Check-cord Tension

Check-cord tension is one of the most important forms of communication between you and your dog. How much tension is too much—or, to put it another way, how hard should a dog pull—is a question that is often asked but difficult to answer. It’s like asking a race-car driver how fast is too fast, when you know that it depends on the car and the track. The same is true with a dog: It depends on the dog and the situation.

I’m sure you have seen amateur trainers dragged around the training field by their dogs. In these scenarios, dogs are telling their trainers that they don’t respect them. Dogs that pull with enthusiasm without dragging trainers around are showing respect, and dogs that walk on loose check-cords without pulling may be unhappy about going into the field.

I had a situation like this a few years ago. I was working a young dog and teaching him to be steady. One morning, I noticed he was not pulling as hard as he normally did. Right there, I knew I had a problem, so I watched him closely as he worked birds. I noticed that he had lost some of his intensity on point. Because I paid attention to the lack of check-cord tension, I was able to step back in training, shoot a couple of birds for him, and before long, he was pulling with enthusiasm to get to the field.

This spring I was working another dog. He was broke on pigeons and had progressed to quail. He had pulled with enthusiasm on pigeons, but now that he had gone to quail, he started dragging me around the field. I was slow to realize how hard he was pulling, and that quail were getting him too excited. As a result, he had lost his manners and reverted to busting birds again. If I had paid closer attention to what he was communicating to me with the check-cord, I would have stopped working him on birds and focused on regaining his attention. A few sessions of asking him to go with me and come to me on the check-cord would have done wonders to regain his respect and get him focused again.

A basic check-cord is about twelve feet long, and while it may appear to be a simple piece of rope with a snap at one end, it’s the most complex piece of training equipment you will ever own. For many pro trainers, it’s the one piece of equipment they cannot do without (see chapter 9 for more information).

Check-cord tension is where much of the communication between you and your dog takes place. Learning how to read this tension and understanding what your dog is communicating takes practice and experience. You will need to work with many dogs at the end of a check-cord before you’ll get really good at it, but if you pay attention, it will help you figure out what is going on in your dog’s head.

Self-Awareness

To be a good dog trainer, you need to be self-aware. In other words, you need to monitor yourself for body-language and verbal cues that you’re unconsciously giving your dog during training.

Last month, a training buddy was working her ten-month-old pup on pigeons. She had become concerned that her pup was losing interest in birds. I suggested she bring the pup cross-wind to the bird so I could see what was going on. At first, the pup did not pick up scent. As she tried to work the pup into the scent, I noticed that she’d raised her right arm, the one holding the check-cord, above her head. As soon as she held the check-cord high, the pup appeared to get nervous.

I walked over and mentioned that she was holding the check-cord above her head. The comment surprised her; she had no idea she was making this gesture. Her pup did fine once she lowered her arm and began to focus on the pup and not where the bird was. For whatever reason, the pup had made a negative association with her body-language cue. As soon as she eliminated this gesture, the pup became more confident around birds.

I have another training buddy who has a bad habit of stopping when she gets close to the bird. She unconsciously stands still when she gets to an area where she hopes her dog will point. By stopping, she is giving a body-language cue to the dog and telling him birds are near. Sometimes, I find myself nagging her a bit—keep moving, keep moving. It can be a challenge to keep moving when you want your dog to stop.

With the Bill West method, you learn to be verbally quiet except for an occasional attention-getting Hey, or Here. Dave Walker tells a great story about a fellow who came to work dogs with him. Apparently, this fellow didn’t realize he was talking nonstop to his dog. Dave got a roll of duct tape, cut a short piece, and put it over this fellow’s mouth. It literally took duct tape for this fellow to realize how much he’d been talking to his dog.

It would be great to have a coach in the field to point out all the goofy things you do of which you are unaware. Since most trainers train alone, it’s up to you to monitor yourself every time you go afield.

I catch myself doing goofy things all the time. What helped me become more self-aware was helping others. As I tried to make my movements clearer to the person I was helping, I realized that, at the same time, my movements were becoming clearer to the dog. If you watch a Bill West or Maurice Lindley DVD (see Resources section), you will notice that their movements seem slower and more stylized. Good trainers give as few cues as possible to the dog about what they are thinking.

Every time you go afield, you are communicating to your dogs. The more you become aware of unnecessary body-language and verbal cues, the easier it is to eliminate them. Verbal cues are easy to fix with a piece of duct tape, but body-language cues take real self-awareness. Hmmm . . . I bet good dog trainers also make good poker players.

Turning the Corner

Recently, I was talking to Maurice Lindley about a dog I was teaching to be steady-to-wing-and-shot.

“I think Chalk has turned the corner,” I said.

“What did he do to make you think that?” Maurice asked.

“He’s calmer,” I replied.

“Good,” he said. “A calm dog is what you look for. A fresh-broke dog should go from being bug-eyed and intense to calm and composed in the presence of game. If you watch a young dog on point, every fiber and nerve is on high alert and poised to pounce. Then, as more training takes place, you notice the dog’s composure changes when he is pointing. He becomes more confident in his job, and confident that you know your job, too. The intensity is still there, but something has changed. To me, the dog just looks different.”

Maurice was describing exactly what I was seeing in Chalk. For the first time since the steadying process began, Chalk was becoming calmer around his game. Earlier in the summer, he was pointing and pouncing on pigeons still on the ground, or pointing and chasing them once they flew. The times he stood steady, either his whole body was vibrating with intensity, or his tail was moving in a quick ticking motion. On occasion, he pointed and lifted a front paw as if he wanted to take a step but knew better. For most of the summer, he followed a pattern of two steps forward and one step back, acting broke for a couple of workouts and then returning to pouncing or chasing again. The one thing I had not seen in him was a calm demeanor. Now, for the first time, I was seeing it.

Well-bred bird dogs can lose their minds when they are worked on birds; they can become totally focused on finding them, tuning everything else out. They are hunting for themselves. As dogs become calmer around game, they begin to accept training, and their attitudes change. They pay attention better. Dogs that once dragged you around the training field stop pulling as hard on the check-cord. They start coming to you and going with you when you ask, and the amount of e-collar you need to use to correct them becomes less.

While Chalk was nowhere close to being broke, he was getting calmer. Each dog goes through training differently. Some take longer than others, and good trainers learn to adjust to each dog, progressing only as fast as the dog can go. It takes time to build a good foundation, but once it is built, it will be solid, with no gaps or holes to go back and fix. Looking for the dog to become calm around his game is an early clue that he is giving in to training and wants to be broke. When you reach this stage, training gets easier.

A word of caution if you think your dog is turning the corner: Be observant. A dog that is becoming calm may resemble a concerned dog that is developing a problem. For example, a dog’s energy level may drop as he becomes calm, but it can also drop from too much pressure. There’s a fine line between calm and concerned. A calm dog is confident and maintains his intensity on point. A concerned dog loses his intensity on point. He is less enthusiastic about working in the training field, and may listen to you almost too well. Often, he is more comfortable walking at your side than walking in front of you, pulling on the check-cord. Anytime you see these types of changes, be aware that you may have a problem.

Dogs don’t become calm around game overnight; it takes time. A dog has to go from wanting to find birds for himself to wanting to find them for you, and this process goes against his predatory nature and need to survive. In Chalk’s case, he had spent many weeks in the training field working on pigeons before I noticed he was becoming calmer. He still had a long way to go, and once he moved to quail, he would go through the whole process again, but hopefully training would be easier during this next phase. Seeing Chalk turn the corner was an exciting moment; I knew he was on his way to becoming a finished dog.

Wait for Tomorrow

An old-time dog trainer gave me advice some twenty years ago when we were working dogs together. He said to wait for tomorrow. It was his way of telling me to be patient and not expect to see immediate results. This advice has stayed with me because it works.

Over the years, I have learned the importance of waiting for the next workout to see results, especially when it comes to e-collar work. Unfortunately, some trainers want to see immediate results. If I see results the same day, I know I probably overdid it. One of the reasons is because dogs are more excited in the training field and around birds, so it may take a lot of e-collar pressure to get them settled down. Once the adrenaline wears off, they may remember this higher level of stimulation and be spooked by it.

Last summer, I was helping a training buddy with one of her dogs. The dog had a solid e-collar foundation and was letting us flush in front of her. On this day, the dog decided to chase when the bird flushed, and she chased hard. My buddy nicked her with the e-collar on 4-low a couple of times, and then on 6-low a couple more times, but the dog never slowed down. I suggested we wait until the next workout and see what we had. On the next workout, the dog chased hard, but unlike the previous time, she started to slow down with each nick. It took one more workout before the e-collar was rolling her to a stop.

Maurice Lindley speaks often about the rolling stop, and his thinking dovetails nicely with the old-time trainer’s advice. Maurice explains, “For a dog with a good e-collar foundation, I don’t want him to stop dead in his tracks at first, even if he is a tough, resistant dog. If he stops like that, I may have done too much. One thing’s for sure: I will know in the next workout or two if I accomplished what I wanted. The slowest way to get a dog finished is to rush any part of the training.”

The same thinking works for teaching the here command. Some trainers call a dog to them, and if the dog does not respond, they use a high level of stimulation to make him come immediately. By looking for immediate results, they miss out on an important part of dog training, which is building cooperation. Instead of a dog that wants to come to them, they end up with a mechanical dog that comes because he was made to come. A better way to think about the here command is to use the least amount of stimulation necessary to ask the dog to bend and go with you. It may take a couple of workouts to accomplish, but you will end up with a happier and more cooperative dog.

If you get in a situation where you feel you have to use too much e-collar pressure to get the dog under control, it may be better to err on the side of caution. Remember, there is always tomorrow. Recently, I had a young dog go after deer in the training field, and rather than nail him with high stimulation and stop him in his tracks, I used a rolling stop and slowed him down. It took a couple of encounters with deer, but the results were definitely worth it. Instead of a dog that was fearful of deer, I had a dog that figured out chasing deer was not fun.

A dog needs time to process everything that happens during training, as well as to buy into what you’re asking him to do. To become a great hunting partner, he needs time to learn from his mistakes. Dog training takes patience, and chipping away at your dog’s behaviors is a far better approach than coming down on him like a ton of bricks. If you’re patient and willing to wait for tomorrow to see results, you’re well on your way to becoming a better trainer.

Training Intelligent Dogs

A dog’s intelligence influences how he goes through training. Learning how to evaluate your dog’s intelligence early on will help you to anticipate what your dog is likely to do so you can do a better job. The training method doesn’t change—you just have to be on your toes and stay one step ahead in order to be successful when training an intelligent dog.

A while back, I asked a couple of pro trainers how they measure a dog’s intelligence. Dave Walker said that he believes intelligence and natural ability are one and the same. The more intelligent the dog, the more natural ability he has. A good example is delayed chase (see chapter 25 for more information). Delayed chase is when a dog returns to birds he previously found rather than continuing forward with the handler. Without a doubt, a dog that returns to birds demonstrates natural ability, as well as the skill to learn from experience.

Maurice Lindley noted that intelligent dogs figure things out faster. He described four new dogs he recently got in for training. “When I began check-cording them, one dog was still pulling against the pinch-collar after thirty minutes of walking him around. The other three were giving in to the pressure after five minutes. How quickly a dog figures out pinch-collar pressure tells me a lot about his intelligence. Dogs that require repeated firm pressure are not as intelligent as dogs that give in.”

I thought a lot about what these pro trainers told me and began paying closer attention to things like delayed chase and how dogs react to the pinch-collar.

I decided to run some pups together and let them find birds. Then, I waited a couple of days before running them again on the same course. I watched closely to see if any of them returned to spots where they had previously found birds. Some pups went right back to these spots, some slowed down as they went by, and others gave no indication. One pup actually pointed where he had previously found birds. I also paid attention to the pups around the kennel and watched to see which of them figured things out the fastest. When I introduced the pinch-collar in the training field, I noted which pups gave in to pressure first. These observations helped me to make informed decisions about the best training methods to pursue with each pup.

It’s very easy to make mistakes with intelligent dogs. You might be able to get away with repeating a training setup or leaving an occasional foot trail to a bird with an average dog, but an intelligent dog will figure it out quickly. These dogs remember where birds are planted. They learn to trail foot scent or four-wheeler tracks to find birds; some even start to get birdy when they come across scent left from the exhaust pipe where you stopped the four-wheeler to plant birds. They read your body language, and sometimes it feels like they can read your mind. Just when you feel like you’re getting a handle on anticipating their actions, they’ll surprise you yet again.

I had a pup last summer I’d determined was pretty intelligent. The second time I worked him on a pigeon in a releaser, he took off in the opposite direction of the bird flushing, running as fast as he could. It took another workout before I realized he wasn’t running away from the bird; he was running to intersect it. The first time I’d worked him on a releaser, he’d figured out that after the pigeon flushed, it flew in big circle before returning to the loft.

Most well-bred dogs are smart, but the really intelligent ones can test your skills as a trainer, especially if you’re an amateur. Being able to evaluate your dog’s intelligence while he is young will help you to anticipate how he will go through training, hopefully allowing you to stay one step ahead of him. Without a doubt, intelligent dogs make superior bird dogs. They can be more challenging to train, but they will sharpen your skills, keep you on your toes, and teach you a lot more than you teach them. To quote a successful horseback pro trainer: “Intelligent dogs are more fun to work.” I would add—if you know what you’re doing.