This video is of a Blind Retrieve kind of a long vid but shows alot. This gets back to my previous statement about the frustration i had with his water/ land retrieve. He starts out great. In the water like he is supposed to then once on the other side gets out and begins a land search only finding nothing, returns to the water and upon finding it will retrieve well. I am not certain if this will be ok for the HZP test. He is searching even though out of the water. And upon finding returns the fastest way he can find which in this case was faster to bring by land. I think he has a good manner of retrieve but just not sure if this is test material.
I took him out yesterday on the Jordan River and did some blinds that in my opinion went very well. I wish i had got footage of that. I would throw the duck across the river without him seeing it and then send him after it. Instantly he begins checking the dense cover on our side of the river then swims across and instantly checks the dense cover on the other side. I can hear him using his nose and then i can tell when he smells it because it is a hard, fast swim to where the duck is held up with a great retrieve. To me this shows great marking ability by Hessian to know that that dense cover is where to look first. Again please bring the comments, advice,criticism. Thanks in advance.
Montana - the right place for a young bird dog
6 months ago
.jpg)
I’m a bit of a newbie to Drahthaars and I’m limited to my four years experience of and handling my dog in the VJP and HZP. I almost blew my dog’s Blind retrieve by sending him out with the same command I used when sending him out on a live duck search. I should have said “fetch” but instead I commanded “seek”. My dog searched for a long time and even bumped the barely floating water-logged duck carcass a couple of times and ignored it. He acted out of desperation and brought me the duck (very apologetically and unsure of himself) only after he was certain there wasn’t a live duck to be had in the pond. I could have really hurt him and ruined his chances for being certified for stud by giving him the wrong command. Thankfully, he once again proved to the world how much smarter than me he is. Long story short: Use different commands for the live duck search and the blind retrieve and be sure to give the correct command for the different (but similar) tasks.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing I can think of that may help your blind retrieve set-up is to make sure that duck is always in the water and never on dry land. Eventually Hessian will figure out that the land search is futile.
It may not help him in a hunting situation because you will be training him to perform well on a test that does a good job of mimicking a hunt but doesn’t cover all the situations that arise while actually hunting. But I’m sure you already knew that. I understand your desire to have Hessian well but in the end isn’t it better to have a dog that hunts well? The test is only one day of your dog’s life. The score is just a snapshot of that individual day. Sometimes a dog can have a great day on test day and other times the dog can be horrid on test day. Good scores are great but what really matters is how pleased you are with his manner of hunting.
Hope I’ve helped some.
Doug Hansen
Owner/Handler Elmo vom Fuchsfluesschen
Thanks for the input doug. I agree the test is only one day and i do need to be satisfied with what the dog does after all i will be hunting with him and the primary reason i got him was for hunting the testing is just an added bonus. In a hunting situation i think he nails it. i will definitaly make sure the duck is always in water to help him learn there is no need for the land, i just don't want to remove that completely cause we all know sometimes those damn ducks do fall on land or swim for heavy cover on land.
ReplyDeletethanks again great stuff.