CockersOnline Forum
Cocker Activities => Working => Topic started by: Cazzie on April 27, 2007, 10:20:55 PM
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Would love to hear all you're story's about actual working cockers and what inspired you to have a working cocker :D
Pictures would also be good :blink:
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When you say "actual" ??? :005:
Hattie worked all afternoon, swimming underwater at a photoshoot, does that count ?! :lol:
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sorry should have maybe said cockers that actually work ::)
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I had Tilly out last season beating and she had a grand old time, she loved it. Hoping to do a few scurries with her this year and then have her out again in the winter.
I am currently training Alfie, he's 15 months and is doing well. He hasn't been shot over yet but he's working on fur and feather and his steadiness is improving every day. I hope to have him out 'lightly' this winter but I think he will really be coming into his own for next year when he'll be fully mature. Who knows we may even make it to a few trials :D I'd love to give it a go so I'm not rushing him now, I'm letting him mature slowly and only introducing new things when I think that he is really ready. He's the first gundog I've trained myself although I've been out with my Stepdad's working springers before so we're both learning a lot :D
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sorry should have maybe said cockers that actually work ::)
what you really should say is cockers that work to the gun / in the field... cos Hattie works, a lot, but not to the gun.... or am I being pedantic ;) :lol:
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sorry should have maybe said cockers that actually work ::)
what you really should say is cockers that work to the gun / in the field... cos Hattie works, a lot, but not to the gun.... or am I being pedantic ;) :lol:
You? The 'p' word?? Never! ph34r ;) :lol:
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and lil lee works sheep.. ;)
my 3 are supposed to work but Oh has lost interest this last while in shooting. doesnt bother me, cos first and foremost mine are pets and I hate dead things. ph34r
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sorry should have maybe said cockers that actually work ::)
what you really should say is cockers that work to the gun / in the field... cos Hattie works, a lot, but not to the gun.... or am I being pedantic ;) :lol:
Not sure? What does pedantic mean? :-\
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and lil lee works sheep.. ;)
my 3 are supposed to work but Oh has lost interest this last while in shooting. doesnt bother me, cos first and foremost mine are pets and I hate dead things. ph34r
Hi Jean
Are all you're sheep kept as pets?
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sorry should have maybe said cockers that actually work ::)
what you really should say is cockers that work to the gun / in the field... cos Hattie works, a lot, but not to the gun.... or am I being pedantic ;) :lol:
Not sure? What does pedantic mean? :-\
Nitpicky, overly concerned with minor details!! :lol:
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sorry should have maybe said cockers that actually work ::)
what you really should say is cockers that work to the gun / in the field... cos Hattie works, a lot, but not to the gun.... or am I being pedantic ;) :lol:
Not sure? What does pedantic mean? :-\
Nitpicky, overly concerned with minor details!! :lol:
Ah thanks for that Nicola been socialising with animals for too long :005: :005: dont get out often :005: :005:
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no we dont have pet sheep the lambs get sold in august we keep a few of the best ewe lambs back to replace the old ewes we are selling or who have died. my OH wont even have a pet lamb about the place and if he does get left with one that is too old for a tie on he will give it to my sister who will bring it on .
its the dogs who are the pets... ;) very petted indeed actually. :luv:
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My friend has a couple who have been reared with her goats they are half pets which is nice. :luv:
My dogs too are very petted. 3 of them work. Its nice to see them working as they enjoy having a job to do although its only a few days per year. :blink:
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I work Dobbie my cocker and Willow my springer, Dobbie and Willow go beating and Dobbie also goes pigeon and crow shooting
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stella will come beating and shooting with me eventually :blink:
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My Bella works, she's almost three now and she's getting a bit of experience at beating and picking up under her belt. She no longer gets overly excited by the shoot, you can see her relax into concentrating on what you ask her to do now, because she's not so suprised by what she flushes or what she has to go and pick up for you.
She's still slightly unsteady on rabbits, there's just something about that bobbing white tail!
But we're trying to conqour this by going walling for rabbits along the dry stone walls in order to familiarise her with what rabbits and how she's not spposed to want to catch them!. She locates the rabbits in the wall by smell, then I reach into the wall and grab the rabbit (unharmed), we then go out into the middle of an open field and I have bella at my heel. I put the rabbit on the ground and it bolts. Bella is kept to heel and walked towards where the rabbit went and then I say 'leave' and walk in the oposite direction with her to heel, then I praise her and give her a dummy to go and retrieve for me.
So far this all seems to be going very well and she will no longer chase after a bolting rabbit when we're out beating. However she has had a few mishaps where I've been lazy, on a walk for instance where she is off lead and she finds a rabbit when she's relatively far ahead of me and she does sometimes choose to chase. In that case I blow the recall whistle and walk in the opposite direction to where she's gone and she's always returned pretty much immediately looking rather sheepish! I doubt the issue of rabbits will ever be truely sorted for my little Bella, but apart from this weakness she's a joy to go shooting with and makes a lovely pet as well.
There's an absolutely gorgeous black working cocker bitch who works on the same shoot as us every year and she doesn't chase rabbits (or maybe her owner has just been very lucky!! ph34r) and is beautifully behaved, so she is what we're wanting Bella to aspire to!
Mary
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hmmm, the dreaded rabbits, my Willow will chase rabbits >:(
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My labs are trained not to chase rabbits and anything other furry and dont. My cocker on the other hand has started to chase them and she is in training to stop this at the moment.
This is not just a good idea to train working dogs not to chase but all dogs as it is infact illegal to have you're dog chase certain other animals. ie hares/deer.
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This is not just a good idea to train working dogs not to chase but all dogs as it is infact illegal to have you're dog chase certain other animals. ie hares/deer.
Is it? :huh:
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My labs are trained not to chase rabbits and anything other furry and dont. My cocker on the other hand has started to chase them and she is in training to stop this at the moment.
So is Alfie! ::) The thing with rabbits is that they just pop up out of nowhere, at least with sheep/deer etc. you can spot them in advance! >:(
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This is not just a good idea to train working dogs not to chase but all dogs as it is infact illegal to have you're dog chase certain other animals. ie hares/deer.
Is it? :huh:
Yes, in Scotland anyway. It comes under the hunting ban although I have a feeling it only applies if you have two or more dogs. I think it's actually illegal to 'encourage' them to chase a wild animal but the difficulty would be in proving that you weren't encouraging them to do it so safer not to let them do it at all (and better for the wildlife as well!).
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Well yes it's illegal for you and your dogs to hunt them. But they have to prove intent to hunt. So if my 5 dogs chase a deer, "they" would have to prove I went out with intent to hunt a deer....
I'm actually quite impressed with my dogs' hunting skills, not many dogs can catch healthy rabbits ! ;)
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Well yes it's illegal for you and your dogs to hunt them. But they have to prove intent to hunt. So if my 5 dogs chase a deer, "they" would have to prove I went out with intent to hunt a deer....
I'm actually quite impressed with my dogs' hunting skills, not many dogs can catch healthy rabbits ! ;)
Thanx for clearing that up, Penel ;)
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Well yes it's illegal for you and your dogs to hunt them. But they have to prove intent to hunt. So if my 5 dogs chase a deer, "they" would have to prove I went out with intent to hunt a deer....
I'm actually quite impressed with my dogs' hunting skills, not many dogs can catch healthy rabbits ! ;)
The Police only have to 'reasonably suspect' you are hunting with your dogs or that you are about to hunt in order to perform an arrest and they can also seize and confiscate dogs and vehicles which they suspect are being used in connection with hunting.
In February of this year two men in Lancashire were found guilty in court of hunting rabbits with lurchers and were fined and there have been similar fines for hunting foxes and hares also.
I do not let my dogs chase any wild mammals, it is not worth the risk imo.
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Fern's been out working a couple of times ;)
But we need some more training and I've recently (well today in fact) found what i hope is going to be a brill trainer to help me, have to speak with / pick the persons brains i'm meeting tomorrow ;)
(I've been looking for pheasent pens and rabbit pens to help me in her training ;) )
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The Police only have to 'reasonably suspect' you are hunting with your dogs or that you are about to hunt in order to perform an arrest and they can also seize and confiscate dogs and vehicles which they suspect are being used in connection with hunting.
In February of this year two men in Lancashire were found guilty in court of hunting rabbits with lurchers and were fined and there have been similar fines for hunting foxes and hares also.
I do not let my dogs chase any wild mammals, it is not worth the risk imo.
oh c'mon, it's quite likely those two men were very obviously poachers, they probably had bags to put their kills in, knives, etc etc.... a vehicle used for hunting is likely to be a 4 x 4 with lamps on the back, and camouflage equipment in it. I am guessing you don't know many working lurchermen do you....(pest controllers I mean, not poachers...)
They are really not likely to arrest me when my dogs occasionally catch a rabbit ::)
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Well yes it's illegal for you and your dogs to hunt them. But they have to prove intent to hunt. So if my 5 dogs chase a deer, "they" would have to prove I went out with intent to hunt a deer....
I'm actually quite impressed with my dogs' hunting skills, not many dogs can catch healthy rabbits ! ;)
The Police only have to 'reasonably suspect' you are hunting with your dogs or that you are about to hunt in order to perform an arrest and they can also seize and confiscate dogs and vehicles which they suspect are being used in connection with hunting.
In February of this year two men in Lancashire were found guilty in court of hunting rabbits with lurchers and were fined and there have been similar fines for hunting foxes and hares also.
I do not let my dogs chase any wild mammals, it is not worth the risk imo.
hmmmm.... but these cases actually sound like they WERE intending to hunt?
with the best will in the world sometimes a dog WILL chase a rabbit/deer or worse, horse/cow/sheep no matter how well they are trained, so I don't think any of us can be over confident about our dogs training - we can do our best.
I think these 'cases' were pursued to make a point about the hunting ban, and I really cannot see the overstretched wiltshire police coming out to arrest Jarvis and me if he 'accidentally' pursued a rabbit. As he doesn't, through luck not training (happy to admit my training fallibilities) we will just have to rely on the duck and pheasant police catching us for now....working on that. ::)
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The Police only have to 'reasonably suspect' you are hunting with your dogs or that you are about to hunt in order to perform an arrest and they can also seize and confiscate dogs and vehicles which they suspect are being used in connection with hunting.
In February of this year two men in Lancashire were found guilty in court of hunting rabbits with lurchers and were fined and there have been similar fines for hunting foxes and hares also.
I do not let my dogs chase any wild mammals, it is not worth the risk imo.
oh c'mon, it's quite likely those two men were very obviously poachers, they probably had bags to put their kills in, knives, etc etc.... a vehicle used for hunting is likely to be a 4 x 4 with lamps on the back, and camouflage equipment in it. I am guessing you don't know many working lurchermen do you....(pest controllers I mean, not poachers...)
They are really not likely to arrest me when my dogs occasionally catch a rabbit ::)
I actually know quite a few people who have working lurchers and also working terriers who are not poachers so don't make assumptions about me. I have no idea what equipment they had with them, the point I was making is that people have been arrested for letting their dogs hunt wildlife.
You may be quite the expert but not everyone who reads this forum is and people should not be under the impression that it is ok to let their dogs go after wildlife without realising that they could in fact be breaking the law and get themselves into trouble. You are clearly of a different pov but I'd rather be safe than sorry in this situation and I would imagine that many other people would too.
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I think these 'cases' were pursued to make a point about the hunting ban, and I really cannot see the overstretched wiltshire police coming out to arrest Jarvis and me if he 'accidentally' pursued a rabbit. As he doesn't, through luck not training (happy to admit my training fallibilities) we will just have to rely on the duck and pheasant police catching us for now....working on that. ::)
Helen, as I've already said above, this is not the point I was trying to make - police coming out to arrest people with ONE dog 'accidentally' chasing a rabbit ::) Apart from anything else as I've already said the law only applies to groups of two or more dogs. As has been pointed out many times on COL not everyone who reads these posts has the benefit of the vast knowledge that some seem to have and therefore I thought that in this case where the hunting law is concerned it was best to make it clear what is actually permitted and what is not. People can then make informed decisions about what they do and don't let their dogs do, that's up to them.
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for goodness sake, i was only trying to inject a bit of humour as this was starting to get a bit heated ::)
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Glad to see that it's not just Bella's vice of choice!!! She's great with pet rabbits, but there's just something so tempting about the wild ones!!! ph34r (only hopefully she'll stop the habbit soon with our training)
Totally agree with everyones comments on training dogs not to chase animals, however we all know what mischief the little thugs will get up to, usually in the most embarrasing situation possible and completely out of the blue! It's a shame that the law has been rather heavy handedly used in these situations, problems can arise with a rather black and white law structure being used to patrol situations where shades of grey and misunderstandings can easily exist and occur. Although hopefully the law will be effective in helping to protect the wildlife in the UK, I think hares are wonderful creatures (doubt Bella would ever catch one of these and she'd never hear the last of it from me if she did catch one! ph34r)
Anyway, hope everyone elses training is going well, such beautiful weather for it too :D
Mary
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This is something I got into on another forum and I was actually wrong. It is not illegal to hunt rabbits as they are classed as vermin.
but you must have the land owners permission.
Other certain animals can be flushed by a dog to be shot but the dog must be under control.
I caught a chap the other day letting his dog hunt out of control and it pegged and injured a pheasant of which he had to dispatch. What would anyone do if their dog did that and they were not compitant enough to put that bird out of it's misery or a hare or even worse a deer? :o
It is a must that dogs don't chase IMO. ;)
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This is something I got into on another forum and I was actually wrong. It is not illegal to hunt rabbits as they are classed as vermin.
but you must have the land owners permission.
Other certain animals can be flushed by a dog to be shot but the dog must be under control.
I caught a chap the other day letting his dog hunt out of control and it pegged and injured a pheasant of which he had to dispatch. What would anyone do if their dog did that and they were not compitant enough to put that bird out of it's misery or a hare or even worse a deer? :o
It is a must that dogs don't chase IMO. ;)
This is what i need to learn stopping Fern chasing certain things ;)
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This is something I got into on another forum and I was actually wrong. It is not illegal to hunt rabbits as they are classed as vermin.
but you must have the land owners permission.
Other certain animals can be flushed by a dog to be shot but the dog must be under control.
I caught a chap the other day letting his dog hunt out of control and it pegged and injured a pheasant of which he had to dispatch. What would anyone do if their dog did that and they were not compitant enough to put that bird out of it's misery or a hare or even worse a deer? :o
It is a must that dogs don't chase IMO. ;)
This is what i need to learn stopping Fern chasing certain things ;)
of course, i agree with all your comments re dogs not chasing - and i do keep my dog under control (jarv pegged a cock pheasant last year - cue very peeved pheasant with a few missing tail feathers and a big dent to it's dignity - he was unharmed). I do my best not to let him chase anything (you got me on seagulls tho, these are his exception).
What I was trying to put across was that accidents do happen, and if your dog escapes your control and does catch a rabbit/hare/duck/pheasant/pigeon it is up then this can not be conceived as 'hunting'.
What i do find quite concerning is that in my experience gun dog owners (even with gundogs as pets, and i include show cockers as gun dogs) are very respectful of the wildlife around them, it is usually inexperienced pet owners that
are oblivious of their dogs chasing and hunting.
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Seagulls not sure either :005:
Yes there is alot of respectful dog owners and thats a great thing :blink:
Off to watch dog borstal
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Off to watch dog borstal
aaah...there we must disagree ph34r :shades:
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I need to look into a trainer that I have found that has rabbit and pheasant pens to help train dogs, Fern is a nightmare in chasing / flushing out ph34r
I'm hoping that this trainer I have located is a good one and think they are, as they are recommended by another COLer ;)
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Off to watch dog borstal
aaah...there we must disagree ph34r :shades:
Do you not like it? I get my kill at it :005:
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Its funny cos we bought Fern to be the lovely pet that she is although she was meant to be sold to a game keeper - we lived in a town and I remember bringing her home and saying to OH that maybe this was the start of a new lifestyle (going out in flat caps gun in hand :005:) and then a year later we move to the rural end of a village and by coincidence somebody (for the first time in the village ) starts rearing pheasant chicks for shooting. She goes mad on pheasant scent, but we have to put her on a lead as she's not trained and just keeps running! BUT since the season ended its not been such a problem and there are two or three pheasants near our garden every day, so she has now got used to them - which is good, because we don't want her upsetting the local gamekeeper do we ph34r we would like to think she would be a good gun dog, but we are too soft to put her through the training - her sister went up to where she was conceived!? [that's the human term but can't be right for dogs is it?!] and had to sleep outdoors and stuff - she's not too bad with rabbits, but that might be cos we have one! We put it in a run and sometimes have a job getting it to come out so we put Fern in to shooh bunny out and they start kissing ! :-\ :D
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Caro
I am the softest person you could know. My heart melts with animals. :luv: I have 1 fully trained gun dog and two that are being trained. :blink:
It doesn't matter how soft you are the training is not hard its repetative and you can only get you're dogs to work for you out of love and mutual respect. ;)
I went years trying to find a gun dog trainer that suited me and have been to lots. I have found who I believe to be the best he is here in perthshire. He has a natural gift with dogs and uses firm but not harsh or cruel methods to train. Why not give it a go Gun dog training is superb even though you may never actually work you're dog. :D
Cazzie
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when we take the spaniels out with the deerhounds the spaniels flush the rabbits the deerhounds catch them and the carcases feed the ferrets...I hate dead things so I leave all that to my sister and yes we are on our own land so its legal.. AND my sister has really good recall on her two older dogs should they take off after a deer she can call them off it. the pups a bit young yet but I imagine he will end up as obedient as the other two.. :luv:
my lot are too busy following a sent and dont look up but the sighthounds have the advantage there they see exactly where the rabbit is going. tho maggie has knocked henry off stride in her haste to beat him to the rabbit and the rabbit then gets away .. and leaves a very peed off henry behind.. ;)
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I went years trying to find a gun dog trainer that suited me and have been to lots. I have found who I believe to be the best he is here in perthshire. He has a natural gift with dogs and uses firm but not harsh or cruel methods to train. Why not give it a go Gun dog training is superb even though you may never actually work you're dog. :D
Cazzie
Cazzie - i will talk to you later I NEED THIS MAN of yours :005:
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when we take the spaniels out with the deerhounds the spaniels flush the rabbits the deerhounds catch them and the carcases feed the ferrets...I hate dead things so I leave all that to my sister and yes we are on our own land so its legal..
I think what Nicola is saying is that the law could be interpreted in such a way that makes this illegal, too ;) Certainly, if a single spaniel chasing a rabbit could be considered illegal, then using spaniels to flush the rabbits and deerhounds to catch them to feed to the ferrets could definitely be interpreted as pre-meditation ;)
Land owners can be prosecuted for allwoing this to happen on their land, too ph34r
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when we take the spaniels out with the deerhounds the spaniels flush the rabbits the deerhounds catch them and the carcases feed the ferrets...I hate dead things so I leave all that to my sister and yes we are on our own land so its legal..
I think what Nicola is saying is that the law could be interpreted in such a way that makes this illegal, too ;) Certainly, if a single spaniel chasing a rabbit could be considered illegal, then using spaniels to flush the rabbits and deerhounds to catch them to feed to the ferrets could definitely be interpreted as pre-meditation ;)
Land owners can be prosecuted for allwoing this to happen on their land, too ph34r
Rabbits are vermin and the way the law is it is not illegal to hunt/chase/despatch them with a dog as long as you have the owners permission or you are the land owner. But with other species as you say its a case of proving you had no intention of hunting with you're dog, which in 99% of dog owners do not. One thing though I will mention is peoples ignorance of the damage dogs can do by hunting out of control especially in the bird nesting season & when deer have their young.
Can we change the topic back to my original post & hear any good stories on working/training etc. :D
Cazzie x :blink:
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if you check out the working topics cazzie you will find there was a poll not so long ago.....
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It doesn't matter how soft you are the training is not hard its repetative and you can only get you're dogs to work for you out of love and mutual respect. ;)
Thanks Cazzie, she is really good she sits, stays and comes pretty much all the time, but when she has her nose down on a scent I can't stop her. Sometimes she will go a whole field's length - I've been told a way to stop this is to bring them back to the spot and tell them to STAY but she always comes back - I've also been told to only call once and then hide, which we do and it works, but only once she's lost interest in what she's chasing usually because its flown up. Any suggestions? I am willing to try it, I just don't really know what's best. :-\
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It doesn't matter how soft you are the training is not hard its repetative and you can only get you're dogs to work for you out of love and mutual respect. ;)
Thanks Cazzie, she is really good she sits, stays and comes pretty much all the time, but when she has her nose down on a scent I can't stop her. Sometimes she will go a whole field's length - I've been told a way to stop this is to bring them back to the spot and tell them to STAY but she always comes back - I've also been told to only call once and then hide, which we do and it works, but only once she's lost interest in what she's chasing usually because its flown up. Any suggestions? I am willing to try it, I just don't really know what's best. :-\
Alfie (15 months) would have done this with birds when he was younger. Every time he ignored the stop whistle (I don't recall him off game, I stop whistle him and then send him on working again) he got scruffed back to the spot where he was when I first whistled him and he ignored me and made to wait there. If he moved again, he got scruffed back again and so on and so on, you must be consistent and do this every time. I would then send him away in a different direction to the one he'd been going in himself, this is very important. When you are training like this you have to watch them like hawks - your job is to get her attention BEFORE she gets lost in the scent. I can read Alfie like a book now and know when he's about to 'go' and I can pre-empt him. It is exhausting sometimes but it works. He is 100x better now than he was and I can stop whistle him off flying game every time... I've yet to test him with fur (i.e. in a rabbit pen) but if the training has been done then it shouldn't be an issue.
If you are wanting to work your dog though you don't always want to whistle them off a scent as this is how they work when they are flushing. If you keep calling them back when they are working a trail then they will become confused and discouraged. They should work properly though and quarter the ground rather than just run in a straight line as far as they can, if I need to I control Alfie in this way with directional pips on the whistle and hand signals to get him to work to the left and right, although now he generally does this himself and I don't need to do anything.
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Hi Caro,
What I did with Bella when she was younger, to get her to stay close and not go off foraging for cheap flushing thrills in the next county >:( , was to take her into a field with long grass and cast her off to look fo game for me (any game had previously been cleared from the field by myself stomping around with Bella kept in a sit position tethered to a post) As she looked for game I would throw nice things for her to fetch (without her seeing me do this) in and around a 15 foot raidus of myself. Through consistent use of this method she started to learn that 'game' was only to be found close to me and that if she deviated too far from me then no game was present. If you combiine this with the method Nicloa uses then I'm sure your dog will learn that straying too far will incurr an abrupt halt to the fun of searching for game and that the best fun and most flushes only occur near you anyway so there is very little reward for her to run off for miles.
My Bella now stays close to us when we go on a walk and also when we take her beating, she really enjoys being with us instead of leading the way and going off on her own agenda.
I hope this helps! :D
Mary
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Really helpful replies thanks - we have some fields so I can try it - I use the whistle to call her back - but have not taught her specific commands with it - so if she comes back anyway, should I just scruff her,tell her to wait and then we go back the way we came? (she usually legs it off course!) as I don't ever send her in a direction we just walk along together and she trots off a little bit ahead - she checks that I'm still there quite a bit though - I've got a nice toy pheasant that I might take out with me to try Mary's idea - just hope nobody sees me! :005: She has got LOADS better since the shooting season ended - also the pheasants are all over the place mating, so she's getting a bit de-sensitised - pheasant, what pheasant? Oh him, yeh ok whatever ! I just want to sort it out before the breeding starts again- if she was good coming back then we might be brave enough to take her out beating, but can't even consider it at the moment! The one good thing about her running off on a scent is that she gets triple the amount of exercise! :lol:
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Woody has started coming rough shooting with me. He turned 2 years old in March. Because it's still new to him I've bought an 8m/26ft retractable lead that I keep him on...it's not ideal but it keeps him at a good working distance for flushing game. On the couple of occasions I have let him off he does really well and comes back (mostly) to call but he gets excited and goes too far ahead... A perfect example was last week when he flushed a big cock pheasant at the far end of the field we were walking up...out of season I know but the bird was well out of shot when he flushed it. Other times I let him off to work a copse or suchlike he's really good, and he gets more obedient the longer we're out when he gets too tired to run off!
He made his first retrieve last week too. My friend shot a rabbit. We weren't with him at the time but came over to where he was and let Woody off, pointing him in the right direction and telling him to "Fetch it"... he went straight past it and couldn't find it but when I went and actually showed it to him he had a good sniff and after a cautious start and much coaxing he retrieved to hand. He has since been much better retrieving a crow.
Here he is with the prize!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v74/julianf/DSC00052.jpg
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Wee sole :luv: what a good boy ;)
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I take mine beating so at least I try to work them. The dogs are better than their handler tho ;) ;)
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Hi chaps, just one word of caution, if you take your dog rough shooting and you have a lead on them, do not hold a gun yourself.
Never have a dog attached to you by a lead if you are planning on shooting yourself, as this is how many shooting accident occur every year, when the dog gets excited, flushes something and you take the gun off of safety to have a shot and the dog jerks you because it is straining on the lead ph34r
Of course it is fine to have the dog on lead if you're not holding a gun yourself, just be careful you don't trip over a fellow shooting companion with the lead! :police:
Best wishes
Mary