Can someone give examples of how you train a dog to hunt, or train one to hunt better?
My "training" (if thats what you choose to call it) has always solely consisted of providing repeated exposure to allow the dog to develop and refine the skills that he/she was born with. I have raised a lot of puppies over the years, and to this day have been unable to make one hunt to my satisfaction that wasn't born with the desire to do so.
I can take a set of pups at +/- 8 months old to the woods that have never had a hand on them, turn them loose and sit on the tailgate watching for a while and within about 5 times of doing this tell which ones were born with it. So far in the litters I have raised, I haven't been wrong.
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Bryant,
I can't speak for other breeds or strains but I used to identify which pups trailed and winded and ranged out a little between the ages of 8 weeks to 12 weeks. At 4 months I took them to the woods and identified who rolled out and went hunting. I like breeding natural ability and not dogs that need losts of exposure.
This testing/training can identify the great ones but some that do not show much can be good at a later date.
