Newbie's First One-to-One Lesson

[Miff]

Well done and thank you for sharing this. You seem to have the right attitude and this will hold you in good stead. Even writing about your experiences will help you to see things clearly. It makes for most enjoyable reading; keep up the good work.

[RAH]

Thanks for your messages

Someone told me that keeping a training diary would be useful. Think I may start one so that when the little grey cells start to puff and wheeze, I'll have something to go back to and remind myself with.

[RAH]

The sun truly shined on the righteous today. Absolutely torrential rain all the way down the A1 to my lesson. Arrived just as the rain stopped and the sun came out! I needed this lesson as I'd had a helluva a week

I had my two cockers out for a walk in the woods earlier this week. Hattie and I had been up on Sunday to do some quartering practise in the woodland and through the ferns. It seemed like it would make a nice change for Willis, so on Wednesday I took them both down to the same place to mix up our daily walk routine. As I walked up to the edge of the woodland, I noticed a sign directing walkers to stay to the main paths as there was a shoot happening. I thought it safest to keep Willis on the lead just in case he decided to do a runner and ruin a drive. Hattie squiggled around in front of me, not really going anywhere but periodically having a bounce in the undergrowth. Willis heard 3 gunshots and stopped dead still looking towards the noise. Then he did exactly what he had done in response to the fireworks earlier this week - gave a huge bark at it, bristled the hair on his back and then carried on as if nothing had happened.

We met the shoot just as they were finishing up. I stopped to talk to them and they invited me to join them on another day to do some beating. Hattie introduced herself to everyone while Willis eyed up the game cart from his spot next to me. And then we carried on.

I found the area where Hattie and I had walked at the weekend, where the ferns were dense but there wasn't much bramble. I sent her off and she nosed around a little unenthusiastically until she found something worth hunting for. About 6ft in front of her a hen bird got up and took off, she made to chase but I called her back and we walked on. About 100yds further on I let Willis of the lead ... BIG MISTAKE! And so he demonstrated the beginning of my next challenge.

Willis caught the scent of game and it was like watching a different dog. That was that. Off he bogged at full kilter about 20yds to my right. Cock bird got up high and Willis shot after it like lightening. I should have realised before I let him off that the shoot would have pushed game out towards the pathways from where they were shooting deeper in the woods. What an idiot.

I was blowing recall again and again until it sounded like a bloody steam train was on its way through. He wasn't listening at all. 200yds out in front, still at full speed, only to flip 90 degrees to cut across the path and shoot into the ferns on the opposite side of the path (incidentally, he is *very* exciting to watch, loves dense cover and doesn't bark when he is really excited so I can check those off the "Cocker Qualities" list). He sent up another cock bird en route that made him doubly excited. Off he went again, never quite getting close enough for me to grab him. I was trying to stay calm and give him all the usual "come back in" signs - arms open, light voice, quick pips on the whistle. A lot of good that did ... in the end I could feel myself getting more irate (much like Tom63 and his "angry Silverback" analogy from last week!) and my voice was getting louder and angrier. I didn't want to get angry because I knew it'd do no good and would probably just push him further out.

I admit it. I gave up.

I walked Hattie to heel back the way we had come. She despondently followed, looking up at me in the hope that she would get to hunt a bit more. I kept her to heel. Willis eventually realised I had gone and came to find us. I put his lead on and we went straight back to the car. The whole performance lasted about 1 minute. Thankfully, the shoot had left before we sent 2 of their birds into the Eastern Counties.

I was really disheartened.

When I arrived at today's lesson, I explained what had happened with Willis and my trainer didn't seem phased. That was until a phezzie wandered out of the cover in his training ground, bold as brass, squalked and caught Willis' attention from about 50 yds away. He sat bolt upright and eyed the bird with piqued interest.

A dummy was thrown in the opposite direction which he went out and picked nicely, but took a wide arc when he came back to me with one eye continuously on the bird. Delivered the dummy to hand and sat to watch the bird again.

My trainer threw another dummy towards the direction of the bird and told me to send him. I said "Well, if you're sure ..." off Willis went ... straight past the dummy, bird went up and made for the cover with Willis in hot pursuit. He dove into the cover to hunt for the bird while I whistled and called and whistled and called. This time he only hunted for maybe 5 or 6 seconds and then came back again and sat down, all the while his eyes still searching for the bird. My trainer said "Well, that was pretty good, he didn't stay in there long and he didn't send up any more birds. That could have been a lot worse". Personally, I think it was not worse more by luck than judgement or handling.

After that performance, we walked away from the heavy cover where the birds were to do some quartering. Willis' hunting was amazing. This is the dog that I was told would never hunt. He got straight into a lovely pattern, quartering 10 -12ft either side of me through stubble with his nose moving up and down as he hunted the ground and air scented, turning himself with very little need for the whistle (which is good because he hasn't got a clue what the turn whistle means yet). He did two lovely stops and two perfectly enthusiastic retrieves to hand. I was thoroughly impressed with him.

My trainer then suggested trying the starter pistol at a distance with him. To add to the chasing issue, I think gunshot will be a work in progress too, but perhaps a job for after Christmas. He's not scared of the noise, but equally he's not 100% comfortable with it either.

I sat Willis at heel while my trainer went out about 30 yds away. He explained he would shoot the pistol and then throw a dummy towards us so that Willis didn't have to go right to the location of the sound. He bristled a bit when the gun went off but he went out and picked the retrieve, bit of a bypass on the way back as he went round behind me, about 4ft away, but I called him in and he delivered the dummy to hand. Sat him up again and this time I was told we'd do the same thing, but with the dummy landing a little closer to the shot, so that he had to go in closer to the noise. The dummy landed and Willis went out, but he was visibly unsure about going closer to where the noise had come from, he hunted for the dummy but missed it by about 5ft (he spent most of his time looking in the spot where the last one had landed). Eventually he winded it with some assistance and then came back towards me with it. This time he ran straight past me and retreated away from the noise and the trainer.

We probably should have stopped there (in my opinion), but the trainer said to give it another try. This time Willis didn't want to go near the noise and so just hunted a circle with the pistol remaining about 20ft away from him. He didn't get close to the dummy. I got in there and made excited noises and urged him towards it. He eventually picked it, but it wasn't like his usual enthusiastic displays.

We did a few easy retrieves after that just to finish with a positive. He's a lot steadier than Hattie around falling dummies. I glad about that as I worked hard on that bit of homework.

I was told that Willis wasn't gun shy, but equally he isn't confident around the noise. We're going to bench that and concentrate on the controlled hunting and trying to address the chasing (i.e. better recall and stop whistle).

Hattie was up and had obviously heard the noises from the car, which really geed her up. Unlike most other Cockers, Hattie is all about retrieving. If she knows you have retrieves in that bag then she won't leave your side to hunt without a real effort. A process of assumption tells me that once she connects the dots with the retrieves coming from the cover rather than out of my pocket or someone's bag the two things will start to meet up nicely, but I need to put in the legwork in the meantime to avoid the chasing that we have with Willis.

After Willis' hunting masterclass, Hattie demonstrated her Velcro Dog tendency. She would only hunt some 6ft away from me and her nose was very rarely on the ground, she was just going through the motions, all the time watching for the dummies. She did do some nice turns, but what she really wanted was retrieves. Her stops were good and and the retrieves without the pistol were speedy, with her delivery getting better all the time.

I know I have an issue with Hattie and the gunshot as she has associated it with running in. It makes her crazy excited to the point of bursting. I explained the set up on the holiday where I had thought she was scared of the noise and so introduce the ball game at the suggestion of someone in the group. The trainer did some experiments with stopping to the whistle + just the gunshot to watch her behaviour, and then when the retrieve was introduced, again, it all went to pot. She ran in for everything.

We set up the exercise so that she would "win" it by me starting right next to her when the gun was fired and the dummy thrown so that I could stop her if she moved. Then I stood between her and the shot and retrieve. She stayed put and retrieved on command (I was really pleased with that). Then I stood next to the trainer, he sounded the gun, threw the retrieve a little way out to the side and again she stayed put. It's a good start. I think my suggestion to add in the half step with me staying next to her while the noise went off might have made something click that was missing before by jumping ahead too quickly.

My homework is to do a week of so of being stationary when the gunshot goes off, then moving on to hunt + stop + gunshot + move to her side before the dummy goes out and then sending her. And then finally hunt + stop + gunshot + dummy just in front of me so that I can get to it if she runs in. She is very quick to learn so hopefully by the next lesson we will have cracked the cycle of gunshot + run in.

Hattie finished her session with some marked retrieves into the cover where the birds were. She was a little madam. She marked well and went straight to the fall site and picked, but would then come out of the cover and stop! She really liked the smells in there. The last retrieve was a bit deeper into the cover. She took an excellent line, heading straight for the fall, but I think her depth of vision was a bit skewed. She missed the fall site by about 3ft (hardly surprising since the cover was about 3ft high and she is only 18in off the floor!). But she hunted it out and this time delivered to hand after a bit of faffing around at the edge of the cover with the dummy in her mouth.

My dogs are like chalk and cheese. One is so easy and dependable, picks up new training in a few attempts, but who won't hunt, yet should (and does when she finds something worth hunting for). The other is an utter mystery: sometimes so good he takes my breath away, hunts like a demon, loves to dive into cover, but currently has a 75% chance of buggering off and going selectively deaf. Why can't I have a mix of the best of both?!

The lesson ended on a positive. My trainer said what lovely dogs there were and how he still couldn't believe that Hattie was 4 and was picking things up so quickly. I get a buzz from those comments every time I hear them. All the effort I am trying to put in to make up a bit of the lost time and it seems to be paying off. Keep on keeping on, as they say

[Sgurr]

Many thanks for a really interesting write up - the effort you are putting into those cockers is so great! Very well done!

[Stihl 090]

I have been told numerous times, some may aggree others disagree. A walk is a walk. Training is training. Until you have better control, never spice up your walk, as you have found out!!
And if you know theres a shoot and likely hood of phezzies keep yoyr dogs on lead. What if there had been cars on a road, train line etc etc. Until foundations of stop whistle and control are mastered in a controlled environment you can quickly see how things get out of hand.

A good read though n keep up the work

[RAH]

About a fortnight ago, Rascal sent me a message and amongst other things she told to me to make sure hunting is always a team effort that I am responsible for managing. I need to be able to see the dogs and aim to control their range while they get busy doing all the hard work of actually finding stuff.

This week, I started reading "Total Recall" by Pippa Mattinson with a view to going back to basics with Willis' recall. Having a dog that hunts like a demon and demolishes cover is all well and good, but if the little sod goes to a new place and won't come back when he's told then we're at, what the French would call, an impasse!

Buoyed by Rascal's advice and what I have read so far, today I went out with a view to keeping Willis inside of the "Zone of Control". I'm happy to report that it went pretty well. He hunted nicely and didn't range as far as he normally would. His stops weren't as good as usual, but he only bogged off outside The Zone the once, which is a marked improvement.

I'm going to take him back to the scene of the crime in the next few weeks, not because I want to test him, but because it is the next logical step. His recall is fine in the places where he walks every day. But we only walk in those woods maybe once a month or so. I've not generalised enough to proof his recall. He will only learn so much by walking in the same places over and over again. And what happens when I want to take him somewhere completely new...?

I wasn't annoyed with him for chasing the other day ... well, of course I was annoyed about that, but I was more annoyed with myself and the fact that I hadn't done enough to proof the behaviour. If I want him to come back in all situations then I need to be varying the locations that I take him so that I can do that. This time I will obviously be checking that there isn't a shoot going on while I am there, and I may also pony up for a long line ... you know, just in case he tries it on again.

Stihl 090, whilst I totally appreciate what you're saying regarding walking vs training, I would rather hope that Willis would recall regardless of whether we are just out for a walk or training. But I'll take your advice on board and thanks for the input, I appreciate any and all advice

In the words of D:Ream, Things Can Only Get Better.

[Rascal]

Here RAH you'll be getting me in trouble we were messaging each other about other stuff rather than me solely giving training advice...

I'm a firm believer that training advice is better on the forum rather than off otherwise there is no point really. Many heads are better than one a bit like a group training session, you learn a lot from other dogs, their handlers and the advice given for a specific problem...

Rascal

[Judy]

I'm a firm believer that training advice is better on the forum rather than off otherwise there is no point really.

Rascal

Too right, otherwise there would be nothing to row about!