Training a bird dog at 5?

[whoami-72]

The wife came running out of the bedroom yesterday morning, jumped on me, and excitedly showed me a picture of a 5 year old golden retriever/Chesapeake bay retriever mix. Long story short, we got a new dog. I’m wondering if it’s worth training her to try to be a bird dog. I primarily hunt doves, quail, and pheasants but have never actually trained any hunting dogs before. She has good traits, is smart, very fetch oriented, food motivated, trainable, notices all the wild game that goes by her and I can tell she wants to chase them. We’ve only had her for about 13 hours though so I haven’t fully tested her yet. Is 5 years old just to old?

My background for anyone who cares. I’ve only ever had goldens. I was still a child during their prime training years but tried hard on my second golden with obedience training. She unfortunately had to have an emergency historectimy (I sounded that out) about this time last year and has since gained a lot of weight and I don’t feel like it would be good to take her hunting anymore. She was never really trained to hunt but was a flushing dog who would normally find the birds and bring them back to me. If I could get that level of performance again out of this dog I’d be happy. If they were able to do anything beyond that I’d be ecstatic.

 

[Jagger0502]

Contrary to popular belief… Old dogs can learn new tricks. If she is willing to learn and you are willing to put in the time, you might just have a good bird dog.

 

[Tod osier]

The wife came running out of the bedroom yesterday morning, jumped on me, and excitedly showed me a picture of a 5 year old golden retriever/Chesapeake bay retriever mix. Long story short, we got a new dog. I’m wondering if it’s worth training her to try to be a bird dog. I primarily hunt doves, quail, and pheasants but have never actually trained any hunting dogs before. She has good traits, is smart, very fetch oriented, food motivated, trainable, notices all the wild game that goes by her and I can tell she wants to chase them. We’ve only had her for about 13 hours though so I haven’t fully tested her yet. Is 5 years old just to old?

My background for anyone who cares. I’ve only ever had goldens. I was still a child during their prime training years but tried hard on my second golden with obedience training. She unfortunately had to have an emergency historectimy (I sounded that out) about this time last year and has since gained a lot of weight and I don’t feel like it would be good to take her hunting anymore. She was never really trained to hunt but was a flushing dog who would normally find the birds and bring them back to me. If I could get that level of performance again out of this dog I’d be happy. If they were able to do anything beyond that I’d be ecstatic.

I don't think that would be a problem at all, especially given your expectations. I'd like to see what that mix is like - POST UP A PIC!!!!

Just start with OB, if the dog likes to fetch, you know you are set there. OB and get it around birds. I really like Bill Hillman's stuff, works great with the softer side of a Chessie and I'd expect Goldens.

 

[jimh406]

I think it is possible for almost any dog to be a hunting dog. You won't know how good until you do the training.

 

[HUNTNUT]

Pheasant hunted in Kansas last year. The dog handler brought the usual assortment of labs and pointers. But, included in this mix of 5-6 dog, was an older border collie: his wife's pet. Several years before, he had brought the dog on a hunt just to get him out of the house and he picked up EVERYTHIING about pheasant hunting by watching the other dogs. He would point, retrieve, obey all commands and chase down the wounded. He was the rockstar of the hunt. I believe any somewhat intelligent dog can be taught to perform at least the basics of upland bird hunting.

 

[RyanML]

Little different but if you look at my last post I just trained my first dog, a 3 year old lab to hunt with me. We didn’t have the money to send her off to gun dog school as a puppy so I kind of gave up on her being a gun dog. Last year I decided I was gonna do it myself and we went on our first hunt together yesterday.

There’s a ton of online resources out there to help you. The biggest thing I kept reminding myself is that I know she wont be as good as dogs that are professionally trained. It was so rewarding to have her out there with me and go through this together.


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[whoami-72]

I don't think that would be a problem at all, especially given your expectations. I'd like to see what that mix is like - POST UP A PIC!!!!

Just start with OB, if the dog likes to fetch, you know you are set there. OB and get it around birds. I really like Bill Hillman's stuff, works great with the softer side of a Chessie and I'd expect Goldens.

She kinda looks like the definition of a mut right now lol. She was a stray and the pound wasn’t good for her and she was loosing lots and lots of hair from the stress. They didn’t even clean her up or take the mats off of her ears.

If I had to describe her, she has the coat composition of the Chesapeake bay retriever but the coloration of a Golden. I’m hoping after a while her hair will stabilize and look a little bit healthier. I think the personality is more towards the golden side but we’ll see.

 

[dtrkyman]

My cousin had a mutt back in the day, shepard and maybe lab mix? She didn't hunt but her brother did, him and I decided to take em pheasant hunting for the heck of it. He was probably 7 years old at the time.

Zero training and neither one of us ever had a hunting dog, we killed a pile of pheasants over that mutt!

 

[GT1]

How's her temperament? have you shot around her?

 

[MtnW]

Be really careful introducing the dog to the gun . You don’t know what kind of trauma the dog was exposed to in it’s precious life.

 

[whoami-72]

Good point on the shooting around her. I’m planning on shooting near her with my suppressed rifle first. Then we’ll try a shotgun. She’s extremely timid and always scared at first so my biggest fear is she won’t like guns. One of the first times I walked into the house with her I was carrying two shotguns and she got scared by them. She eventually came by and sniffed them and moved on. I’m hoping she didn’t have trauma from guns before…….

My last dog would scare herself every time a bird flushed in front of her but would chase it to the ends of the earth as soon as she heard a shot and instincts kicked in lol. In fact, one time she had a rooster cluck at her instead of flushing and she ran back to me instead of flushing it

 

[molliesmaster]

No, no. Don’t shoot the suppressed rifle around her. The idea here is not to see if she can handle the loud noises but to get the dog to associate the shots with a positive instead of negative.

So we take the dog out, I’m going to assume that she likes to retrieve based on her breeding, and we throw a tennis ball for her and let her have fun. Then at about the 3rd throw in when the dog is high charged and running towards the ball, the wife or a friend fires a shotgun or 22 rimfire off in the distance somewhere, say about 100 yards away. Does the dog flinch? Back the gunner up even further. Dog not even pay attention? Move the gunner in 15-20 yards.

Work at this until you can fire the gun by your side. This may take several sessions and can be done in days or weeks. It is better not to rush it and always keep it fun. The second her drive or enthusiasm goes down is the time to stop and move onto something else.


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[Tod osier]

She kinda looks like the definition of a mut right now lol. She was a stray and the pound wasn’t good for her and she was loosing lots and lots of hair from the stress. They didn’t even clean her up or take the mats off of her ears.

If I had to describe her, she has the coat composition of the Chesapeake bay retriever but the coloration of a Golden. I’m hoping after a while her hair will stabilize and look a little bit healthier. I think the personality is more towards the golden side but we’ll see.

She will be good looking when the body and coat fill out. Chessies and Goldens are closer than you would think for temperment, especially as far as training.

What has been said about using the dogs love of retrieving to introduce gun fire is right on. It is easy if done right (start slow and at a distance) you will end up with a dog that positively associates gunfire with retrieving.

 

[rideold]

Start her gun training at home. Begin making louder and louder noises every time you feed her or give treats. Things like cupboard doors, stomping your feet while you walk her to the food bowl. Stuff like that. After she's used to that move on to louder stuff. When my dog was a pup I cut the ends off some shells and emptied them out and started with just firing the primers. I'd get my dog all riled up and excited in the field and when she was 30 or 50 yards away shoot my shotgun loaded with the primer shells in the opposite direction. I worked closer and closer over time and then moved to full loads the same way.

 

[whoami-72]

Hmmmmm ok, my neighbors threw a fit when I was shooting my bow at my house so they definitely wouldn’t like gun shot noises. However, I could work on that at my in-laws house or just head to the desert. I didn’t think about the .22lr or retrieving. I’ll give that a try first. After a few days with us at the house she isn’t nearly as afraid as she used to be. Loud noises around the house isn’t an issue anymore thankfully.

I was planning on trying to associate fun shots with good things but I was gonna use the supressed rifle and the wife giving her treats 100yds back or so and work her way up. I think that may end up being an intermediary step if necessary. Plus I have ~5k ish rounds of .22lr and I have to hand load each of my rifle rounds so that will save me lots of time

 

[Sherman]

It may be unconventional, but with our lab I walked around the property with a Red Rider killing birds. She associated guns with birds before she ever heard a shot. One day I was putting my shotgun away and some geese took off from a field heading toward the house. I loaded a round in the chamber and let one off as they were about 15 yards overhead. Sadie was excited when I pulled the gun out and after she heard the shot she was looking for the bird falling.

Start with a red rider or pellet gun so the associate guns with birds. It was easy for us.

 

[Monty3006]

Two pieces of 2”x4” clapped together can make a surprisingly loud clap that I have used in the past as a substitute for early stages of training to gun shot.

 

[thedutchtouch]

My brother trained his bird dog to be ok with gun noises using music. Apparently there's classical music DVDs that have random gunfire mixed in, they would leave it on for the dog while they went to work and said it did help decreasing the flinch to the noise.

 

[GSPHUNTER]

She should have natural instinct so you have that. Go out and see how she reacts around wild birds. As mentioned be mindful when introducing any dog to shooting. I have always started with a starters .22. I let them get out in front exploring and maybe find a scent before I shoot, I point the gun either towards the ground or to my rear, depending on how they react to the noise , Determines how I proceed. If the noise doesn't seem to bother them, start working closer. they will start to associate the noise of the gun with the excitement of the hunt.

 

[Dos Perros]

Any dog that has learned to learn can learn new things. Based off the OP's description of her, I would not be discouraged. She's already learning your program, new house new rules etc, this is just another layer. Keep it light and keep it fun.