ips wrote:Thanks for explanation. So in your opinion as long as there within 15 yds or so effectively just let em get on with it. ???
I'm not a trainer so get on with it might have a world of different meanings…….beating on big shoots where we have thousands of birds up front I keep them closer, let them range a bit if we are blanking in miles behind and rough shooting no matter how close they were I would probably still miss
I do like them to work both sides of me so I make sure they go left and right rather than take off where they want
trialling pretty much depends on what judge some like them to take in a wider beat than others
I'd have to disagree with Alpha. I think white grass and rushes is where cockers show off at their best, especially when there is a healthy population of rabbits in residence for them to winkle out. And heavy bramble and briar is where they are at a distinct disadvantage against the superior weight and leg length of a decent sized springer.
Naj wrote:I'd have to disagree with Alpha. I think white grass and rushes is where cockers show off at their best, especially when there is a healthy population of rabbits in residence for them to winkle out. And heavy bramble and briar is where they are at a distinct disadvantage against the superior weight and leg length of a decent sized springer.
Naj
See now mine go under it rather than through it and use rabbit fox and badger runs to get into really dense stuff:) and TBH i have never worked the on grass or rushes all the shoots I attend are woodland and some cover crop…..aka spaniel motorway like maize.
I see lots of springers that just bounce over the cover rather than work and miss lots of birds especially them wiley January ones it sometimes size isn't everything.
I suppose its what pleases you beauty in the eye of the beholder and all that and
back to the subject of sprockers the ones local to me all seem to be of cocker variety some might not be the best trained in the world but go all day and hunt and retrieve for fun I wouldn't throw one out if it worked like they do
I wouldn't throw one out if it were free. And my Cockers hunt cover perfectly well, provided there is something to go in for, I disagree that Pingers have the advantage there, where they do win is in open ground with their longer legs, they can catch the runners quicker.
In life, it is important to know when to stop arguing with people and simply let them be wrong.
Dawnrazor wrote:I think a Cocker is at a significant disadvantage against a springer as soon as they come out of a kennel.
As i see it the real disadvantage a proper cocker would have would be to be owned by a die hard springer fan.
But then again perhaps they 've only ever had sprockers
Naj wrote:Doh! been a bit slow on this one but it suddenly dawned on me that this can work both ways and if these individuals are happy to pass a sprocker off as a cocker they will have no qualms in doing the same with springers, which may explain why I'm often bemused by the frenetic and fussy hunting style of some winning springers which is totally alien to how I remember springers. Put a springer over a cocker and you're going to have pups that will pass as cockers but others that won't because they throw to the springer side. So there's nothing stopping them passing these off as springers if they make the grade.
It's a generalisation but 30 years ago springers hunted in relatively wide, sweeping casts and cockers had a finicky hunting pattern which was much choppier. Some modern springers are much fussier hunters and are pirouetting all over the place in an untypical manner so could it be a cocker influence because it's more like a hyper fast cocker style of hunting than traditional springer?
The other day I saw some video clips of two young springers hunting for tennis balls. They were twirling about like demented dervishes in a style which I found untypical of the breed and, as an aside, it crossed my mind that if we're breeding springers with that amount of quick fire animation in their hunting gait then it's no wonder that we're seeing more knee and shoulder problems in the breed. It ain't natural.
I was thinking it might just be me and my rose tinted glasses but a few weeks back I met up with an old shooting friend and lover of springers who first cut his teeth in the company of the likes of Tom Laird and his Criffel dogs - Straightforward hunting dogs for those not familiar. He'd lost track of the trials scene but had a nice shooting bitch which he decided to gave a litter out of and took to a highly recommended FTCh Stud. He was appalled to see how small the dog was and it was so hyper and animated that he genuinely thought it had a mental disorder. He made his excuses and left. So perhaps it's not just me.
I just toss those thoughts on the table. If people are willing to run sprockers as cockers then there's no earthly reason why they wouldn't also run dogs from the same litter as springers if they threw to that side.
Naj
Spot on Naj! They've swopped styles! I went to an open springer stake recently and some of the top guys were running springers that hunted like cockers, on ground scent, twirling about here there and everywhere, no flat pattern, turning away from the wind and their heads were the size of cockers too! I think a lot has to do with training, they've been trained on rabbits and kept really tight, not allowed to flow in a wide flat pattern that a springer should have IMO. A cocker should hunt like a stoat, a springer should hunt like a smaller version of an hpr using the wind and ground scent where appropriate but certainly keeping a pattern but that's just my humble opinion. Funnily enough I posted on this forum many moons ago asking for recommendations of stud dogs without the line in question. Not because I've got an axe to grind but just because for me they don't represent anything I feel a true cocker should be.
I think white grass and rushes is where cockers show off at their best, especially when there is a healthy population of rabbits in residence for them to winkle out. And heavy bramble and briar is where they are at a distinct disadvantage against the superior weight and leg length of a decent sized springer. 
been a bit slow on this one but it suddenly dawned on me that this can work both ways and if these individuals are happy to pass a sprocker off as a cocker they will have no qualms in doing the same with springers, which may explain why I'm often bemused by the frenetic and fussy hunting style of some winning springers which is totally alien to how I remember springers. Put a springer over a cocker and you're going to have pups that will pass as cockers but others that won't because they throw to the springer side. So there's nothing stopping them passing these off as springers if they make the grade.