Fun afternoon

[assateague]

New member from central Ga here.

This is what I did, and occasionally Taz will still do it. When he pops, ignore him. Tie yoyr shoe, or get in your bag, let him know he's on his own. If he stands there waiting, recall and send again. I'm sure there are drills to help, or better ways to work on this.

Not sure where this sweet quote came from, I quoted Olly but yet Tapatalk freaked out. Hasn't let me check a thread since this post, works on all other forums though. Rick explained it well also.

I don't know why you'd be singled out. Is your Tapatalk up to date? It's hard to tell you why when you're the only one.

Its the NSA.

No, that would be my Tapatalk you're referring to.

[Flightstopper]

I noticed you asked the dog to "Mark" the blind and sent the dog on "Back". Which I find a little odd. Are you using "Mark" to get the dog excited?

On marked birds, I usually send the dog on the dogs name ("Wendy" in my case) and on blinds, send the dog on "Back".

Great video of a nice looking dog.

Thanks Ron. I have always done the same as Redbeard stated. Use his name if he sees it the mark, back on a blind. Also open to suggestions. This isn't something we've spent much time on, and I'm not much of a retriever trainer. After NAVHDA tests i plan to join HRC so i can learn more.

I've always wondered about this as well. What is the perceived reaction the dog gets between the two different ways of releasing? I've always used his name for first mark and then back for the rest until all are picked. I also started using 'dead bird' when lining him up which seems to really perk him up good.

[jarbo03]

I noticed you asked the dog to "Mark" the blind and sent the dog on "Back". Which I find a little odd. Are you using "Mark" to get the dog excited?

On marked birds, I usually send the dog on the dogs name ("Wendy" in my case) and on blinds, send the dog on "Back".

Great video of a nice looking dog.

Thanks Ron. I have always done the same as Redbeard stated. Use his name if he sees it the mark, back on a blind. Also open to suggestions. This isn't something we've spent much time on, and I'm not much of a retriever trainer. After NAVHDA tests i plan to join HRC so i can learn more.

I've always wondered about this as well. What is the perceived reaction the dog gets between the two different ways of releasing? I've always used his name for first mark and then back for the rest until all are picked. I also started using 'dead bird' when lining him up which seems to really perk him up good.

I use his name for marks he sees, along with releasing from a remote location for a retrieve. I use back on any blind retrieve. Like Aaron said, i say mark ib this blind situation to let him know a retrieve was expected, and to help with lining. In the video we were waljing as though upland hunting. I had dropped the bumper prob 20 min or longer before hand. I told him heal, he did not know a retrieve was coming. I told him to mark and lined my hand so he would know what to do.

[banknote]

Taz is lookin' good Jerry

Yea he his, his back command is better than Moose's. My dog has a habit that I cannot break of him stopping every 50ft and looking at me for fruther direction on a back command. A follow up back hand signal sends him further back.

I'm not a "hunt test" judge. If it works, if be happy with it. I'm just happy if I can get my dog to retrieve what she sees fall.

Yea I'm very happy with him it's just a funny quirk and I don't know what I did to make him do it.

Seems to me we've discussed this before. Might once have been that he just wasn't well conditioned to believe taking the line would get him to the bird and needed more conditioning to that end. But by this point that's compounded by him probably believing he's doing the right thing, which you're inadvertently reinforcing it by responding with another cue.

Generally when a pup that understands taking a line leads to success pops up close like that, the best thing you can do is nothing at all. Just wait him out, and he'll eventually spin and continue back. But when you honor a pop with a handle, you're conditioning the pop.

Were your dog mine, I'd stick my hands in my back pockets and go back to square one of teaching blind retrieves according to whatever program you used and shorten the initial distances so much Pup hardly had a chance to pop before he was at his target. Particularly so with so much of the off season available to put the annoyance behind you before the open season's demands again tempts the short term expediency of further ingraining it.

Hey Olly, I'm interested to know if you ever got this straightened out. It's an issue I'm actively trying to avoid with Ki by not handling unless he's way off the mark and going the wrong direction. I'm actually afraid I may have started handing a little too early with him only being 16 months old. He does occasionally stop to look for direction, but only after and extended search.

Do you think working on visible backs at interval distances, building to a long blind, might work? Like go out in a big mowed field, set visible white bumpers in a line at 25 yard intervals with an orange/blind bumper at the end. Send him back for each successive bumper all the way through to the final blind. Seems like it would build confidence and momentum to drive deeper.

I also do a fair bit of "find it" drills, where I set a fairly short blind and instead of giving him a line, I caste him to a general area and say "find it," which just means it's in there somewhere, find it! Then I just let him hunt. I figure this is good practice for cripples that have moved from where they were seen to fall or blinds where I haven't made a good mark for myself.

[Rick]

Hey Olly, I'm interested to know if you ever got this straightened out. It's an issue I'm actively trying to avoid with Ki by not handling unless he's way off the mark and going the wrong direction. I'm actually afraid I may have started handing a little too early with him only being 16 months old. He does occasionally stop to look for direction, but only after and extended search.

Do you think working on visible backs at interval distances, building to a long blind, might work? Like go out in a big mowed field, set visible white bumpers in a line at 25 yard intervals with an orange/blind bumper at the end. Send him back for each successive bumper all the way through to the final blind. Seems like it would build confidence and momentum to drive deeper.

I also do a fair bit of "find it" drills, where I set a fairly short blind and instead of giving him a line, I caste him to a general area and say "find it," which just means it's in there somewhere, find it! Then I just let him hunt. I figure this is good practice for cripples that have moved from where they were seen to fall or blinds where I haven't made a good mark for myself.

Pretty sure the series of bumpers you're asking about is called a "ladder drill" and is, or at least was, common way of extending blind line distance in pups, so your training instincts are working.

Could say the same about letting Ki roll to build momentum down range even though he's veering off line, but when teaching blinds you also want to be sure you're teaching him that following your direction will get him to the bumper, so there should be no "extended search," and hardly any search at all, while training blinds. Finding the bumper by searching, rather than taking direction, has the counterproductive effect of making Pup think it's searching, rather than taking direction, that's gotten him the retrieve that's his reward - so why listen to Pop when he could be searching?

I'd suggest keeping handling and "find it" two very separate things (literally, in terms of time and venue, too) until Ki's handling is well developed and conditioned.

[Redbeard]

X2

[banknote]

Hey Olly, I'm interested to know if you ever got this straightened out. It's an issue I'm actively trying to avoid with Ki by not handling unless he's way off the mark and going the wrong direction. I'm actually afraid I may have started handing a little too early with him only being 16 months old. He does occasionally stop to look for direction, but only after and extended search.

Do you think working on visible backs at interval distances, building to a long blind, might work? Like go out in a big mowed field, set visible white bumpers in a line at 25 yard intervals with an orange/blind bumper at the end. Send him back for each successive bumper all the way through to the final blind. Seems like it would build confidence and momentum to drive deeper.

I also do a fair bit of "find it" drills, where I set a fairly short blind and instead of giving him a line, I caste him to a general area and say "find it," which just means it's in there somewhere, find it! Then I just let him hunt. I figure this is good practice for cripples that have moved from where they were seen to fall or blinds where I haven't made a good mark for myself.

Pretty sure the series of bumpers you're asking about is called a "ladder drill" and is, or at least was, common way of extending blind line distance in pups, so your training instincts are working.

Could say the same about letting Ki roll to build momentum down range even though he's veering off line, but when teaching blinds you also want to be sure you're teaching him that following your direction will get him to the bumper, so there should be no "extended search," and hardly any search at all, while training blinds. Finding the bumper by searching, rather than taking direction, has the counterproductive effect of making Pup think it's searching, rather than taking direction, that's gotten him the retrieve that's his reward - so why listen to Pop when he could be searching?

I'd suggest keeping handling and "find it" two very separate things (literally, in terms of time and venue, too) until Ki's handling is well developed and conditioned.

Thanks, Rick. I appreciate the advice. Not letting him search too long, or too far, when he's supposed to be following direction makes sense.

He's usually pretty good about taking a line, but some times he instead goes straight to where he "wants" to find the bird/bumper, especially if I'm sending him across water. When that happens I'll usually call him right back to heel and line him up again, which seems to get him back on track. We're doing a lot of baseball and wagon wheel kinds of drills now, too, starting with those and working up to blinds and handling once he's good and tuned in.

The "find it" drills are fairly random and not in conjunction with our handling work. I just want him to be confident enough to search on his own for those times I'm all out of direction for him.