# stop eating my birds!!



## puddle jumper (Mar 29, 2006)

You all have been great with the advice and responses in the past so I thought where better to come to with my new problems.

1. I tried playing with my 5 month old chocolate lab and a pheasent wing and as soon as she got it in her mouth she tried to swallow it whole. She absolutely would not let go of it no matter what I did. I finally let her have it and waited for her to quit paying attention and stole it. Also one day shot a rabbit in the yard and she beat me to it and tried to eat it. It's like as soon as she gets something dead around her she goes nuts and is a totally different dog. I have a feeling this could have a huge effect on retrieving dead birds.

2. She constantly mouths her training dummys. Would a dead fowl trainer have any positive influence on her putting the dummy square in her mouth and not chewing on it or what else could I try.

3. When I make her sit and stay and go across the field and give her the hear command she tries to run me over. Not a huge problem but kind of annoying when she tries to jump into my chest every time. It's actually starting to hurt!!


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## Britman (Dec 18, 2002)

Sounds like a real nice high driven dog. These are just a few things I would try to help reduce the mouthing. Take those pheasent wings and tie them around a metal soup can, this way when your dog tries to mouth it has a hard surface under it and it won't be so pleasent. Also when working on retrieving keep a check cord on the dog and don't give it time to think about mouthing, as soon as the dog has the object in its mouth use the check cord to bring the dog to you. The next thing is make the dog hold a dummy in its mouth when the dog starts to mouth the dummy just lightly pop the dog with your hand under the chin and say hold, repeat this two or three times and quit for the day, continue to repeat till the dog just holds and does not mouth the object. Finally don't allow your dog to play with any type of training dummy or wings, these should be put away as soon as training is done.

Also remember to not come down on the dog, just show it what you want it to do.


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## puddle jumper (Mar 29, 2006)

I'll have to try that soup can idea. As far as her training toys, they are put away until it is time to work. She is definatly a high octane dog but she is getting to be more and more fun as she is learning. Hopefully that soup can idea will work, it would be nice to know that all of the time I'm putting in with her won't be in vain because she keeps eating all of the birds. Thanks!


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

keep in mind that a 5 month old pup will try to eat virtually everything it gets a hold of so your probably worring about something that time will cure. They almost always grow out of that by 1 year of age


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## ryanps18 (Jun 23, 2006)

One other thing to add to Bob's comment. The dog may also be getting new teeth in so I would stop all retreiving for a while of thats the case. Good thing is it will give you more time for obdedience work, Yes I am an obediance nazi if most of you have not figgued that out.

I think many people forget the importance of a good obedience foundation before they start throwing dummies endlessly for thier dogs. If you buy a good retriever he should have that hard wired into him. Therefore why train the instinct side of dog before you have complete control of the dog. Iam not saying never throw for a dog I would give a 5 month old dog mabyee 20 throws a week, with me picking up close to half of them. Result is a steady dog on the line and an easier dog to stop on the whistle ect....... I konw OB iis not fun but if you want a dog to be proud of it is a must. Take your time you have plenty of it.


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