(EP:30) Bird Dog Etiquette & Hunting With Friends Dogs That Are Not Trained To The Same Level.

Have you ever had a buddy that brings his dog hunting and it just ruins the hunt? Have you ever wished later you had not invited him because his dog is annoying? In this podcast we talk about some ideas on how to avoid this and some things you could try before you get together with your buddy hunting in the field. Hope this saves some hunting buddies relationships! Haha! Enjoy everyone!

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Transcript

Tyce: 0:35

Hey everyone. Welcome to the bird dog podcast. My name is Tycericson. I am the host of this show and thanks for tuning in. Hope everyone had an awesome Thanksgiving. Hopefully you all ate tons of pie and food and Spent some good time with family and friends. That's what it's all about and Maybe got out and got those bird dogs out and did a little hunting with them and had a good time with Them if you're new to the show Just a little background on me. I've been training gun dogs professionally for the last 18 years I've had dogs ever since I was I've had dogs my whole life But had my first dog when I was about 12 years old and trained it and trained other dogs. And one thing led to another and been doing this full time. We have a small team of four trainers that work for me and with me and to try to produce some of the best dogs that we filler possible for mostly hunting. I've also done, we do obedience training too, for people that just don't hunt, but want good obedience training. We do that. And also we run hunt tests title dogs all the way through the AKC up all through the master level, junior, senior master, and also through the American pointing lab association, the APLA run dogs all the way from certified advanced master to grandmaster pointer retriever level. Cause I bred still breed pointing labs. We usually have one or two litters a year, so not a ton of those, but those are really fun to, And train and have and then we also breed golden retrievers filled bred golden retrievers. So just a some information for you if you're interested on instagram, you can follow us at utah bird dog training. We also own filled bred golden retrievers Check that out. My wife rachel. She manages that and does a pretty good job Sharing and posting things about our golden retrievers and upcoming litters So if you're looking for a really good hunting golden, you can check that one out My lab website is Utah pointing labs. If you're interested in getting a good retriever and, we obviously we're breeding these dogs to, to point and but we, I'm also a huge water fowler and so we want our dogs to be very versatile. So when you see a pointing lab, they are purebred. They've just had this genetic gene to point that they found, Lost 30, 40 years and have bred those back, to each other and tried to develop the point and bring it out stronger and also maintain and keep the characteristics of a good retriever. So when you see these dogs, out hunting waterfowl with them, they look like a lab, they're an American lab, they look like a lab, they're going to retrieve like a lab, they're going to run hunt tests. And if you want to do field trials or do your waterfowl stuff. Just like a traditional Labrador. Anyways, just a little bit of plug about me and a little bit about our background. If you're looking also for a really good dog caught, check out Corunda dog beds. Those are what we use in our kennels and our indoor facility here. Those cots are, I wouldn't say they're, Indestructible. I don't think anything is indestructible, but they're the best caught that I've seen on the market. If you follow our link in the show notes, follow that to the website. It gives us a little kickback, helps us out. So if you're looking for a dog bed and you need to buy one, we'd appreciate it if you go through that. Also, if you're looking for a gunner kennel gunner kennels, gunners makes a great dog kennel. If you. Reach out to us. We can help you out with one of those and get you a discount on one of those. So anyhow, just a little information there just wanted to talk about with you guys and share with you. Also you can reach out to us at the bird dog podcast at gmail. com. If you want to send us. Um, message that you with on an email to talk about a certain topic, or you can also DM us at the bird dog podcast on Instagram, or also Utah bird dog training and send us a DM and we'll try to go over those questions and get them answered for you guys and share with you. As we talk about these topics, this, these topics of dog training or whatever it may be, That we're addressing these, the knowledge that we're sharing with you is from doing this every day for years and years. My passion behind all this is having an amazing dog for hunting hunt test. It feels really good. We got to title our dogs and run our dogs in these hunt tests and get titles. So when people buy them, they can look at the pedigrees and see the different titles. So it feels good when your dog does a good job and your dog can, compete at that level. But my love and passion and goal is for my dogs and client dogs are produced the best hunting dog possible. So they go hunting that dog performs extremely well for them. And also part of that is training clients how to handle their dog and how to become a good handler of a dog that we have trained for them. Just yeah, the hunts are going. It's been fun. It's been a great year so far. I've had some really good waterfowl hunts. I haven't made it out to the Dakotas, but all the reports from my clients are the Dakotas are crushing it, that the pheasant numbers are up. I think upland bird numbers in general are up, but all I see is. Picture after picture of clients with tailgates full of rooster pheasants coming out from the Midwest. So If you're wanting to go get some pheasant hunting done this year, it seems like it's about as good as it's been in a long time. I had one client say it's as good as it's been in 10 years. That's good news. I love hearing that bird numbers are up and people are getting after it and having some fun. I think that's awesome. I wanted to, in this podcast I wanted to just talk about a subject that That someone DM me Jared on Instagram, DM me, and I'll just read it with you guys basically said, Hey, I love the podcast. He said, I was wondering if you could cover dog owner etiquette. My boy, Oscar is my first hunting dog and I don't know what to do. And others, other hunters want to bring their dog or I get invited on hunts. Should I bring mine? Also, if I find myself on a hunt with Oscar and another. Hunter's dog that is not as trained. What can I do to not ruin a hunt and possibly a friendship? Any suggestions would be appreciated. I'll be listening. So this is a fun topic. It's a great topic. It's one that can be a little tricky. And what I think it comes down to ultimately I think it, it comes down to, communication. Most things in life come down to communication, right? You think you just need to over overly communicate what your expectation is and and hopefully, you can be on the same page through clear communication, being respectful of one another. Let's talk through some scenarios though. Ideally, and I've talked to this with clients, if we have a dog that's been trained and has gone through our program and this dog is very well trained and you have a really nice dog and then your buddy brings his dog that isn't trained as well, that can be extremely frustrating. And the areas it gets frustrating, I would say is You know, let's say your dog is taught to sit there and sit at your side or sit in a place on the boat or sit on a hunting stand and stay steady. Let's talk about waterfowl. Let's talk about in the realm of retrievers right now. And it's supposed to stay steady and in that and your other buddy's dog is running around the place, running all over the place. And cause it's not trained and he's yelling at it and the birds are trying to come in and your dog sitting there calmly and his dog's coming over and bugging your dog and It's just not very fun. And what you don't want to have to do is tell your buddy, Hey dude, get your dog under control. Or don't bring your dog. Cause then your buddy can, could get offended from you, you communicate him that way. It can be a tricky subject because it's like someone's it's a dog is it's not a human, but it's an, it's almost like second in command from children, right? So a lot of people don't want to be told how they should, raise their kids or how they should communicate to their kids or how they should discipline their kids. So there is some tack there. So let's talk about options. you could just talk to your friend and say, Hey, Again, part of communication. I got my dog fully trained. I'm trying to work through some things with him, or I want to have him to have some just good experience. And, it seems like when your dog is here, it's just throwing him off a little bit. So if he's your good hunting partner and you want to be hunting with him, then I would suggest maybe if it's not working out with the two dogs together, I would suggest probably. Taking turns, right? So either say, Hey, this hunt, let's say you're going out for a morning hunt, this hunt, let's run your dog. And you just, if you like your buddy and you want to continue to hunt with them, but and he's, let's say one, he's not open to suggestions of. Of how to handle his dog. And hopefully through him knowing you, he knows that you maybe know more than him about dogs. Then hopefully he'll be open to that and say, Hey. And you can even say, Hey, can we hunt my dog today? And the next hunt, we hunt your dog and I'm happy to help you or coach you with your dog, or, or when you're not hunting. That's something, just coming to thought here, something you could do is train with him. So a lot of things that I, a lot of problems that I see when people are hunting dogs in the field is they don't train for the hunts. So this is a suggestion you could do is actually take your dog with your buddy's dog. And again, Both parties need to be invested in this, right? But say, Hey, I want us to have a really successful experience in the field. I want our dogs to be both be steady. I don't want them breaking. So before we just go out and hunt them and quote unquote, see how it goes, why don't we train our dogs together and. Worst case scenario work on some honoring. So take a bumper or a duck and throw and shoot, do some calling, try to set it up like the hunt and have your buddy's dog go and get the bird and then have your dog go get the bird and say, look, maybe he. Didn't really know what you were talking about, but if you show them and you say, Hey, see if we train like this, if we work the dogs like this, when we go in the field, we're going to do the same thing. And just, I would get on the same page outside the field instead of just bring your dogs together and then and then, you're getting frustrated cause your dog, buddy's dog sucks or doesn't listen or whatever, it may be, and And and go from there. So I would say just communicate. And I would say probably number one, I'd probably train outside of hunting together. Your dogs, one, they're familiar with each other. They're not going to be fighting each other. They know each other, the dogs, and you can work on honoring the retrieves and working as a team, as hunting partners, you and your buddy to have a good experience in the field. If you guys don't have time to work together, And you know your buddy's dog is not trained to the same level as yours, then the second thing I would suggest is just work the dogs separate. Just take turns. Maybe if you're hunting for a full day, you pull one dog out and hunt one dog in the morning and you hunt one in the evening. Or you hunt one for an hour or two and then you hunt the other one for an hour or two. But just communicate with your buddy. Say, Hey. I like you, our friendship and our relationship is more important than our dogs. I think if you establish that and say, but we both want to hunt our dogs, but they're both trained at different levels, maybe we have different expectations. And so let's, I still want to hunt with you. And so I'm, and so you're willing to, deal with maybe his unruly dog, his or her unruly dog, whatever it may be. So those are some, a couple of suggestions I can think of. The third one I would say is. Is obviously you just don't hunt that buddy, you just don't call him up and you hunt just with your dog or you hunt with, you really, it definitely makes it easier to hunt with dogs trained to the similar level that the other, that your other buddy's dog is trained to. So again, cause you're just not dealing with all those different variations, but I'd say, worst case scenario, a good duck dog should have good obedience. That's going to be key. The very least is a dog that's going to sit there and not be running around the brush. It can be controlled, isn't flaring birds. So if your buddy's dog is not doing that, it's going to, it can just be hard to hunt with that. Cause obviously birds catch movement. They're going to see that. And they're going to be flaring and you're not going to have a good hunt. You're going to be frustrated. Your buddy, you're going to be frustrated. His dog. So it almost be safer. If you enjoy that relationship and you're going to be frustrated to not hunt with him, just to not invite him and just take your dog out, have a good experience, and then maybe help your buddy get up to par with his dog and training. And again, I would suggest train outside of hunting together, work your dogs together, make sure they're in, they're cohesive and you're working and doing, okay, this is how we want to hunt. We're going to be hunting out of ground blinds. We're going to be hunting out of the boat and really take those dogs out pre hunting and get them ready for the hunts. And then when you go hunting, you're going to have less issues. So I've talked about this in few future or past podcasts that you just need to. You just need to train for the hunts and most problems happen. People don't train for the hunts. They go out in the field and it's too big of a jump. And that's where the dog, you start getting breakdowns with the animal and you start getting. maybe with your buddy and going from there. So something you definitely want to work on if you have multiple dogs is honoring. There's been times where I've taken my employees, I've taken friends that have all dogs, all these dogs are trained to similar levels, and we've hunted as many of as six labs or retrievers at a time. And, It's been just super clean. It's been fun. We were hunting on a river system and all the dogs are basically at heel behind blinds and and we shoot a bird down and we say, all right, whose turn is it? And okay, it's your turn. And the guy down on the right, we shoot a single down. He sends his dog out, goes and picks it up. All right. It's the next guy in line. All right. Whose turn is it? It's your next one. Bird comes in, boom, shoots it down. You send the dog out, goes and gets it. If there's a double that goes down or at least two dogs at a time to go and get them or we may even release three dogs. And it's just fun to have this clean, these dogs that are trained similar levels or same levels and just, it's all clean and everything's fun. And it's not like you're just, everyone's yelling at their dogs and having a rough go. It's just this nice. It's just good teamwork. It's really, it's just fun and really rewarding to see all that. I can understand how it is hard when you've, when you hunt with people that aren't at that, their dog is not at the same level. All right. So I think that's it. Trying to think if there's anything else off the top of my head that I'm missing. You guys have any other thoughts or ideas, please shoot me an email or a DM and I'll try to address those. But I'd probably say number again, number one train outside of actual hunting with your buddy and his dogs or to take turns with the dogs or three. Just don't hunt with each other if it's not, if it's going to hurt your relationship with your friend. Okay, let's talk about and this kind of, it overlaps into the retriever world. But let's talk about upland hunting with buddies. This is something that can also be frustrating. And most of these things come down to training or control of the animal. Let's say you and your buddy both have labs and you guys are going to, you're going pheasant hunting or to a pheasant farm and you've put out these birds that you've paid a bunch of money for and your buddy pulls the dog out and the dog takes off and it's 200 yards in front of everyone and it's flushing all the birds and all the birds are flying away that you paid 30 a bird for and no one gets any shots and. Your buddy's yelling and screaming, you're screaming at the dog, and you're also mad at your buddy because he brought his dog that is out of control, and it just doesn't make fun experience. So again, know what have realistic expectations. If you know your buddy's dog, is that way, then if, and the dog doesn't, then you can't really be mad if you invited your friend and you said, Hey, yeah, go ahead and bring your dog. It comes down to who invites you to, if your buddy invites you and he's paying for the birds and he has his dog if he's paying for him and his dog flushes them all away and you don't get any shots, that's it's not, you're not at anything out of pocket, besides maybe, shooting at the birds and And it is what it is right now. If you're paying for the birds, you got some skin in the game. So I think you have the option to say, Hey man, you got to get your dog in here. Or beforehand say, we got to make sure we keep these dogs in close and that we have control on them. And again, it just comes down to that communicating what your desires are and hopefully your buddy communicates his desires. And on how you think the hunt's going to go down. And then also hopefully you're close enough to your friend. You know how well the dog is trained. If you know the dog is just a pain, it flushes the birds. It's not even worth going. And he invites you, Hey, do you want to go pheasant hunting? Then just tell him no, or tell him I can't make it that day. Whatever you feel like you need to again, because that human relationship, if you enjoy that person is more important than, hunting with them with a dog and maybe losing that relationship over that. One thing a good bird dog should do, and this is frustrating because I used to guide quite a bit at some of the pheasant preserve nearby here is I went out with a guy that was guiding and my dog, we shoot a bird down. My dog goes and gets it and it's coming back with the retrieve and his short hair comes in just bam, just nails my dog and stills the bird out of his mouth. To me, that is not acceptable. Most of the time, if you know what you're doing, you can give the dog a little quick correction. If the dog goes in, if you have an E collar on the dog, which you should, if your dog has this issue, there has to be some form of correction. But you correct the dog right in the moment. Tell him, leave it. No here. And you utilize that obedience and call him away from the other dog or correct him when they go to try to steal a bird from another dog. The dog that has a bird in its mouth should not have another dog ever rip a bird. From its mouth. And two, if that dog holds on my dog, because it's, it had done so much honoring, it just gave the bird to the dog. It's Whoa, what's this? Okay. You can just have it. Where that dog is obviously created that habit and the owner let the dog get away with that. So that is not, that's not okay in my book. It needs to be addressed. It can be awkward if this guy didn't really know him real well and just say, Hey, you need to correct your dog for that. That's a problem, but just try to do it in a kind way and a cordial way. And if the dog keeps doing it, you can say, Hey, do you know, I'm going to let you finish up guiding here and I'm going to head back, to the lodge or whatever. And then just make a note in your book. I don't want to, I don't want to ever guide with that guy unless he's going to correct that in his dogs. And if you're put together to guide with him, then you can address that and say, Hey this happened last time. If you worked with your dog on it, is the dog doing better? And if the guy's Hey man, I'm really trying to correct this, I'm doing it. And he's, being humble about it, then yeah, maybe give him another try. Becomes a pain again, or. He's struggling on it. Do all you can to help him out with his dog and then move forward from there. But I would say the biggest issues you're probably going to have when it comes to hunting upland game with another person and dog issues is going to be dog, just again, out of control. It's pretty much an issue with your waterfowl too, but just a dog that you're sticking, that's sticking in close enough. That's not bumping or flushing birds. That's going to be your issue. If it's a pointing dog, obviously flushing them out of there too far, or a pointing or a flushing dog if it's flushing them out of there too far. So just keep them in close, keep them under control. Again, just be aware of what your buddy's dog is and those expectations. And again, I would probably come down to training outside of the hunting realm or working the dogs separate of one another, just letting his dog work that day and your dog work that day. And you just try to deal with what's going on or you just. Hunt separate from them, but your buddy's not going to have fun if your dog, if his dog's out of control and they can sense when you're frustrated with them, to roll with the punches, be patient and and work together, but Again, remember number one, the human relationship is most important. So if you're trying to protect that and your buddy's dog isn't making progress, he's not willing to let you help him or that he's not willing to send it off to training and he's not willing to put in the own time, his own time to train his dog and get it to the level you both you want, or the dog should have to have a good experience. Then it might be worth, Not hunting together, you just, yeah, you go watch a ball game together or whatever other hobbies you have, or you hunt big game together, but you don't hunt your bird dogs together because you both just can't get on the same page when it comes to your dogs or again, you take turns. So I know I've repeated the same thing a bunch of times, but it's what I can really the best way I can really think of how I, how to address the situation. So it's funny. People are very people are very opinionated when it comes to dogs. People are very passionate about their dogs and everyone loves their dog and everyone thinks their dog's the best. Even we have people that bring their dogs to us for training and their dog really needs a lot of work. Oh, he's a really good dog. I, but that's true. He could have a good personality. And that's, and we hope they all are good dogs. but through training you can have a great dog and just have an enjoyable experience with your dog in the field. That was a great topic. Thanks so much for sending that one in. If you guys, I know, I don't know everything. But those are just some. Thoughts I've had in regards to this subject Jared appreciate that, yeah, writing us in again, if there's any thoughts or ideas you guys want to send over to us we're happy to look at those and if we think they are valid, we'll go ahead and. Talk about those two. So anyways, have fun out there, everyone. This is, that's going to be it for this podcast. Not going to be a crazy long podcast. We'll try to keep these rolling. Thanks for listening and stay safe. And we're down to in a lot of these areas, only about a month left, month and a half to maybe two months, depending on some of the upland hunting areas left. So get out, get after it enjoy it and we'll see you in the next show.