The first drive we stood quite far back as wanted him to hear/see from a distance. He stayed quiet and we just watched a few birds land with no retrieving. He was extremely steady and left him on the lead for some of the drive specially the first drive and then let him heel off lead for the end of the drive, didn't help I had a extremely short lead and if he was on the lead my hands got cold!
The first bird I sent him for would of been nice basic retrieve for his first warm game. It landed dead, I waited until the drive was pretty much over with him marking it. I sent him and he went off like a rocket, then heard some shouting noticed a peg dog (obese lab) ran in, went for my cocker as he tried to pick i, my cocker stood up for himself but was no match for a 35kg lab. The gun was absolutely screaming at his dog, whistling from the complete other end of the field etc, turns out that labs 6 and a experienced dog apparently. I called Harley off it, he came back straight away without the bird, bless him and was a bit confused what happened. The lab ran back with the bird and got a smack and put on a lead for the rest of the day. I was stood hoping I hope it hasn't ruined mine.
It amazed me shortly after a bird was shot and landed behind us into a woodland on the 2nd drive, we were stood next to the gun on this drive, with behind us a woodland. He was off lead at heel and heard it land. I heard it and turned around looking in the woodland, I completely forgot about the dog!! To my shock he stayed steady, he was OFF lead but stayed sat at heel, looking at me shaking with excitement "mum can I go?!" He had sat steady for both drives and had a dog tried to attack him already so deserved a bird. I sent him for it, he hunted the woodland lovely for the big cock bird and bought it back to hand. His first warm game retrieve. Proud moment.
After retrieving his first bird he did make a small noise (mere whimper) on the next drive which I can only assume was excitement, I ignored and walked him at heel a few foot away to try and keep his mind off the excitement which seemed to work but did make me panic oh crap hes going to be a crier. I knew I wouldn’t send him for any more birds on that drive as he made a noise.
The final drive. The guns were across a stream from the pickers who were in a woodland, I heard 2 birds land (so did the dog) but knew they were dead so waited until the horn was blown to pick them and wanted to make sure he was mute. He hunted the woodland for one cock bird and another black pheasant was in the stream both delivered to hand nicely.
One of the pickers has a ton of dogs, labs, spaniels etc and it always amazes me how badly behaved they are, every time I've been to this place. They have little to no training and standoff lead and just pick birds as they wish. There is not really any ‘training’ aspect to it, or it seems?! The spaniel goes missing nearly every shoot day and is found after a few hours. On the first drive we watched the lab run into the pen and peg a hen bird, not left the pen so not shot. I mentioned it to the owner and he said he always does it. Then on the 3rd drive it was sent for a bird which legged it so again, it ran to another pen, was lost for 30 minutes in the pen ignoring all recall, owner shouting etc and bought back a bird, pegged or a runner, who knows.
The peg dog that ran in on my spaniel, the owner came over and thoroughly apologized - dogs are dogs, they aren't robots so no hard feelings and didn't put mine off picking any more birds.
A few beaters had 12-24 month dogs on leads for the first day, crying their eyes out all day on every drive, even in between drives still whimpering and not let off the lead all day as they weren't ready yet apparently.. surely kept on a lead all day will lead to increase noise if the dog gets over excited? That confused me a bit.
A good day all in all and to be honest mine was one of the better behaved out of all the dogs there, surprisingly! He had lots of nice comments, lots of dogs wanted to play on elevenses, a bitch just come out of season liked him but he wasn't interested in dogs whatsoever and in pure work mode so put him in the truck for a bit of down time and he had a treat for some energy.
He heeled off lead to the drives with tons of distraction and retrieved birds straight back listening to the whistle and he didn't have to get told off once throughout the day so was really proud of him and had a great day.
The only tiny issue was the single noise he made on one of the drives just hope he doesn't make anymore noise this weekend now as at a different shoot again but will be a much smaller day...
