You may know that I travel to Montana every year to train clients dogs as well as my own. It’s always fun but definitely hard work.

I think often that some folks think it easy. It’s not. Wild bird populations have a tremendous impact on whether a dog will have sufficient bird contact to actually learn something.

4 years ago eastern Montana had a terrible hatch due to drought conditions and late wet snow. Chicks were impacted severely. When I arrived in August and began to condition dogs I noticed immediately that it was going to be tough.

If you have 20 dogs to train, that is 10 braces. A brace is two dogs on the ground at the same time. I have found that a brace works best when working young dogs on wild birds. Primarily because both are often inexperienced and just finding a wild … [Read more →]