TRAINING A BIRD DOG

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Dart recieving a treat for retrieving a pheasant out in the field.

The word, "breaking" was probably used in animal training because the trainer had to broke the spirit of the animal in order to train it. We still use the term "breaking" in

  • house breaking
  • breaking to wing & shot
  • force breaking

but don't truly break the dog's spirit. On the other hand, many of the old "breaking" techniques are still used in bird dog training; force breaking, for example.

Bird dog training can incorporate current dog training concepts such as behavior shaping with the use of clicker training, treats, and even with the positive use of electricity.

 
Dart pointing the scent cone of a quail. You can see the bird at the bottom of the picture. She does not see the bird. She is pointing the scent.

Topics


 
PRINCIPLES OF DOG TRAINING
  1. Short training sessions are better than long ones. If you are training for periods of longer than one hour, only give a single dog no more than 20 to 30 min.
  2. Del Mar Smith, a great bird dog trainer says that dogs learn in sets of threes and sevens
  3. Quit with success; even if you had planned to do more.
  4. Never give your dog a command you know he will not execute.
  5. Never give your dog a command you cannot inforce.

Familiarization with birds
No matter how young or old your dog is, it still needs a period of familiarization with game birds. Yes, even if you dog points or chases dickey birds in your back yard, you still need a familiarization period to game birds. Dickey birds are non-game birds.

Wing-On-A-String
For young puppies a wing-on-a-string can be used for familiarization, but soon after a puppy experiences real game birds, the dog may ignore the wing-on-a-string. The key to using the wing-on-a-string is to

  • never let your puppy catch the wing
  • don’t make it a chasing game
  • swing the wing into one spot and hold it there
  • hold the wing still until the puppy moves;
    • as soon as the pup moves, pull the bird up and out of sight
  • don't tease the pup

A bird dog that can catch a bird does not need to point. If possible, never let your puppy catch the wing or the bird. “Never” is optimal. There will be times when your puppy does catch the wing or the bird. The more often you let that happen the least likely your dog will point the next bird.

A fishing pole is optimal for the wing-on-a-string exercises. Hold the pole as though you would be fishing; the tip of the fishing pole should no more than 12-24 inches above your head when the pole is held out in front of the puppy. The string should be long enough to let the wing sit on the ground with your hands at waist level and the tip of the pole is at its highest height.

When using the wing-on-a-string, place the wing on the ground within two feet of the puppy. The puppy should focus on the wing. If he does not, wiggle the wing a little bit to catch his attention. As soon as the puppy moves toward the wing, pull it up and out of sight. Repeat several times. Each time the pup should point longer. No need to talk to the pup during the exercise. Let the dog be independent.

Using the wing-on-a-string stimulates site pointing and should not be used too long. Your dog does need to find a bird using scent not sight. A second stage for the wing-on-a-string could be to hide the wing in leaves or bushes so that the dog has to use its nose to find the wing. If you hide it, remember never to let your dog catch it. You can keep the wing on the string and put the fishing pole in a place where you can quickly move it once the puppy moves.

Using Game Birds
When it comes time to use birds, start off with quail instead of pigeons or pheasant. The “wing” of the quail is less scary to a young dog. Start the familiarization to birds by letting your dog see a bird in your hand. When your dog has an interest, let the bird go. It is good for the pup or dog to pursuit the bird, but not to catch it. Make sure you use a bird that can get away.

In the beginning stages, the ideal situation is for the bird to fly between 5-20 feet away and hide in lightly dense cover. In this case the dog loses eye contact, but follows the bird to find the bird with the use of his nose. If he finds it with his nose, you have set-up the idea situation for the beginning hunting dog. You have given him the successful behaviors of marking the bird and finding it with use of nose. If he points, you’ve reinforced the additional behavior of pointing. If he does not point, you need a stronger bird that will fly away when he finds it.

The progression of birds in this exercise is:

  • For young or first time dogs, we may use a bird without flight feathers. This bird will flap, partially fly, or run away. A pup will chase and get excited. Try to grab the bird before the pup picks it up. Do NOT punish or negatively reinforce the pup if it picks the bird up. Encourage it to bring it back to you (i.e. retrieve).
  • For more experienced pups/dogs, use a bird that will fly within a progressive
    • 20 foot radius
    • 50 foot radius
    • 100 foot radius
    • 50 yard radius
    • 100 yard radius
  • For more experienced pups/dogs, the bird should be strong enough to flush and fly away whenever the dog finds it again. It is critical not to use bad flyers or wet birds at the later stages of bird familiarization.

The key to pointing is to not let the dog get the bird. A dog stops pointing when it can catch the bird. Just don’t let the dog get the bird, but never tell the dog not to go after it until the dog understands the “whoa” concept….which may not be for years.

If your pup picks up a bird and does not bring it back to you, do not chase the dog or negatively reinforce the picking up the bird behavior. Always keep another bird in your pocket to entice them back to you. When the dog brings the bird back NEVER reach for the bird. Reinforce the dog coming to you. Pet the dog. As you pet the dog, take the bird out of his mouth. Give the bird back to the dog to let him know that whenever he brings a bird back to you, he does not lose it.

Pointing
What do you do when the dog points? To start, don’t flush the bird. Don’t take your dog’s bird away. Let your dog decide what to do with it. Later, for the hunt test, you will have to flush it. But wait for that exercise. Don’t let your dog associate you with scaring the bird off, not early in his training.

Bird Planting
Dogs will look for birds where they were successful in finding them before. If you want your dog to perform in hunt tests, most of your birds should be planted in the middle of the field. Because they must also know how to hunt the tree lines of the back course, some birds must also be planted along the tree lines. If you want your dog to perform in field trials, most of the birds should be planted on the tree lines.

Once your dog returns to the same place it found the first few birds, the next time we’ll plant more than one bird. Each time your dog is successful with the planted birds, we will plant them further and further apart until your dog’s area of interest becomes larger.

Introducing the Gun
The gun should be a good noise that is associated with birds. NEVER make noises around your dog just to get them used to sound. They must associate the shot to the bird. The dog should NEVER be introduced to the gun until it has a strong desire for the bird…..until it is totally focused on the bird.

Gun-shyness is man-made.

A dog becomes gun shy on the second time you shoot, not the first time. After all he has no idea the gun will go off the first time. It is usually the second time you shoot around your dog that you will find out if he feels he needs to run away from that bad sound. Gun-shyness can be trained out, but you will need plenty of birds to do it. The best thing to do is prevent gun-shyness by introducing the gun correctly. There are two ways to introduce the gun. The method you choose depends on the final performance you want from your dog.

#1

You need two people for this one. This technique is good for dogs that hold their point and do not chase birds. It is good for people who don’t want to encourage their dogs to chase birds; making it easier to steady them to wing and shot.
One person handles the dog, the other stands all the way across the field and shoots the starters pistol. Once your dog has pointed and the bird has been flushed and the dog is focused on the bird, signal the shooter to shoot. Watch your dog.
If the dog acknowledges the shot by stopping their focus or looking to the sound, you are shooting too close or shooting too soon in your training. Work your dog on many more birds (several weeks) or
move the shooter back. If the dog ignores the shot, move the shooter a few feet closer to your next bird. Keep repeating this (may take days of training) until you can hold the gun and do the shooting.

#2

If you have no one to help you shoot and you do not care if the dog chases birds or is not steady to wing and shot at an early age. With this technique, once the dog chases, you can shoot. The first time you shoot, however, the dog should be quite a ways from you; like across the field. Point the gun behind your back and up in the air. Watch your dog after you shoot.
If the dog acknowledges the shot by stopping the chase or looking to the sound, you are shooting too close or shooting too soon. Work on more birds or let them run further away before shooting.
If the dog ignores the shot, shoot sooner next time. Don’t let the dog get as far away. Keep repeating this (may take days of training) until you can shoot the gun closer and closer to the dog.

Running in Braces
It is important for junior dogs to focus on the job and not play with the brace mate. The key to the focus is to make sure the dog knows his job; there is a bird out there for him to find. We can approach running in braces several ways.

  1. The best way is to never run your dog with another dog until your dog understands his job.
  2. If you have two beginning dogs, start the brace with the dogs far apart. Show each of them a bird in front of them. They should each run for their own bird. Then shape the behavior by moving the brace mates closer and closer together as well as putting the baiting birds further and further away….. until they can be side by side and ignore each other to hunt for the bird.
  3. Or we can brace a beginning dog with an experienced one that will not play.

Aggressive behavior at the line is intolerable. If you know you have an aggressive brace mate, let the aggressive one go before you let your dog go.

You can find the hunt test rules at

http://www.akc.org/rules/hunting_pointing_breeds.cfm

 

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Totem Vizslas
Webmaster: Janet P. Wallace, PhD
12-Sep-2013 URL: http://www.totemvizslas.com
mailto: wallacej@indiana.edu