Barbed Wire - Training

B

BirddogGSP

Active member
Anyone have any training ideas on dealing with barbed wire? Two dogs got nicked pretty good on the Sd opener. I typical run my dog with Mendota skid plate which has helped. Birds have a habit of going up by fence lines.
 
Ehhh unless ya wanna keep finger on tone or vibrate forever then yes..... a couple trips threw it and they will start slowing down. Least this year i finally started seeing it with 8 yr old lab. Now if a bird is down running that they see all bets are off.
 
If you're referring to a fence, I used to train to whoa at the fence. after a while they get it and just wait for you to toss them over.
 
BD, good idea. Has that helped any with the hot persuits or downed birds. I’ve seen dogs bounce off them and some get shredded.
 
BirddogGSP said:
BD, good idea. Has that helped any with the hot persuits or downed birds. I’ve seen dogs bounce off them and some get shredded.
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That might be a different story. I used to do it because in my hayday I might climb 6-8 fences a day. Dogs would sometimes get hung or hurt going over. Most of the fences are gone now.
 
I've never had to do much for barb wire, I just walk them through it the first few times and they are good. The fence that scares me is the 2 strands of barb wire with hog panel below obscured with grass and weeds. They get used to splitting the strands down low, and then hit the hog panel.
 
Im waiting for my pups stitches to heal from a week ago. She was hangin on the fence by her chest for a solid 3 count. 2 big holes. This dog hasnt went a week of her life the past 4 months without a wound of some sort. She wont learn from this either. 1000 mph everywhere all the time.
 
The dog should be figuring it out by itself, most will run straight into it the first time and then learn to watch for it. I say most because theres always the dogs that will spend all day walking into a brick wall and wondering what hit their nose. Same with electric fences.

If you are crossing fence, sit the dog before you get to it, cross, open it up yourself and call the dog through.

Paralleling a fence, call the dog off it with a "no" and redirection every time it gets close. Dont let the dog freely run through it.
 
No barbed wire in my Alaska hunting areas.
Surprisingly both my labs became experts at barbed wire here in Montana.
When I first hunted them, I would whistle-stop the dog as it approached a barbed wire fence,
the I would lift the bottom wire and verbally release the lab to go under the wire.

Both dogs quickly learned to go under barbed wire and if the barbed wire was too close to the ground,
the lab would wait for me to step on the lower wire and lift the middle wire to allow the dog through.

Both labs also learned to go around cattle guards with similar teaching.
 
I always heal mine to the fence when they are young pups, have them sit, then lift the wire for them to go under. Very easy to do once you have covered obedience and collar conditioning. I do like to start with a single strand of electric fence that is not hot. Letting a dog figure it out on its own can have bad results. Especially for a fire breather.
 
Feels like we cross barb wire 10 times a day, the way explained above is correct. My problems seem to always involve a cripple in a fence line or over the fence retrieve. I try hard not to make that situation but some old fence are grown over and unavoidable. Birds love a fence line!
 
Was just giving my buddy hell because his dog didn't know how to cross a woven wire fence with barb wire on top. I was holding the fence down and barbwire up after 2 minutes the dog squeezes thru the woven wire. My weims can't do that.
 
Pups sat out three different times this year from stitches or staples. Knock on wood, goin on close to 4 weeks since our last giant gash. Ive become a Nazi when shes near a fence with my finger on the button. She hunted in front of my buddy 100 yards away from me last weekend and I was a nervous wreck. He was near a fence. She squared it up once but the vest took it. What has me worried is the bird that flushes near a fence and flies over. Shes young and she chases.
 
I was you last year, 3 sets of stitches, 2 more that could have used a stitch. After a summer of formal training and a whoa on ecollar installed it’s better. Hang in there and accept that it’s a problem and fix it in your own way. I can accept a few stitches over the years to come on retrieves and cripples, but not on a controlled crossing. Good luck!
 
Most generally I don't hunt around barbed wire and when I do I practice "foreseeability". I teach mine how to go under barb wire but no bird hunt is worth injuring a dog.
 
I hunt near fences much of the time. I feel like for that reason, it doesn't take my dog long to master them. Mostly. Granted, they still get bit a little now & then, but in 22 years of dog ownership, only 1 injury requiring stitches, & that was (I believe) in large part because a shot rooster fell right in the fenceline. A tussle ensued right in a bad spot. It may also help that springers are smaller than many breeds (if not smarter) & can navigate fences a little easier. Woven wire sucks & should be outlawed near public hunting areas. Ace has tried unsuccessfully to squeeze through it a couple times & is therefore a little freaked out by it. Even if I hold it down, & the barbed wire up, he still takes a super cautious approach to it.
 
KEOutdoors said:
The dog should be figuring it out by itself, most will run straight into it the first time and then learn to watch for it.
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My dog picked up on this the first season. She plowed right into one and the shock of it literally sent her backwards with a yelp.

From that day forward she has always looked for them and been more cautious. One time she got stuck on an electric one in a snow drift and couldn't get off though.
 
If you let them learn while excited over birds they can get badly hurt. Best to take them out when there are no birds and let them run through it back and forth dozens of times. I'll bet Rocket went thru b-wire a thousand times this season and never got a nick, but this was his 4th season of dealing with fences. Hog-wire is a no-go.
 
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