The Glencuan Way

The Glencuan Way – to train a Pointer.
If you accept that there is a perfect way to do something then any involvement with less than the perfect way is flawed. In this way the training of a pointer in Northern Ireland is fundamentally flawed for the perfect conditions to train a Pointer do not exist here, for me at any rate. It is all very well for a dog to spend periods of time in the perfect place, in my case Yorkshire, but no matter how welcome these sojourns are they do not compensate for a lifetime spent in among grouse. If people are supposed to learn from their mistakes then I should be a genius for I have probably made every conceivable mistake that can be imagined in connection with dogs. What I have developed is a system that works for me. When I say it works for me it works in my surroundings, it isn’t so much the way I would like to do it, it is the way I have to do it.

My strategy can be broken into two main parts, the dog, and what to do with the dog. Perhaps if I lived in England or Scotland I would be a great dog trainer but living here in Northern Ireland I feel very average. It is for this reason that I prefer to breed my own pups. If I take a pup as a stud fee I try to get my hands on it as soon as is feasible but ideally I breed them.

When it comes to a dog like Basso that I just couldn’t get before he was eleven months old because of the constraints of the Pets Passport scheme I have nearly written the dog off as untrainable before he arrives. It looks like he will be OK but I try not to expect too much from such an animal so as not to be disappointed.

Not only do I breed my own pups I now breed from within my own line. With the sixth generation now in the kennel I feel that I am ahead of the game when it comes to what the pup will do next. It is an art form more than a science but I have an idea as to what I can expect at any stage, or maybe even more importantly what I can’t expect, or shouldn’t expect, just now at any rate.

Pointers have been with us for over a hundred years and obviously as with all pedigree animals I can trace the lineage of my dogs back to the founders of the breed. It is obviously of little other than academic interest that I could trace a dog of mine back to Bang (Cohams) but if we look at the last forty years and a good dog starts to appear twenty or thirty times then it may be of some importance. Although I really couldn’t tell you the technical difference between line breeding and in breeding, close breeding doesn’t worry me…..yet. I remember two points from Snakefoot the making of a Champion by Bob Wehele. He maintained that close breeding does not in itself create abnormalities or bad traits. He reckoned that for progeny to be defective then one of the parents had to be carrying that defective gene. His comment, “Lexington Jake appears in Snakefoot’s pedigree 426 times and if as I intend to I breed him to his sister……” ( I will have to check this quote) is also something worth remembering.

When I bought Echednei Hendi, flying by the seat of my pants as usual, I was going on the say so of her owner that there were great dogs in her pedigree. I now know he was if anything understating their quality. The point is I am working with good stock. Any would be Pointer owner would be well advised to read a lot about pointers, attend events and ask a lot of questions about pointers and save. Save every penny they can and buy the very best they can afford. You really can’t make a silk purse out of a pigs ear.

“What to do with the dog”
For me this is where it starts. In fact twelve hours before this, just as the pups are born. I am handling and talking to my pups from the minute they are born, literally. By the time they open their eyes they will know the sound of my voice, my smell, and as they grow they will learn that they have nothing to fear from me. From the time they can walk they are taken for frequent car rides, more than once a day, and given a bit of a run about. Not only does this make them happy to be in the car, coupled with the hand fed tripe ration only good thing come from me. My current three are now three months old and they will happily walk with me and come to me and I can even get them to sit for an instant or two on a verbal command. So much of my system revolves round spending time with the pups getting to know them and them to know me but eventually training has to start in ernest.

Dogs can’t read plans but trainers can and although there has to be an element of flexibility when working with animals you must have some idea of a plan if you are to succeed. The whole idea of breeding my own dogs is to have them early, I try to have the basics instilled by twenty weeks, twenty six weeks at the very latest. Pups seem most receptive to training in these first few months and I have found that puppies learn things very quickly even though you would expect an older dog to have more sense and understanding. I have also found that lessons taught successfully in these early months are easily revised in later years if the dog seems to regress.

There are actually a whole lot of things that you can’t teach your pointer. You can’t teach it to point, you can encourage it to point, and give it the opportunity to point but you can’t teach it to point. What you can teach it to do is obey the drop. My whole regime is based on willing compliance to the drop command. The drop is the safety net that enables you to expose your charge to so many situations and as it is such a pivotal command I start it early. I have developed a way of teaching the drop and the credit must go to Derry Argue’s book and the Jagerhund video. I will eventually give you an idea of how I teach the drop but it is more important that it is scheduled for early lessons than considerations as to which method to use.

Click here for the Glencuan “Drop” method.

Now that you have a dog that will drop don’t for one minute think that the job is done. In true Churchillian style ” It isn’t the end”. You can also expect the wheels to fall off from time to time. Usually you will find that if you analyse what has been going on you will probably have skimped on something, quite possibly because you thought you had that lesson fully taught. On other occasions these regressions come completely out of the blue. The dog may even do something it has never done before. Usually timed to catch you out completely and make you look a prat. Expect these set backs and don’t worry about having to go over old ground.

You can now use the drop to put the “Turn ” into your dog. Always run your youngsters into the wind and no matter how desperate you are to make progress if the conditions aren’t right wait for another time. In competition you will set your dog up to go across the wind depending on which side you are drawn. In this case just let the dog off. Before the dog can quarter its ground the dog has to be keen and able to run. You choose ground that is easy running and has good footing and just let it go. You walk along talking to the dog and hopefully it will skip along and find its legs. You can practice The Drop a few times but until you feel the dog is happy running you don’t place any pressure on the dog as far as turning is concerned.

Next you introduce the turn whistle. I use dot,dot,dot,dash. Morse V. Just to suggest the turn to the pup I use a kind lead and walk about setting up situations where the pup is at the end of the lead’s reach. I jerk, not horse, the lead gently, peep the whistle and walk in the opposite direction. The pup is about two stone I am sixteen. It has no option but to follow.
I now let the dog loose and let it run about. I am trying to estimate when it will turn of its own accord. When I think it is about to turn I blow the turn, call the dog in a friendly voice and walk away from it across the wind. Usually it will follow. Once again considerations like a likely response apply. A pup chasing a butterfly probably won’t turn. Wait a while. The point will come when the pup won’t turn and there won’t be any obvious excuses. You then drop the pup. Attract its attention and call it to you, getting down on one knee and opening your arms. The recall on the whistle is a number of peeps but is only given after the pup has turned, and once the pup is coming to me I stop whistling unless it wavers in its approach, in which case I give it a few more peeps. Hopefully the pup will hit you about the middle of your chest. As you continue to work at this the distance at which you can expect compliance will increase but this is something you can take your time at. Better to have a dog that will turn at fifty yards each time on barren ground as when you get to game there will be plenty of temptation to take it further. Even if you get the pup to turn each time you blow the whistle still walk away from it across the wind as this will encourage its natural quartering instinct. Don’t be worried if the pup doesn’t run on past you and out the other side. That will come.

Unfortunately I can’t give you any estimate of what age the pup will be when you reach this stage. There are so many variables. The time of year the pup is born, the sort of season that year and the maturity/immaturity of the pup will all have an effect on how quickly progress is made. The aim is to have a dog that is happy to be out with you. A dog that you can recall and put on the lead and that will turn when asked. This latter point you should have a fair understanding of by now as it is incomprehensible that in your training sessions there won’t have been the odd lark or rabbit or maybe even hare that will give you the opportunity to test how well your dog is responding to the drop command.

This is where the whole thing becomes a bit iffy. If I were living on the mainland we would be discussing the comparative merits of grouse or partridge as the bird of choice for training. But I am not living on the mainland I am living in Northern Ireland. Basically the only wild bird that I have access to in any numbers is snipe. From time to time I have access to pheasants and I usually have access to homing pigeons. There is the occasional day counting grouse in Northern Ireland as well but other than that the odd find on grouse in a trial is all I have access to. That plus the occasional trip to the mainland.

So what about snipe. Firstly in the context of Irish trials it is imperative that a dog can handle snipe as they are an opportunity to show that your dog can do its work. It all depends on how much credit the individual judges give for work on snipe but ability to handle snipe is important. Not only are snipe important for competition they are a very rewarding quarry when shooting. As a training tool they are not ideal but they at least inhabit the sort of ground where you could expect a pointer to work and , importantly when it comes to flushing they are very quickly lost from sight, partly because of their size and partly because of their flight. This means a dog is less likely to chase snipe for any distance. The problem is that if too many snipe are shot for a dog he tends to notice the sort of terrain where snipe would tend to lie and becomes very careful in these places. The old timers would often say of a dog “He’ll point when he gets his feet wet.” I usually don’t shoot that many snipe over competition dogs but it is something to bear in mind.

I can’t explain why but you get a feeling when a dog is ready for birds. Perhaps it is the animal’s reaction to larks and such but something just grabs you. The whole secret is to NEVER chastise a dog on game. I don’t have a problem with stickiness or blinking but perhaps that is because I really try to carry this out. I start by dizzying a pigeon and placing it in suitable cover. In set-aside there are quite often areas of short thistles or nettles. A young dog’s feet are very susceptible to nettles and thistles so I place the dizzied pigeon in one of these areas. It is really handy to have somebody to help you with this but you could leave the dog in the car and place the pigeon yourself, if you are quick and good at dizzying, which I am not. Remembering to always work into the wind you let the dog off down wind of your plant. You will of course have given the dog a blow out before hand. The chances are the pup will run about and eventually get the scent of the bird. Unless it is a real head banger it won’t want to enter the thistles and will at least indicate the presence of the pigeon but mostly mine point the bird. This is the one time where my cack handedness in dizzying pays dividends because the chances are that the pigeon will wake up and flush of its own accord. For the first few outings with the pigeons I use the same part of the field. It actually helps if the pup has an idea of what is going on and it is surprising just how quickly they realise the game that is afoot.

Once the pup points, however unsteadily, I move in slowly and gently and stroke the pup up. Stroking along the flanks, perhaps raising the tail to horizontal and talking in a soothing voice. When I think the dog is steady and happy, if the pigeon hasn’t flushed, I stir it with a cane and it flies off.

If the pup chases a bit don’t worry unduly. When it returns to you, as it surely will, make a big fuss of the dog where the bird was and then let the dog go free for a run. It has never taken more that five or six goes at this to have the dog pointing a dizzied pigeon. Twenty repetitions aren’t necessary at this stage we are ready for the next step.

The last dog I did this with was Bess. Because Davy Shaw was much more proficient than me at dizzying he was able to put out four and maybe six pigeons at a time and the last would be still asleep when work had been done on all the others. This time it was a field with ankle length grass sufficient to hide the pigeon from view, but not disrupt the scent cone unduly. There was also nothing stopping the dog from getting close to the bird should it want. Having been more than happy to point the dizzied pigeons amongst the thistles Bess found and pointed all four of her pigeons in the grass field. Whoever went to the point would stroke her up and the other would come in with the cane and flush the bird at an agreed signal. Bess was more than happy to drop to the whistle when the pigeon was flushed and then even happier to hunt for the next one. It really was as easy as that.

There are two things to remember here. There is a chance that your dog will run in and try to lift the bird. Whatever you do don’t make a fuss. The chances are that the dog will deliver the pigeon to you. Talk soothingly and usually the pigeon will be released unharmed. For such a dog you would fit a leather collar with seven or eight foot of a trailing rope. The dog would be walked to the next few pigeons and held up short before being stroked up and the bird flushed. When appropriate you could let the dog run to find the bird and then hold it on the rope for the flush. It usually doesn’t take that many goes before the pup is steady. The other likely problem is that the dog will point alright but want to chase after the flushed bird and won’t respond to your drop. You musn’t make a fuss just now. What you do is go away and practice the drop until you have it really well instilled. You can then test your dog’s steadiness on another pigeon and again use the leather collar and trailing rope to prevent a chase. If it chases again you go off for more drop enforcement. You want the dog’s response to the drop whistle to be so spontanious that the bird is almost of no consequence to the dog. It drops without thinking. Eventually the penny will drop and you have a dog steady to wing and flush. It hasn’t flushed itself yet, you have flushed the birds or they have flushed of their own accord.

We are now in the position that the dog will point the bird and drop to the flush. The next step is to have the dog flush the bird itself and to introduce the shot. This is now where technology comes to the rescue. I have a remote control bird launcher that I now use for the pigeons. The reason is that I want to be able to teach the dog its distance. i.e. the closest it can get to a bird without it flushing. I want the dog to stand well off its bird and I do this by releasing the bird before the dog is pointing fully. Very quickly the dog learns that it can’t really faff about when it gets a scent. It has to point on the first whiff of a bird.

Having encouraged the dog to point a bit off the bird we now want it to close the gap on the bird or “Road in”. This is usually quite easily done with a pup you have reared yourself but a dog that doesn’t know you that well may be distracted when you walk up beside  it when it is on point. The dog must be happy in your company. You simply walk up beside it and encourage it to move forward. I say “Get in” and maybe slap my thigh lightly if the dog appears reluctant. Moving slightly ahead of the dog will also help encourage it to move. When the dog has moved a few feet or yards I release the pigeon, blow the whistle and perhaps I have to exert slight pressure on the dog’s back to get it right down. Then we wait a while before starting again.

I know a number of trainers/handlers who use various words to get their dog to move in for the flush. Get in, get it up, flush etc. There are also some who click their fingers. I am attracted to finger clicking but I don’t use it. In competition the two dogs are pointing close together, a joint find. You have trained your dog to flush on the click but so has the other handler. He is asked to work out first and he clicks his fingers. What do you think your dog is going to do? It has just been told to flush hasn’t it? So “Get in” does it for me.

When this is going nicely it is time to introduce the shot and at this stage you need a helper. The helper stands some distance off with the starting pistol and fires it when the pigeon is released. I also now start to encourage the dog to stay down for a time after the flush and shot. What I don’t want in competition is for my dog to anticipate the release and run off to hunt on, or to chase the bird so I keep it in the down position for up to two minutes I am trying to establish a routine. Scent, point,road, flush,drop,bang, stay. The order may vary slightly as the dog may not actually see the bird flush but it that case it should drop to the shot. Over a while the helper will move closer to the pointing dog and eventually the gun will be in you own hand. For now make a point of firing the gun with your hand in the air and pointed slightly away from your dog.

There is only one other skill that the dog needs and that is backing, honouring point, seconding which ever terminology you wish to use. For me it’s “Backing”. Sometimes when shooting and in competition two dogs will be run at the same time. This is something your pup hasn’t done yet. Backing is a skill where if one of the dogs has a find the other will adopt a pointing stance but it will be pointing at the other dog. It should back the minute it sees the other dog on point, no matter where it is in relation to the other dog. It should stay backing until released by its handler. This keeps the second dog out of the way while the dog with the find works out its point, the bird is shot and then retrieved.

When my young dog is ready to go to the hill to hunt in earnest I always take it along with another experienced dog. I would select my staunchest pointer for this lesson. If conditions are perfect the young dog might get a short run into the wind but there are times that conditions don’t suit and the youngster just gets a long walk on the lead. In this instance I am hoping for my experienced dog to point so that I can encourage my young dog to adopt the backing/pointing stance. Usually the young dogs are excited by the point and even if they don’t exactly back right off, a bit of stroking up and soothing talk soon has them backing like a Champion. I think it was Jalad who watched Jump point about two dozen times, in one session, before I let him off for a run. I think Jalad pointed his first snipe that day and backed Jump at the first opportunity. It’s all in the diary.

This backing is a bit of a two edged sword. In England where your opponent’s dog will have a good chance of a find even if it won’t run out of your way it will almost certainly be needed. In Ireland the last thing you need is your dog to “Run for the back” in other words keep looking for the other dog and not just get on with the job of trying to find a bird.

These first few hunts with a young dog are really exciting. You know that if everythig goes to plan your dog will find a wild bird for the first time but quite often the opportunity won’t arise. Something will always snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Then, probably when you least expect it, somebody will have rung you on the mobile, you turn round and your dog is on point two hundred yards away. Quick as a flash you are over beside the dog ,”Get in”, the snipe flushes, the dog drops to the shot and you can put it on the lead. Weeks and months of work have gone in to reaching this stage The Trained Pointer. Trained in that he can hunt, point,is steady to wing and shot and can be controlled at least most of the time.He is trained but not experienced and the necessary experience can only come with work.

All that is needed now is to smarten up the dog on its ground work. Pointer work is 15% bird work and 85% ground work. The bird work and a little of the ground work is in the dog by this stage. From now on concentrate on the ground work. Make sure the pattern is even sided and the bite is also even. Take the dog to as many different locations as possible and try to get it a find from time to time to keep its interest. Who knows you may fancy entering a trial. Everybody says go and attend trials and watch that is expected of the dogs but beware! The minute you say to yourself, or even worse say it to others, ” My dog can do better than that ” you’re hooked.