A great training session

[EddieP]

I meant to post this earlier, but somehow time has slipped by.

A couple of weeks ago, we went down to the Hamptworth Estate for an hours session with Nick Gregory. It was brilliant! An absolutely top, top guy who put all our worries to rest and gave us a few things to work on with Alfie and most importantly made sure we were having fun and so was the pup. We then had a demo of a 12 month bitch he is training - wow! If Alfie is half as good when fully trained I'd be over the moon. Just watching him with Alfie and the things he was getting him to do meant we learnt so much.

We have never owned a gun dog (I've never had a dog before) so we thought it really important to learn what we should and shouldn't be doing. We're not planning on working him (though that may change beating maybe??) but thought doing some gun dog specific would be really rewarding for bit both Alfie and us.

Needless to say I can't recommend him enough. We're going back in a month or two when he is old enough to do a bit more.

Ed

[Top Barks]

what did he give you to work on? what sort of methods does he use?

[EddieP]

Hi Top Barks,

At the moment, some really simple stuff. Main thing he wants us to do is get him retrieving. Tennis ball, socks - anything really, but nothing too interesting. We've had some good sessions and some bad. Lots of praise, keeping it short so pup doesn't get bored, talking in quite high pitched / silly voice ( ), not throwing the retrieve too far. Really trying to keep it fun. Most difficult part for us at the moment is we keep trying to do too much and Alfie then pegs it off with the retrieve.

The other thing we are doing is getting him used to the whistle. He's been really good picking up the recall and now we've just started trying the stop whistle when his bum hits the ground.

The main difficulty we are having is only doing 3 sessions a week as we always want to do more and then he gets bored / finds something more interesting.

I think this could get quite addictive!

[Top Barks]

I think this could get quite addictive!

I'm afraid dog training does

[JohnW]

I think this could get quite addictive!

I'm afraid dog training does

Almost as addictive as Cockersonline.  

[Nicola]

It's great that you're doing some gun training with Alfie, I'm sure he'll love it and I bet if you actually try working him you won't look back

[EddieP]

I hope so. Really enjoying it. Can't wait for the next session.