Gun training, whistle, and pheasant scent...Could use some help

KitsapCaller · 12-04-2003, 03:34 PM

Friends:

At the recommendation of a friend, I purchased a few tools to train my dog...a whistle, a cap gun, and some pheasant scent for her canvas dummy.

My question is how do I put it "all together" to use in the field? Obviously, the pheasant scent goes on the dummy, but other questions arise:

How do I start her on the cap gun? How should it be introduced and used?
How do I properly use the whistle in the field?
How do I get her to find the canvas dummy when it has been blindly hidden in the field versus throwing it?

Thanks in advance for your tips and assistance. ~Kitsap

Illinois hunter · 12-05-2003, 07:00 PM

Kitsap, what type of dog do you have? First of all i would reccomend obedience and yard training be started if it has not yet been. During this training you will get your dog used to yor verbal commands" here, sit, stay, come, whoa, alright, hup" whatever commands you choose to use. Just be consistant with them. As your dog starts understanding what you want, you can start using the whistle along with your verbal commands.One blow will mean a command, two blows will mean another and three blows may mean come, here or whatever you decide to use. I would make sure the dog is confident in his commands before confusing him with the whistle training.
As for the canvas dummy, I would start out just by playing fetch wiyh the dog, first at short distances in lower cut grass, and gradually going further and further. If your dog is not naturally retreiving then put him on 20 foot check cord and coax him in untill he will starts aoto. bringing it back to you. As the dog starts to improve at long ditances, start throwing, or planting your dummy in higher cut grass, weeds and the dog will have to start going on scent to find the dummy. You can use the word DEAD for him to hunt up shot birds. Start to tell him this as he is excitedly looking for the dummy.
As for the gun, do this slow and gradual as to not scare the dog. I have seen many a dog, even dogs that have been around guns before get scared, frightened and become gun shy. DONT DO THIS.! Avoid this by slowly adjusting the dog to the new noisy thing. Start by getting the dog used to loud noises at happy times, such as feeding. Simply bang his pans together or something like that. When you start on the gun, start at least 150-200 yards away , maybe even further, and let someone fire the gun as you walk your dog around. watch him and see what his expression is, if he starts acting scared at any time, STOP and comfort him with some play time. If he does fine, keep him occupied as you advance tword the shooter maybe10 yards. keep repeating this, maybe breaking it up into 3-4 days until you can walk the dog right up to the cap gun shooter. Then you can advance to a .22 caliber, and then a light gauge shotgun. A trap range is a perfect place to slowly walk your dog up to. SLOWLY.
As your dog becomes comf. with the gun, mahim stay on Sit,Hup,Whoa, until you have thrown the dummy in the air, fired the gun and the bird has fallen with the dog marking its fall.
Go slow with him and make sure you know what you want him to do or he will not know what you want.Be consistent with your commands. Repitition is the biggest part of training End each 15-20 minute session(no longer or you will bore the dog) with a possitive ending.If this a pointing dog you may want to visit "thecheckcord.com" as it has a lot of step by step training aids to get you started, but every one has different methods and opinions, so keep us posted on the development with progress and any questions or problems. Ive seen a lot of good advise on this site. GOOD LUCK!!!!!!!!

KitsapCaller · 12-07-2003, 07:24 AM

Thanks Illinois for the advice.

Doc E · 12-07-2003, 07:47 AM

Kitsap,

What kind of dog do you have? What (besides the apparent Pheasants) are you going to hunt?

You need to get on a progressive/sequential training program. This means a planned training program, where everything the dog learns is based on what it has already learned. For me to know what training plan to recommend will depend on breed of dog and what you plan to hunt.

BillDeLuc · 12-13-2003, 09:21 AM

My 2 cents, for what it is worth, is stay away from the artificial scents, and use only real bird wings and real birds. I have heard from many a good source that those artifical scents can confuse a young dog. I am no expert, just a relativly new amature trainer, but I tried the bottled scent on my dog and it did seem to mess him up for a few days. I started with pheasent wings, and when I put my Lab on real birds, he caught on fast. Good Luck!