Went with Chris again last night to work with the dogs a bit. Annie got to work on her retrieving with the dead hen pheasant from yesterday. She did pretty good and finally brought the bird back after a little coaxing. Chris was careful not to snatch the bird away from her until he had heaped on the praise. He likes to let a young pup like Annie hold the bird for a few minutes and enjoy the feel of it.

Chris had his labs and his tennis ball slingshot so I let my german shorthair dogs Jake and Abby out to see how the game is played. They followed the labs after the tennis ball and followed them back when they retrieved. Neither Jake nor Abby had any interest in beating the labs to the ball. They seemed content just to run along side and watch. I was hoping they would get jealous and go after the tennis ball. I’ve heard sometimes that a little competition can help inspire a distracted dog. I’ve still got a lot of hard work ahead of me.

After working with Chris the other day I wanted to give it a go with Abby. Chris was kind enough to have me along as the shooter again and agreed to run Abby through the same drills. The first problem was that Abby was a little too hyper and it took her a minute to settle down and focus. Next time I think it would help to run her for a bit on the ATV to help take the edge off. It was cold and windy but she finally scented the bird, but her point was a bit weak. I think with a few more birds her pointing will improve as she learns what is expected.

After Abby help a point for a minute or two we released the hen pheasant and let her fly a ways before I shot her. As soon as the bird hit the ground, Chris released Abby for the retrieve. She found the bird without any trouble but was a little tentative to pick it up. She seemed to just want to stand proudly over it knowing it was her prize. At one point she kind of wandered around the area to see if there might be another bird down. Finally, she settled down and picked the bird up. I knelt down and she brought it right to me. For a job well done we heaped on the praise and made sure she knew she did something good. In a few days we will try it all again in a different setting with new terrrain and unfamiliar surroundings.

The other day I went with my friend Chris to set up a training situation for a shorthair pup “Josie” that he is training. The first thing we did was test the wind direction so that we could lead the dog right into the scent cone. Chris uses a homemade version of an electronic bird launcher. You can use any bird from pigeons to chukars, but we had a live hen pheasant in the launcher.

The idea was simply to lead Josie into the scent cone until she went on point. When she pointed the bird Chris slid up the lead and steadied Josie using the Whoa command. While Josie was intent on the bird I slid around to the front and got ready to make the shot. His 8 year old daughter activated the launcher and I shot the bird. Chris asked me to wait a few extra seconds while the bird was in flight so Josie would learn to be more steady.

After the shot Chris sent Josie to get the bird and he reeled her in using the long training lead. She retrieved the bird nicely and Chris was careful to let her enjoy the bird and really heaped on the praise. While the bird was still warm we reloaded the launcher and ran through the whole scenario a second time. Josie is still a young dog but is improving greatly. I learned how important it is to set up the training situation very carefully so all goes well.

My little barn pigeon chick died on the 5th day of life. It appears that the mother pigeon was killed because I haven’t seen her around since. I was sad to see the chick died but learned that there were other pigeon folk around. I went to visit my neighbor Mike who raises Birmingham Roller Pigeons to see about buying some pigeons to use for dog training. He was kind enough to show me his coops and gave me some good pointers for building my pigeon coop.

He had several roller pigeon chicks and eggs to be hatched. He seems to know his stuff and says there are a few other folks in town who belong to a pigeon club. He agreed to sell me a couple of breeder pairs when they get done raising their young chicks. He said another month or so and I could come back and pick some up. He feeds his a mix of milo and sunflower seeds and uses the commercial pigeon feed as a special treat once a week. It was fun to see his kit of pigeons flying around doing their silly backflips.