If you could give just one tip for a puppy owner....

[Sgurr]

Just bond with your puppy - when you have the bond, training is easy. As said earlier, you are the fun centre of you puppy's world.

[Cass]

Live birds from day 1 and not too much structure

[Rascal]

Live birds from day 1 and not too much structure

You can't in this country Cass training with wing clipped birds is illegal.

Although I give a youngster dead game at an early age to take the novelty value away and to tick that box so to speak...Continued training has to be done using dummies for practical purposes.

To the OP if you have no idea of what you are aiming at not having seen gundogs working then you are doing the right thing going to a trainer..

Rascal

[shropshirelad]

get help from the start, dont hold off untill you feck it up, because you will feck it up.

+1

If you take one piece of advice from this, this is the one.....

Rascal

If you do take this advice then at least go on recommendations as just because they are a gundog trainer does not mean they know what they are talking about.!

[Judy]

Isn't that the truth! And one man's meat is another man's poison just to muddy the waters further re trainers. Whereabouts are you, which County? Somebody may be able to recommend a good one although I gather you have a trainer you are seeing regularly so stick with her.

Some of mine had squeaky toys, didn't affect their mouths, played tuggy with the first few gundogs too, they had good mouths too, neither thing is generally recommended and I don't do it now. I have one dog with a tendency to hard mouth and that is entirely my fault for a completely different reason.

The most important thing is don't tell them off when they have something in their mouths.

[Nickheref]

Never give a young dog a command if you think there is a good chance it will ignore it and you are not in a position to enforce it. For example paying with other dogs and you want to recall it.
Just to be clear this is not saying be hard on the dog but if it gets used to your commands being optional it will soon be completely out of control. Much better to let it think that you are happy with the situation and address the issue later when you are in a position to work on it.

Have fun

[keirk]

My tip to my future self - teach them to not bark at the frigging front door

Otherwise either commit to training the perfect dog, or accept her limitations. Dont blame the poor thing for your failings as a trainer.

[WGD]

Know what you want the dog to do and what you want to achieve, if you don't know exactly what you want the dog to do the dog has little chance of success.

That and what James said.

[Cass]

Live birds from day 1 and not too much structure

You can't in this country Cass training with wing clipped birds is illegal.

Although I give a youngster dead game at an early age to take the novelty value away and to tick that box so to speak...Continued training has to be done using dummies for practical purposes.

To the OP if you have no idea of what you are aiming at not having seen gundogs working then you are doing the right thing going to a trainer..

Rascal

Cold game works as well I just think early exposure to game of some sort - whether live or dead is invaluable.

[Gundogguy]

Live birds from day 1 and not too much structure

You can't in this country Cass training with wing clipped birds is illegal.

Although I give a youngster dead game at an early age to take the novelty value away and to tick that box so to speak...Continued training has to be done using dummies for practical purposes.

To the OP if you have no idea of what you are aiming at not having seen gundogs working then you are doing the right thing going to a trainer..

Rascal

+1 Rascal
I know folks that can not run there dogs when they have no birds. Many a great dog has been made in the UK using tennis ball and bumper bag long before they ever had a chance to get on with game. Having clear goal of what one wants in a dog and getting experienced help to achieve that goal would be my top tip of the day!