Analyzing Our Dog’s Traits

Analyzing Our Dog’s Traits
By Frank Jezioro

We spend hours, weeks, and months with our new pups in preparation for that first day, that first season in the converts in search of wild birds. The first requirement of training a dog is that the trainer must know more than the dog! Too many trainers go about the training process without actually analyzing what it is they are seeing, what traits.

There are certain traits or actions that are required of the bird dog that we hope will be a true specialist. By this I mean that if we are primarily hunting grouse, there are certain characteristics that he should possess to become a true specialist on this bird. The same goes for the pheasant dog, the quail dog, the woodcock dog, and even the dog that hunts the plains for Huns and sharptails. While some of the requirements are basic for all pointing dogs, like a good nose, other requirements may be more specific to the bird we are hunting.

I started training Tembo, our Elhew pointer, when he was eight months old. By then he appeared to be leaving some of his puppy actions behind. I spent the spring , some summer days, and early fall reinforcing the his hunting and pointing instincts. Since I’m primarily a grouse hunter, the traits I concentrated on were staunchness and hunting with me since he would be primarily a “cover” dog.

From the first I felt he was a smart dog. He seemed to know what it was I wanted him to do as far as quartering in front of me. The third time I worked him across the wind from a planted pigeon, he hit the scent hard from an extended distance. But he did two things that I noted. First, he pointed with his head lower than I liked. Second he held the point only a few seconds and wanted to creep toward the pigeon. Both of these can be expected of any young dog, but both can be the source of problems in the grouse woods.