Tail talk 😄

W

Weimdogman

Well-known member
One of the other threads has lots of comments about dog tails. I prefer the docked tails like my weims or gsp's. I actually get a bigger kick out of the helicopter action of a dogs tail on hot scent over the stiff tail on point. The former means there maybe some action , the later means I have done my job now you do yours.

Not a fan of long tails after the neighborhood brat I was babysitting let their St. Bernard in the house. Dog wagged his tail and knocked the kitchen table into the wall knocking a beautiful painting to the floor damaging it.

My buddy had his 2 labs with us staying in a Holiday Inn while on a hunting trip. Went to take them out and their tails thumped against the hallway walls all the way out and back again.
 
I like a tail long enough to be used as a rudder when swimming but not long enough to get in the way or to be beat bloody. I've read that getting beat bloody was the reason that they started cutting them. But if that's true, why didn't they bob the biggest tail bleeders of all the pointer? I had one once, Poor girl spent the whole winter with a raw tail tip.
 
But just think of the Jackson Pollock master pieces the bloody long tail could create on your walls!!!!!! Been their done that, wife was not impressed. Once my current longtails retire to pheasant heavens I will stick with the bobtails.
 
Tail injuries have a more significant likelihood of infection, which can be pretty serious. I didn't know this until a couple months ago when my wife and dogs had a woman let her big fat lab loose on them while on a jog. My older GSP had to go to the emergency vet for some injuries, and they noted the very small scrape on her tail tip. She had to wear a cone for two weeks (really only a couple days after we were convinced she wasn't trying to lick it.) Vet said they are very careful with tail injuries due to the high chance of bad infection and potential for amputation. Who knows how probable bad infection is, but we figured it wasn't worth the risk.
 
I tend to like the long tail of my golden, when he's birdy I enjoy seeing it wag to the point where it's almost hitting him in the face, also like the sound of it in the cattails when I can't see him, the sound of that tail thumping and a couple of cattails moving makes me smile. It wags differently with what's going on too, a white hot scent and a cold one have different intensities of it. First 10 minutes of the hunt it doesn't tell me much other than he's a dog doing what he loves.

The kids learned early how to defend themselves against it. My 18 month old just automatically puts her hand up whenever she walks behind the dog so she doesn't get whacked.
 
My nieces had a weim with a undocked tail. 3 surgeries and over 10 grand in vet bills and it had a docked tail.
Dogs with long hair or thick coats are better suited to long tails.
 
Long tails are understandably more prone to injury, slammed in doors, dog fights, stepped on by owners and tail ends get cracked by whipping motion. Fewer problems with docked tails. $10,000 could have bought a new screw on tail. :unsure:
 
UplandHntr said:
My Springer only has 3/4" taken off- field trial style. I like it.
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I swear sometimes guys think those tails are what makes a field bred springer. I mean you can have a field bred springer that just had its tail docked. It’s a thing done by humans.. Maybe I’m confusing it with guys more meaning it like bred specifically for trials and such. Not necessarily just for hunting. Anyways I get a kick out of it sometimes.
 
Has anyone ever considered docking a traditionally long-tailed breed? Those SMs and GLPs would make a nice looking dog (to my eye at least!) without that tail!
 
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The longer the better! I regularly had more than 6 setters & EP’s for years & never had any of the previously mentioned mishaps or injuries, except for some minor tail bleeding. I had 2 dogs that their tail got a kind of crook in it if they pointed a grouse rather than a phez or quail. I am short & can see that long 12 oclock tail a lot easier than a docked one.
 
captainshotgun said:
The longer the better! I regularly had more than 6 setters & EP’s for years & never had any of the previously mentioned mishaps or injuries, except for some minor tail bleeding. I had 2 dogs that their tail got a kind of crook in it if they pointed a grouse rather than a phez or quail. I am short & can see that long 12 oclock tail a lot easier than a docked one.
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I'm with you. My dogs gotta have a tail and never have had any of the aforementioned issues. Only tail issue I had is my first female Small Munsterlander sprained her tail her first hunting season. Vet said not uncommon in hunting dogs during their first hunting season (the muscle in the tail is still kind of weak I guess) probably due to over exertion. She was literally dragging her tail for a couple weeks then good as new and never happened again (vet also said if it happens once, it never happens again as the muscle heals up stronger).

I think folks anti tail have been around dog breeds that have helicopter tails that could power a duck boat. My dad's labs had tails that were always knocking stuff over and thudding against the wall, Small Munsterlanders at least, they're tails don't whip around like that. Plus, all that hair keeps them from getting raw and bloody.
 
I'm a Brittany guy so I can't get into the long tail debate. But, I do like a little longer tail on my Brittanys. I hate when they really bob them and leave just a stub. I think having that little longer tail makes the dog look better on point. Also might help with style points in a field trial. Here's pics of my last two Brittanys with a little longer than normal tail for a Brit.

May 2022.jpg2016.jpg
 
Dakotazeb said:
I'm a Brittany guy so I can't get into the long tail debate. But, I do like a little longer tail on my Brittanys. I hate when they really bob them and leave just a stub. I think having that little longer tail makes the dog look better on point. Also might help with style points in a field trial. Here's pics of my last two Brittanys with a little longer than normal tail for a Brit.

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I started out with Brits & have had over a dozen. I agree with you on the longer tail. I had some that if they were looking back at you it was hard to tell if they were pointing or not with those bob tails. Brits do have their place! As long as we had decent numbers of grouse here in Ohio, I always had at least 1 Brit. Sadly, those days are gone, and probably will not return.
 
captainshotgun said:
I started out with Brits & have had over a dozen. I agree with you on the longer tail. I had some that if they were looking back at you it was hard to tell if they were pointing or not with those bob tails. Brits do have their place! As long as we had decent numbers of grouse here in Ohio, I always had at least 1 Brit. Sadly, those days are gone, and probably will not return.
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They would return if the stoopid people who are against logging would become not sooo stooopid.

All the Big Tree People Park people have no idea what they "save the trees" idiocy has done to wildlife. North American forests used to burn regularly. When the first Europeans came here they marveled at how low density the forests were. A quote I read from an earlier settler writing back to Europe was that 'you could drive your wagons straight through the forest and barely have to turn". And that leaf litter each year would accumulate to 5-7 feet tall in some areas.

Red Earth worms, that now eat up all that litter are invasive species in North Amer. Before they arrive, the leaves would accumulate and burn eventually taking out the undergrowth and in some areas clearing out the forest for all new growth. Great places for grouse!

Now we have these sterile forests with nothing but big trees, little habitat for anything under the canopy, hardly any forage and barren wastelands IMO. But we have big trees! So pretty!!!!
 
After having shorthairs and brits for almost 20 years we switched to dogs with long tails about 13 years ago. It took a long time to get use to the idea but now I have to admit after a long day at work, it’s kind of satisfying to hear the thump, thump when I walk in the door.
 
AtTheMurph said:
They would return if the stoopid people who are against logging would become not sooo stooopid.

All the Big Tree People Park people have no idea what they "save the trees" idiocy has done to wildlife. North American forests used to burn regularly. When the first Europeans came here they marveled at how low density the forests were. A quote I read from an earlier settler writing back to Europe was that 'you could drive your wagons straight through the forest and barely have to turn". And that leaf litter each year would accumulate to 5-7 feet tall in some areas.

Red Earth worms, that now eat up all that litter are invasive species in North Amer. Before they arrive, the leaves would accumulate and burn eventually taking out the undergrowth and in some areas clearing out the forest for all new growth. Great places for grouse!

Now we have these sterile forests with nothing but big trees, little habitat for anything under the canopy, hardly any forage and barren wastelands IMO. But we have big trees! So pretty!
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As the grouse were disappearing here, I ran into a couple of foresters in the national forest. I don't remember the terms they used, but basically, they told me that the philosophy had changed from trying to improve habitat to leaving everything naturally go. I said that they might change their mind if they could see all the tracks in the snow around those clearcuts. Everything used them. They said it wouldn't matter because it was about the trees not the wildlife. Grouse were gone in five years.
 
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