Quote:
Originally Posted by Pineedles
Does anyone have any advice or experience with training 3 or 5 year old yellow labs for hunting retrieval services? I have recently taken up hunting, (long time ago used to be upland game hunter), and wonder if either one of these worthless balls of fur  could possibly earn their keep with either duck retrieval or pheasant flushing with proper training. |
Now I am going to leave field train techniques and ideas to those above.... But some thoughts on working with older dogs. They get set in their ways... If they already to a lot of fetch and retrieval you are probably in good shape, however if they don't you need to work on the basic game of fetching extensively.... I never believe that dogs get to old to learn new tricks, just like the say goes. However they can just be a bit more stubborn. Also if these dogs have been used mainly as family pets, I suggest talking with the rest of the family, Mainly Mrs. Pineedles before starting this endeavor.... I was yelled at and reprimanded when by Mrs. LIforrelaxin when I hinted that I might get some realistic looking waterfowl retrieval training dummies for our new pup... I don't plan to use him to hunt but it is in the nature of the bread (springer spaniel) and I was going to foster it..... I decided I pushed my luck enough by getting the dog...