The Scientific Education of Dogs for the Gun (History of Shooting Series - Gundogs & Training)

H. Nevill Fitt

Description

The author writes from his then thirty-seven years of practical experience, beginning with his first successfully trained Pointer as a teenager. Some of his methods will prove controversial, but the overall advice given in this book has easily stood the test of time and will benefit all first-time trainers or anyone wishing to improve on their present methods. 220 pages contain sixteen detailed chapters dealing with: - "The Rationalle." - Kennel Management. - Retrievers ( 4 chapters). - Wild Fowling. - Pointers and Setters (8 chapters). - Field Trials. - Spaniels. The eight chapters concentrating on the "breaking" or training of Pointers and Setters will prove of enormous interest to shooting men, field triallers, and falconers. The author's admiration for the reasoning power of the dog, which makes itself evident on every other page, will assuredly be shared by all who read this book. Many of the earliest sporting books, particularly those dating back to the 1800s, are now extremely scarce and very expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

Informations

• Publié par: Read Books Ltd.
• Date de parution: 08 janvier 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781528769822
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE
SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION OF DOGS FOR THE GUN
BY
H. H.
Printed in Great Britain at THE WAVERLEY PRESS Forest Gate. London. E.7
To
GEORGE TEASDALE TEASDALE-BUCKELL, ESQ.,
AS
A THOROUGH SPORTSMAN
AND
A PAST MASTER IN THE ART OF DOG BREAKING
THIS VOLUME IS
DEDICATED
AS A MARK OF FRIENDSHIP AND ESTEEM
BY
H. H.
PREFACE
To OriginaL Edition ,

T HE instructions and remarks on Dog Education contained in this volume are the result of the amateur practical experience of thirty-seven years of the life of an enthusiastic sportsman and dog lover. By the study of Colonel Hutchinson s well-known book, I broke my first pointer at the age of sixteen.
Ever since that time I have been learning and unlearning by the light of common sense carried out into constant practise, and have thus evolved the system I have endeavoured to describe.
Many sportsmen of the present age will probably receive with something like incredulity many of my anecdotes of the intelligence and reasoning power of the dog; to such I would boldly say, work out the system yourself with patience and temper, and you will find that it is possible to go much farther and to learn much more than it has hitherto been possible for me to do. I am still learning every day, and I am convinced that no man has yet discovered, or probably ever will discover the extent to which the Instinct of animals, more especially that of the dog, can be cultivated, and thus improved into a Reasoning power little inferior to that of an educated man.
SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION OF DOGS.
( By the Editor of British Hunting . )

S INCE the first edition of this book was issued shooting over dogs has in some measure been displaced by the ever increasing popularity of driving. But it is still constantly lamented that much good sport is spoilt every season by the presence in the field of imperfectly trained dogs. For instance, the value of a well-broken retriever, both from the sporting and the intrinsic standpoints, has never been higher than it is to-day, and it seems to be an opportune time to publish a reprint of an eminently practical work on Dog Education.
Providing one has the necessary patience and the time to spare, the art of dog training unfailingly proves delightful. The failures, as occasionally there must be, especially at first, are soon forgotten in the pleasure engendered by the gradual evolution of the perfectly-schooled animal. A real treasure he is to the amateur who breaks him for his own use; a source of no little profit to the professional who can still find a ready market for the carefully-educated dog for the gun.
Primarily this book was written by an amateur for amateurs, but it was the product of many years of practical experience in the full sense of the expression. The author s admiration for the reasoning power of the dog, which makes itself evident on every other page, will assuredly be shared by the majority of his readers. Once the breaker has come to understand his dog-to realise the mental qualities and intelligence of the animal-he may be said to have advanced a considerable way towards making a faithful servant and valued friend.
The main object of the breaker is to produce a dog who can be relied upon to do the right thing at the critical moment; and that, after all, is what the shooting man of to-day stands in need of.
ARTHUR W. COATEN.
CONTENTS.

PART I.
I.
THE RATIONALE
II.
KENNEL MANAGEMENT

PART II.
I.
RETRIEVERS
II.
RETRIEVERS ( continued )
III.
RETRIEVERS ( continued )
IV.
RETRIEVERS ( continued )
V.
WILD FOWLING

PART III.
I.
POINTERS AND SETTERS
II.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued )
III.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued )
IV.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued )
V.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued )
VI.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued )
VII.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued )
VIII.
POINTERS AND SETTERS ( continued ) FIELD TRIALS

PART IV.
I.
SPANIELS
PART I.

CHAPTER I.
THE RATIONALE.
B EFORE a man sets himself seriously to any work or business, he first of all invariably either gathers from the experience of others or evolves of his own inner consciousness a full perception of the end to which he purposes to attain; and not only so, but to a greater or less degree the means by which he intends to compass that end. The ordinary dog-breaker is an exception to this common-sense rule; he has but a very hazy idea of what he wants, and a still more hazy one of how to obtain it. I am quite aware that the greater part of the professors of the art would utterly deny this impeachment. They think they know both, and this is the reason why, as a rule, they are such utter failures.
Here s a setter or a pointer, they say; he has got to be made to point, back, come to whistle or holloa, drop to wing and shot, and not chase, c.; here s a retriever, he has got never to go till he s told, and then he has got to find the bird and bring it back. A good shrill whistle, a good stout whip, a check cord and spiked collar for emergencies, and a plentiful command of language, and the thing is done. Is it? Follow this system and succeed in your object, and in nine cases out of ten you get a sulky slave, a senseless automaton, a mechanical apparatus. It may serve its turn, do its business as long as no complication occurs, but the moment you want something out of the common, presence of mind, thought, or great courage and perseverance, you are nowhere. I say the dog-breaker has to do this; he has an animal which has a certain instinct inherent and cultivated by transmission; that instinct always has an object in view. In sporting dogs the object is to catch the game in one way or another. The breaker has to cultivate that instinct in the same direction, as a rule, in which it naturally leads, and so to raise it into something far higher than instinct, even into the Reasoning Power, which is supposed by some to be the attribute of man only; and then to get that reasoning power to direct the actions of the animal toward the end it naturally has in view, so that it shall discover of its own head that self-control and obedience are the best, and indeed the only, way of attaining its desires, which desires shall ere long be identical with his own.
It is often said, Very few men can break a dog. I quite agree that very few men do, but I don t believe in the cannot, if they will only take the same pains to learn this science as they take to learn many a lower one. There are certain attributes a man must have, of course. He must be fond of animals, he must have great patience, perseverance, and a perfect control of temper. He must also have prompt decision and a strong will. If you have these, you can break a dog, and do it well, too; but if you are going to be a first-rate dog-breaker, you must have something else, too, and it is a case here of nascitur non fit . You must have, first, a natural and sharp intuition into character, be able to know what a dog is thinking about, and how he is going to carry out his thoughts; and secondly, lots of animal magnetism. It is perfectly astounding what a man with this can do with an animal, where a man devoid of it can do nothing at all. I have held a lot of dogs by the magnetic power of will from doing wrong hundreds of yards away from me till they have given up their intense wish to run riot; while, on the other hand, I have, as I was thus holding them, turned to address a remark to a friend sotto voce , and thus broken the link of connection, and, hey presto! the spell is dissolved, and every sort of devilry is committed. I dare say I shall be told that this sort of thing is done by the power of the eye. It is a common thing to say (I have said it often myself before I learned better), but how on earth can your eye influence anything a quarter of a mile away, especially when the thing to be influenced has its back to you? I will give some good instances of this sort of thing farther on.
CHAPTER II.
KENNEL MANAGEMENT.
I T may be said that the housing and the feeding of dogs have but little to do with their education.
Excuse me! They have everything to do with it. A young dog, just like a child, must be in perfect health in order to assimilate knowledge, and if either the one or the other is sickly or unwell, far better let him alone altogether until he is perfectly restored to his normal salubrity. Now the health of a dog is positively dependent on kennels, feeding, and proper exercise.
First their Kennels .
It is to me perfectly astounding the carelessness and short-sightedness of the generality of the world about the way in which they lodge their dogs. Here is a man who does not care what he gives for a brace or two of setters or pointers, and resolves to go in for breeding on a large scale perhaps. He will spare no expense in having the very best food and the best attendance he can procure, and yet those same dogs are lodged in a draughty, undrained, damp, stinking hole that is not fit to put a pig in, and so one fine morning out comes a brace of these priceless ones. Dear me, Don has got a cough; I wonder how he got that. Why from sleeping most likely in a thorough draught, or on damp straw. Or, after your crack has put up a single bird or two up wind without an attempt at a find, or got so close to a covey that it has risen before you could get up, Why, Belle s nose seems to be gone to-day.
What wonder, when she has been in a reeking atmosphere of foul drains for a week? Or, again, Dido goes very dicky over that