This past week I have had a great "awakening," I guess you could say. Or more precisely, my dog did.
I have a two year old Lab/collie that is "my baby." She sleeps on my pillow, rides in the front seat of the truck, always gets a bit of my food, etc. But, she is a Labrador, and it shows.
Despite not having the retrieval part of being a retriever down, she has a nose and is good at using it. Ever since the first time I took her for a walk as a two month old puppy, she has been able to track, and do it without any training. She just did it. Once, at nine months old we trailed a coyote who was carrying a dead rabbit for over a mile. Another time, she found a grouse in a bush and pointed, then flushed it.
Her biggest flaws are stubbornness and gun shyness. The stubbornness I blame on the border collie, and we're working through that. But the gun shyness is ridiculous. She gets scared and hides under the bed when the neighbors use a hammer: he's a hobbyist furniture maker, so it's frequent.
To break her of this, I've been working with an air rifle. It has variable pressure/velocity capabilities, so I've been shooting it with her on a leash next to me. I give her a treat before every shot (beef jerky), and have worked up in pellet velocity and volume incrementally over the past year.
Thursday, I decided to test her. We went out for our daily walk, but I brought the 22 this time. She knows what a rifle is, and is used to me carrying one when we go out (two and four legged predators lurk our woods), so everything was normal. When we got back to the truck, I had her sit at my feet and burned ten rounds into the mountain. She responded by nudging me for a treat. A small victory, but a victory none the less.
Friday, I took her out to another one of our places that I know has squirrels for days to see how it would work. Normally she just chases them when they're on the ground, then runs off when they get to the trees. We found the first squirrel and that is what happened. So I called her back to the tree and put her on the scent. While she was sniffing the base of the tree, I tossed her a treat and took a shot (I missed). It took a moment for her to figure out what just happened, but then she was back at the scent. By then the squirrel was barking at us, and it got her attention. I shot at it again (and missed again-I blame excitement), and she got even more excited.
Eventually, I gave up on that squirrel because it had gone into a hole in the tree, so I called her over and we went on. The next time she crossed a squirrel scent, she barked and took the trail. I followed and when I got to her, she had another squirrel treed, jumping up and barking, then coming to me and trying to bring me over. I never got a shot at that tree rat, but for the sake of consistency I put a round into the dirt and gave her a treat.
This went on for a few more squirrels, until I was low enough on ammo to call it a day. Gotta save a few rounds for the walk home, you know.
I was content with this development for the day, but she had more surprises for me. On the way back to the truck we have to go through a big open area where we normally see deer, coyote, ground squirrels, and jackrabbit. Normally she just chases them indiscriminately (not coyote, which is fortunate) until they get into a hole. Well, this time she got on a jackrabbit scent and starts tracking, and barking at me to follow. So I follow out after her, and she leads me to a thicket of blackberries. She then pointed, and flushed a jackrabbit. I burned through a few round trying to get it, but never did. But I realized when I looked back that she had not moved to chase the rabbit after she flushed it. Instead, she had returned to me and was sitting excitedly at heel. I told her to go get it and she took off after it. This time she tried herding it back to me, which I think is the border collie again, but I didn't complain.
I was out of ammo by then, but I let her chase the rabbit anyway until it found a hole. Then I called her off and gave her a treat.
So there you have it. The story of how my dog literally went from exuberant puppy to a squirrel treeing, rabbit running hunting dog over night. I have absolutely no explanation for this, but I'm not complaining.
To be continued, I suppose.
My Labrador has a had an Epiphany
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