Attention: TDR Forum Junkies 
Everyone has their own idea of the "perfect hunting dog", but I think we can all agree that a dog who knows his master's mind and the game is tough to beat. A great dog just wants to please you.
I like to keep things fun for my mutt (he's actually a purebred Golden, but I don't want him getting uppity so I call him anything but; such as "butthead, poodle, pot-licker, cookie-baker, mama's boy, fuzznuts, ****zhu-without-the-zhu, etc).
{Boy, has this site got a ridiculously anal "profanity monitor" or what?!! You can't even type the legitimate name of a legitimate dog breed like shi*zhu!! I'll bet you can't talk about breeding a ***** (female dog), either... Sure makes it tough on non-pc dog lovers... } Anyway...
Teaching to "hunt dead":
One of the most difficult, and important, things to teach a dog to do well is find downed birds in tall, heavy cover. Especially when he did not see the bird(s) go down. This happens a lot here, such as when multiple roosters flush along with multiple hens. Birds everywhere! Multiple shooters and shots. Multiple birds down. Some dead. Some crippled and hiding. Some running. And a pheasant will run a mile for every hundred yards it flies.
Add to this fast action pandemonium some very thick switchgrass, standing corn, and/or multiflora rose (danged Brits!), and lost birds become a problem even for a good dog. Many dogs have no interest in anything but "the next bird".
One ritual I have that works real well for getting my dog to "hunt dead", and to even follow my hand and voice signals as I put him in what I believe is the right vicinity, is something I do every day when I get home from work. The dog loves it, and it teaches him to use his nose very well.
I keep a large tin of milkbone type dog biscuits on my back porch. I have a large yard surrounded by thick forest and underbrush: ideal cover. Like most dogs, my pup knows when I should get home and he knows the sound of my vehicles. He is kept indoors and is a tail wagging a dog when I open the door.
Prior to doing that, I will throw, or even work very hard at hiding, one or more dog biscuits in the timber and brush or anyplace I can think of to confound him. You need to work up to that, so start it out easy until he or she figures out the game. I have tied snacks to a string and dragged them all over the yard and well into the woods and underbrush. I have hidden snacks on low tree limbs. I have buried them under leaves. Hidden them under logs. Anything I can think of.
Sundance knows this game very well and is waiting eagerly for me to open the door and tell him "dead bird"! I absolutely LOVE watching him race around to pick up the scent on his own. I learned long ago that he will track my steps as easily as the scent of the dragged dogbone. So I often throw the treat well beyond my own trail.
It is amazing how good he is at this! Doing up to 3 snacks in separate locations can keep him busy for awhile, but he always finds them as long as I send him back out. I use the multiple snacks mostly for getting him to mind my voice and hand commands as well as to grasp the concept of "more than one".
Come hunting season, this daily ritual, which we both enjoy, pays off handsomely in birds in the bag, and they are the only ones that count. It also gives an owner an idea of just how powerful a dog's nose is, and what the dog's search habits are. You also learn how weather affects scent. Rain is challenging. So is soggy-foggy weather where the air just hangs there. More than once, the shooter is terribly wrong about where a bird went down. Even more often, the bird has run a long ways. Learn to trust your dog. Teach him to trust you when you assure him there IS a "dead bird" to be found. This simple game will help tremendously.
I hope others here can and will add one or two of their own little "secrets" to this thread...
I like to keep things fun for my mutt (he's actually a purebred Golden, but I don't want him getting uppity so I call him anything but; such as "butthead, poodle, pot-licker, cookie-baker, mama's boy, fuzznuts, ****zhu-without-the-zhu, etc).
{Boy, has this site got a ridiculously anal "profanity monitor" or what?!! You can't even type the legitimate name of a legitimate dog breed like shi*zhu!! I'll bet you can't talk about breeding a ***** (female dog), either... Sure makes it tough on non-pc dog lovers... } Anyway...
Teaching to "hunt dead":
One of the most difficult, and important, things to teach a dog to do well is find downed birds in tall, heavy cover. Especially when he did not see the bird(s) go down. This happens a lot here, such as when multiple roosters flush along with multiple hens. Birds everywhere! Multiple shooters and shots. Multiple birds down. Some dead. Some crippled and hiding. Some running. And a pheasant will run a mile for every hundred yards it flies.
Add to this fast action pandemonium some very thick switchgrass, standing corn, and/or multiflora rose (danged Brits!), and lost birds become a problem even for a good dog. Many dogs have no interest in anything but "the next bird".
One ritual I have that works real well for getting my dog to "hunt dead", and to even follow my hand and voice signals as I put him in what I believe is the right vicinity, is something I do every day when I get home from work. The dog loves it, and it teaches him to use his nose very well.
I keep a large tin of milkbone type dog biscuits on my back porch. I have a large yard surrounded by thick forest and underbrush: ideal cover. Like most dogs, my pup knows when I should get home and he knows the sound of my vehicles. He is kept indoors and is a tail wagging a dog when I open the door.
Prior to doing that, I will throw, or even work very hard at hiding, one or more dog biscuits in the timber and brush or anyplace I can think of to confound him. You need to work up to that, so start it out easy until he or she figures out the game. I have tied snacks to a string and dragged them all over the yard and well into the woods and underbrush. I have hidden snacks on low tree limbs. I have buried them under leaves. Hidden them under logs. Anything I can think of.
Sundance knows this game very well and is waiting eagerly for me to open the door and tell him "dead bird"! I absolutely LOVE watching him race around to pick up the scent on his own. I learned long ago that he will track my steps as easily as the scent of the dragged dogbone. So I often throw the treat well beyond my own trail.
It is amazing how good he is at this! Doing up to 3 snacks in separate locations can keep him busy for awhile, but he always finds them as long as I send him back out. I use the multiple snacks mostly for getting him to mind my voice and hand commands as well as to grasp the concept of "more than one".
Come hunting season, this daily ritual, which we both enjoy, pays off handsomely in birds in the bag, and they are the only ones that count. It also gives an owner an idea of just how powerful a dog's nose is, and what the dog's search habits are. You also learn how weather affects scent. Rain is challenging. So is soggy-foggy weather where the air just hangs there. More than once, the shooter is terribly wrong about where a bird went down. Even more often, the bird has run a long ways. Learn to trust your dog. Teach him to trust you when you assure him there IS a "dead bird" to be found. This simple game will help tremendously.
I hope others here can and will add one or two of their own little "secrets" to this thread...
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He may as well just give me back my old Proline bow and call it quits...
