Puppy Progress

I always find spending time with the puppies at the kennel fascinating.  They grow so fast and develop quickly.  The Bud Bros have gotten to the point where I can't gang run them anymore and still keep track of them.  I can still run Molly and Dottie together.  This morning I threw out a couple quail for them.  It took me a few minutes to get ready to go as today was Ivermectin and tick prevention.  Used Biospot on the bigger pups all the dogs.and used something for smaller dogs on the littler pups.  By the time we got over to the bird field the quail had moved from where I put them and we didn't find them on the way out.   I don't like to use tip-ups or other devices to hold the quail in place as I want the flush to be as natural as possible when they do find a bird.  I try not to stand around where the bird was planted and let the pups find the birds off the flow of the walk.  On the way back in Dottie found one of the birds that was making its way back towards the pen.  She was pretty excited when it flushed and chased a little bit before going back and smelling more where it had been.   I marked the bird down and called Molly who loves to carry things in here mouth.  She came by me with a rather respectable piece of firewood in her jaws and started into the woods when she hit scent and slammed on the brakes.  She dropped the stick and styled up really nice for about a two count and then flushed and chased the bird which she quickly lost in the woods.  Seeing those two little puppies Molly is 16 weeks old and Dottie is 10 weeks old use their noses to find birds and at least flash point shows that the genetic programing is intact and operating.  They also run to the front and stay up there with only a little reminding with voice and whistle.  yesterday Dottie had a quail find on the edge of the bird field and Molly put up a grouse in the poplar stand that is part of my puppy loop.

At their age "training" is all about providing opportunities.  Once they discover their purpose in life then the training actually starts.  My goals for all five puppies is to have them ready to hunt over this fall.  They'll handle and in some fashion point birds.  Last summer's puppies progressed similarly over the summer and early fall and all of them had pointed birds shot for them.  The woodcock are either hatched or about to hatch and the grouse should be hatching in the first two weeks of June with the majority of them around here at the later part of that window as they seemed to get a late start with their drumming.

Dottie in Hot Pursuit