Virginia Gun Owners Forum - VGOF

Well Griswold was 9 months old on Wednesday and he is wrapping up his force fetch training from Silverbrook Kennels. Trish sent me a text video (sorry for the quality) the other day. Great trainers but that duck calls squawker is broke. Pick him up Sunday!! Can't wait.

Obviously, they can train a gun dog better than they can blow a duck call.

Great Video! I have been contemplating getting a duck dog! Any suggestions?

njrosinski wrote:Great Video! I have been contemplating getting a duck dog! Any suggestions?

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I've done a fair amount of waterfowl hunting on both the Atlantic and Mississippi flyways, and I've seen more Labradors in duck and goose blinds than anything else. In fact, I've seldom seen anything else.

njrosinski wrote:Great Video! I have been contemplating getting a duck dog! Any suggestions?

The first think you have to ask is how much money do you have to spend. You have to look at the initial fee in acquiring a dog. Quality in quality out and it's reflected in the price. The pedigree includes not only champions in the bloodline but also the medical testing done on the parents. Most breeds have issues that can be passed on a poor breeding program. They include things like Hip and elbow Dysplasia, Progressive retinal atrophy, Epilepsy etc. In many program the parental medical clearances and pairing can genetically prevent many of these issues. Training a dog takes lots of time money and effort and if you take any dog off the street and expend those resources on it only to find out when it hits cold water it has a seizure or is in too much pain from hip dysplasia to continue with a retrieve. IMO it's worth the research, effort and cost of starting with a puppy that has the best chance of succeeding. Some dogs are just meant to be great pets rather than highly trained master hunters.

Then you have to ask yourself what you want to actually do. If you just want to hunt with it the level of effort is not as great as if you want to do field trials towards earning a title.

Do you plan on training it or will you have someone else do it? I'm here to tell you repetition is the key to success and it's very time consuming. Also the tools you will need are expensive. From videos to bumpers to launchers to dead fowl, e collars etc. you will spend a lot. Probably, when you add in your time, as much as it would have taken to have some one else do it. There is much to consider and there is no right way to answer it for everyone. Been a lot of dogs bought with good intention and then the owners become less motivated when they see the time required and they just end up with a pet. Or, they spend a lot getting it trained to find out the dog has medical problems.

I'll be the first to admit I don't have the time to do much myself but It hasn't been cheap either. Certainly not a frugal endeavor if you get ate up with it. But if you decide to put the resources into one I recommend you get one from a reputable breeder that you can trace genetics. It really pays big dividends also to have the resources of a professional even if your doing it yourself.

Good point by Hockti. I used to keep Brittanys and Pointers; and did a lot of grouse and some quail and even occasionally went pheasant hunting. I've been there, done that; made all the mistakes for myself and then had to pay for fixing them. Unless you train dogs for a living, do yourself a BIG favor and have someone who knows what he is doing train your gun dog.