maybe your big Shorthair pup picks up the
quail you've just shot, shaking and mangling it. You decide to
give him a little Thomas Edison to cure that problem. Maybe your
feisty Viszla pup keeps on chasing the bird, far into the sunset,
after you flushed it and missed the shot. Give her a little tap
of the button, right? Perhaps she just refuses to listen to you
when you whistle to her and you, in your inexperience,
don't realize that she is working a bird, so again, you remind
her with the collar. Or and this is a crucial one
you don't see your Wirehair anywhere. He is in a draw, invisible,
staunchly pointing a pheasant, not responding to your call. So
you use your e-collar. What harm can a little stimulation do,
right?
Wrong!
Can you guess what might happen in these scenarios? Can you see
where you could turn your pup off of birds, causing him to be
uncertain and to begin to associate unpleasantness with them?
Pups can start to blink birds, or refuse to hunt or retrieve,
deciding to avoid the whole confusing experience. You've inadvertently
created a brand new set of problemsand now what do you do? |
Misty, a sleek, liver roan Shorthair nearly
two years old, came to our kennel several years ago. Loved and
pampered, she was right up there next to her owner's wife on
the family priority chain. Coming from a line of superb champion
field dogs, Misty had great natural ability. Her enthusiastic
and well-meaning owner an intelligent retired fellow who'd
been very successful in business had read everything he
could about dog training. Preparing himself to do a good job
in training Misty, he also had the clothes, the equipment, and
the e-collar. When he brought Misty to us, he was baffled
and worried.
"I've tried all the methods I've read about and used the
e-collar, too but she's just quit hunting on me,"
 |
he explained. "She's hesitant and
stays near my side, as though she's afraid to do anything."
Another client recently shared a disturbing story with us. He
was hunting with a fellow who had an e-collar on his young female
pointer. When her owner used the collar to correct her repeatedly,
our client told us that the pup rolled over on her back, urinating
on herself. An extreme case, but nonetheless true.
These are situations that you want to avoid. They generally result
from improper introduction to and overuse of the electronic collar
by inexperienced and overzealous novice trainers who fail
to read their dog's reactions in this training process.
It is always easier to prevent the problem than to fix it, and
the fixing often requires professional help. So keep it simple
this first season. Adopt the doctors' philosophy first
do no harm. A calm, quiet manner, a good whistle around your
neck used sparingly, but with reinforcement when needed
a 15-20 foot checkcord to effect that reinforcement, a
training lead for yard work, comfortable field clothes, and lots
of birds. We know of no dog whose enthusiasm and ability has
been hampered by dragging a checkcord or hearing a whistle
and no owner who hasn't easily learned how to use both effectively.
Evaluation is an important part of your training program. Remember
how you assessed your pup's temperament at an earlier age? And
how we advised that this evaluation would determine how you would
approach your pup's training? Then you laid your groundwork with
lots of birds, field and yard training, and the lessons that
expe |
