Great time of the year to work with the dogs....

nice pictures

Greatness.

That white Shorthair is beautiful! Slick blood?

Nice pictures. And nice weather. High of near 90 and low above 70 here. Sadly, it's already getting too hot for my dog in Texas.

Dogmountin, that first pic is the way every day should end. Thanks

Spring time and young dogs. Fun times. Kate getting staunched up.

Nice pics fellas.

Here is the breeding on that white GSP. Most natural dog I have ever owned. Got her from Ray Nelson and she is out of Riden High Rudy. Been deadly on wild birds since 5 months old...that is about as tight as you want to line breed

Beautiful, thanks for sharing. Forrest

Chet,
Is this setup for teaching whoa, to condition the dog to the flank collar?

Yes sir, whoa breaking. Collar on the flanks reminds her to keep her feet in place.

Nice back!

Just throwing this up on the new thread in case some of you haven't see it.



All bird dogs point. The breaking process teaches them to hold point. There are two ways to teach a dog to hold point, with dozens of variations. The first way is to let the birds train the pups. That generally involves launchers and pigeons, with some whoa breaking mixed in. It's very effective. I use the Delmar Smith method, substituting the e-collar for the bump under the chin. My dogs are completely whoa broke before I put them on birds. I use pen raised quail, because I can be done with them for the summer. I like to start in August, and finish in time for hunting season.

I start off on the whoa post. I introduce the e-collar the same day, that I introduce the whos post. Here's cracker on her first day with the whoa post;





I keep them on the whoa post only until I can get out in front of them, and then go to the yard for heel and whoa. Cracker tended to sit, so I had to start with the suitcase hitch. I go from the yard to longer walks. The pup has pretty well gotten it down after three weeks.




I then go from the walks to whoa in the field. Here's Cracker in the field in the field, before I put her on birds. This whole process has taken me around four weeks.




This is her first day on birds. I train alone, so I had to plant the bird, where I could wrap the CC around a bush. Notice the slack CC.




I kept her on the CC for three training days. She only went around on the bird one time. Here she is after 9 training flushes.





I started walking some of the birds out after a few days. Here you go;





A little side note. My birds were not recalling all that well, so I used Cookie to point them while I netted them;




A lot depends on the pup, and you have to adjust for each pup. Cracker has never taken out a single pointed bird or covey.

I would be willing to bet it is extremely rare for a dog to go from training birds holding point to wild birds holding point with out a glitch

I know of some that took a full season. It was like they would run through them without ever smelling them.

That’s when it’s time to get rid of that dog. If they ran through them downwind and didn’t smell them all season, you don’t need that dog, he’ll make a great yard pet, or candidate for a 22. If they got too excited and ran through them, you can work with that.

This is the only dog I’ve had to break on the WHOA post. I can usually Whoa break a dog when I teach him to heel. This poor dumb bastard was given to me by a buddy that spent $2500 with a professional trainer, he came back not even knowing his name. We lost him every time we put him down his first season. He would come in to gunfire, that’s the only way we got him back, he stayed out overnight the first time until we figured this out the next day killing bird. My buddy was going to do away with him and I said I’d take him home. He was finding bird until he got out of sight and running through them. This is the dumbest dog I’ve ever owned, it took him 6 weeks of being on the Whoa post every day to learn what WHOA means. Once he got that down that dumb son of a bitch will hold his bird all day and has turned into a valuable member of the team. I’m glad I didn’t give up on him He’s also learned to hunt dead and retrieve to hand. He can tear up a kennel and has to have a top on his. His only redeeming quality is that bird finding nose, that’s really the only thing you need from a bird dog. He handles well now and I can’t help but love the SOB.

Scalebuster
So to clarify what you said was the dog pointing and holding birds from the bird scent or from you yelling whoa

Holding point is a no brainer. Simply give up the shooting, zip your lip , and keep your finger on the hot button.

Thanks! Dot (the dog backing) just finished her first season. Hopefully all those good habits she developed in the field this winter won't leave her pretty little head between now and November.

Exactly! What I do is stop him with the collar after the flush. I set the dog back. Make him stand for 5 minutes. And I mean 5 minutes

Some guys may try to stop him with the collar before he breaks and flushes the birds. Problem with me on that is I want the dog to learn to relocate since we hunt running birds.

I stop my pups before they flush if possible, I whoa them if I’m up there and feel they’re getting too close. I like a dog to relocate but train them to hold point and not move until Released at the house.. Everything changes on wild bird and it doesn’t take them long to hold point and release on flush to retrieve. I want my dogs on dead bird as soon as they hit the ground. All I expect from my mutts is to hold the birds until I walk up to shoot them and then retrieve. I’m also different in that I still want my dogs to stay in sight. I think a 200 yard dog in front of a mule is perfect where I usually hunt. If I’m prairie hunting I still want to be able to see a white dot when they go on point. I hunt with some men who “Let em roll.” I like to watch my mutts and am not a fan of tracking down a dog on GPS that’s on point 900 yards away. But that’s just me.

I let this gyp point a bird the other day at the house. She screams when other pups get out for training. This is the smartest dog I’ve ever owned. She was completely Whoa broke in 4 days. This will be her 3rd year on wild bird and all she wants to do is be taught something new. She could be a circus dog. My boys love teaching her new tricks.