Fun with Ceilidh!

[Naj]

Spaniels and rabbits are a funny subject here. When I was young we always hunted rabbits and hares with my father’s ESS. I have always shot a few a year over mine. Sometime in the 1990’s I ran into many with the opinion that you should not shoot rabbits in front of “bird dogs”. I have never had a problem with it. I enjoy seeing them pop them out and it’s up to me if I shoot. I have never had a dog leave a hot pheasant scent to pursue a bunny. Here rabbit populations cycle in balance with their predators. Right now we are way down with coyotes and foxes so we have bunnies in abundance. Ceilidh is already enjoying harassing them. I will probably shoot a few in front of her this winter but only after I get her solidly on birds.

I always started my cocker pups on rabbits, and there were untold numbers to go at. One summer I shot over 500 just ‘shooting in’ two young cockers. Never had a problem with them switching to birds, in fact rabbits naturally tighten up a dog’s pattern and educate the nose, especially when it comes to lining wounded game. The only thing it doesn’t do is give opportunities to practice handling on retrieves because the dog simply has to stick to the line the rabbit went then switch to the blood scent at the fall. After 50-100 rabbits they quickly develop great gun and game sense. Funnily enough, when it comes to my HPRs I choose not to shoot ground game over them when they’re young because it’s part of my steadiness conditioning, but they still point hare and rabbits along with birds. In fact their earliest points are generally on hare.

[Mikew]

It makes me laugh in a way. With the Pointing dogs rabbits were completely undesired, unwanted. With my Cpcker it was got the basics down, I looked at it like a training routine. The hup and when ready cast off. Working in a quartering fashion and in range , all done with dummy and nice retrieving. Good on all commands. Hup., recall, turning with whistle and verbal
Once good confidence was reached, a rabbit find and flush came into the routine. Steady to flush rabbit. After a pause, a recall and once hunting resumed cast off in the opposite direction. Ever aware to foresee the slightest hint. The is no chasing or hunting out of range
Maintaining a proper close hunting pattern. Mike
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[CockerCanuck]

So we are now two months in and I am really liking this little black dog. As I have said many times WC are not at all common here so when I got my first 10 years ago I just treated him like he was an ESS and we got along fine. Over those years I did start to encounter a few other WC’s here. Maybe 10-12 over a decade. All of them were significantly more high strung than my Fergal. I was never really sure how much was “nature vs. nurture” so was a bit worried what to expect from the new pup. It turns out I had no reason for concern. She can certainly get worked up when training or she finds fresh rabbit scent but most of the time she is very relaxed and easy to deal with. I think even more so than Fergal was as a pup. I appreciate and reward calm thoughtful behaviour and she seems to respond. She is great on eye contact in training. However it’s also a lot just her nature. My wife loves her and we just had a week with two Grandsons staying with us. She loved the rambunctious play with them but there was no nipping or really wild behaviour. She is confident but contained. A very nice disposition for me

[Judy]

Sounds perfect, CC, my 3 year old is very similar, absorbs information like a sponge, is very keen and yet has a good off switch. There does seem to be two types of Cocker, one bonkers and highly strung and the other perfectly fine. I've been lucky with mine but I have been known to walk away from litters if the Mother is a tad "over-active".

[Mikew]

I corresponded with Alan Gwyeen for many years, a fieldvtrail judge of both breeds Springers and Cockers. It was field trailing and the breedings...also the field trails and judging. But when it came for me to get a Cocker, I knew what I want as sure as I was at the kennel and had looked them over. It wasn't a field trail dog but an honest little bitch that trained easy, nice conformation, of true Cocker type and action. Nice retrieving,. It turned out she was from the Pillars of the breed and I was very pleased. Alan knew I grew up with Pointing dogs and hunted mainly Grouse. I let it be known I wasn't in a hurry and would wait a couple years. I stayed in touch with Alan and his wife Jean for many years. It was a great learning experience. Mike

[Nutter]

Now to the point of this post. With time on my hands and the Internet at my fingertips I started to watch UK videos of Cocker training in case I could pick up some new ideas. I have watched Mordor Gundogs, Hampshire Spaniels and Kugae. To my horror I learned that I am dealing with scatterbrained little terrors who are much more difficult to handle than Springers??? If I had seen these stories ten years ago I doubt I would have considered one. It just doesn’t match my experience. My question is did I just get lucky with the two I have or is this whole “naughty cocker” thing way overblown on the internet?

Revisiting this - aside from their takes on cocker temperament, what did you think of their approaches to training? I have found it a bit difficult to divine what these particular youtubers are actually doing on a day to day basis but wonder if that is more obvious to more experienced people? For exanple with the heel work I can only assume they are using corrections? Charlie and Chris have both said in videos previously that they dislike the use of treats. The videos are interesting but gleaning instruction from them is harder

[Judy]

I agree, I tend to find they tend to show how wonderful their training is without ever showing how they got to that stage. I guess it's because each video from a pro trainer is a form of advertisement of their "wares", after all you wouldn't want to give away too many of your trade secrets would yo?

[Naj]

Mordor seems stuck in the past and hasn’t moved on from the old traditional correctional model. He bases his training unapologetically on the use of aversives/corrections, but in doing so he often makes hard work out of training the simplest of exercises, at the expense of the dog who has to struggle along as best it can. The other two are a bit more progressive and incorporate some positive reinforcement into their training, usually in the form of ball games.