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Naming a hunting dog is a personal choice and ideally should factor in a bit of the dogs personality, family agreement, and practicality. Bear in mind that training your gun dog entails using their name frequently and repeatedly. Therefore, while an interesting name is great, one should try to keep it easy as well. Picking out the pup or training them may seem like the hardest part, but alot of people come to the realization that naming their new hunting dog may be the biggest challenge! First and foremost, if the new dog is adopted and not a puppy, it is highly recommended that one keeps the original name – there is enough work at hand without complicating training with a new name.

A few things to keep in mind when naming a hunting dog. For most people, there are two different names that will be associated with your new pup. The first is the registered name, which is often a blending of the sire and/or dam’s name or line, and one’s own personal touch. The combination of names that make up the registered name can be as grandiose and multi-syllable as one likes, and may or may not include or inspire the call name. A dog’s call name is, simply put, its everyday name. For call names, conventional wisdom supports that shorter names are better. One or two syllable names are highly preferred. Think about shouting out something like “Remington” over and over and over while training the dog, or in the field while hunting. Its going to end up being “Remi” pretty quickly. Shorter names are easier for the dog to learn and respond to as well. Whether or not the dog is going to be run in field trials can significantly influence the call name. Having a “popular” or common call name can lead to a lot of confusion during a brace. As a general rule, when selecting a call name it is good practice to eliminate any names that have more than two syllables from contention early on. Another popular practice is to have a name with some hard consonants. When combined with a one or two syllable name this makes the call name easier to shout and be heard, especially in a trial or over distance when hunting.

When naming a hunting dog, its important to come up with a name this is appealing to the owner and is one the dog will easily respond to. Many people pick a name that they later regret, either because it is hard to call, reflects an image they didn’t consider when naming, or is too common. The experienced gun dog owner will give careful consideration before settling on a name. Keep in mind that one syllable names are preferred and two syllable names can work, but hunting dog names are generally better if they are short and distinct. A gun dog’s call name needs to be a name that the owner likes, is easy to say, and one that the owner and the dog can live with many years.

Whistles really seem to come down, at least for me, to what you like. The pitch or tone never seems to matter much to Ruby, while I have one whistle I use primarily, I’ve used others and even used my steel “coaches” whistle when I forgot my usual one.

What’s my usual one? I really favor the orange Ray Gonia Special training whistle. I think I paid about five dollars for it.

I’ve run my Brittany in some trials and I’ve hunted her quite a bit. She spent a great summer with a professional trainer and really got to the point she needed to be for one years old. Whoa, steady point, hunting targets, honoring (well that still needs some work) , etc.

She’ll be going back for a second summer of training soon and I’ve some decisions to make on what I want the focus to be. I think she’s brilliant, but there’s only so much we can fit in her head.

Lots of folks want them to heel, be steady to the wing and shot, run big, etc. All those things are great if they fit the purpose for which you own the dog. If you trial, there are skills that are a necessity, if you don’t trial then my opinion is that it’s really up to you how to finish them.

For example, obedience trainers will want to teach a dog to sit. A hunting or trialing dog owner most likely won’t want to teach them to sit because the dog may slide out of a point and into a sitting position. Might not bother you, or might be that you want the dog to sit, but many will think its a bad choice. The point is, its your choice ultimately. My preference was that she NOT learn to sit. It just makes sense to me, how I hunt with her, and the fact that we enjoyed trialing for a while.

For me trialing was an interesting (and fun) experience, but I have three sons in competitive sports and the point of trialing was to give Ruby something to do when she wasn’t hunting with me, I don’t really have time for another child in competitive sports right now. Therefore, I’ll likely stop trialing because, for me, some of the skills she needs to be successful at it aren’t necessarily how I want her to hunt. Hunting is how she and I will spend most of our time.

We tend to hunt just the two of us a lot, in a lot of varied cover and conditions. So steady to the wing and shot, or running big doesn’t always work well and to trial well she needs to do both of those well (at least from my observations.) I’ve seen in the first year that she adapts well to the situation and my choice is going to be to focus on the hunting aspect and how she and I work together.

Now certainly I want her to honor other dogs points, its just good manners. Heeling is going to be useful not only in the field, but also when she’s at home and my wife walks her. The finer points I’m not going to worry about.

There’s an awful lot of opinions on how a dog should act, and all have their merit I’m sure, but remember its YOUR dog and how you want to work with it is really up to you. (That’s really not my original thought, it comes from talking to her trainer and listening to his philosophy.)

I’d say this though; if you have any interest in trialing to start off, you should definitely try it, just make sure you teach your dog the skills that will allow them to be successful at competing. Understand the rules of trialing and the expectations of a dogs behavior in a brace. If after time, you decide not to trial, these skills are still immensely useful, even in day to day life at home.

I’ve been looking at Training collars while Ruby is away training and I think I’ve settled on the Innotek Command Series CS 1600TT. It allows you to run two dogs, and if I can get spousal agreement to add another Brit in a year or two, the extra cost will be worth it.

It is a bit spendy, but the folks that I’ve talked to at trials all seem to like it.

I dropped Ruby off in Argyle, Iowa for the start of her training. The trainer I selected is Bob Burchett (Burchett’s Bird Dogs; 319-838-2822 .) Bob came highly recommended to me from several members of the LaSalle Brittany Club.

His reaction to meeting Ruby and the way he has the facility set up leaves me confident it will be a good experience for her. I can’t wait to get back and see her in a month!

Training a dog with a crate is useful and effective technique. Its important to start using the crate from the moment you pick your puppy up. Therefore, the crate should be selected and purchased before the puppy is picked up and ideally used to transport it home. Wire crates are the most popular, easiest to clean and maintain, allow the puppy to see their surroundings, and often can be broken down flat for storage. Some dogs can have problems with them, so seeing how your dog reacts initially to their crate is important. Understand that most dogs love their crates, they are instinctively den animals, and their crate should be viewed as their safe haven. If the training is conducted properly, your dog will consider their crate a safe, happy place. Therefore, it is very important that the dog’s crate is not used as a form of punishment.

The best time to start crate training is when your dog is a puppy, as it is generally much harder to effectively crate train an older dog. Crate training should be kept very positive, and while the primary purpose of crate-training is to housebreak your puppy, putting the pup in a crate does not in and of itself house train the dog.

There are lots of viewpoints on how to acclimate the puppy to the crate, but the simplest answer is take it at a pace you and the dog are comfortable with and keep it consistent. A few key points to remember:

• Do not leave your puppy in the crate for hours and hours. The crate is not a substitute for your attention.
• Do not keep moving the crate around your house. Pick a spot and leave it there.
• Make sure the crate is in a safe area, and not where your dog can become too hot or too cold.
• Collars can get caught in a crate’s bars. Many people opt to remove the collar when they crate their puppy.
• If the dog is upset, don’t drag it out of the crate. Let the dog come out of its own accord, after all this is their safe haven.

One opinion is that when a puppy is whining or fussing, don’t take them out of the crate as it teaches them how to get what they want out of you. In general this is a good rule of thumb, however, until you get to know your puppy well, it can be hard to discern whining for the sake of attention versus whining for the purpose of wanting to go out to go to the bathroom. If the use of the crate as a method to eliminate soiling where they sleep is succesful, many puppies are going to communicate the need to go outside by making a fuss. As the owner you are going to need to learn to differentiate the reasons your dog is whining or barking.

Crate training is, at it’s core, simply a method of house training your puppy and because most dogs will not go to the bathroom in the same place they sleep, your puppy will most likely try to hold it when it is confined to a crate. Ideally for a puppy, you start with a smaller crate, or block off one end so he can’t turn one end into sleeping area and the other into it’s bathroom.    By crate training your puppy you can better predict when the dog will need to go to the bathroom and you can take it outside to the correct spot. Some practices that can make this process more successful:

• When your puppy wakes up, take it outside to its spot. Having one preferred spot for the dog to go to the bathroom can help with the early successes.
• When your puppy whines, take it outside to its spot.
• When your puppy goes to the door, take it outside to its spot. Reinforce that its going to the door will trigger your response of taking it outside.
• After your puppy eats, take it outside to its spot.
• Praise your puppy for doing its “business” outside. Make a big deal about it. Play with it and give it attention when it does what you want it to.
• If your puppy doesnt go, put it back in the crate and then try again in a bit.

What you are trying to reinforce here, essentially, is that everytime the puppy leaves its crate the first order of business is to go to the bathroom. Outside.

A noted earlier, with puppies you need to make sure that the crate is confined enough so they don’t have room to make a mess in one area and sleep in another. Until they grow into the crate you should use dividers (boxes work as well) to constrain the size of the crate down to a small size designed for sleeping. As the puppy grows, you can increase the amount of the crate available to them. As the puppy becomes housebroken, you can increase the amount of the crate available to them. As a general rule of thumb, if the puppy is soiling their crate you have either given them too much space, or you are confining them to the crate for too long between walks. Remember our first key point – the crate is not a substitute for your attention.

Aside from aiding in housebreaking, crate training a puppy can have many long-term rewards for owners and their dogs. When transporting a dog, they should be crated as its considerably safer for the dog (and driver) to be in a crate.  When the owner is gone during the day, it provides peace of mind that the dog is not creating havoc in the home.  For the dog it provides a safe haven when they are stressed.  Crate training can be viewed as the easiest and most perhaps sensible method of dog training, allowing for consistency and discipline. The use of a crate to house your puppy can provide dog owners with the peace of mind that their dog is safe and secure when they are not there.

So I picked up Richard Wolter’s GUN DOG book. Its pretty much supposed to be the defacto standard in training gun dogs.

Until she goes to the trainer this summer, I’m going to focus on “come” and”whoa”. I’ve had a grouse tail my Uncle Roger gave me and she’s pointed that consistently.

As far as Ruby’s training, we withdrew her from the obedience trainer here as she (the trainer) was a little over the top. She wanted us to use a pinch collar on her, only pet her when she sat (which we told her we weren’t teaching her) and was generally too strict in her approach. Ruby seems far too bright to need such a strict type of training.