Gundog Nation
A show to bring together gundog enthusiasts, trainers, and handlers with discussion focused on all breeds and styles of gundogs.
Gundog Nation
Gundog Nation #005: Shane Kendrick, James River Retrievers
In this episode of Gun Dog Nation, host Ken Witt and guest Shane Kendrick discuss the preparation needed for hunting season, including tips for training dogs, maintaining their health, and ensuring they are ready for the field. They cover essential first aid for dogs, the importance of nutrition, and the role of hunt tests in training. Shane shares insights on selecting the right dog and breeder, as well as the significance of socialization and training in different environments. The conversation emphasizes the continuous learning process in dog training and the importance of community support.
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All right, welcome to episode five of Gundog Nation. I'm Kenneth Witt, your host. I'm recording. Well, live, for us at least. It probably won't be on for a day or two, but from Fort McAvitt, texas, at my ranch, and I've got the pleasure of having a special guest on tonight from James River Retrievers, somebody I've followed a long time, mr Shane Kendricks.
Speaker 1:Shane and our topic tonight. Before we get started, I'm going to let Shane cut loose and I'm going to stop talking because he's the expert, but I'm going to let Shane talk about. You know, it's an exciting time of year at the ranch. Today, shane, it feels like fall for the first time since last fall. It was in the 90s, high 90s out down here all last week and today it's so nice and I think it's like that pretty much across the state, but anyway. So that being said, it's getting close to hunting season. So our topic tonight is tips from Shane on getting your dog and yourself close to hunting season. Yes, so our topic tonight is tips from shane on getting your dog and yourself ready for hunting season. Shane, take it away and introduce yourself too better than I did.
Speaker 2:First off, man, yeah, thank you so much for having me on. Super excited to be on here and have this conversation with you. Uh, for those that don't know me, my name is shane kendrick and me and my wife sarah uh run jangiver retrievers. Uh, we're based in southwest missouri uh, mostly just breeding uh labradors and training them for uh gundog work, mostly for hunting style uh gundogs uh, but we do uh hunt tests as well, but that's just kind of icing on the cake for us, mostly just trying to build uh fantastic dogs in the field now shane, correct me if I'm wrong.
Speaker 1:are you guys are strictly British lines, correct? Yes, sir, or UK lines?
Speaker 2:Yes, all of our lines are coming from the UK.
Speaker 1:Yes, sir, okay, so I've got some of those too. I've just got my first American dog, so we'll see how it goes.
Speaker 2:As a matter of fact, I think we were talking earlier.
Speaker 1:You told me your UK dog is out of cedar is that right? I've got one out of boho that the 2022 igl champion. I have one from ireland out of copper birch, a male pup. That's, uh, the 2023 irish igl champion, right, and what else? But yeah, I think, and that I've got Maverick, which is an SOK dog. So Maverick's out of Cedar and Stella.
Speaker 2:So those specks you see on my wall behind me there. So that was actually on a hunt that we did with SOK, and Cedar actually picked those birds up for us. So yeah, great dog man.
Speaker 1:I love watching that dog work. It's my second Cedar dog, a Cedar pup, and Barton felt like that that would be a good match for me. He knows kind of what I like, but I really like that dog and maverick. So maverick, he's in one south dakota right now with scott knee neighbor doing pheasants seven days a week and this is brand new. He's turned two days ago, maverick turned two. Okay so, but he's got a motor like a. You know people think he's an American dog.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I've been around a few of those seer pups, man, I think real highly of them. I love seeing them work, um. But yeah, let's go ahead and jump right into it. You know, um, seasons right around the corner, like you said, everyone's temperatures are finally starting to go down. Uh, this is our first week in Missouri. We're kind of waking up to those 60 degree mornings which you know we're looking forward to, the that morning chill, um.
Speaker 2:But when we think about a dog's you know season and kind of how to set them up for success, uh, whether older dog or you know it's their first season. But the main part about success is finding the birds right. Um. So getting out there scouting, uh, definitely doing your due diligence to make sure you're getting that dog on birds especially with a dog that you know maybe it's their first season Definitely want to, you know, not have them in these instances where you're getting out there and getting scouts hunt after hunt after hunt, where they're thinking, you know, it's kind of starting to get boring for them. Of course that's going to happen. Right, it is waterfowl, it is hunting, yeah, so you're going to have those slow days, for sure. But you know some things we do to kind of offset with that. Always have a bumper with us or a doken or whatever you're doing to work with Whenever you have those slow times make sure you're still getting your dogs some work and getting them some retrieves.
Speaker 1:And Shane, you know you and I know why we do that. But if we've got young listeners or new listeners, it's just really getting into this. Tell them why you want your dog to be successful. Yeah, man, why we do that.
Speaker 2:You know, making it black and white, like what we're out there to do, right, we're out there to hunt and, you know, pick up some birds. But also, if your dog's in that kennel or in that dog blind and they're being perfectly steady, perfectly quiet, we've got to reward that. If you just go out there and you hunt a few hours and you don't see any birds, you pack up and leave. What's your dog thinking? What did we just do? You've got to reward that good behavior. You've done all this work to get up to this point in training, so let's not do anything to spoil the dog's attitude towards hunting. Make sure we get those rewards in as early as possible, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I talked about that the other night on the podcast. For years I trained antler dogs. And that's the hardest thing in the world to keep a dog motivated, because when you're hunting antlers you're only finding one, maybe one a day if you're lucky, unless you're in a high fence like I have here. But anyway, same concept.
Speaker 2:Let me ask you on that, then, so if you're out there doing an antler hunt, and maybe it's a bad day you're not finding anything do you typically keep some antlers with you to kind of just drop at some point for them to find?
Speaker 1:I do, and especially like in early season February, march when they're dropping, I try really hard to find fresh sheds as fast as I can, and I don't know if this works. But I take saran wrap, plastic wrap and put over that edge where that scent is and try to hold that. Now, whether that works or not, that's my hillbilly logic, but that's what I do. And then if I've got young pups, I want them to sniff and lick on that fresh antler and get that smell and that taste, because I'm not an antler expert but I don't think that sense stays on for a long period of time. Then it's just basically bone. Yeah, um. So yes, to answer that question, I keep stuff in my pocket because it just they just like you said. I mean you go walk dog three or four hours and they don't get to do anything fun. That's not fun, right, yeah, and it kills their drive yeah, absolutely man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, so know, you got your scout down, you found your purge, you know you're out there, you're ready to, you know, get your season going. The next thing that I really think of as far as being prepared is being prepared for what could happen Right, and that comes with putting together a good first aid kit. Comes with putting together a good first aid kit. There's a lot of things that folks have kind of put together pre-made that are out there. I know Retriever Training Supply, I think, sells one on their site. It's a fantastic first aid kit.
Speaker 2:But some things I like to keep in mind and kind of why I like to keep them. You know, always keep a thermometer in there. You never know if you're going to need to check the temps, see kind of where they're at, if you think they're hyperthermia or anything along those lines. And of course, you know nail trimmer you don't want to get out there and have a dog rip a nail, something. You can go out there and still go ahead and clip them off if that ever does happen. You know you'll get those every once in a while where it's like a partial tear, it's not completely ripped off and you want to go ahead and just clip that off. So good pair of nail trimmers for dogs is always something we like to keep. Um, the next big thing that I like in here is our quick stop. So basically that's just a powder that, if they do rip a nail or anything along those lines, bust open a tail, anything like that.
Speaker 1:You can use that powder to kind of stop the bleeding that's kind of like a natural clot or helps the clotting process, I guess, man, I wish I don't have to write this down, yeah man, this is good stuff.
Speaker 2:Hydrogen peroxide. That's something we always keep in there as well. It can induce vomiting. So if your dog gets into something they shouldn't have, you're able to kind of, you know, like I said, induce that vomiting and get that up as quickly as possible, and then from there just some, you know, gloves, just in case I need gloves for whatever reason. We got some tape we keep the tourniquet as well, just worst case scenario, you know and then just some wrap as well.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I think that's pretty much the gist of what we got going on. Triple antibiotic ointment also, the one, you know great thing is my wife's worked at a vet clinic now for 18 years. So when it comes to the health side of thing, I'm always, you know, going to her with those questions and she's, you know, the one that kind of put this first aid kit together for us. And yeah, yeah, definitely something important you want to have if you're going to be out there chasing birds man, because eventually, if you do it long enough, something's going to happen and you definitely want to be prepared for it.
Speaker 1:You know I need to do that. I now feel guilty because I keep one for humans in my truck. But now you've made me, I'll get on this. You know I've hunted out here in Texas a few times with hog hunting guys and those hogs they'll split a dog's chest open. I mean it's crazy and it's that's with with vest on, uh, and these guys they'll sew their dogs up and everything it's. It's insane right there on the spot. You know, yeah, anyway, you don't need to.
Speaker 2:You know, halfway, be a veterinarian yourself. Yeah, yeah, some of this stuff, yeah, um, but from there, right. So we've got our scout, we found our birds, uh, we got our first aid kit together, we're safe and we're ready to rock. A lot of times whenever I'm speaking with folks that are taking their dog out for its first season and you know, ultimately, are you looking at a dog that you want to hunt test in the future? Are you looking for a great gun dog? Um, so there are some things I take into consideration if we are going towards the hunt test, if you're wanting that, that HRCH title on your dog, or master hunter grand title, that kind of thing. But ultimately, you know, for a dog's first season, the first few things that I really kind of keep in the back of my mind that would equal a successful first season are A that dog's completely steady, ok, and. B we're continuing to have that dog delivered a hand. Uh, that's something that I see can definitely. Those two things can definitely get sloppy in a dog's first season, um, especially once you're starting to, you know, got a bunch of birds in your face and you're starting to, you know, shoot and everything, and maybe you aren't paying attention to that dog and now they're creeping and it turns into a two foot creep, then a five foot creep, then it's, you know, the dog's breaking and it's in the, in the decoys, before the birds are even landing. So, definitely trying to prevent the dog from doing any kind of breaking, keeping them steady throughout the season and then also, like I said, you know, if you're doing any kind of hole conditioning or force fetch program, you can see that hold kind of get sloppy over the season as well. So, keeping that standard high and making sure they're delivering that bird to hand, whether crippled or whether, you know, stone cold, killed bird, you know, whatever.
Speaker 2:Um, as far as you know, keeping the dog steady, what I like to tell folks a lot of times is that first season don't really expect to shoot a whole lot of birds. Um, I always take my gun with me just in case we got crippled birds we need to clean up that kind of thing. But all my focus is on my young dog and keeping them steady. Um, I will typically I mean even with my very, very steady dogs that we have you know that are, you know, younger dogs I typically always keep a lead on them. Um, this style of lead is kind of like a slip style lead that retriever supply sells as well.
Speaker 2:Um, and it does have a quick release on the leash. So what I'll do, whether you're in an A-frame or whether you're in a layout, whatever it is those layouts, you know, have the zipper on the side if you got like your goose flag working or anything like that. But I'll actually just throw this lead right through that layout. So I've got a hold of it as well. If my dog is breaking or trying to break or anything along those lines, I've got a good hold on them and we're able to continue to be safe and make sure there's no accidents happening. But also with that quick release, you know the second, they're steady, the birds are on the ground. Hey guys, we're sending the dog. Go ahead and hit that clip and then send your pup out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I have those same leads and you're right, they're perfect for that. Let me ask you and this might be jumping ahead, but I'll forget if I don't ask you so do you see, after a full season of hunting with your dog and you're also going to go to test with that dog do you have to clean up some bad habits that were developed during hunting season?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you know it really depends on kind of what your expectations are during hunting season. So we just sent three different dogs home that we trained for clients as started dogs. So they all got their started hunter retriever title with us and they went home with the expectation that they are coming back after season to start running that next level of test, which would be season for us Because we mostly primarily do the HRC style tests here. So with that, you know these dogs are starting to handle. They've been doing lining drills and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:But whenever I talk to my clients you know I'm really telling them hey, don't anticipate on running any blinds in hunting season, you're not going to have time to correct generally and you know, basically you're trying to pick up birds quick before that next volley comes in and you need to get reset. So again, whenever I'm talking about success for a dog's first season, I really focus on the steadiness because that's, you know, something that can be really hard to train out of a dog once they've been successful breaking and picking up those birds. So we harp on the steadiness and we harp on, you know, continue to reinforce that good hold, make sure they aren't getting too mouthy. Dropping the bird, that kind of thing Cause again we can get in a hurry. Right, we got more birds coming in, we got to rebrush blinds, we've got to move decoys. Whatever you got going on. There can be so much going on. It can be a little chaotic in these hunting situations.
Speaker 1:Uh, so just you know, keeping your standards high on your basic obedience stuff like steadiness and continuing to have a good hold. Okay, so that's season number one with your hunting dog. Yeah, basically. Yep, that's interesting, cause I guess there's so much going on in a real hunting scenario that you're not going to have going on in a hunt test. Correct that, it's okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. And, like I said, kind of back to the main question there, if you are trying to run blinds a lot with a young dog, that's really where we see some issues start to develop that we need to clean up whenever that dog comes back from their first season.
Speaker 1:What do you see, do what? What do you see that they?
Speaker 2:develop.
Speaker 2:So, like, just you know handling, once they start casting the dog might take it and then you know, smell something over here and they're able to kind of do that scallop that they can do whenever you're giving them that over, they're going to start going back and just not taking that cast all the way through, like what we like to see.
Speaker 2:Like I said, in a hunting situation I'm not really focused on running blinds with with the majority of my dogs, even my more advanced dogs, just because you can kind of start to develop some of those bad habits. Now I will tell folks, you know, if you're hunting a snow goose and you got that wing, you know, hanging up and your dog's locked on it, go ahead and send them. You know the dog's going to go ahead and pick up that bird with not much struggle. Also, you know, look for situations too, like we talked earlier, once it does start to slow back down maybe you had a great morning and then it's slowing down in the, you know, afternoon time. You got a few birds with you Go ahead and set you up a little memory drill that you can run or start thinking about different casting drills you could do Utilizing the pond that you are hunting on that way whenever that dog comes back for its second, third, fourth season.
Speaker 1:It's already pretty proficient, pretty confident, running in those areas and doing those same types of skills and I assume you try to hunt in a lot of different locations that first season as many as possible.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and we try and train too. So local to us where we hunt some of our more private ponds, we're able to train on them before season as well. So you know, once we start getting this close to season we're definitely staying away trying to let the birds get back in there and everything and get settled. But yeah, as much off-season work you can do with your pup getting them in that area, just getting them used to the scents and smells and everything else that's out there is definitely beneficial.
Speaker 1:Shane, do you switch up your food intake? Do you change your nutrition for season, like I had a? You know Scott Neenah, the guy I had on the first episode. You know he hunts seven days a week at a preserve and then so do you have to, do you? Do you just keep them pretty much on the same feed regimen?
Speaker 2:We pretty much keep them on the same feed year round, and that reason being is because we're training year round. If we're not training, we're hunting. If we're not hunting, we're training and we're preparing for hunt tests.
Speaker 1:And I guess that's different than someone who's just a hunter, who owns a hunting dog or two and they've probably been hanging around the house all season. Now they're getting ready to go out and work their dogs pretty hard for the next little bit.
Speaker 2:But ultimately, man, I just look at the dog. To be honest with you and what I tell folks all the time when they ask me how much should I be feeding my dog, look at the back of the food of whatever bag you're getting and that's just your starting point. Okay, but look at your dog. You know if they've got that nice tummy tuck, if you're able to see, you know, good muscle definition, your dog's in shape. You should be able to see some ribs. You know whenever they're breathing in heavy, especially when they're drinking water, you should see some ribs. That's good. Definitely want to see that muscle tone. Once you start seeing like a spine or pelvis or something like that. Okay, your dog's a little underweight. You need to kind of up that food. But, like I said, the starting point is always kind of what the back of that dog food bag says and then just read your dog from there and just kind of keep an eye on them and see where they're at.
Speaker 1:Do you mind me asking what you feed?
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, so we feed Voyager. They're a company up in the Michigan area. They've got a Pollock based food, so a little bit more of a fish food that we've loved. Man, we've had dogs on all different types of food coming through the kennel and the Voyager food has just been the most consistent we've seen throughout our kennel. The Black Labs, you know, their coats really shine having that fish oil that's in the food and really everyone's done super successful on it. Um, there was a time, kind of whenever we first started training, that part of the deal was we'd have folks bring in whatever dog food they wanted to feed for the time their dog would be here and it was a good kind of um, you know, scientific study to see all those different types of foods and how those dogs reacted to it.
Speaker 2:Um, and without a doubt, the most consistent has been the Voyager. For us, so that's what we like to use.
Speaker 1:Do a lot of those customers? Once they go back, do they switch their dogs on Voyager? Yep, absolutely Interesting. I've never tried it. I'm on Yucca and Uber right now, but it's so far, so good.
Speaker 2:And if it ain't broke, don't fix it. That's right, you know and I hear this.
Speaker 1:I'm still in a saying I've heard a hundred times. You know, feed the dog in front of you, just like you were saying. Right, you look at your dog and my dog looks healthy, his coat's healthy, his skin looks good yeah.
Speaker 2:And you'll hear like a new food come on the market every once in a while and everyone an issue with the last few. Well, no, I just wanted to try this like you're having an issue, just stick with it. If your dog's being successful, looking good, running good, uh, stick with it, you know yeah, it's a and I just switched that.
Speaker 1:I should. Maybe I should put this on podcast, but yeah, I'm gonna put it on here anyway. I don't care. I've been on victor for 12 years. Yeah, I have referred numerous people, lots and lots of people to use victor and I caught them. Like you know, I use a lot of dog food. I go through a lot of dog food. I've got a bunch of dogs and you guys have discounts for, you know, trainers, hunters, anything like that. Nope, no kind of discount whatsoever. I called you can Uber, just like that, right, rep. I emailed him. Rep calls me discount. Yeah, so anyway that's.
Speaker 2:That's why I get that man. You know I'm big on working with people that want to work with us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean I was like, come on, I spread Gerald's word, you know, like the gospel, and and uh, and I've got lots and lots of friends that use it because I said, hey, just try it. It's not the most expensive food, but for your money it was a decent food, but anyway I shouldn't. Hopefully I can get an advertisement out of that, but anyway. So, shane, how did you get started? What got you into doing this? This is also your living right. You don't have a day job. This is your day job.
Speaker 2:No, I do have a day job as well.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's right, you did Nine to five that I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is definitely a passion project that me and my wife love doing, and it's definitely something that we do together, um, but you know how I got started? I've always waterfowl hunted my entire life, okay, uh, we've had dogs growing up, um, it's you know, looking back on it to. You know, some of those early labs we had kind of wish we could have back now and with the level of training that we understand now, because at that point it was just kind of hold on to your dog and send it, and if it didn't see the mark the first time, you're throwing rocks to get its attention and send it a second time, you know? Um, so mostly this is what most folks would call a meat dog. It's kind of what we grew up with. Um, we'd love to have some of those dogs back and kind of see what we could get them.
Speaker 1:Uh, nowadays, you know no one's really with that, knowing what you know now exactly yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:Um, but really, you know, uh, whenever sarah and I got married, uh started waterfowl hunting and every been waterfowl hunting. But she kind of would see me go waterfowl hunting and kept telling me I need a dog and uh, I just always knew how much time it would take and just was not interested at at that time. Um, fast forward to a few months later, you know. She kept putting pressure on me to get a dog, get a dog, and found this litter that was local to us and went ahead and picked up a pup and it's. It's been basically downhill from there. Um got got the the. You know, uh, whatever you want to call it, got the, got the bite from it and uh just just kept rolling with it. Uh, so the.
Speaker 2:Really the first dog that we trained to a higher level of standard would have been Oak Um, he was a chocolate American lab and just did fantastic his first season um and rolled right into the hunt hunt test world. Uh, it's kind of funny, you know you, you learn every time you go to one of these hunt tests. Uh, you might learn what not to do, but you can also learn what to do as well. Um just always learning going these things and, uh, the first test we ever went to. So we were at the starter level, which is kind of the lower level of the hrc world. Um, basically, you know, that's just the level that we're just trying to get people introduced into the sport and kind of hooked on the sport.
Speaker 2:Um, so, throwing marks for him, he had picked up, uh, waterfowl at that point. But whenever you go to most of these tests they're all running farm ducks and, for whatever reason, that sense different and you'll see dogs sometimes blink, those birds, you know, even though they picked up ducks several times before that. Um, so that's what he did. He ran out on this probably 60, 65 yard mark and it was a little bit of a challenging mark with some of the factors that were going on. Um ran right to it, jumped up in the air and then took off the other direction.
Speaker 2:And I looked back at the judges like what the heck was going on and they're like, is there a snake out there? Like what happened? Well, come find out. He just, you know that scent was different, uh, the duck was different and it just kind of threw him for a loop. Um, so I was humbled right away in that world, which I think ultimately is a good thing, right, because it kind of builds that fire in you like, ok, I know you can do this, we just need to figure it out together. So definitely grew quite a bit as a handler and a trainer at that point and, you know, ran him on the other mark and he actually did fine on that mark. Ran him the next day and we got our first pass and you know, been addicted basically ever since then.
Speaker 1:Now see, I can relate to that. That's like me going and trying to buy a store-bought tomato after I've eaten tomatoes out of the garden. And they have no taste and no smell. So I figured it's the same thing. You know, those farm-raised ducks don't have the, the flavor or whatever. But no, it's yeah. But I didn't know that was a thing until you just told me that I never thought about.
Speaker 2:And depending on what clubs you go to, they kind of dispatch those birds differently. Um, this specific club would actually gas the birds, which is common. A lot of different clubs do do that to dispatch them, and I think that left quite a bit of a scent on the duck as well and that was something I threw them for a loop.
Speaker 1:Yeah, never thought I didn't know they. I didn't realize that.
Speaker 2:I mean, I've been, I've been to clubs and I've been a few trials now yeah, what I always tell folks too because, uh, I mean, now I'm a started judge in hrc working to get to the next level of season, hopefully this next uh, upcoming spring, uh. But you know, if it's your first time at a hunt test, you know, know, don't be shy. You know there'll be a handler's meeting where the judges call everyone up and explain, uh, the mechanics of the test, explain gun safety, because HRC does use a real gun. Um, but yeah, once that handler's meeting over, ask that judge hey, I've got a first time dog with me. I'm a first time handler. Can I take one of these birds with me and just go? Let my dog sniff it? Let them hold it for a minute, and, man, every judge should tell you.
Speaker 1:Yes, man, you give me some good advice, thank you. I just started doing this and I've actually went to the judge's course to HRC and AKC, but I'm not eligible yet because I have to try at the different levels. But right, yeah, that's. I'm glad you told me that. Yeah, so I'll have to do that, my next hunt test absolutely man yeah now.
Speaker 1:So you, you having a full time job, you've got your kennel and you're running dogs. You, you have no free time, I guess. So how? How many times a year are you running dogs to test?
Speaker 2:tests? Uh, we typically do three to four in the spring and three and four in the fall, yeah, and there's always that break in the middle when it's kind of getting too hot, you know, um, definitely not running dogs, you know, in July or anything like that. But yeah, we do. We do about six to eight every year. That's quite a bit. What about field trials? Nope, don't do. Don't do the field trials. And I really don't deal with the AKC tests as much. We do have a club that I belong to that's local, the Southwest Missouri Retrievers Club. We are a dual club, so we will do an AKC test in the spring and then an HRC test in the fall. So I always love going and helping out, since I'm a club member, always volunteering my time to help out with those tests, and I always figure if I'm there I might as well be running a dog. So I'll typically run AKC at that event. But mostly we're just doing the HRC style tests.
Speaker 1:Yeah, at that event, uh, but mostly we're just doing the hrc style tests, yeah, okay, yeah, I belong to alamo tree club out of san antonio and they're both. They do both, but I don't think many do that, do they?
Speaker 2:most clubs are one or the other. Yeah, yeah yeah, um are you a native of southwest missouri, so originally uh, born and raised in central california, uh, just outside of Modesto, we moved to Missouri. Entire family, man, aunts, uncles, grandparents everyone packed up and caravaned out to southwest Missouri and we've been out here since 2004. So I think, just officially, I've been out in Missouri longer than I was in California, so I officially call myself a Missourian now.
Speaker 1:That's a huge change. It is man. Well, I went from southeast kentucky, right in the heart of appalachia, to, uh, you know where I actually lived, like almost see the middle fork river from my house, yeah, and see a creek from my house. But uh, now I'm in west texas, or awesome, in midland there's no water, you know, except for the pecos river, I guess, which is about as wide as my car door, right, yeah, anyway, yeah, that's interesting. So, um, that part of missouri I've never really hunted missouri. What, what all do you have native there?
Speaker 2:yeah, so mostly yeah, mostly we're chasing canada. Um, we're kind of where I'm at specifically, we're kind of in the middle of two different flyways. Uh, we can go a few hours to our east or west and, you know, be flooded with birds, but you know, sometimes that's not in the agenda to be able to drive that far away or in the schedule. So you know, if we're just hunting local, we're mostly getting greater candidates, which that's a question we get a lot as well as hey, do you have doors to pick up canadas? It's like, man, they have to pick up these birds because that's primarily what we're shooting. If we get some mallards in, if we get some gadwall or some ducks in, that's a great day.
Speaker 1:Um, but mostly we're chasing greater canadas around local, yeah, now are you hunting a lot of public land up there, or is it mostly private, mostly private?
Speaker 2:yep, um, I've got some buddies here locally that had to. If they've got a good scout on some public land we'll definitely go out there and give it a try, but mostly doing private ponds that are local to us with those greater canadas. And then we do travel out to the Wichita Kansas area quite a bit and hunt with my good buddy out there, wade Skeen. So he owns Skeen Gun Dogs and Outdoors and, uh, we actually have our annual james river retrievers hunt with him every year and get clients out there to see what you know numbers of birds that they have in kansas because you know, some folks don't don't get to see that very often and it's it's wild to see the amount of birds they have out there?
Speaker 1:what do they have out there? I've never hunted kansas either.
Speaker 2:Everything absolutely everything. Yeah, um, we've, you know, shot widgeon, we've shot pinto, we've shot mallards, gadwalls, greater canadas, lesser canadas, snows I mean just about everything, yeah.
Speaker 1:Do you ever get to upland hunt at all?
Speaker 2:No, unfortunately not. It's something I'm trying to dip my toes into a little bit. Growing up in California there really wasn't a big deer population, so that wasn't anything that we really got into. As far as deer hunting, the ducks were great and the pheasants were fantastic. So we did do a lot of pheasant hunting growing up, but moving out to Missouri mostly just focused on ducks out here where I'm at. But we did recently actually purchase a Cocker Spaniel, an English Field Trial Cocker Spaniel, from Raglan Gundogs out there in Illinois and she's a fantastic pup man. She's ready to rock. So I definitely want to start getting a little bit more into the upland side of the world and get her on some pheasants, because she's just a fun dog to watch work.
Speaker 1:You know you and I talked a little bit about that. I'm interested too in Cocker Spaniels. Actually, thanks to you, I reached out to Raglan and they're going to do a podcast with me Awesome. But, man, I got on their website, which I had followed them anyway. I told you that I'd already followed them but really didn't dig into their stuff. But they have some really top-bred dogs at Cocker's.
Speaker 2:Yeah, jay's fantastic, and I don't know too much of his backstory, but from what I have heard, man, he's a super, super interesting guy. His facility, though, is one of the best facilities I've been to as far as cleanliness and having everything just set up for the dogs, and, yeah, I was really impressed with his entire setup.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, I haven't hunted yet with cockers and I do uplands more of my thing. I'm actually to be honest with you, I'm not a very experienced waterfowl guy. I thing I'm actually to be honest with you, I'm not a very experienced waterfowl guy. I'm going to change that. But uh, but I really like upland and it's, it's. You can walk and talk and you don't sit still and freeze to death and absolutely. But uh, from what I've been told and probably you know I've talked gun, gun, dog guys all over the country uh, that those cockers are just a ball of fire.
Speaker 1:You know, oh my, gosh so what tell me about yours, cause I'm really interested.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she's, she's a blast man. Um, so I've definitely got her on like HRC style setups as well. And it's funny Cause I'll get out with some of my Labrador friends and we'll have a setup, you know, getting ready to train, and we'll run some labs and all of a sudden I'll kick Pearl off. That's our little cocker spaniels name, and they're like man, is that your house dog? Like? Who are you bringing out here to run these marks?
Speaker 2:and I'm like you just wait, we'll talk after this. And she dang near out marks, you know, a good portion of those labradors, so she's driving. Uh, she loves cover, you know, she blows through cover like crazy, and just a lot of fun to work. Um, you know, around the time I kind of got interested in a Cocker Spaniel. I actually had a local club to me that would put on the field trials for Cocker Spaniels and so I reached out to one of the club members. I'm like, hey, what can I do to come out and volunteer and just kind of learn, kind of watch these dogs work? And they're like, absolutely, man, come on down. So basically what they do is they'll have, you know, a handler and a dog on either side and they both have their lanes that they're quartering in to flush up these birds and they have three different gunners and they got two guys behind the handlers that carry a backpack and that's where they put all the pheasants after they're dispatched. So I got to be one of those guys with the backpack that just walked behind and got to observe everything and, you know, get those birds in the bag. Um, holy cow man, it was so much fun watching those dogs work, watching them flush the pheasants. And it was equally fun watching the gunners too, man, because there's some of those birds would flush.
Speaker 2:I'm like man, I wouldn't have a prayer to hit that bird because they kind of have to time it just right. Also, you don't want to just shoot the bird right away and have it land right in front of the dog. I mean, you're not really letting the dog show off its you know talent, skill and what it's been working on at that point. Um, so they have to let the bird kind of get out a little ways before they, you know, go ahead and shoot.
Speaker 2:Uh, but man, I don't think there was a single bird missed that day and they were just smacking them. And it was fun because you know those cockers are pretty dang short dogs, yeah, and this cover was knee high to waist high at some points and it's like you know, this dog's not marking that bird at this point, it's out of its sight. So I imagine it kind of just sees the projectile of the fall, runs that way until it hits the scent cone. And those dogs were, you know, blown through cover. I mean 60 yard marks on some of these birds, if not longer, and just very, very impressive dog work for sure yeah, it's, and I've watched a couple videos of them.
Speaker 1:Uh, flush, or getting birds in england in real high grass and you just like they don't know how they. They look so small. You want to carry a big right, a big bird, but uh yeah, I'm very interested, that's.
Speaker 2:You know the size of them.
Speaker 1:Basically, yeah, it looks bigger than Uh. But now, since you're a trainer, are you using the same methods for the for the spaniel that you would your your labs?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a good question. So I have up to this point. Um, there are a few different drills I've done to kind of, uh, teach that quartering. So basically we'll just put place boards out, you know, start them off pretty close and just start teaching that quartering back and forth, back and forth. Um, I've not gotten to the point where we have, like they have different style of launchers, where in the HRC world we don't mostly use wingers, which is just basically like a big slingshot.
Speaker 1:Um, they have like these box style launchers.
Speaker 2:That just throws up the bird for upland style training. Um'm actually going to get a few of those this weekend, so hopefully we can start progressing to that point. And yeah, and I'm super excited to hear the podcast that you're going to have with Jay from Ridelent and please pick his brain on some of that training, because I need, I need more info on that. Yeah, and I'm clueless.
Speaker 1:This will be completely a clean slate for me to talk to him. But you know one of the things that I and to talk to him. But you know one of the things that I and I learned a lot from Scott the neighbor, my pheasant guy that's got my dogs. First question I asked him. So you know, scott, these dogs are you're not, they quarter and flush and he says he doesn't teach that and what he told me and I said I actually listened to the podcast a couple of times because he says so much in there.
Speaker 1:That's useful, but that's useful. But anyway, what he was saying, shane, is when these, the dogs, the labs, learn that when they flush that bird they get a retrieve because it gets shot. So the coring, he says he doesn't teach coring, he doesn't teach flushing, that they just do it and he takes out he starts yeah, he said it's pure natural ability.
Speaker 1:all he teaches is a retrieve. And if you watch these dogs shane like they're so like uh, I mean it's just like a soldier's trained Shane, like they're. They're so like uh, I mean it's just like a soldiers trained to March. I mean they're just all working, you know, in these areas and these cornfields, and then we will hunt cornfields, and then we'll hunt Milo and sorghum, high, high native grasses, you know, and they, they still do the same motions, right, but it's neat.
Speaker 1:So I wonder if you had the, if you had the place to, to, to do that, your dogs would probably do it, naturally. But you really can't do that there because you don't have. You can't sit and flush wild birds, Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Okay, I would say you know all the basic obedience, all that was exactly the same as we do with the Labradors Whole conditioning, all that was the same.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, are they? You know you and I are kind of British Lab guys and there's all kinds of debate. But you know our dogs are pretty much our labs are bred to just deliver and most of the time they'll deliver to hand. It's just what they're bred for and have a soft mouth. But do you see that in the spaniel, so far with at least with yours, I mean, was it natural retrieving like you see in your labs? In comparison, how would you compare the two?
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that's a great question. Man, super drivey, definitely natural ability going out and doing those retrieves. And you know the good hold. That's something that we do at a pretty early age. There's a lot you can do to kind of develop that good hold. That's something that we do at a pretty early age. There's a lot you can do to kind of develop that good hold. Of course you want to be natural, um, and you'll kind of see that come out when the dog's a little bit older. You know six to eight months, uh, eight month range. Whenever you start kind of working that whole conditioning or whatever your force fetch program is, and they got their adult teeth in, you're going to start seeing them. If they're going to be a mouthy dog or not, you'll probably see it at that point. Um never had any issues with her on wanting to mouth the bird, um, and yeah, just super natural retrieve drive for sure. I would almost put her up there more similar to like american style labrador when it comes to that drive really, yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm excited. Maybe I'll get to see you work that dog one day. I tell you what you should do once you go with me south dakota. Yeah, uh, go up there, man. It's, it's wild birds, and I'd love to man, yeah, october 19th is opening day and I usually we get to do opening.
Speaker 2:We always go up opening day and hunt three days right, but yeah but, yeah, you know um, a lot of things, like I was saying a second ago, that you can do to kind of help build that hold uh, from a young stage.
Speaker 1:Elaborate on that for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one thing that we're really big on, especially with your younger dogs and we're talking, like you know you just picked this puppy up, maybe it's eight weeks old, 10 weeks old, 12 weeks old, in that range some things that you can kind of do to help build that good hold. First off, you know we only do retrieves at that age mostly in our hallway. Uh, we have kind of a longer hallway in our home and that dog's got two options Go pick up that bird and then come right back to me. There is really no other option they can do. Uh, but whenever we talk about, you know, trying to build that holdup, a lot of folks will take that bumper away right away. And now the dog is like, okay, they're starting to be conditioned to. As soon as I bring it back to you, I just need to spit that bird out. So what we'll do quite a bit is I usually try and scratch on their chest, because when you do that they'll want to lift their head up slightly and that's the delivery we want, right, whenever that dog swings in the hill, we want that dog looking up at us so we can take the bird away from them.
Speaker 2:But yeah, just let them have that thing for a few seconds, scratch on them a little bit.
Speaker 2:It uh get them used to your hand, kind of going towards their face and not taking the bumper away the other thing I'm really big on also once you do take that away, even at that age, go ahead and hand it back to them. They're probably going to reach out for it and that's going to help you quite a bit. Once you start getting to that whole conditioning process or your force fetch process, you want them reaching for that bumper and they're already going to be kind of preconditioned to do that, and I'll do that with bumper retrieves in the hallway. But, man, I'll do the same thing in my front yard. If they go pick up a pine cone, I'll call them to me, I'll scratch on their chest, I'll let them have it for a minute, I'll take it from them and then I'll try and give it back to them and see if they start reaching for it and the. I love that and you know, I actually wish I'd just written down what you said but I can always replay this.
Speaker 1:I do that with my pups, but I didn't not for the reason you just said. I didn't know any better. I was actually doing it because I do protection dog work. You know, I'm Miles Rottweiler's and now I've got Doberman's and we do that, we do a whole. When they buy the sleeve or they buy whatever they buy, if it's a we're training on a bite pillow, right, we want a full grip, that's very important. But we, once they get like, say, the sleeve, and the sleeve comes off, we want them hold, we pet them. We hold her chin up and we pet them. And that's the same concept, it's the same conditioning. But you really helped me. I'm now. I need to be more cognizant of doing that, like you just said, with my puppies yeah, with my young dog.
Speaker 2:I'm always looking for opportunities to train outside of the training session, if that makes sense. Um so typically with a young dog, your training session might be five minutes or 10 minutes. Right, they're going to have a lower attention span. You're not going to have them for, you know, 35 minutes to train with um 5-10 minutes at most, and then they see a butterfly and they're gone. Um so, even whenever we're doing our afternoon or evening walks with the dog, I typically always have a treat bag with me. Um, the second that dog kind of is wanders away from me if I can, can make a noise to get its attention. It's going to probably run towards me because it knows I've already got the treats, it knows it's going to get a reward. And the second, that dog makes any kind of effort towards me. Here I'm giving the command because I'm pretty confident at that point that the dog's going to already take out the command because it's already, you know, made two or three steps towards me.
Speaker 1:Yes so, yes so, and it's kind of like, uh, I went to that in a Popo school actually Missouri, and uh, which is you know, it's general obedience but it's a lot of protection, dog stuff, but anyway, you know they, they taught there. Maybe keep a clicker with you all the time. When you see a dog doing something like, say, you can see it lay down but you never taught it down, you click and give it a treat and start shaping that behavior just, and not even a training session, just like you're doing. So you're shaping behavior that you catch. Absolutely I like that. Yes, now when you walk I need to know this because it's at the ranch sometimes I walk with all of, but it's kind of chaotic. I'm getting where I just work one pup at a time when I walk like that. Yeah, so do you? How do you do yours? Do you walk them all?
Speaker 2:yeah, we just split up males and females and we walk them all yeah, and how many might that be at a time? Uh. So I mean, whenever we're we we don't like have a, you know, 30 to 40 that's right.
Speaker 1:You're not, or?
Speaker 2:anything along those lines.
Speaker 1:We typically only have about 10 to 12 at once, um, so it's usually split right down the middle, usually have five or six males and five or six females and you do that all together, even if they're like, say, 10 weeks, 12 weeks or these are kind of a little bit older pups yeah, yeah, no, I mean they're all together?
Speaker 2:yeah, absolutely at any age. Um, we don't have any aggressive dogs in our kennel. Um, you know kind of the big few um red flags that I see if a client dog's coming in. You know, if there's any kind of aggression, whether it's food aggression, dog aggression, anything like that we we don't have anything to do with with dogs like that. Gotta be quiet as well. Can't see any dogs, it's noisy and gotta keep clean kennels too. Yeah, that's all things that we build in our dogs and that's what we expect of our client dogs as well.
Speaker 1:I like that. Yeah, you know I own aggressive dogs, you know, because that's what they're bred for. But I own labs and I've never had an aggressive lab. I guess I've been lucky. I've heard of people having them, but I've never had it. Yeah, and like even my male Maverick, he's just happy. Go lucky Maverick, he's just happy-go-lucky, he loves every dog If another dog growls at him. He's like.
Speaker 2:Some of our adult dogs if the puppies are coming up to them, trying to mess with them they just walk off.
Speaker 1:There's no any kind of issues or any aggression.
Speaker 2:I love that.
Speaker 1:Do you? I assume you sell pups too, correct, correct? How often? How many litters do you? I assume you sell pups too, correct, correct? Yep, how often? What's your? How often do you? How many litters do you usually have a year, if you?
Speaker 2:don't mind, typically two to three. Okay, nothing crazy. Yeah, we typically only have two to three litters.
Speaker 1:Where do you try to and maybe that's none of my business, but where do you try to get your dogs from, or what do you try to find? What do you look for when you're maybe that's a better question what do you look for when you're trying to find a breeder dog?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Um. So I mean genetics and and and your health, right. So making sure that eyes, hips and elbows are all done and that's all cleared, um, and also making sure those genetics are done is definitely the starting point. Um, you know, you can have a dog with a fantastic pedigree and if it does has bad hips, elbows, bad eyes, I mean we're, we're out the door that we're not interested.
Speaker 2:Um, so, definitely, starting with those uh, health, uh concerns and making sure that those are you know what we need them to be, and then looking at that pedigree also. Um, you know we're able to research a lot of these dogs nowadays and able to go online and kind of, you know, see what's going on with these dogs, what they look, how they run, seeing if we can speak to people that either you know have seen that dog run personally or maybe they got a pup off them and see, you know, just because a stud runs fantastic in the field trials, they might not throw themselves in the pups. You know, also kind of follow up with folks that have pups from that stud and if and if we can see those dogs run, uh, basically just doing our due diligence to make sure that it's the type of dog that we're looking for.
Speaker 1:You know that's so crazy. You can have a world champion stud dog and he will not throw himself Absolutely. But you know, and I'm a believer, um, and everybody's got their own beliefs I, I believe the female maybe even is. I really think the female is more important in the in the bloodline myself I look and I know, and it's hard to find that, because a lot of times the females aren't titled because they're busy breeding, right, and they don't have the hunt title. So and it's kind of unfair. It might be a really good dog, but you don't know that she doesn't have a title, right. But so that's when you really have to do your homework yep, yep, and you made a good point too.
Speaker 2:The female is super important. Um, you know the puppy is going to be with that female for the first five weeks of its life.
Speaker 1:Um, and if you have any kind of behavioral issues from that female, that's something that you might see in those puppies as well in the future. Yes, yeah, yeah, no, I believe that. Um, do you, uh, do you? One lab I've never owned is a Fox Red. Do you see those much Are they getting to be more and more popular? You know, 20 years ago you didn't hardly see a red, so tell me why it's in the States. Okay, yes, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I mean, it's definitely just the yellow lab. The Fox Red is kind of just a marketing term for it. You know, most the only labs you'll see come from our kennel are going to be black and yellow, because those are the lines that the uk has brought up and produced. There are some chocolate dogs over there, um, they're just not quite at the level that we see the black and yellow labs at yet, uh, so that's why we don't have those in our kennel right now. But, yeah, fox red, uh, you know that yellow labrador you'll typically see kind of like in three different colors. There's that dark yellow or the fox red, kind of a run-of-the-mill normal yellow, and there's almost that like white color. Yeah, super, super light. Um, so just some different shades of yellow, that, uh, that you can kind of see those dogs come in.
Speaker 2:Um, I've had a few different, uh, dark yellow females in the kennel. Um, we currently have a bitch named kiwi. Uh, that she's, you know, dark yellow. She comes out of a field trial champion named drum goose warlord. Um, really, really nice dog, one of the nicest bitches that we've had here in the kennel. Um, and yeah, and, and honestly, you know if, if I'm looking at my front pasture whenever I see those dogs all running around, the dogs that camouflage best to me is typically that dark yellow dog.
Speaker 2:Um, so, yeah, now have you bred her yet? Yeah, so she just had her first litter. Uh bred her to a field trial champion that barton ramsey recently imported. Uh, called names ozzy and actually just sent the last pup home today. Uh, so she's on a plane right now going to dallas, texas. Uh, but very happy with how those pups all turned out so far. Um, you know it's not uncommon for us to have a 10 pup litter and you know, one of those pups might be a little shy. I've got to bring them in the house kind of work on some socializing, that kind of thing. Didn't have any of these pups have any kind of issues like that Super bold, and there's 10 pups in that litter.
Speaker 1:Super bold, super confident and just happy dogs man videos do. What is it the first?
Speaker 2:breeding with her. It was her first breeding she had 10 pups first time?
Speaker 1:yes, sir, wow, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you, but that threw that. That really threw me off, okay you're good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, and you know it took her a minute to kind of figure out the whole being a mama dog thing uh, but when she got the hang of it we were, we were good to go. Uh, so really happy with how those pups turned out and how happy uh kiwi did with that litter, um, but yeah, like I said, pups were all super bold, super confident and just happy to work. Man, anytime we were doing some click or treat work with them on you know, place boards or whatever it is, that tail didn't stop, you know, just wagging the entire time, happy to be be there when you get a like, say, for instance, you get a field trial winter from overseas.
Speaker 1:Have you ever took any of them to a UKC test or anything? Just just trying Like a?
Speaker 2:dog that we've imported. Yeah, so we actually haven't even imported dogs from overseas. We mostly just import straws from overseas, from studs that we've seen and, like I said, heard from folks that you know I've seen that dog run personally. And then we're at a time now where you know there's so many british labs in the state that generally I can find an offspring to that dog somewhere and go watch him run. Um, that being said, I've definitely been around other kennels that have imported field trial champions from overseas and come and run them at a test. And yeah, man, you know they don't do as much water work as we do over here, but they're, they love the water too. So yeah, they do fantastic at the hunt tests.
Speaker 1:That's interesting. You know, I just got two pups imported this summer and they had to. It was really cutting it close because you know, the CDC changed the rules August 1st. Yeah, so now you know six months or older, and in some countries I think it's older than that, but the non-ravy countries I think is six months and older, so I got that's. When I got my copper birch pup, then I got a boho pup uh, female and uh, how old are they now? About 12, 14 weeks.
Speaker 2:Okay, 14, 15 weeks.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's funny they were born pretty close together. You know one's from Ireland, one's from England, but they're really similar but really happy. Yeah, I really like both of them and yeah.
Speaker 2:So when you've got two pups at that age, are you generally trying to keep them pretty?
Speaker 1:separate. Yes, I wouldn't even let them be in the kennel beside each other, gotcha, and uh, uh, you know, I just learned that from somebody probably like you years ago. Uh, to you know, I want that pup's world to be me. Yes, and that's, you know. If not, you know, you know what that, what that causes, and um, and it's so far, so good.
Speaker 1:I don't even I never train them together, I never let them play together, actually much until until later on, and then I'll let them all play together, but right now I just won't. I feed them out of my hand, you know. And uh, everything we do is just me and them directly. And then, like right now, I'm getting ready to take, I take them on ATV, one at a time, on the ranch and my side-by-side, just let them bond with me on my lap and get used to that and get used to the motor and the noise and, you know, just socializing them. But I always do it one at a time. When I didn't know any better, I'd put the whole batch in the back, you know. And then you know, that's just chaos.
Speaker 2:So and they can definitely, like you're saying, you know, start to build that pack mentality and maybe all of a sudden they're not as interested in what you got going on. Yeah, we had something similar. My current dog that I have is a HRCH dog named Taco, and we got him at the same time as my wife got her yellow lab named Fox, and same thing. We kept them separate the whole time and now they're at a point I mean I think they're what five years old now. So we train them together all the time. Now we hunt them together all the time. Uh, but that first year really, we pretty much kept them separate all the time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because you know, as you know all too well, you're going to be hunting them and test on, you know, unleashed with other dogs around, so you know they've got to be socialized. But there's just kind of a fine line and but yeah, I, I learned that a long time ago. Oddly enough, you know, I've never done a lot of high end advanced retriever training, but I've trained in full with dogs my whole life and I'm 56 years old, so, but I've learned a lot. I've been to many, many seminars, schools, read countless books and I'm always learning from people like you. I mean, it's what I love about this podcast is every guest I've had on. I've learned stuff from you. Today I learned something from everybody that's on here.
Speaker 2:And you touched on something right there that I want to mention too. Yes, always learning, that's right Never know it all.
Speaker 2:And I'll tell people that I'm not a know-it-all, I'll never be a know-it-all and I I don't want that mindset. Yeah, even though I'm from my early on mentors. Uh, local buddy of mine named gil wilson, uh, one of the first things he ever said to me whenever I came out there and started working with him, he's like shane. He's like there's three levels of trainers, right. There's the first stage where you're a sponge everything you see you just want to soak up okay. Then there's that second stage where you think you're a know-it-all, you think you've got everything figured out and, uh, you know you, maybe you've got a hrch into your belt or you know you've got a couple different things going on and you think you've got it figured out. Then there's that third stage where you realize you really didn't know anything and you go back to always trying to learn he goes, shane, he goes. You get to that third stage as quickly as possible.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, and you know it's one of the things that always comes to mind. When I was young, especially in eastern kentucky, you know, I grew up riding three wheelers and dirt bikes. I had a race in three wheeler that was just, you know, absolutely a rocket. Dangerous. You know, and I learned the hard way that when you get real cocky and think you're just really, really good at something, you'll bust your tail.
Speaker 1:And it happens, and then I started mountain biking and uh, and I decided I was going to get real mountain bikes. Some guys are really good back home. And uh, got pretty fancy, got real good. Come off a hill flying real heavy and flip broke my collarbone. I was like okay that's a good way to realize you're not so good, you know, and so.
Speaker 1:I've tried to use that same mentality for dog training. Yeah, and you know, and I'll call people I've talked to a guy that's half my age. I was stumped on a dog the other day, uh, trying to do a backwards heel. It was Josh Parvin. I called Josh and I was like you know, man, josh, I've taught heel a million times and I'm trying to get my doberman to go backwards with me. He said what are you doing? And I told him well, it's common sense, a stupid mistake. I was using the collar to slip lead, just like you have for RTS. So when I was backing up, I was putting pressure on his neck. Well then he's like oh, what's the pressure for? He's not gonna. So I was like, okay, wow, and then I fixed it. But that just shows you as much as I know, or thought I knew, I call a 20 some year old kid that correct me just like that.
Speaker 1:You know so I.
Speaker 2:It's humbling dogs are humbling. Yeah, and it's, you know, super. Um. I think important too to do group style training for a number of reasons. Um having your dog be around those other dogs Sometimes it's not always as important as the marks that your dog have picked up, but sometimes it's just as important for the dogs that your dog or for the marks that your dog watched other dogs picked up you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Yes, you learn to mark better. I think yes.
Speaker 2:Well, not just that, but learning to honor also, kind of learning that not every bird that hits the ground is their bird to go pick up. But one thing that I don't feel like a lot of people talk about having someone else watch you too. I can't tell you. There's so many times that you know the way I get a cast and someone will stop me and be like, hey, man, you know you're doing this and I bet you.
Speaker 2:From that dog's perspective that's a little bit confusing. Try it like this, and then I'll, you know, adapt that into my training process. And now, all of a sudden we're moving a lot better. And same thing vice versa. If I'm watching my buddy and he's trying to line up his dog and you know he thinks the dog's lined up, but really the dog's kind of turned sideways and then he takes an inappropriate line. It's like, hey, hey, back this up. This is what I saw. And you know, having your buddies out there to communicate with you that are on the same page to have a similar goal can definitely be beneficial you know that's that just happened to me.
Speaker 1:If I go to the outlaw retriever club, like I told you, and I'm training those other guys there and they have, in a very nice way, correcting me on stuff that I need to correct it on, you know, and and I've learned so much from them and watching them train and then you know they're giving me feedback. And one of them was, like you know, I'd stop my dog with a whistle and was going to cast him and, like I told you, I'm not really advanced retriever guy yet I will be, but I was casting too fast, like I didn't give him time to turn around, you know. So they were like just stop, you know. And they told me how to do it. And so as soon as I did that, my dog was like just you know, he knew he'd already been trained. So but anyway, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:Like you said, always growing, always trying to learn from other folks. Check that ego at the door. You know you're there to try and learn and improve. And that's something that you kind of touched on a while back in the conversation. Going to that HRC judges meeting Right Just to be a fly on that wall as a young handler and just listen to those folks and all the knowledge that's in that room is super beneficial.
Speaker 1:Well, I didn't know that much about the test, so I went to AKC first, then to UKC and I mean it was like and I've got my books right here from it, but I learned so much about the test itself that I didn't Right, and how those judges are looking at the test and the kind of factors that they're actually judging on, and you know, yeah, yeah, and the class was full of judges. You know, most of them were current judges.
Speaker 2:Yeah, usually they have to go to do those classes. I think it's like every other year that they have to do it. So they're all active judges that are, you know, still participating in the sport.
Speaker 1:And yeah, the knowledge there is huge. You know, I went there, shane, with the idea that I wanted to judge and I left there with the idea went no, I don't either. It's like man, because you know I've got a lot to learn before I get to that point.
Speaker 2:So, but it was worth it just to know how the trial process works and what for those folks that might be interested into getting into the sport, um, reach out to your local club whenever they're putting on a test, go volunteer. Uh, just like what I said I did with the cocker spaniels kind of just getting into that field trial world for the cocker spaniels man. They need all kinds of volunteers at those hunt tests. Um, especially if you're just starting out at that lower level of started, we always have a gunner for those dogs at that level, someone that's up there actually shooting the blanks out of that 12 gauge volunteer to do that. You know you're going to see 30 something dogs run that day on land and water. You're going to learn something from every one of those dogs. Might be what to do, might be what not to do, but you're going to learn like crazy.
Speaker 1:You know, chris rub was on here a couple weeks ago. He said the same thing and he does that. You know this guy, chris, is as successful in the hunt test world as anybody right, and he still does that. Yeah, so to learn, but just like you said, so I need to do that too. Uh, yeah, I enjoy it. I think it gives it, gives you and your dog and just more ways to bond. Something to do in the off season.
Speaker 2:Right Keeps me motivated, you know all the way back to the beginning of the conversation again, whenever we talk about the dog you know being healthy and being successful first season or the 12th season, it doesn't matter. Having that dog in shape is going to set them up for success first and foremost's. The way to get in shape is to stay in shape right, and so having something like those hunt tests in the off season is definitely a good goal to have, just to kind of keep your dog working you know, on my first podcast with scott, he uh, you know he's the guy that runs a dog 105 days a year.
Speaker 1:You know he's, he's, he's had dogs, he's hunted up to 14 years old. I mean it just blows me away. But he, he treats he the nutrition, he uses, the conditioning, he, he rotates the dogs. You know he's not running them to death every day. He's rotating dogs in and my dogs up there in a rotation and I was like, can you imagine him? You see, you know these show line labs at eight years old and they can't hardly walk, right, so it so at least it makes me feel like we're doing a very humane thing. You know we're, we're hunting these dogs. Yeah, we're working them and we're working them like a tool. But but guys that really care, like you and I and most people in this, in this, you know sport take care of their animals and keep them in better shape than than most you know sport. Take care of their animals and keep them in better shape than than most.
Speaker 1:you know, right, yeah, absolutely, and I'm sure you do. I've seen your dogs on. I followed you on Instagram for quite a long time and you got beautiful dogs on there and I mean you can tell when people have take care of their stuff, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, super important. Um, like I said, you know, the worst thing you can do is get that dog out on its first hunt and it'd be overweight or whatever and blow an acl or something and uh, just for the longevity of that dog man, to keep them in shape for sure now is your, if you don't mind me asking, is your dog food?
Speaker 1:is you using a 30 protein, 20 fat or? Yeah, okay, you're right, year round yes, but you're training year round too. Training year round? Yep, absolutely, because I I've got maverick, my two-year-old.
Speaker 2:I had him on that 30 you can move in and he actually got started getting big now I will say I do cut them back a little bit on their food in the off season, um. So I think during season most of my dogs are probably getting four cups to four and a half cups a day, uh. So we do cut that back, probably to uh two and a half to three cups a day, okay, but yeah, we keep them on the same food.
Speaker 1:Same food.
Speaker 2:You're just changing the intake. Yeah, okay, and you know we're just watching the dog. So if your dog looks a little overweight, then cut the food back. Yeah, we're not going off of any kind of specific diagram or anything, it's just looking at your dog.
Speaker 1:You know that's me fed dogs, since I could walk and I've never measured anything. I can tell how much I use the same size cup. I use this like a Dickie's barbecue cup or something you know, but I can tell, I know what, I know when to back down, I know when to pick it up and I just write dogs.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Interesting. Okay, well, let's see. Tell everybody how to find you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man. So I've got our website JamesRiverRetrieverscom. You can check us out on social media, of course Instagram at James River Retrievers and on Facebook and you know Shane Kendrick on Instagram and Facebook as well Phone numbers plastered all over the website and on the Instagram page. I tell folks all the time you know. Sometimes they're like, hey, sorry to bother you. Instagram page I tell folks all the time you know. Sometimes they're like, hey, sorry to bother you. Just had a quick question Now. I'm always happy to talk to gun dogs. Generally it's better than whatever I'm currently doing. So anyone wants to reach out and talk to gun dogs, don't hesitate.
Speaker 1:Well, shane, it was a pleasure having you on here. Thanks for taking the time. I know you're crazy busy with your, your kindling, your real job and and so hopefully we'll get to meet in person here pretty soon. Maybe some of these hunt tests?
Speaker 1:yes, sir, I appreciate you having me on well, thank you, hey, uh, this is another episode of gun dog nation. We've had a great time. Uh, this is a must listen for anybody getting ready for hunting season. But, uh, we will be uh back here in another week or so with a new episode. But anyway, shane, thank you, we will be keeping in touch. Thank you, sir, take care. Yes, sir.