Training Mixed breed to be Bird Dog

M

mattk

New member
Hi Everyone,

I have a 2 year old mixed breed, we believe her to be lab/American bulldog. She loves getting out and running and chasing animals. I have a friend who is also a big bird hunter who’s trains his own dogs, and I plan on bringing her out in the spring to his 80 acres and see if she has any willingness or ability to do it. Does anyone have any tips or thoughts for me? I appreciate the help!
 
By all means, take her out & see what she does, but why wait until spring?? Also, if this land of your friend's is a place wild birds could be nesting in the spring, avoid potential nesting areas please, so you don't disrupt it. But wherever & whenever you take her, ideally, basic obedience training would be quite solid before you do it. If you're just wondering if she'll be apt to hunt, that's 99% genetic/instinctive. Exposure to birds may awaken the beast & continued exposure may strengthen the desire. But you really can't teach that.
 
You have to start at the beginning. The first question I ask is this; Does your dog have rock solid OB (Obedience, sit, stay, here, & heel)? OB is the foundation of all training and if your dog's isn't rock solid, trying to teach anything else is a waste of time & will ultimately fail. It is during OB your dog learns how to train. Also, a dog that doesn't obey basic commands instantly in the field can not only ruin a hunt, but more importantly is a safety issue.

I gather you have no or very limited experience training a gun dog. That means you have to learn to be a trainer at the same time your dog has to learn to train. This starts for both of you with OB. Don't get discouraged, everyone who has ever trained a gun dog started out at that same point.

I recommend getting a copy of John & Amy Dahl's 10 Minute Retriever. Read it cover to cover before you start training your dog, and follow it.
 
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I agree w/ Labs' comments & suggestions. He's probably forgotten more than I've ever learned about gun dog training.
That said, my opinion is that his somewhat severe language (e.g.: "waste of time & will ultimately fail"; "will not only ruin a hunt") is true only if your expectations are that your dog be absolutely rock solid. Rock solid is fantastic! That's not my expectation, & I think most dog owners fall into a similar category. You can successfully train & hunt a dog without perfect OB. There are 10's of 1,000's of living-proof examples in fields today. They just aren't perfect. An important thing, imho, is to KNOW what your expectations are & what you HAVE trained. If you haven't trained something, you can't expect it. And if your expectation is something less than rock solid & haven't trained for rock solid, then you can't expect rock solid.
 
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The only thing two dog trainers will agree upon is that the third trainer is wrong :)

With that in mind, I will disagree slightly with the above. Yes, the obedience is very important. However, you first have to build bird drive so you can properly gun break the dog. Work on your obedience separate from your bird and gun work for now. Build strong desire to chase and retrieve birds so you can properly introduce the gun. It is very important to build the association with the dog that gunshot means bird. This is even more important with a line of dogs not bred to tolerate and work around gunfire.

A rope should be standard equipment in the field right now. Don't shout a bunch of commands that you can't enforce. Use your rope to encourage your dog to come in with it's prize. Don't just rely on luck or divine intervention to occur. TEACH your dog what you want it to know. Set up sessions so they result in success for the dog.

I don't know where you live but if you have access to catching or buying pigeons they are great for the early work with dogs.

Bird dogs are made by exposure to birds. Sure, breeding is important however you can take the best cross in the world and it will be useless if it isn't exposed to proper training and lots of bird contacts. Conversely, you can take a mutt from the pound that is cooperative and has prey drive and turn it into a bird hunting machine with the proper handling. The smart money though will always be on dogs bred for the specific task of finding and retrieving a bird.

Good luck with your project!
 
I think it's rare but it happens. When I was a kid my buddy's chihuahua was good on pheasants. We never shot over her but there were lots of birds by the house in the city so we would hunt her. She got it and would hunt the hell out of them. It was hilarious.
 
Growing up one of the best pheasant dogs I've ever had was a mixed breed . We did everything together, so hunting was just another thing added to the list. Like others have said you MUST start with obedience, your dog must be under control before you even think about introducing him to birds. Then there is the introduction to gun fire, you don't want to lose him. If work on ALL of the basics I see no reason why you can't have a good partner in the uplands!
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
I agree w/ Labs' comments & suggestions. He's probably forgotten more than I've ever learned about gun dog training.
That said, my opinion is that his somewhat severe language (e.g.: "waste of time & will ultimately fail"; "will not only ruin a hunt") is true only if your expectations are that your dog be absolutely rock solid. Rock solid is fantastic! That's not my expectation, & I think most dog owners fall into a similar category. You can successfully train & hunt a dog without perfect OB. There are 10's of 1,000's of living-proof examples in fields today. They just aren't perfect. An important thing, imho, is to KNOW what your expectations are & what you HAVE trained. If you haven't trained something, you can't expect it. And if your expectation is something less than rock solid & haven't trained for rock solid, then you can't expect rock solid.
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I agree.My dog hunts hard, and I follow my dog, but she is not trained in a classical sense. She retrieves to hand.
 
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