From Train Wreck to 173 Retrieves: Kevin & Mabel’s Journey | Kevin Wright

In this episode, we talk about Mabel’s second full hunting season, her 173 retrieves, the lessons Kevin learned as a handler, the breakthrough moments on blinds, river retrieves, zombie geese, and why training with a community can change everything.

This is a great episode for anyone who has ever wondered, “Is my dog going to turn out?” Because sometimes the dogs that struggle early become the ones with the best stories.

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Transcript

Welcome Back Kevin Wright

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome to the Build From Here podcast on this episode. This is no stranger to this podcast. You've seen him a few times, Mr. Kevin Wright. Excited to have him back on. Glad you're here, man. And uh in studio, in person. It's uh it's always fun when you can do them in person just because it you just it's close and personal. And we actually got to go out and train this morning, and the dogs didn't act like fools. They all listened well, they were steady, they did what they're supposed to do. And I gotta say, man, I'm blown away by Mabel. We were just I was talking about this, and I'll link up his episode so as y'all are listening, you can um go back and listen to his first episode. But it was, I think your first episode with this was February 27th of 2025. So just over a year ago as I'm recording this, and uh, because we're in 26 now, and it's just been incredible to see uh maybe Mabel is four four now. So just seeing Mabel's journey from like when the first member weekend you came, as I was listening about that episode, I didn't I had forgotten that you said that you had only you had never even duck hunted at the first member weekend, like you were figuring all that out, and as you're doing on the mock hunting, so that was kind of cool because you're getting to learn all that. But from that first member weekend to where you're at now with Mabel and really where you're at in the dog community, man, you're just all in. I would say you're you're becoming a pillar in the community, like you're helpful to people. Uh it's it's just been amazing to see her growth. So I just and again, I always like to honor people before we get on. Hopefully, it don't make you blush too much here. But I just am grateful for you and thankful for all that you've done and and all the people that you've helped because you really have done a good job. And um, more than anything, you've modeled it yourself, like how to navigate those challenges because Mabel did have those challenges in the group environment uh at member weekend. She was struggling to begin with, but that encouragement and it has helped a lot of people because a lot of people face that and they think, oh no, my dog's not gonna turn out. And you know, you faced it and you just stayed steady, calm, and then now I mean, like we're out there today, and Mabel is crushing this, like blinds, marks, steady. Uh, and we've got Bertie was young, he's a younger dog, had all the dogs out there, and she or two dogs out there, and she's just crushing it. So uh now every time I see you and Mabel work, I've just seen you guys work really good together. Even in the member weekend environment, not only are you able to work your dog, but you're able to like help others. And we'll get on to that in the leadership and and the podcast and chapters and all that in a minute. But um, man, I'm just grateful for you and just glad you're here.

SPEAKER_00 2:24

I I'm glad to be here and appreciate the kind words. Um I'm just glad there's no video from that first uh first members weekend or two because that was it, I mean at the time it felt like a train wreck.

SPEAKER_02 2:38

Too bad you didn't have those meta glasses back then.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

Oh no. That that would have been deleted. There's no doubt about that. Yeah, yeah, because I could I can control that. Uh but no, it it's it's been a crazy and roller coaster at times, and you know, of course, I mean look, I'd be lying if I didn't say they weren't a couple times that I was like, this this is beyond me. I'm ready to quit. But you know, we we had no choice. We kept going through. We started the journey, so we're continuing it. And there's there's still holes, you know, there always are, and there's ebbs and flows. But uh what I have learned is we can work through it all. It just may take a little bit of effort, some things a little more, but I mean that's what you do.

SPEAKER_02 3:23

Yeah, that's a good point. You know, I love that perspective because like man, all you gotta do is go to Facebook and go find a retriever group, any retriever group, it doesn't matter, they're all the same. Pick one waterfowl retrievers, any any whatever hung retrievers. I there's like tons of them. Go in there and then you'll immediately see someone. I have this problem, I'm facing this challenge, and it's not going well. That's the story of training a dog. Like you're gonna, it's it's just going to happen. It's what you do next that matters. And I do think a lot of people like get to a place where they're pulling out their hair and they end up quitting or settling. And that's you know, one of the things that we talk about. We just don't want to see people settle. And that's what I'm so fired up about for you and Mabel, and I'm excited to talk about this past season because we're gonna be able to talk about a story where you didn't settle. You know, you faced these challenges. I know I believe personally it would have been really easy, right? Because if I remember correctly, it was really just like the whining and yelping that she had a big problem with.

SPEAKER_00 4:21

That was a major problem, but it was it was general obedience.

SPEAKER_02 4:25

Okay, obedience too, pulling on the lead, stuff like that. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Yeah, because that's I mean, that's still a little bit of a struggle. I mean, she's a thousand times better, and you know, it's something I have to stay on top of. Yeah, because she's a high drive dog and she likes to go. And so, you know, I I have to, you know, consistency is the key to stay on top of that, make sure that she's doing things correctly. And and it's amazing, you know, because I've I've sent to you a couple of videos, you know, as we've been working on cleaning up Hill. When you get the dog to where they're relaxed and they're just doing what to do, they're happier.

SPEAKER_01 5:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

I mean, they when they're engaged with you, it's it's amazing. And then you know, when you get that established, what you can do out here, it's it's beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 5:20

I like what you said, like when they're engaged with you, because like a lot of people a lot of people fall into the trap of ego training, right? The dog does something, it embarrasses you, and then now you come down hard on the dog because you don't want that to happen. I mean, let's just face it, it's uncomfortable getting embarrassed.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

I've been guilty of that. I mean, yeah, I mean, you're I think we all have.

SPEAKER_02 5:42

Uh I I think we all have. And it's but getting them to want to do it not because they have to do it, afraid of pressure. That's always the best way. And that's one thing I I like that you've done with Mabel. And again, like even at the first member weekend, like you were just or your first member weekend, you were just calm and cool and collected about it. I'm sure internally you were feeling your memory's not that good, but yeah. Well, I just I just remember you just sitting there. I was worried about you. I did think you were like, I I did wonder what you were thinking, because like you pulled her way back from everybody and you were just sitting there.

SPEAKER_00 6:15

Yeah, on the mock hunt, I was sitting back just making her sit watch while there were a couple of ladies over there, and we were we were talking and and basically didn't know it at the time, but we were working on extinction. You're just gonna have to sit here and work work through your craziness, and you're not gonna get what you want until you relax. And and I mean that was kind of the beginnings of not that we had done some of that more, but that was kind of that. And then the second weekend was the second members weekend was a struggle too. Yeah. Um, because we couldn't do the walk-up at all.

SPEAKER_02 6:49

The walk-ups are hard, I will say that. They are hard.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Yeah, and so there was a lot of big struggles with that, and the vocal issues really came out then. Yeah, that was when it was it was really, really bad. And I was pretty heartbroken, I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, and I was on my way home, and I just remember actually I stopped at the gas station, checked on her, and I said, We're just gonna have to work through this. And we we got back, and I and I did have some help, you know, talk to the get some of the guys in the retriever club, and there's one of the guys that you've met, Andrew Quintana. Yeah, um, he and I we started getting together because his dog struggled with some steadiness. Yeah, and she's uh she's a high-drive dog too. So we got it there just the two of us. A lot of what we were doing today, just intentionally trying to get them to act crazy, yeah, and but then showing them the correct way. And when I was able to work on that and focus on that, the improvement was drastic and it was quick. Wow. I mean, it it was amazing, and you know, and she still struggles with it some now, and you know, that just reminds me it's like everything you know, mentioned we mentioned basic obedience and healing, you've got to continue to work on those things. Yeah, you know, doing what we did today helps that. Yeah, and so it's you've always got to be willing and uh able to go back to the basics.

SPEAKER_02 8:18

Yeah, I mean, when you say she struggles, I mean the where she was, where she's now. I mean, you can't even tell. Like, I mean, even at last member weekend, like I mean, you're over there leading, leading a group, walking everybody around, like, and you're able to like leave her own place while you're talking and directing and helping other people, like that's an extremely hard skill set to get to. And that just shows your dedication. And that's really cool that you guys worked on all that and understanding the concept of extinction and understanding the concept of if this behaviors only exist because they're reinforced or rewarded. That's it. And so you can fix it now. That doesn't mean you can fix it in the day, but you can fix it over time, little by little. And some dogs do have their certain tendencies, right? We talked about that earlier. Violet, it gets a little bit jumpy, like she'll she'll sit there, but she'll kind of like back and forth versus Bertie is like very stoic. It would just sit there now. And and she will break it if you're not careful, if you're not paying attention and you're not making sure that you're communicating. But most of the time she's just gonna sit there. Like today, on that very last retrieve. Um, I let my guard down a little bit, and then you know, Mabel goes, and then Bertie starts to go out. I'll just assume like a sss and then she just stopped like that. So like she's got a little more composure there. But and you gotta know the dog. And so that knowing the dog helps you respond and let me say this, helps you communicate and helps you train and really the right word is handle in such a way, handle each dog differently. And I know a lot of times we have a saying, train the dog in front of you, but it's also kind of the idea of handle the dog in front of you. I'm gonna handle Bertie differently than I'm gonna handle Violet and any other dog than that. But let's um now that we've kind of talked about just the background, we've talked about where you used to be back in the day, the challenges you

Growth From Early Training Struggles

SPEAKER_02 10:06

faced. Because again, you're in a totally different place now. You're leading uh the chapter. In fact, this is we we just uh we had lunch a minute ago at Taco Mama. Like, this is the place where chapter started, because that was the conversation we had. We were sitting at Tacoma and we I thought you was the same table.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

It was the same table.

SPEAKER_02 10:22

Yeah, yeah. I wondered if you picked that intentionally or not. I was wondering. Actually, I did. I thought about it when I sat down.

SPEAKER_00 10:27

I meant to bring it up, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:29

I was wondering about that. So we're sitting there, I was like, this is where chapter started because we uh well when was that last summer?

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Well, it's last year, and then this summer was when we we started talking about it that February, and then we got on a call with Seth and Ben, and we talked about it, you know, your ideas of it, and so we and we took it and started running with it.

SPEAKER_02 10:51

I can't even believe it, man. It's just taken off and it's been incredible. Uh, and we'll get into chapters in a second, but I was bringing that up just to say like, you know, the growth journey you've been on has been incredible. And like the knowledge and the skills that you have now, as uh really someone that's understands dog training now, you're passionate about hunting now. You hadn't really hunted in the past, now you're getting really good at it. Like and maybe like you two are a dangerous duo in the blind out there. Because I mean, we've seen I've seen a lot of those clips you've been sending over, kind of a little bit jealous of how two are smoking some birds. I want to get out there after some of that, man. I I gotta get on some good hunts like you guys have. But um, let's recount the season because I want again, I want we've painted that picture of the past.

Second Season Hunting With Mabel

SPEAKER_02 11:34

Let's talk about where you're at now. Let's talk about how this hunting season has been. And let me ask this question before we talk about the hunting season. When I I'm assuming at the moment when that first member weekend, when you came to the realization of the challenges you had, you probably weren't thinking about where you're at now. You probably weren't even thinking that was a possibility, I would imagine.

SPEAKER_00 11:55

Before I showed up to Members Weekend, I thought we were further along than we were. Members Weekend was a wake-up call. It was because and you know, and and and this is what I tell people, you know, when we talk about people coming to Members Weekend, I'm like, don't worry about how things are. Your first one, it's gonna be crazy. Your dog's probably gonna go crazy. It it doesn't matter because trust me, it's probably not your dog's probably not gonna be crazier than Mabel was on our first weekend. I mean, I know there's some stories of before I came of dogs knocking over the tables, you know, the food tables. Okay, she didn't do that. Thankfully, yeah, thankfully.

SPEAKER_02 12:36

That was a wild one, yes. I guess uh have we ever told that story on a podcast at all? Yeah, you had him on, you had him on it. Y'all covered it all. That's right. Well, that'll be in another episode. You have to listen to that one.

SPEAKER_00 12:47

Yeah, that was that was hilarious. Uh, not for anybody.

SPEAKER_02 12:50

If anybody's listening to this right now that's not familiar with the cornerstone, they're probably like, what on earth is going on in member weekend? It's a bad thing. Tables get knocked out, dog's gonna go crazy. Oh man. Uh it's not that crazy. But it is at the same time.

SPEAKER_00 13:08

But yeah, but yeah, and then having that, I mean, at that point, of course, we probably all have that thought when we first thought, this is gonna be the greatest dog ever, I'm gonna have the greatest dog. You know, our ego comes in, it's gonna be, and and we all have the greatest dog. I mean, I believe that it's greatest for you, but when you don't know what it takes to get there until you do it, that's the wake-up call because it's it's a crazy journey. And there are times it goes so well that you're like, man, this is this is not hard. And then there are times where I'm done with this, I'm quitting. No, I mean you go through all emotions with it, all emotions with it. But yeah, and but yeah, and then getting to I mean, heck, even my first her first retrieve, you know, I was it didn't work like I planned on it. It was it was different, you know. We you know, we you know, and I told it in the last last one, but I'll recap it real quick. You know, her very first retrieve, there was they were burning fields, there was some fields burning on the other side of a levee in a ditch behind us. We were a little worried that the fire was gonna jump. It was smoky, and it was during speckle belly season, and then I didn't even take my gun out of the case because I was like, if we have to get up and go, I just want to grab my stuff and go. And so the other guy sitting there and we had a speckle belly come over. Boom, they dropped it. And I was like, oh, and so I said her name and she still because I had her leashed up, and so she tries to jump out while she's leased. Oh no. So yeah, the poor girl couldn't, and it was crippled, uh, barely crippled.

SPEAKER_02 14:52

Not as bad of a first retrieve as that happened while it's not an ideal retrieve, but you know, we got out, and I lined her up on it, and it's standing up.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

She ran right by it. I'm pretty sure she thought it was a decoy. She came back and I shot it and killed it, and she went over to it, and she sniffed it at first and looked at me and I go, Fetch. She reached down and grabbed it. After that, game on. She never hesitated, she has not hesitated on a bird since. She, you know, cripple or not, she's getting that bird. And and then it and and she just and she got better as the season went on, you know, and that's the way it goes.

SPEAKER_02 15:28

Yeah. It's but it's amazing, man. It was amazing. Once y'all get in that groove, you've done the training, and y'all, y'all have completed the whole course at this stage of the game, so now you're you're maintaining everything. How was this what season number was this for Mabel? This this season was her second full season. Our second full season. That's a game changer. When you get into that second season, how was opening morning of this season?

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Well, we didn't kill a bird. So there's this is speckle belly season. Okay. That was the first one. We didn't kill a bird for the first couple of mornings on duck season. And I it was just a down year for ducks. It's a great year for geese, but down year for ducks. So it's still balanced out. But the very first morning, we're I still remember this. We were riding out on the side by side, and you know, I'm up front, she's kind of sitting in my lap. And it was not cold. She was shivering. She knew what was going. She was so fired up. I mean, she could not wait to get out there. She knew exactly what we were doing. And it was so awesome. And we, you know, obviously we sat out there and we didn't shoot one. We didn't shoot one the next day. And then when we got we when we finally got the first bird, um I think I even told you the first one I was talking about earlier. We had one come right in front, shot it, and it dropped. I mean, it would be what you would want on a first retreat, an actual one, but you know, it it's screaming on its way down, hit the ground, Mabel, boom, boom, like a machine. Wow. I mean, yeah, her, it was it was great.

unknown 17:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

Man. So you obviously how let me ask you this. So this was your first or your second full season with a dog. Oh, the first retrieves there. Did you have any kind of nervousness going in, or did you feel pretty good about her, or was that the question still in the back of your mind? I wonder if she's gonna remember this. Or you knew when she was shaking, like, okay, she knows what we're doing.

SPEAKER_00 17:29

Yeah, I I knew that. I mean, I was obviously last year, I mean, that was a big learning curve for me of handling a dog because I had never handled a dog in a hunting situation. You know, um, I was a lot more relaxed. Uh towards the end of the season, I was I was fine. And you know, I made some handler mistakes early on, you know, even though I had her leashed, what I would do when I would send her when I was having her lease, I didn't leash her this year, but last year, you know, I'd unlatch and as soon as I unlatched Mabel.

SPEAKER_02 18:00

You know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:02

Unleash said for a second, focus on your mark, and then say her name. You know, just slowing down as a handler.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

Yeah.

unknown 18:16

Man.

SPEAKER_02 18:16

How many birds did y'all end up with?

SPEAKER_00 18:18

So total this year, we had uh 81 birds.

SPEAKER_02 18:22

Okay. So last year. Mabel get most of those?

SPEAKER_00 18:24

Uh that's her retreats.

SPEAKER_02 18:25

Oh, Mabel got eighty one retreats. Eighty one retreats. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:28

Wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:29

So she had she had uh she had 92 last year. So pretty close. So yeah, it was close to the couple.

SPEAKER_02 18:37

More more ducks last year.

SPEAKER_00 18:38

And making a trip out to uh Kansas to visit Wade kind of helped those numbers a little bit, especially that first day out there was a lot of fun. But uh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:47

Yeah, you can get on some pretty big hunts. It could be 80 birds in one hunt if it goes that way. That's very rare that that happens, but it but it does.

SPEAKER_00 18:56

Well, when you've got them landing and you're not shooting them because more are coming in and they're walking 10 yards in front of your face. I mean, Mabel struggled with that. I struggled with that. I mean, it was I mean, thankfully she didn't run out in the middle of them. You know, she she did break on me, but on the shots, not on not just running out chasing down a bird. So that's good. So that that was that was good. And she did get a little vocal with that. Um that's really intense for her. Um, and it's hard to replicate in a track environment.

SPEAKER_02 19:29

Pretty much impossible to replicate having I I've been on many hunts where we've done that. There was one on Montana, and it was it was before shooting a lot, so they were just pouring in, walking around. There was, I mean 30,000, I don't know, thousands of birds just just pouring in. And you could everybody like we're just standing there and just watching them, and then shooting time comes, and it's I mean, there was multiple volleys that we limited out pretty quick. I was doubling up like every volley, like because there's just that many birds, like you didn't have to rush, and we had 10 guys in the blind, and you're just sitting there. I say I was doubling up on every volley, we we limited out quick when you and everybody else was good shots too. So it was not many volleys, it was boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. We're we're wrapping up. It was a lot of birds total when you got 10 guys, but it was just to know that you're one, two, to feel like you have that connection when you know you smoke those birds, it's incredible. And the dogs handled that well, but I've been on hunts like that. It's that's hard on a dog, like that's what we train for, though. We want to train for the hardest, the craziest environment. That way, if we are on a hunt and we get a few birds come in, that's no big deal. But I will not lie, there's been many times I've been on some hunts where there's some birds sitting out there, and I'm sitting there thinking, hmm, I could just smoke that bird right now. I know there's a bunch more coming, but like I want to kill that one. And uh I will not lie, there has been times when I'm looking at the guide and I see he's as he's like, kill before he says kill um, I've already shot before the um comes out. Because I'm just I'm waiting for that moment just to smoke them. And I know the dogs are doing the same thing. They're like, come on, let's go, just say my name, let's go. Oh yeah, yeah. Especially Mabel with that fire. I mean, she's just like, let's go.

SPEAKER_00 21:17

Yeah, it's awesome to see. Yeah, it's funny you mention that. We had a guy that because I was with Mills Foster and it was one of the guys' sons. He he jumped right right at the time when they did. And of course, he shot it was one bird. And then he, of course, and Mabel got retrieved, and then he he apologized to him. I go, for what? You shot the bird. That's what we're for. Don't jump out early and miss. That's the bad thing. If you're gonna do it, you better hit the bird. Yeah, I was I was like, I and you know this as a dog handler. Yeah, I like shooting birds. But if my girl can get a retrieve, I don't care. I mean, it's I'm it it's a it's more about the dog for me now than not that I've had some years. Of experience with duck hunting, uh it it's there's something about watching your dog that you've worked with run out and nail or tree.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

And and it's amazing. I mean it that moment is and because we work on this all year round, like or most of the year. I mean, most people are gonna take a little bit of time off, but like most of the year, like if you're training a dog, if you're preparing for a dog, like you're having just as much fun in March, April, and May as you do in the fall. It's just nice to see all that work come together in the real environment, see the birds fall, see the dog go get them. And it's amazing what they do, like, and especially as a dog gets more experience. So after I would let's talk about kind of midway through the season, was there any tendencies you were seeing, like, okay, this is new with her, like not in not a negative context, but more of like you see as the dog gets more experience, they start learning nuances of ways they can handle, they can do things better to retrieve better. Is anything that stood out to you?

Fixing Blinds With Better Handling

SPEAKER_00 23:01

Well, th there were two things. Um, and this this showed because of what I was focusing on training in the off-season, I kind of neglected a little bit, and this was on on the blind running. Um because I was training for uh you know to get us through the season. Yeah. And so the blinds that they run are pretty simple at the season level, you know, and they depending on the judges and what they set up. They're they're usually not that far. I mean, usually not even 50 yards, and a lot of times even shorter. Wow. And as and as fast as Mabel is Yeah, we saw her today.

SPEAKER_02 23:42

She's actually flipping over the bumper.

SPEAKER_00 23:44

I you know, if I don't line her right, she's not gonna get the bird, because I I'm I'm it's gonna be a a struggle to be fast enough to stop her. You know, so I focused on lining and it was sh short blinds. Well, and that's what I really focused on. Well, when you get into the season, you're probably not gonna have many 50 yard blinds, because if they drop, they can see it.

SPEAKER_02 24:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:12

You know, I mean it's not really a blind. And even if they didn't see, you can point, oh, there's the bird, and I'm gonna go get it. Yeah. So and so we struggled initially a little bit to get out to dissonances. And then she had a little snap in her head that they do sometimes. She was got very independent. I could stop her, but she just wouldn't take the cast. I mean, she'd always turn the right way, but she was gonna go where she thought the bird was.

SPEAKER_02 24:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:41

And so our blind struggled a little bit with that early in the season. And so what I did mid-season, I'm like, okay, we've got to get this handling under control. We we just did a bunch of walking baseball. And when we weren't hunting, we did walk in baseball. And I just I did a lot of reps with that, and then it clicked with her one day, and it it's like she's like, Oh yeah, if he points me here, there's a bird there. It's kind of amazing how that works, isn't it? Yeah, so it was cool, and so she started, she started nailing her blinds, and she was really and pushing herself out deeper because she was struggling to go go longer because I didn't focus on that enough. I think I told you, and I even got some of it on video, um, we had two mallards come in. We dropped one that was about probably 50, it dropped about 50 yards out. Yeah, and the guy at the other end of the line took a miracle shot at the the second one. And I swear it was when he hit it, it was probably 70 yards.

SPEAKER_02 25:46

Whoa.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

What was he using? Uh I thought he was using a three and a half, but uh, and I know we had a mix of BBs. Yeah. Okay. Because we had geese coming in. So I'm pretty sure if I remember correctly he had that, because he usually shoots three and a halves too, which I'm like, you're insane. But he he even but I uh but I did we did talk about I know it was a it was a three-inch, and I forget what shell he was shooting. I can't it might have been Kent, but I can't remember. Yeah, but anyway, so it dropped, and so it dropped on the other side of the levee in the rice field, and there was some grass that's grown over it. And there are breaks in it where you can see see.

SPEAKER_02 26:25

So when it hit the ground, how far do you think it was?

SPEAKER_00 26:28

Oh, it when it hit the ground, it was I would say at least 80 yards, maybe out to between 80 and 100.

SPEAKER_02 26:35

Because you got a 50 yarder and then you got a 90-ish.

SPEAKER_00 26:38

Yeah, so she picked up the the first one first, and then I lined her up for the second one, and I couldn't see where the I mean roughly, but it fell behind the row of grass. Yeah. So I I knew it was behind there, but I knew I had to put push her to it. And that was something, you know, we struggled with a little bit, you know, that last training day here. No, you know, her going in to cover, you know, whatever. But she got better as the season went on. She kind of learned, oh, birds are on the other side of stuff.

SPEAKER_02 27:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:07

So I lined her up and sent her back. Now I I would yell back just to kind of reinforce it. But she really didn't hesitate and she went straight back. She punched right through, and then I wasn't sure exactly where it was. She started, after she got through, she kind of started hunt mode a little bit, and they said, No, she's to her right. So I stopped her, one cast over, and then she went over, disappeared behind the grass. Next thing you know, here she comes.

SPEAKER_01 27:32

Man.

SPEAKER_00 27:33

And yeah, it was it was it was awesome. She I was so proud of her on that point, and it was cool. Oh man.

SPEAKER_02 27:40

That's second season, too. And you got, and that's the thing, like, I mean, you got a professionally trained dog. Like, this dog's working. You know, like a lot of people like hunting dogs. You hear the term meat dog, right? And it goes and gets the meat, right? And a lot of people are using like rocks or slingshots to kind of direct. It's cool that you're not doing that. Not only you got your dog sitting there steady like it's supposed to, instead of having to like walk way out there and basically walk to, and I've seen that before. There's no shame in that if you need to do that, if it's the first few retrieves. But you don't want to always be walking your dog out to get the bird because at that point, why do you need a dog? Other than to use their nose, right? But being able to cast your dog out there and give them those directions at distance, like all the camo, all the chaos, and that'd be a second retrieve. So that's a classic example of a bird that might have gotten away because you get that first one the reasonable, easy mark, 50 yards, go pick that one up, and then a blind that shows that the dog trusts you to have a dog be able to do that in a hunting situation. It's one thing to do that, and that's a pretty simple training concept, right? That's people probably practice that all day, but to be able to have that in the hunting environment when there's multiple shots going off, a dude that uses three and a half inch shells and BB on the end, probably shooting a little more than needs to be shooting. You know, you have all of that going on, like that's impressive. That's cool. I said, How does that feel having a dog like that? And looking back at where you were, are you shocked that you are at this level? I mean, obviously now, knowing what you know now, you realize, oh, I could do this probably with any dog I want to train. Like it's not, it's so it's not it's not simple, but it doesn't have to be hard, right? It's but it could be hard if you if you're unsure or don't know what to do.

SPEAKER_00 29:25

Well, I mean in my I really, you know, because I talk I talked about you know when you first start on, you know, you have this grand idea that your dog's gonna do this. Well, in some ways, I really kind of am there.

SPEAKER_01 29:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:42

I mean, it does not mean that there are not things. I mean, we've talked about it, I talk about it all the time. Sometimes it may sound like I'm being negative, like, hey, we've got to work on this.

SPEAKER_02 29:53

Because we've got a culture of people that are driven to excellence. You are you're aiming for excellence. And if it if that's not just below excellence on anything, you're like, that doesn't count.

SPEAKER_00 30:03

We must become excellent. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, I mean, she's and and there are things I learned how to teach her to do that I had no idea that I could do. Wow. You know, um, so so yeah, I mean, I'm I'm ecstatic where we are, but I'm not satisfied.

SPEAKER_02 30:18

Good. Yeah, that's the way it should be. Yeah, they're never done. Like you can train them for until it's time to retire them. And at that point, then you could talk about how great of a dog they were and and all that. And and I do, and I I love to value where they're at, right? I know you value where she's at, but I like that that you're achieving for more. We want to aspire for more because there's no point in settling for less. Like you know now, like if you want to accomplish it, you can do it. You just put your head down and go to work, and now you know the process to get there. Like you understand how to get there. Was that one of the most memorable retrieves from the season? Did you have any other standout retrieves?

River Retrieves And The 100th Bird

SPEAKER_00 30:56

That was an interesting one. Yeah. That that was that was uh well that was one talking about it at Wade's, uh we were hunting the river, and that was the the first bird that we shot that morning was uh Drake Mallard. And it was really a cool scenario. It landed before before the shooting light. So it was sitting there and it was swimming in. I mean, it bumped into a couple of the detoys. No, and you know, Mills with Mills was with Ruby at the other end of the blind, you know, and that's what the way we work, you know, panel which end. So it was on my end, and the current's going from right to left, so it's swimming up, you know, probably 10 yards off the bank. So sitting there, of course, Mabel's looking at it, I'm looking at it.

SPEAKER_02 31:45

Well, one of the planning your soft on this bird.

SPEAKER_00 31:49

Mill's grandson was there, and so one of the blinds, and he one of the guides, it was so cool what he did. So he as it was getting close, so he got his grandson up there, really gets over, and they just get on the other side of Mabel's blind, just kind of waiting right there. And so he's saying, All right, get ready, and he's looking at his clock on his phone to count down when it's shooting light. So it comes down and he goes, Archie, you got 10 seconds. Hold on. And and then right when he was getting ready to say, All right, shoot him, it got up. And that boy smoked because it's flying away, and that's a hard shot, you know, shooting in the back. Dropped him. Really? Yeah, dropped him, it's coming down, and it's and it's a good current. You've been in that river. Yes, sir. So you know I'm sitting there with her, it's down, Mabel. She goes, and she's never hunted in a river before. It's first time. First river retreat. She didn't swim right at the bird, she swam to where it was going. Really? Yeah. First time ever. First time. Never even retrieved in a river. Never retrieved in a river. That's so cool. And she went because she she hit the water and she sees it going this way, so she just swims out there and meets it where it is.

SPEAKER_02 32:56

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 32:57

Yeah, I was like, you gotta be good.

SPEAKER_02 32:58

That's impressive.

SPEAKER_00 32:59

Yeah. And that was that was so awesome.

unknown 33:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:03

Now that's a special hunt all the way around. I mean, that's cool. How old is his grandson? But his grandson was so fired up about that. I I forget how old is it? I wonder if they mounted that bird. That's was it a greenhead or is it a greenhead?

SPEAKER_00 33:14

They I they can't they kept grabbing birds. Oh, I'm gonna mount this on this, and Emil's is like, Are you gonna mount every bird we kill? I mean, it became a big joke. Yeah, but uh, but there were some that they were getting mounted, but I haven't mounted any birds yet.

SPEAKER_02 33:29

Uh there's one bird that I've killed that's been mounted, and it was it's at Salt Plains. It's hanging out. It's a uh blonde pintail hen.

SPEAKER_00 33:38

Oh, nice.

SPEAKER_02 33:39

And uh I just let them have it because they said they were gonna hang it up. I was like, that'd be kind of cool. If I ever go back, I'll go look, and there it is. I know I killed that bird. But uh, we need some birds right back up over there.

SPEAKER_00 33:49

Yes, yeah, you do need some of the freezer.

SPEAKER_02 33:51

We do, we do. I think I've got some in the freezer, I might need to mount them.

SPEAKER_00 33:54

Well, I've got another another memorable retrieve was her hundredth retrieve.

SPEAKER_02 33:59

Okay, hundredth retrieve. Now that is that's a big milestone.

SPEAKER_00 34:02

That's a great one. So, and it's funny as we're going up, you know, I keep talking to the guys, which they're laughing at me because I'm keeping track, my buddies in the duck club, because I'm keeping track of every retrieve, and I goes, Oh, that's Mabel's this. And you know, you'll hear them make comments and stuff. I mean, we're cutting up with each other. But as we were getting closer and closer, uh one of the guys, Greg Ladd, which most of those videos that you've seen of her retrieves was him. Uh we call it Laughing Ladd Productions, but uh he uh so as it's getting closer and closer, and when it was when we were at 99, he goes, Well, what what if it's a spoonie? What if it's you know a you know, a dirty, you know, we were talking about it. I said, I don't care if it's a coot or whatever, but you know, that'd be nice. Well, we had one come, we shot it, great retrieve, come back, and it was a Drake Widgeon, beautiful bird.

SPEAKER_02 34:52

Really?

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Yeah, so that one's getting mounted.

SPEAKER_02 34:54

That's the 100th retrieve. The Drake Widgeon. That's amazing. Yeah, is it already there? You gotta go drop it off.

SPEAKER_00 34:59

I still have to take it, but I've got it.

SPEAKER_02 35:01

Uh we gotta see a picture of that. 100th retrieve. That is special.

SPEAKER_00 35:05

Yeah, I'll I'll I'll send you a picture of the bird of me holding it, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:09

We are doing pretty good then. I mean, so second season, second full season, already over a hundred birds, so 80 or 90.

SPEAKER_00 35:15

I'm 173, so yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:16

You're on track. I actually recorded a podcast with Michael Davis. It's not out yet. Uh, it'll be out at some point. But it was his uh Marley's thousandth retreat. We talked about the fact, and based on the track record that you're on, you're already 170. You're you're heading right to a thousand, and you just keep chucking along, you'll be there. I forget how old um she was. I think she was uh she's eight or nine when that happened. So it took him a little while to get there, but um, that's special. And what's interesting on that, and we'll have to get that on another story, is we hunted at Salt Plains together, and this was like way back uh their first real test. And he had a dog that he was unsure was going to turn out. I for I forget exactly what the issue was, but it's in the podcast if anyone wants to listen to that. But uh just like you had some of those challenges that made you concerned, he had some big challenges, but he had a very beautiful retrieve on Salt Plains, and it was pretty big to him. But another gentleman, uh Matt Robinson, he's been on the podcast before too. They actually both hit a thousand about the same time, and they were both on that same hunt together. I just thought that was so kind of crazy that they both hit a thousand retrieves, like pretty close. It's uh, but we're gonna have to have a thousandth retreat episode for you and me. 100%.

SPEAKER_00 36:28

100%. Yeah. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. It's it's it's crazy. And you know, like I said, ducks in Arkansas were down this year for most people. Apparently, depending on what part of Arkansas, it was either the second or third driest year on record. Oh, okay. Like 130 years. Wow. So so yeah, that that hurt. I mean, we still were able to kill a few, but it I mean, last year was was a lot better, but but the geese were better because a couple of our fields were either on either the eggs or were right next to the eggs. And so we were able to to get some some good numbers of geese. And so it it it it worked out well. It was still a fun season, and it's just fun getting the dogs out, man.

SPEAKER_02 37:14

Oh yeah. I love getting after it, man. I and I like I like killing geese too. Smackwell bellies would probably be my favorite. I do enjoy those. I mean, I'm not gonna not shoot a goose if it comes in, I'll say that. If it comes in, I do like seeing a big, big uh bird go down, especially if it's just a little long drop and you hear that thump. That that's a good feeling. And we've uh oh I've seen some of those. It's uh I like it, but I prefer for the birds to be close. I like 10 to 30 yard shots. That's kind of my wheelhouse. Keep them in 10 to 30 yards. I know that it's a no-brainer. We're gonna smoke them. Actually, uh, Wayne, we we were hunting with him, and this wasn't a goose, but he had bought a brand new uh 28 gauge. I think it was an Ethos, Benelli Ethos, a beautiful gun, one of the most beautiful guns I've ever seen. And I was like, look at it. I was like, man, I feel like I need one of those, but I, you know, I've got my 20 gauge and I love it. But he uh he was out working his dog, and then I uh I was getting out because I was gonna go video what he was retrieving, and all of a sudden these random uh blackjack birds just pour in, so that I just grabbed his gun and pop, it did the it did the job, it was effective. So 28 gauge is is effective. But he uh the reason I'm talking about 28 gauge is because we're talking about geese getting smacked and thumping. He smoked some pretty big geese with that 28 gauge. I was impressed, I was kind of shocked. I was like, man, we've been overshooting for years, yeah. Which you know, I switched to 20 not too long ago, and I've enjoyed 20 gauge, but that 28 gauge, how light that little thing was, it was so light.

SPEAKER_00 38:46

And your follow-up shots are probably a lot better.

SPEAKER_02 38:48

Yeah, yeah. That was one of the things that he was talking about. It was just easy to stay on target. You're faster too, so like if you need to like switch, like boom, boom, you can move the barrel faster because it's less weight on the gun.

SPEAKER_00 39:00

Less recoil, definitely. Less recoil.

SPEAKER_02 39:01

Definitely less recoil. Um, but it's incredible. Just seeing some of those big geese get smacked. Yeah, that's awesome. That's and that's cool because he's part of the Nashville chapter, and that that kind of leads us into the next part of the conversation. And then as long as there's no more retrieves you want to talk about. Is there any others you want to?

SPEAKER_00 39:16

Yeah, there is one.

Zombie Geese And Poison Bird Lessons

SPEAKER_00 39:17

Okay, I've got to share it. This one's this one's crazy. So when the snow geese arrive, there's a lot of them that died. There's speckled, not speckled belly, but speckled snow geese all over the landscape. So there's carcasses in there. Well, we shot we shot a speckled belly and it sailed probably 75 yards. And it was actually still crippled, so it was still moving some. So I line Mabel and she's going crazy for it. And this is this is in the flooded, so it's running water, flooded rice field. And so as she's going, well, there are these white geese out there. She goes and then she notices one of them. I'm sure it's like, oh, that's a white bumper. Yeah. And then she went and got it. So she brought it back, and we started, I started calling them zombie geese because they were already dead. Lined her up again, and they're everywhere.

SPEAKER_02 40:17

And at that point, the momentum target-rich environment for Mabel. Yeah. She's like, this is awesome. She picked up seven of those.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

And it was so bad that my buddy Greg that I mentioned earlier, Greg Grant, that had a dog. He he he got out and went drove, all got to side by side and drove around because it was going to get kept getting away from the biggest.

SPEAKER_02 40:38

There's a lot of dead geese out there.

SPEAKER_00 40:39

Yeah, but I'll I'll my ego, and this gets into it. I thought, well, I can st I can work her through it. Yeah, because I hadn't taught poison true poison bird, poison bird drills enough to cast her off of the that suction. Um, and so we didn't get that one. But I mean, we got some others that day, but there was one that went out in the tall grass and we were hunting it up, and she she was bringing them, and we didn't know where it was. I was trying to have her hunt it up, and she'd pick up one of those stupid zombies, bring it back up. Oh god, and she'd go back, you know, I'm throwing it away. And I knew she had to write one because I hear her move and I hear her. So I'm like, okay, she's got it to stop.

SPEAKER_02 41:18

That's insane. Yeah. Poison birds are a good thing, but I mean, I don't know. I would I've never thought about training for like multiple poison birds. In my mind, I'm thinking like one bird, but that was important that's a very unique situation right there.

SPEAKER_00 41:32

I'm not gonna try next time. If that's the case, we're walking around because we can see where it's going and getting it. Yeah, that's that's just your ego getting in the way.

SPEAKER_02 41:42

Oh man, that's cool. Well, that happens. I think uh so speaking of egos and egos getting in the way and actually humbling experiences, a lot of that's gonna happen in group work. You're gonna get humbled in a good way, you're gonna learn, you have the opportunity. And I think one of the one of the things I'm gonna bring up from earlier in the conversation, you're talking about I do think if we'd have had chapters back when you first got in, I think your member weekend experience would have been totally

Why Chapters Change Everything

SPEAKER_02 42:09

different.

unknown 42:09

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 42:09

So, like Bertie, I will say, having her, she's younger, having her go through the Birmingham chapter and being at multiple smaller events where we've got four to ten other dogs, which is what you'll see at member weekend in your group, except there's multiple, multiple groups. So when you start looking at them, it's crazy. But that has helped her. Like, I feel like she, like we talked about it today, like she's pretty solid and will like just chill. She's very relaxed. I attribute a lot of that, I believe, to just having her involved in the chapter because what I did is I brought her out, I just set her there and let everybody else work, and I put her right in the middle and had her involved pretty young. So that really helped. Now, that wasn't, you know, chapters have only been around not even a year at this point, so she's older than that, but I still got her involved in some of those environments. But I think that that is a tremendous helper for people that are coming into member weekend. Like if you're involved with a chapter, odds are things will go significantly better than you know, for the past multiple years doing member weekend. We, like you said, we tell everybody, like, hey, look, don't worry about where you're at, just come in and just experience it because it's gonna be who knows what's gonna happen. Like, your dog may respond one way or another. I do think that that's helped a lot. I would love to talk about you your chapter, the national chapter. Love to talk about what you're seeing there, the excitement that's going on, and just any improvements you see or anything that you see that the chapters are doing that otherwise wouldn't normally happen.

SPEAKER_00 43:39

Well, I think first off, my only regret about about the chapters thing is that it wasn't center. You know, because you're right, it would have helped me tremendously to be able to get Mabel to a lot of that exposure at a young age to learn that, to learn to relax, to have that opportunity to work through that. Of course, I wouldn't have understood. As well as I do now what that means to do that. But you've got but you'll have people to help who've been through it to get help encourage you. This is normal, that's why you train. You want them to act up in training. That's where you want it to happen, because it's going to happen. That's where you want it to, because you can teach them in that environment. It's hard, if not impossible, in the hunting blind.

SPEAKER_02 44:21

Yeah. It can be difficult. It's not fun too, because like, I mean, if you're like me and you want to kill the, like, I mean, I just I'm going to shoot these birds. If they're coming, I'm bloodthirsty. I get it. 100%. And so I know there's been many times where I'm like looking at my dog and then I'm looking looking over there. I keep I'm divided loyalty at this point. You know what I mean? Gotta stay focused here. That's it is better if it can happen in the training environment.

SPEAKER_00 44:46

Yeah. But yeah, the chapters, I mean, I'm excited. You know, last year was the first launch of it with the Nashville chapter. Started off with a bang. We had a great turnout. It was an awesome time. Had a great time training. Uh, and then throughout the year we we had we had several, you know, Seth and I got together with a few different people, or or just the two of us, you know, because people schedule, especially during the summertime, you know, it's challenging. Um but yeah, we we did all that. Um and then of course, you know, hunting season comes around, so you know, that kind of kills that uh because you're going hunting and not training. So yeah, as this year's coming up, you know, Seth and I have talked a lot, you and I have talked a lot. There's uh uh Sam Wolf. Yeah, yeah, he's fine. Sam Wolf is is is is jumping in and taking over t you know, taking on some leadership and you know, really because he's got some grounds and he plus he has some, even though he's he's relatively new to Cornerstone, he's he's an experienced dog trainer. So uh he's he's gonna be a great asset, he's got great ideas, uh, and he's really fired up and and like, hey, you know, let's do this, let's do that. So it it's it's I think it's gonna be a great year. We've got a weekend reserved at the pool's knob you know grounds. So we're gonna have a great event that weekend. Uh it it's gonna be awesome. That'll be kind of our unofficial, official kickoff of the training season. But we're gonna start getting together because Sam and I have gotten together a couple of times. Seth and I have gotten together a couple of times, but we're really gonna try to build the community of it and you know, to get to get people to train together. Uh Sam has talked about you know hosting several events, you know, at his place. So, you know, we'll we'll talk about through talk through how that can work.

SPEAKER_02 46:49

That's gonna be cool.

SPEAKER_00 46:50

Uh we're gonna, you know, we've we've been talking about having, you know, not just you know, training days, but you know, just get together, just to get together and build a community. Uh you know, maybe try to get a group and uh go shoot some play pigeons.

SPEAKER_02 47:05

Oh the count me in the world. That sounds fun. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 47:08

Yeah, there so we've we've had a lot of ideas and things like that, and we've we've got to just kind of coalesce on that and and get a plan going and and rock with that. So yeah, it's I'm excited about where things are going. Um you know what was awesome and what was awesome about last year, there were there were four or five people that were supposed to come and they wanted to, but things just didn't work out, or they couldn't come. And but you know, I've reached out to them letting them know, hey, this is coming, trying to be proactive to give them enough time to plan for this. And I know they want to come. Um so and I I know there'll be new people and then you know, I have the same people. So I expect it probably to be a little bit, you know, I think it'll be bigger and better. If it's not, that's fine. You know, the turnout doesn't matter, it's just getting out there.

SPEAKER_02 48:01

Having the community there, the people there. And and that's what it is. Like it's great to have 70 people, but I think one of the cool things I love about the cornerstone community in and of itself and the people. It's really when I say the community, we're talking about cornerstone members, the people. It's unique in that this isn't really a self-serving community, right? It's not about the numbers, it's not about any of that. It's it's nice to have more people, it's nice to have more because that means greater impact. But to some degree, just because you have a larger crowd doesn't necessarily mean greater impact. But the richness of the community and the quality of the connections that's in the community is I mean, it's just amazing. And we kind of talked about that earlier, like, and we do things just differently, like then there's nothing wrong with the other hunting dog community out there, and I think it's great because I mean they got a great thing going. But we we train totally differently, like when we come out, like all the dogs are out at one time, and that might blow some people's minds that are listening to this, they might not they just may have not seen it done that way, versus other community. Typically, it's one or a couple of dogs out, and then the rest of everybody fulfilling different roles. And I think there's always more than one way to do things, so neither way is right or wrong, but it definitely creates that camaraderie because I will say that I do like having all the dogs out at once because we talked about you know being humbled earlier. Anyone can talk a big game when your dog's sitting in the kennel. But there ain't there's not much room to be talking a big game while your dog's sitting there off of leading next to you, because you could be sitting there talking about, and then you turn around, where'd my dog go? But the We've all experienced that.

SPEAKER_00 49:39

Oh my goodness. And not throwing you on his bus, but I've seen you experience it with Violet, you know.

SPEAKER_02 49:46

Guilty as charged.

SPEAKER_00 49:47

But that's you know, but that's that's the reality of dogs.

SPEAKER_02 49:50

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it is, and that I love the authenticity of that too, because that is just what it is. Like, we're not our reputation isn't built on facades or um smoke and mirrors, like, because it's one thing to run your dog and then put it up and then just like cool, we're good. You you saw the highlight real, you see the real thing all the way around here. And I think what that allows is for people to get significantly better than they would otherwise. Because if you're just running to just stroke your ego, put the dog back in the kennel, and I'm not dogging at any in particular person or group here, I'm just saying in general. Let me just say this the environment we create makes it really hard to do that. But if you're just doing that, then you're you're missing out on opportunities for yourself to get better, like what we've just talked about, like having that dog out more, having the dog sit there and watch, having the dog off lead. And maybe you have to start on the lead. That's totally fine. Actually, we all know reinforcement happens one way or another. So if your dog's gonna break, put the dog on the lead, don't let it break. And then you go do that for a few weeks after going to your chapter and hanging out with people. Like, one day you could just take the lead off, and the dog's just gonna be sit there because it doesn't know any better. Um, but that what kind of wrapping that back around to the the concept of the authenticity, I think is really cool in in the community and the chapters that I've been seeing. Like when I went up to Nashville, like it literally it's the same culture and environment that we have here at Member Weekend. Like when I drove up to y'all's first event, like it wasn't any different. It was the same group, like or the same feel, if that makes sense. It felt the same as if we're doing member weekend, or if we're doing a Birmingham chapter, it just has the same natural feel, which I think is just so cool. And I attribute that to people like you and Seth and then Sam, like people that are raising their hands taking ownership, like we love this type of thing, but we want more. And it's guys like you that are like jumping out there and taking that ownership and making it happen. Because otherwise, if if we didn't have people like y'all, chapters would be limited to Tupelo or Guntown, Mississippi, where Barton lives, and then uh Birmingham, Alabama, where my dad where my dad and I live. But because people like you now, there's chapters all over the country, it's east to west coast, and people can meet and gather together. There was one out and I saw a post not too long ago, and they happen everywhere. The the Dallas uh, I think D FW chapter had a really good meetup. We had uh Colorado, I think this past fall, they had a cool, they had a beautiful meetup. I mean, mountains in the background. I was like, we gotta get out of Colorado and check that out.

SPEAKER_00 52:25

I can't compete with that. I know, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:27

And we got a bunch of like ticks and we got a bunch of like maybe some some snakes you gotta watch out for. Yeah. Don't don't think hear the snake part. You know, you can still come to memory weekend, you'll be safe. Uh I did I think somebody told me one time they're like, I don't know about coming down there. I'm afraid of snakes. I was like, well, actually, it was surprising. I don't I don't know about you. I haven't really seen that many snakes. Uh maybe a couple here and there.

SPEAKER_00 52:50

Well out there at Pool's Nob, Riptum and you you just saw the grounds. I've seen one dead snake on the road. Wow. I'm out there a lot. Yeah. Walking all through those grounds, you know. So is Mabel. I've seen more skunks than snakes. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:07

Oh, you don't want to you want to avoid those, do you?

SPEAKER_00 53:09

Yeah, I I I am not a fan of those little jerks. But yeah. Mabel's been sprayed twice by those. Oh really? Yeah. Yeah, that was not fun. Oh man.

Member Weekend Without The Overwhelm

SPEAKER_00 53:23

But yeah, the one of the great things about the chapters, because you know, I I get sometimes you know, the members weekend with that many people and that many that can it's overwhelming for the dog. But it can be overwhelming for a first-time person to come in there.

SPEAKER_02 53:38

Yeah, that's something worth talking about. Because that I mean, to be honest, if you've experienced the community socially or digitally, it you it's still, I mean, in the back of our mind, we just think, is it going to be like that here? And like I get it. So I would love to hear more on what you're saying there, because that I just wanted to throw that in there.

SPEAKER_00 53:59

You know, it and it's not that the community's not welcoming or anything like that. I mean, you you know, you you came up and helped me, some, you know, and some others did. But still, it it can be it, because it's it's it's like drinking water from a fire hose. You know, there's a lot going on. But if you can get involved in the chapters and you've got that on a smaller scale, you can really kind of get the feel of it. So yeah, if you can I'm not saying go to a chap don't go to one if you haven't been to a chapter meetup. But the chapter kind of, you know, like you said, it's it's it's very similar, but it's in a less overwhelming manner because you just don't have the avalanche of people there. Yeah. You know. Um so uh so yeah, I mean it it it can I I know it can be because you know some people some people are more outgoing and assertive to go, hey, you know, come get me and help me. Some other people might feel, you know, because there was there was a point where that I was just depressed. And I'm you know, I'm just sitting there. Of course, you know, Chad and I had, Chad and Ben and I, you know, we had been we had met before we came and we were friends, you know, and Chad and I would chat some, you know, and it's it it because sometimes you just don't even know what to do, you know. It's like it's like you know, and that's just but that you know that that's part of it, and and it and it was fine. It I was thankful to go because I got a lot out of it, and we grew from from that. And then, you know, it got a lot better, but then the second time was when the vocal issues really went up. So that was just a different issue that I had to deal with. Third time was incredible, yeah. It was it was great.

SPEAKER_02 55:36

Um you were on cloud nine that third time. I remember like you were like you were having an amazing time. I mean, I was even thinking about that out there today, and that's been carried on. Like, here we are, we've got two dogs awfully just sitting there. They haven't even been trained yet. We had just got them out of the truck. They're just sitting there, like, let's go. And they're just sitting there while we're sitting there talking and having a conversation a fairly like 20 minutes, just sitting there talking, like haven't trained yet. Yeah, like having that level of control, like that's just fun. I mean, to be honest with you, like to not have to wrestle a dog, to have it just sit there and like wait and like be patient, like you can actually enjoy your life and do what we were supposed to do, which is connect to people, have a good time, and then when it's time, turn the switch on, send the dog and let them go.

SPEAKER_00 56:24

Well, talking about that, so you know, I was leading one of the groups and we were doing the water series over there. We had a lot of young dogs in our group, you know, some that had barely even been in the water. Wow. So, you know, there's gonna be some that struggle to pick up the marks. Well, Mabel's there to clean backup. She's sitting there on her Momarsh, you know, and we're you know, we're reloading the reloading the wingers, you know, she's just sitting there watching dogs run and do that. And then if one of them failed to get it, I would just look over and go, where's your mark? And she'd look at it, call her name, and she goes and gets it.

SPEAKER_02 56:58

That's almost more fun than actually running the thing.

SPEAKER_00 57:00

Yeah, I mean, I'm not gonna lie, my butt my my eager my you know, I might have puffed up a little bit with that. I'm not gonna lie. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:06

I mean, I I know like I've seen like a lot of the leaders, that's where they end up getting co-placed. And somebody's got to do it because that I mean I'm not going to swim out there for that bumper. I'll go swim out there for dogs drowned. I've only had to do that one time. But I will not uh I'm not going out there for a bumper. Forget that bumper. We'll go buy a new one.

unknown 57:23

No.

SPEAKER_00 57:24

I got more out to try.

SPEAKER_02 57:25

Yeah. That's cool. And that I'm excited about this member weekend. Oh, man, I'm looking forward to it. It's gonna be amazing. It's gonna be awesome. Or member week, or actually, it's a little bit different. We we've extended it a little bit, giving people more time. I really think that flow is gonna be amazing because the normal flow is jump straight in. Like you said, you're just drinking from the fire hose. Yeah. The first thing we do is the massive group session where you've got like 50 or 180 dogs, how many, depending on how the size of the group member weekend, it'll be a little different this time. You could stretch the dog's legs, everybody's gonna be able to be more relaxed and hopefully flow into that first event with a little more relaxed because what is going on internally here and and here impacts what happens out here, right? It's from outside in that things can be.

SPEAKER_00 58:16

If you haven't done the mass group obedience, it's awesome now that I've been a part of it, but that first time I was like, What? And you know, of course, she's never experienced anything. Yeah, that that that can it it can be now it's and even with I mean, even Mabel started doing well there because we were able to work through it. So it was a great time. But that first initial shock of it is it's like, whoa, yeah, this is crazy, but yeah, it's awesome though. It really is awesome.

SPEAKER_02 58:47

Yeah, I love it.

SPEAKER_00 58:48

It's uh it's a great kickoff to it because it just it does it sets you and the dog in the right frame to what's going on this weekend. I mean, it's it's the way we start training. We start with an obedience session, and then we jump into the training because that gets you all kind of working together and ready to go.

SPEAKER_02 59:07

Yeah, I mean, it's like I mean, you don't start you shouldn't start a workout without a warm-up. Yep. I did the other day because I took off for like two months of hunting season because I was just so gung-ko on hunting that I was not taking the time to work out. And then I was running short on time, so I just go straight in. I go straight for a deadlift, did a quick little warm up lightweight, throw heavier weight on, boom, pull muscle. I was like, I I probably deserve that one. I was like, I'm I'm done. In my old days, I would have just pushed through it and then I hadn't been hurt for a long time. I've already recovered since. But same thing for the dog setup here. Like, you don't need to just jump straight. Everybody wants to go, I want to do this 200-yard blind. I want to do this big mark. It does feel good. I'm not gonna lie. I mean, when your dog does that, it does. But we don't want to neglect the most important factor because I don't care if a dog can do a 500-yard mark or blind, if it can't sit there still and quiet and listen to you, that's not a dog that someone's gonna want to hunt with. Because even on the best of days, except for those days where you limit out in like 10 minutes, 98% of your hunts or 99% of the hunts are going to involve some sitting, some quietness, and like you just don't want to be having to wrestle, or even let's just throw hunting out the window for a minute, just life in general. Like barbecuing, hanging out like we were today, just going and training. Like you need to have a calm, quiet, collected dog that's confident but reserved when it's time to be reserved and fired up when it's time to be fired up. Makes it makes a big difference.

Foundations Beat Early Big Retrieves

SPEAKER_00 1:00:39

Yeah, and I'm glad you brought that up because you know, you see this not just in Cornerstone, in everything, and even some some people that I've trained with that are new with younger dogs, uh, you know, when they're just starting out. And it seems counterintuitive because people are so worried about the retrieve as the first thing. I'm like, no. Look, if if you if you got a puppy and you throw the sock and the dog runs and gets the sock and what's the play, you've got to drive right there. Because it wants to run and chase something. If it sees something move out here and it wants to chase it, your dog will treat. It's gonna be fine. Don't worry about I mean Yeah, but throw a couple of under controlled circumstances, throw a couple of puppy bumpers, you know, make it to where they can't go anywhere but back to you, you know, just to be safe to because you'll it's not the end of the world, but you don't want to develop a bad habit of running away from you or anything like that. You know, you're just that's not fun, by the way. You're just trying to shape the behavior. But don't worry about that. If they've got that early on, you want to do it, you you may want to do it just to see.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:55

Don't worry about the retrieves. Worry about the foundation that you're building. Because you can get the retrieve worked out. And the less the less you screw up the retrieve earlier on, the easier it is when you get to the formal retrieve to really lock it in solid. I think that's where a lot of people with young dogs as a first trainer is they mess up. They're like, Well, I want to make sure the dog can retrieve. I want to and I get it, it's fun. We want to do the fun stuff. But you're doing yourself a disservice and your dog a disservice by focusing, by not focusing on the basics. Because if you establish that, it makes the rest of it a lot easier. Yeah. Trust me, I know.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:47

It's it really is, and I think there's a lot of misinformation out there on that. I was talking to somebody the other day. I think it comes from like old school mentality, old school mindset. You gotta have like we I'm trying to think of how to say this the best way. I mean, the truth is, you're right, people are out there preaching. Drive, drive, drive, make sure your dog's got the drive. I ain't worried if my dog's got the drive. I know that it's got the drive. I've got a good dog, like it's going to happen. But that said, I think for new people, and if you're listening to this and you're thinking about training a dog, or you just started training a dog and you're hearing people out there or you're seeing young dogs doing 150-yard retrieves, let's say a 12-week-old dog just doing a 100-yard retrieve, like, that's cool. That actually is gonna bite you in the end because you're not like Kevin just said, you're not focused on that foundation. But I also understand, like, there's just so many people out there preaching, you gotta drive, drive, drive, drive, drive, drive. That's old school mentality. And that's probably fine if you're gonna go a force-fetch route as your methodology because you're gonna force it anyways, you're gonna go down that path, and you're gonna use uh negative reinforcement to make sure you're controlling that dog. At least in the way we're training, we're not doing any of that. Our dogs are working not out of avoidance of pressure, they're working out of pursuit of passion. Gets to, not has to. And it's pretty cool to see the dogs work that way. Like there, there's they're a unique, it's a characteristic, a flavor, so to speak, of the dog that you see. They just look unique. But I also understand for the person out there, like I understand that fear because when you're hearing everybody say do this, you're thinking, Oh my goodness, my dog's not going to turn out. Like the guy I talked to the other day, he said that uh his uncle or somebody, family member or something, would have told him, Man, that dog will never hunt. You might as well just go get you a new one, go get that dog to somebody else and get yourself a new dog. And this dog ends up turning out. Why does it end up turning out? Well, that old school mentality probably has cost, there's no telling how many great dogs never became great. And I hate to hear that, but there's a lot of great dogs that could be great. And really every dog has a potential to be great in its own way, and really can probably be great by most standards if it's handled right and it's nurtured right and taken care of. Like nurture is a big part of this entire process. What you do can either pull out potential, or it can either stall potential, or it can basically eradicate potential. And it's really up to the handler. So I like what you said counterintuitive, and where I'm want to wrap around on this concept is that a lot of dog training, at least the way we train, is pretty much gonna be the opposite of what you think you should do. You think you should do lots of retrieves early. Actually, when we first did fifty two plus, like we had zero retrieving until week eighteen. Zero, zero, zero. And everybody's like, What about this retrieving? They're panicking. I should be retrieving. We finally added a little bit of retrieving earlier just to help. It's not for the dog, it's for the person. You can do a little bit of retrieving, do it like this. There is no need to do that technically. You don't, and we didn't you don't have to retrieve if you don't need to. But that's a counterintuitive concept. The other counterintuitive concept is okay, when a problem arises, when things are going wrong, most people attack the problem head on. Typically, that is one of the worst things you can do. Solving the problem by going around the block typically works a lot better because it's an indirect way of doing it. And most of the time, the what you're when you start trying to treat the problem, you're treating a symptom. A symptom is visually what you see. The root cause of that is never, I shouldn't say never, almost never, or almost most of the time, is not what you see the result of. Like, for example, dog breaking. The res the root cause of that is probably gonna come back to place work. It's gonna come back to it could even be hill work. Some of that could just be small tendencies that were overlooked in training. And that's a huge thing that I think if you've never trained a dog before, it's gonna be hard to spot that. I think I do think that's why the the system that we've got here at Cornerstone basically dummy proves that so that you don't have to worry about it.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:20

I mean, we've thought through those things because we've learned them the hard way, as Kevin said we've been well along those lines, and this is what's cool, you know, you you mentioned it in the training, the the back channing of the retrieve. Yeah, right? So one of the guys that I that I've trained with, I mean, he was throwing some out in one of our other friends was kind of encouraging me, stretch out. And I, you know, I told him, I said, look, here's the problem with doing it. Can you get a dog to run out? Yes, you can. Then what? You don't have any tools that you've taught this dog how to handle the retreat. So what if the dog runs out there, snips it, and walks out? Well, you haven't taught them fetch. So they are gonna pick up. You haven't taught them recall with the bumper. So you know, because you've got it, it's not just recall, it's recall with a bumper. Yes. You know, so you don't have any tools to that would be like trying to run a dog on a blind without teaching them casting.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:22

It's gonna be hard.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:23

Yeah, you have to have the tools that are a part of it taught that way you can handle it.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:29

That's I like that you brought that's a much better example than the breaking example that I gave out because the whole concept of that back training and having those tools to train with. A lot of people, the dog's not retrieving. Why's my dog not retrieving, right? And you start throwing more retrieves and you start trying to tease the dog, you get the dog jack sideways. You're not addressing the actual problem, you're just addressing the symptom, and then it creates more problems. And I have seen some really wound up. You know, if I think about fishing, I think of those birds' nests. I've seen some pretty wound up dogs. And picking apart a bird's nest is as aggravating as picking apart a wound-up dog that has been turned upside down. That is aggravating.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:12

You know, trying to do a lot. Yeah, but yeah, that's a great analogy.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:15

It's uh that's about what it feels like. It's about what

Community Over Perfection And Price

SPEAKER_02 1:09:18

it feels like. And we do that on the regular. We hit we help people like I know, like I know like when you think about Cornerstone, and you know, there's a lot of like we have people from time to time will say, I'm just having a hard time getting uh past the price. They're like, look, we understand, and they're like citing uh reasons why, like, hey, there's there's a lot of other options out there, they're cheaper, they're less expensive. Yes, yes, there are. We get it. Like we never want to talk anybody into anything because we we uh really focus on preserving the culture because like what we have here with people, chapters, the community is extremely special. Even if that means like we know our course is what they need. Even if internally like we know we have exactly what you need, like we have the recipe, the prescription for what you're looking for, but if you're a little unsure, like we're not gonna try to convince you of that because we don't want you to come in and have a question in the back of your mind thinking, you know, we no one should ever be talked into doing this. Bottom line. They should come into this because it makes sense for them. I say all that to say a lot of those same people will come back, we they will reach back out, and we've got it in our little CRM there. You'll see two years ago they were looking at this, they were asking questions, and then they reached back out and said, Hey, I'm having these challenges. Do you think it's too late? Do you think we can still help? And 100% we can still help. That that is the whole birdness concept. Like, it's better to not have to unravel all of that, and like I'm confident if you start this to begin with, we can 100% help you avoid that. But if you find yourself in that position, just know there's work ahead of you, but it is 100% possible to work through that, and it just comes down to the right things in the right order. And honestly, I would say beyond anything, it's the people. If you can just like I think the theme of your story here is community. Like, I start thinking, we start thinking about some of the defining moments for you, and honestly, like what's really made a big difference. Yes, the course helped you. You still were running into some challenges though, right? I think without the community aspect, without member weekend, I don't know where things would have ended up because everything we keep talking about, I keep hearing you say uh, you know, Chad and Seth, and then you and uh Marty, other people had taken the time to invest in you. Like Chris. Chris has helped a lot of people. His name, but he's helped a ton of people because he's just that type of guy who wants to do that. Yeah, he and Marty love those two together.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:56

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:56

Great people. Amazing people, champions, champions of the brand.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:00

They just the OGs, yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:01

The OGs, amazing, helpful people. I don't know where you would be or anybody would be without the community. And myself included, where would I be? Like I think back to when when we got started, none of this type of thing existed. There was like subsets of like random communities. It's like the internet where you find this old form on the internet when you search a topic and it's like not on a mainstream form. Like, man, where does this community exist? So you just find this rent. That's what retriever training used to look like, because it was just like random little hubs and subsets. But you know, Barton really helped us when we were getting started, and he was very early on too, but there was other people that helped him and helped us. I think one of his mentors, Mark Carefield, you start thinking about the people that help you. I really believe community and connection with people is probably one of the biggest difference makers for anybody because nobody's gonna do this perfectly. Even if you're even if you're following our plan, you're going to make a mistake. You're going to, it's human nature. You're gonna you're gonna question the plan, you're about this doesn't make sense, or you're about, I've been doing this way too long, and you're gonna skip ahead. And be like, oh man, now I you'll come back. I know why we did that so many times now. But that's gonna happen. And it sometimes you need someone to say, hey, I see what's going on, let me help you. And that's what I love about the community, man. And it's just uh it's cool. I'm talking too much now, just I just get so passionate about that and community and having someone.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:28

We could talk for hours, but I don't think we want a uh Joe Rogan-esque podcast, you know, six hours long. Yeah, we could get six John Ryan show and Joe Rogan.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:37

I don't think we're we're quiet there yet. We're we're kind of we're in our infancy stage on the on the podcast game, but it's um it's been amazing. Well, Kevin, you're gonna be back on more podcasts. We're gonna talk again in the future. Uh we've kind of gone around the block. It's been amazing to recount. You've got 173 retrieves. Is that what you said? 173 retrieves. Second season, you've got a dog that's confident in the blind, you're proud to take hunting with you, you've got the ability to continue from there. You've learned a lot. You're not only that, you're involved in the community. So much good things are happening, man. And it's amazing to see how you're I like I love the word all in, and I think that defines most cornerstone members. You're all in. Like you're just after this

Keep Learning And Final Thoughts

SPEAKER_02 1:14:18

thing. What's some of the final things you'll say as we kind of close out this episode? And again, we'll follow up. I know we got that thousandth retrieve episode. We'll be planted here in a few years. Maybe, maybe sooner than later.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:28

I would love for it to be next year. That would not hurt my feelings at all.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:31

You gotta go on a tour of duty and follow the migration down and just smoke some birds.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:36

Yeah, no kidding. No, uh I'm I'm just looking forward. I mean, each year it's like as you as you learn more, I realize there's a lot more I need to learn.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:49

400%.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:49

You know, and there's a lot more that Mabel needs to learn. And that's what's awesome about this. And the thing is, she wants to learn. I want to learn. We both want to learn because she loves challenges. And, you know, you can see it on her face, you know, like today, you know, we were doing the challenge, you know, through the ropes. You know, you could see how happy she was on that last retrieve at that last bind. When you come out, you know, she's prancing a little more with her bumper, you know, showing it off. But, you know, that's the thing, is just to keep growing in this and keep learning because I still, you know, I've learned a lot, but there's a lot I don't know, and I still try to learn every day.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:24

So yeah. I like that. Yeah, learn every day. That's what it's about, man. And I I think that's a good way to sum it up. And again, I just want to thank you for taking the time to actually come here in person. I enjoyed training with you this morning. Um, and again, it's an honor to have people like you. Like, I'm in awe of like you and and all the members, but I just want to honor you for taking the time to do this because like if it wasn't for you, I don't think chapters would be where they are. They wouldn't have been what they are. You're pioneering that. The leadership that you're exhibiting there is incredible. So thank you for that, and thank you for helping on this podcast, man. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:56

My pleasure, brother.

unknown 1:15:57

All right.