your dog will need to see alot of birds, I raise around 2000 birds a year for the intermediate trainers in my area and believe me $10 a bird is not that bad when considering all the work, money and effort that goes into raising birds.  If you check with the pointing dog clubs in your area you might find a local source for a small time guy like myself who caters to the guy that only needs a few birds at a time.  Anyway good luck to you.

Mike

kmk75:
The only bird my dog was ever on was a wounded grouse that I shot.  She didn't flush it, but after I shot it she came running over looking for direction.  This was the first time she went hunting this past Nov. She went nuts and started smelling around so much that she was snorting!  She found it but didn't bring it back to me.  I walked over to her as she was playing with it.  She was taking out some feathers but I didn't discourage her because I wanted her to have a good experience with her first  bird.  I didn't want to associate a shock or a no to the bird.  I was actually very surprised to see that she wasn't scared to approach it and start mouthing it.  That lasted about 30 seconds than I told her to leave it so I can put it out of its misery.  We then played fetch and I planted it a few times to see if she could find it.  She had no problem finding it but she just couldn't seem to get a good grip on it to bring it back to me.  She did like pulling them feathers out though!  Something we can work on when I get my birds. 

I can imagine that there is a bunch of effort that goes into raising birds and I wish I had the demand for them and the property because it does interest me.  Maybe I can look into getting a shooting preserve license for my inlaws property upstate NY than I can raise more birds to bring up there for hunting season.  The problem is that I live in NY and we seem to have some difficult laws when it comes to doing this.  But I am going to look into it.  In the meantime I will continue my search for a local bird supplier, but it doesn't look good.  If all else fails I will use the only place I found so far on the internet that will ship flight ready birds and guarantee them.

www.dunlaphatchery.net

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page