I'm new to the HN.com forums and thought this would be a great time to introduce myself and become an active member of the community.
I'm 26, Single, and live on a small farm on the western plains of colorado. The bird hunting is suppose to be pretty good around the area. We have multiple hunt clubs and game ranches around for hunting opportunities as well as some decent public crop land access.
I received a German Shorthaired Pointer for christmas from my family and am starting to progress into training her to be my bird dog. The main goal is to teach her basic pointing and retrieving, She will be mostly used for hunting pheasant,quail, grouse, and waterfowl.
She is now almost 15 weeks old and is showing great potential and already picking up on the training basics. I named her "Bella"
I have never trained a pointer before, And this is my first dog other than that as a kid growing up. I am an avid hunter and have hunted waterfowl in the past but never really got involved in the upland game bird scene until now.
I have been focusing on obedience training as of now, and teaching her basic commands like sit, stay, and to retrieve. I have recently started her on the "wing on a string" and trying to get her to trail pheasant wings in the brush around my farm.
I have found a few resources online to help train her to become a great hunting dog but I would be interested to see what others think on the best approach to getting her training efficiently.
I do not have the extra $$ to pay for training lessons, So I will be doing all the work myself. I have a ton of free time this spring and summer to focus on getting this done right.
I would love to hear from others on the subject and see what everyone thinks the best approach would be.
I will be ordering some live quail and chukar chicks to raise along with the dog as soon as they are available locally. Live birds early on in the training program are suppose to help significantly.
Thanks for reading through all my ranting~ I will keep everyone updated on her progress throughout the season.
EDIT:Fixed the pics~
