I don’t really train my bird dogs. I’ve been lucky in that my three English setters have all taken quite naturally to hunting. Jade, the third of my line and the dog which will be my hunting partner again this year, started especially early.
Jade was backing and pointing birds her first fall, at about 5 months old. Setter No. 2, Doll, managed most of Jade’s training. Doll was 10, and still an experienced, effective hunter, though she was slowing down. That allowed Jade to keep up, and she shadowed Doll whenever I let them hunt together.
Fortunately for Jade, I do most of my hunting these days on smaller islands of public land. We hunt them like a professional bass angler fishes a tournament. We hit a spot and work it for all it’s worth, then get back in the truck and motor to the next spot. That meant young Jade could join us most of the time.
On vast, Western public land, where we hunt four- or five-hour loops sometimes, that’s too much running for such a young pup. It’s not good for her developing joints.
My first setter, Jack, was a handful when he was young. He was always a big-running dog. Males. They require a bit more attention than the females I prefer to hunt these days.
We lived in Flagstaff, Arizona, when Jack was young, on a mesa in the center of town. The mesa was a big, open grassland with timbered edges. We had our moments there, enjoying long walks with our new puppy.
After a month or so, Jack stopped following dutifully at our heels and became a dangerous teen. We’d walk a bit, then he’d get a whiff of something and be gone. The mesa was a relatively safe walk despite being in the center of the city. The roads were some distance, and I felt reasonably confident Jack’s wanderlust would be checked before he reached asphalt. Still, we needed to teach him not to wander too far. So, we tried a trick recommended by the Dog Whisperer.
“This time, when Jack runs off,” I told my twin daughters, who often walked with me. “We’ll move off the trail and hide.”
Eventually, Jack would come back, I explained, but since he couldn’t find us, he’d be terrified and this would teach him not to run off in the future.
When Jack ran off, the three of us hid behind a broad ponderosa.
We let him run back along the trail to where he’d ditched us, and then, as he backtracked a second time, desperate to find his humans, we stepped out to greet our panicked setter.
Alas, the dog was still a puppy, and, while terrified, lacked the cognition to connect his terror with the act of running off in the first place. The next time we stepped out on the mesa, and he got a whiff of something, he was gone again.
I needed electronics. He settled down with time, but still wore an e-collar for the rest of his life. I used it when I needed to redirect his train of thought long enough to get him under control. I used the same collar for the same purpose with Doll.
Jade, I thought, would never need electronics. Then we found the epic, 100+ Gambel’s quail coveys the Mojave Desert produced in 2025. When Jade saw that many birds running across open desert terrain, she couldn’t help herself. “What has become of my steady pointer?” I asked.
I got her a collar last year, and I’ve only used it once. Jade’s a soft dog with a good memory. She hasn’t chased a bird since.
My best piece of dog-training advice? Make sure your older dog is still a solid hunter when you get your next pup, then let the mature dog do most of the training. And pray you too will someday find yourself trailing 100-bird coveys. It’s something. It’s everything.