Tara Fetching a Honker...

Well she has not fetch one yet, but she is in training.

She has completed her second hunting season, fetching about 100 ducks each season, but only 1 goose in that hunt, her first hunt 2018, I drop a big fat Canada and she would not pick it up, just overwhelmed her that big a bird. Took it home, tried to get her to fetch it, too much still. So I froze it, planned to teach her to fetch it in the off season but never worked on that, so her second season never shot a goose so good thing lol. So we worked on this today. The goose weighs 9 lbs 2oz in the freezer. Bought goose dokken, it weighs I think 4.5 lbs. She fetched that fine, so started adding weight in like 1.5 lb increments got it to over 8 lbs today. We almost there...



Funny she has never gone in circles like that before, all that weight had her spinning a guess lol.

Looked like she was gonna throw a shot put.

She is a good looking dog, man. Great video.

Nice. Keep at it.

Nice work Guy! On the really big honkers, finding the handle is the major obstacle for most dogs.

It wasn't easy smokey, but finally got her fetching it. 2 days in a row now, should be down hill from here. This is all she will fetch for the next week or so.

I see she used the neck as a handle...on the frozen goose. my black lab Raelette had trouble because she wanted to pick them up by the neck, then would trip over the goose. Thawed one out and then refroze it with one wing pulled away from the body...now she picks 'em all up, right at the wing/breast junction and looks like a pro...tell me that Tara is not spayed...I'd be interested in a pup a year or so from now...

That 2nd retrieve was the first time I seen her pick it up from the back using the neck like that, normally she gets it on the breast. I might have to thaw out and refreeze like you did. This is all she is gonna fetch until she has this down. I'll finish her off with it all thawed out. We might do this for the next 2 weeks, see how it goes.

Having fun in the off season

Nice work Tara! The most difficult part is accomplished. The more she handles them the more adept she will become. Most dogs either settle on the base of the wing or the back bone just below the wings. Determination has a lot to do with how well a dog learns to handle the big honkers.