Libby's Diary

[trekmoor]

Forth Estates - 9.30 a.m. - very cold, very windy and a bit snowy.

Dogs - Libby.

This was beaters day but I didn't see much of it. There was only about 2 inches of snow on the ground but my car didn't want to stop as I approached a T junction and I sweated cobs trying to get it to stop before we skidded on ice onto a main road. I managed it but only just. At the next T junction I again had to stop but I began trying to stop much further back . That resulted in me stopping about 4-5 feet back from the white lines but I was very pleased with that extra space just a second later. A lady driver on the main road was trying to turn into my road and her car went into a skid out on the main road which sent it spinning towards mine.....it missed me by inches and then went for a bit of unplanned off-roading into a ditch !

The woman got out of her car screaming curses at it and gave it a boot in the ribs too ......so I knew she was O.K. and continued on towards the shoot !

The estates little roads were icy in places too but I kept below 15 mph and arrived at the meeting place O.K. I was informed by the keeper that since I was ancient and decrepit I would be a "floater." This meant I could stand to shoot at every drive but not among the other lads who had all drawn for which drives to shoot and which to be beaters on. Along with the game cart driver, another "ancient," I was to shoot as a sort of backmarker.

I was wearing gloves but my fingers just got colder and colder the longer I stood there on the edge of a wood waiting for a pheasant to fly over. Then the nearest gun 30-40 yards away shouted, "Over Bill !" at me and I almost blasted a buzzard that glided over to kingdom come ! The man is a good friend of mines but that hadn't stopped him trying to get me to shoot the buzzard ! His only comment when I let loose a flood of lurid curses at him was ....." I was just checking to see if your eyesight is O.K. !"

A moment later a pheasant did fly over him and he missed it. He then said, " I can't believe I missed that !" I at once saw my chance for revenge so I shouted back , " I believe it. You've been firing blanks all your life !" I'm pleased to say that got a laugh from the few other men who heard it.

Some woodpigeons flew over me but they were very high , I tried a couple of shots anyway and missed. The strong winds were my excuse, those pigeons really were motoring along. Then two more came over at about the same height of 50-60 yards and I brought down one of them and received a cheer from a couple of the other lads. The pigeon very nearly fell right into the gamecart so the driver who was shooting from right beside it yelled up to me ,"You missed you auld dud !"

More pigeons came over and then a cock pheasant within easy range but by now ,even though I was wearing gloves, I could not feel my fingers. I failed to find the safety button on the gun in time to shoot at the pigeons and though I did manage to work the safety when the pheasant came over I could not even feel the trigger. A last moment pull on it failed miserably and I missed that easy pheasant.

The drive ended and Libby had behaved perfectly throughout it, she'd just sat there watching making no attempt to run in for the 3 or 4 birds that she had seen falling. I was feeling terrible though, I couldn't feel my hands at all and the wind plus the occasional flurry of snow seemed to be making my body cold too. I informed the other lads nearby that I would be going home and was home by 11.30 a.m.

It took ages to get home. The police had blocked off the same junction the woman had nearly skidded into me at and I had to make a long, long detour ......during which I got lost .....twice !

Ah well, there's always next season ......if I should live so long ! My crusty old mentor used to say that after every shoot when asked if he'd be there the following week. It has taken me a long time to be able to use that "line" but I've done it !

Wullie

[trekmoor]

Forth Estates - 2 .30 p.m. - Cloudy ,some rain, moderate winds.

Dogs - Libby

About 12 of us turned up for roost shooting the pigeons and I was allocated one of the large pens I usually stand in when picking up as my place to roost shoot. That pen is very big, bigger than a football pitch and it has pretty tall and thickly growing trees standing in it with fallen trees being the main ground cover. It has gates at it's diametrically opposed corners .......and Libby knows every inch of the pen plus it's gateways.

Pigeons flew over as soon as I got there and I missed my first 5 or 6 shots. The pigeons came in from any direction and I was too slow for this kind of snap shooting . By the time I'd seen the pigeons and mounted the gun I was having to "snatch" the shots in between the tree branches instead of having reasonably clear overhead shots. What I needed was a swivel mounted head but I've got spondylitis and even turning my head slowly can hurt. Anyway that's my excuse for all the missing coupled with my fingers being so cold I could not feel the safety catch quickly enough and was never sure that I'd pushed it to "off" as I reached for the trigger.

I also think I wore too much clothing in an effort to keep out the cold. The gun butt caught my clothing as I lifted it several times.
It dawned on me that I was going to have to rethink my roost shooting tactics ! I sat on a fallen tree .....and got a very wet bum..... and faced just one direction looking through the branches. Any birds that flew over from any other direction I just left alone.

It worked and I at last shot a pigeon and it would be an easy retrieve for Libby ......or so I thought ! Libby had been looking a bit bewildered as normally, when she is picking up in there, the birds fly or fall into the pen from the direction of the standing guns in the river valley down below. The surrounding woods all had at least one other pigeon shooter in them banging away though so Libby was doing the same as I'd been doing and sitting there with her head swivelling in all directions.

She was also of the opinion that any falling birds must be pheasants because they are all she ever gets to retrieve. I sent her for the pigeon I'd shot and she found it right away, blinked it and went looking for a pheasant ! No amount of whistling brought her back either and I was not amused ! She hunted out the entire pen in her fruitless search for a downed pheasant but she found only 4 very live ones ......one of which she brought back to me as a "present ."

The pigeon was still out there only 40 yards away so I sent her again .....and again she blinked it . She ignored the whistle again too and even ignored my voice ....... I got even more peeved ! This time she extended her sweeping to outside the pen too ..... I could tell by the pheasants flying past me ! I'd thought there would be few pheasants left for my dogs to find as most of them would have been shot during the season but Libby was finding plenty. I'm pleased to say however that she was fully switched into retrieve mode for as far as I am aware she didn't point the birds she found.

Eventually she returned to me having cleared every pheasant from the surrounding wood .....and maybe beyond it too. That is her job when picking up but she was stuck on the idea that she was looking for pheasants. This time I went with her to within 10 yards of the fallen pigeon before sending her. She blinked it but my close proximity made her think twice about ignoring the whistle . She finally condescended to pick the bird up when encouraged to by an emphatic "There ! You little *%^$**^% !" from me !

She began to bring it out of the bushes so I turned my back to return to my tree trunk seat . When I turned to take it from her she'd already spat it out and was sneaking off to hunt for a pheasant. This time I really blew my top and gave her a damned good shake.
When I sent her again she at once retrieved it and even did a very nice sitting present !

She blinked the next bird I shot too but when I re-sent her she knew I was "on her case" so she retrieved it. I shot only two more pigeons and by then it had dawned on her that I actually wanted these birds brought back and not pheasants. It's just as well she began to behave a bit better for the "stress" of those first two terrible retrieves had made my heart do the rhumba.

I only shot those four pigeons for about 12-14 cartridges so my shooting could stand a lot of improvement but Libby's obedience was so bad it needs even more improvement than my shooting does ! About the only thing she didn't do wrong was run-in. She was completely steady to every one of those four pigeons.

As it got near to 5 p.m. I walked back to my car and had a quick blether with two of the other roost shooters ..... I hadn't done too badly after all for neither of the two of them had shot any pigeons at all !

Libby is in dire need of some après season re-training. Stop whistles and recall whistles were totally ignored today at any range greater than about 20-30 yards.

Wullie

[ips]

Great read and I have to say I truly admire your honesty. I think many of us novices are under an illusion of how good all of the time a fully trained dog is whereas the reality it would seem is that even the best dogs and the most experienced handlers can have a bad day. It probably doesn't make you feel any better but I find it refreshing

[trekmoor]

Thanks IPS, I can't see any sense in telling porkies about how good my dogs are. Some of my mates occasionally read this stuff even though they are not forum members and if I told porkies they'd have a field day taking the p*ss out of me !

What made me so angry yesterday was that I knew what I'd have done 20 years ago to remedy Libby's disobedience but all I can do now is to just stand there like a total limp dick and await her return at her convenience ! I have a fairly serious heart condition and things like walking uphill will set it off ......but so will stress. I got stressed out badly in that pen just by feeling so damned useless and my heart was giving me hell.

I never have been a "laid back" sort of person , if I see a problem I tend to go straight at it and do something about it even if what I do is the wrong thing. I have a lot of tolerance but very little patience ! Having to just stand there while a dog runs amok drives me up the wall. I think it was Judy who used to say...." The older I get, the better I was." That very accurately describes me nowadays.
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I awoke this morning with the intention of retraining Libby. I wasn't really annoyed with her because she'd blinked the two pigeons because she only ever gets pheasants or a very occasional partridge to retrieve. That pen is one of her picking up stations and only pheasants ever fall in there. She did as she was used to doing and was fixated on finding a shot pheasant.

I was very annoyed at her total refusal to stop to whistle or to recall to whistle however . I intended to hunt her today and to do it "spaniel fashion" keeping her within 30 yards from me and insisting on immediate stops and recalls to whistle . Trying to keep a dog like Libby within 30 yards would see me having to turn or recall her almost every cast .....she'd get plenty of practice !
I also intended to use the pigeons I shot yesterday as cold game retrieves for her to get her more used to picking them up....to get her to accept that pigeons are "game" too.
She has no problems at all when picking up woodpigeons , she seems to do it in such a way that the loose feathers stay on the bird. It is just her non-acceptance of them as being game that causes the problem.

All of these good intentions on my part departed as soon as I looked out the window. The rain was , and still is, pouring down and the wind is very strong . It is thoroughly miserable outdoors so once more I became a fair weather dog trainer and only went out for a couple of minutes. Libby's redemption will have to wait for another day.

Wullie

[trekmoor]

I'm off to shoot , or rather to shoot at, roosting pigeons again tomorrow afternoon. Libby will be very pleased for she has been nowhere all week. She'll probably be as high as a kite tomorrow so I'm in for a bit of trouble ....probably .

On Sunday she'll be out again but this time as a sort of demo dog........so gawd help me ! A lady who lives about 15 miles away has a street stray rescue GSP male of 2 years of age. Apparently he'd been allowed to roam the streets for most of those two years and was completely untrained. The lady has already done a lot of work on him using a clicker and , she says, he works to the clicker very well but completely ignores any command once allowed off the lead.

He does like food but running wild is more of a treat for him so that is what he does. I was sorry to hear that for my first suggestion was to clicker train him. His owner is now hoping a more old fashioned way of training might work better . The dog is not intended for gundog use but will be expected to go for runs in the country as his owner runs or bicycles . Since this dog bogs off into woodlands etc. at every opportunity and does not come back unless actually caught I think this will be a hard nut to crack.

I had a fairly long conversation with the lady over the phone and we have opted for some e-collar training ! This is the first time I will have used an e-collar for any purpose other than stopping dogs that chase sheep. The lady has laid the foundations of the sit and the recall using C.T. and a check cord so I will at least have that in my favour when the e-collar is added to this.

I'm going to begin with the recall after giving the dog a couple of weeks to become accustomed to the dummy e-collar.
Having talked to the lady I'm beginning to think that with this dog, the alternative to the e-collar might be to have the dog put to sleep before he does something terrible.

It seems this dog loves to hunt . Hunt what is the thing that worries me. Has it been hunting and perhaps killing cats when it was a street stray ?

Wullie

[trekmoor]

Forth Estates - 3p.m. - Snow in almost blizzard conditions, sleet, rain , hailstones and a strong very cold wind.

Dogs - Libby

The only word suitable to describe the weather yesterday is "Hellish." Along with nearly 20 other idiots I was sent to the wood where I was to shoot the pigeons as they came into roost. The other lads all went to their specific woods and the shooting began at once ......but not for me. Pigeons did fly over my wood but they were far too high up and most of them were too far out too.

I fired 6 shots at pigeons but more in hope than expectation and I hit not one of them. The other lads were firing plenty of shots and the birds were flying from wood to wood trying to roost .....but none of them wanted to roost in my wood ! I'd found a convenient tree stump to sit on but it was obviously going to be a very long and cold and wet wait. I was wearing heavyweight waterproof leggings but I took them off in order to wrap one of them around Libby in an effort to keep the worst of the wet and the wind off her. The other one I just draped over my legs after I'd sat on the stump.

That was it for the next two hours......we just sat there getting cold and a bit wet. I went home like an ice lollipop but Libby seemed very happy about it all. She'd remained sitting the whole time with only her head peeping out from the legging watching every bird that flew over but never breaking her sit ....... I was quite impressed ........wonder who taught her that !

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Sunday 14th

I met up with the couple with the one time street stray G.S.P. The dog was on a check cord and he remained on it too ! As his owners had said he was 100% well behaved and obedient while on it and I wasn't going to chance letting him off , not with his history ! I'd taken Libby and Edge with me and I used them as demo dogs for recall and for sit and explained how to get this started on the lead or check cord and touched on adding gradually strengthening distractions.

I'd taken an e-collar with me and explained or tried to , the rudiments of using it but I only gave the dogs owners the dummy collar .I want the dog to be used to wearing the dummy collar for at least a fortnight before using the "live" collar. While explaining this I saw something I really did not like. The dog appeared to be afraid of the collar I was showing his owners and was maybe even more worried looking when I showed them the transmitter.

Has this dog been subjected to an e-collar used incorrectly at some point in his past ? It looked like it to me.
The dogs owners do not want a gundog but this dog has a very high interest in birds and in rabbit holes . I think he has been used as a hunter and then discarded for some reason .

His owners want him to accompany them off lead as they go running and cycling up in the hills or among woodlands. I doubt very much if this dog will ever do that without running-off to hunt. I'll see him again in about a fortnight and I've given his owners some homework to do but to be honest I am not very hopeful of a good result.

Wullie

[munstyman]

Just a thought Wullie, have they looked into canicross and bikejoring with their gsp, it could be a good compromise for both parties if your prediction on the e-collar is right.

[Tina]

Very interesting post on the rescued GSP - I look forward to hearing how you get on!

[trekmoor]

I don't think I will even mention bikejoring to the dog's owners ! It may be selfish of me but I detest seeing dogs attached to bicycles.
I don't believe dogs can be well enough controlled to prevent accidents . I don't mind if only the cyclist gets injured but the accident could easily involve other people and other dogs.

His owners have the idea in their heads of a nice doggy running , lead free, alongside them ......... I don't think this particular dog will ever do that.

Wullie

[Naj]

There is no reason it couldn't be taught to run with the owner, attached on a shortish lead & perhaps later loose beside them.

Naj