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Training a spaniel to  'hold an area'  by Jack Russell

 

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When you are handling your dog out at distance to make a blind retrieve of shot game, or you know a runner has disappeared into a certain area; you won’t want your dog to start hunting all over the place and disturbing other potential game-holding areas, particularly if out of shooting range, so it is important that you are able to direct your dog out into the ‘target’ area, and can hold and work the dog within a small area of constraint.

 

Setting out piles of hay

First I make 6 piles of hay in the size I want the dog to work in (for a Spaniel I work on 4x4m). Initially, I use hay to encourage the dog to be bold and smash into the cover.

I'll then sit the dog up about 20m away at first - (you can increase the distances away once you are reasonably confident that the dog can respond to you further out.)

         

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Hiding the dummy

I then go from one pile to another in a totally random fashion and place a dummy under one of the piles so that the dog doesn't actually see me place it.

I continue and go to each pile 'pretending' to put a dummy under each pile

 

Right: Jack hides the dummy with his back to the dog

     

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Casting the dog out to hunt

I'll then return to the dog and either cast him forward or give him the 'back' command. (depends oh my position relative to his)

When he gets into the 'search' area marked out by the hay piles I tell him "Hi Lost" to start him hunting the area. If he goes out of the area, or isn't hunting in the right area I drop him on the whistle and re-direct him and then command him to hunt on in the area I want

   

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Searching the furthest pile first

Usually a dog with a good nose can scent the dummy and will head for that pile fairly quickly - so I direct the dog to start searching in the furthest pile from the dummy pile to encourage him to search out the other piles. My dog gets used to the size of the working area fairly quickly and will hold in that area and hit the cover quite hard and search each pile systematically.

     
           
     

Tell the dog he is on the right track

When my dog is on the right pile I give the command "There, there" which will make him hit into the cover even harder and makes him search hard for an imminent find.

Once I am confident that my dog will hold in and search the area, I can then move onto some light cover, and go through the same routine, building up to heavier cover over time

     
   

Jack Russell and NOBS

Jack Russell is the Shropshire representative for the National Organisation of Beaters and Pickers Up.

This article was first published on the NOBS website.  Jack runs training days for the Salopian Nobs.   Illustrations are photographs of Jack's 20 month old Field Trial Winner springer  "Barley"  Copyright for Training a spaniel to 'hold an area' and all photographs of "Barley" belong to Jack Russell          Copyright©Jack Russell 2006

     
                         

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