anyone shooting any birds? I hear duff is

Wacking and stacking em...

Awesome I.will be up your way in a couple weeks. I will bank on full scouting reports

We have done ok. It's been all local birds around us with every duck dynasty idiot sky busting them and a rookie partner with us who keeps trying to skybust as well, so we have had to be on our A game this year. I'm looking forward to colder weather that drives off the less dedicated hunters.

Skybusting is a derogatory term that we Americans like to use for waterfowl hunters that take poor shots at birds in various circumstances such as shooting at birds that are in excess of 40 yards or more and shooting multiple times and missing. Basically it taking shots at birds that will either miss and educate birds or cripple them with poor chance for retrieval. My fiance likes to bring birds in very close for 10-20 yrd shots and work them into landing in the decoys. We find chasing crippled birds around the marsh is very hard work and also do not like risking losing our birds with longer distance shots.

Like you we must also use non-toxic shot, no lead but there is a type of non toxic shot we personally use that is very similar to lead shot in terms of density. I am envious of your private ponds that you have access too along with a little less competition it seems. I watched your video about waterfowling and smiled to myself thinking about all the mischief my fiance could do to those uneducated UK birds with his calling skills and tactics.

Now after having one of those critters. I wouldn't go back to not having one.

I hear ya! That's just the tip of the iceberg when you figure in all the training that they need. I can't even begin to figure out how much I've spent on birds training Springer Spaniels over the years. WAY more than what the pup cost!!!! A buddy and I would go thru 9 pigeons per dog per training day. When you have 4 dogs between you, that's a lot of birds. Then when the trial season started we'd start using pheasants......

Luckily Labs are trained with a lot of retriever work, which uses bumpers (retrieving dummies) but you still have to use birds to get them used to picking up stuff with feathers on it. Then you have to use larger bumpers and birds to simulate geese.....

But, once you hunt with a well trained dog you'll not want to hunt without one ever again.

I have one that is my little project dog back from when my parents were breeders. She is a Boykin/Springer cross from one accidental litter we had. No one wanted her so I kept her as mine.

I pretend I know what I am doing with her and she is none the wiser, poor thing. She does love the water and will pick up the birds, but does have a bit of a gunshyness issue that has been a tricky knot to unravel. You can shoot fireworks over this dog, run around in a thunderstorm with her and bang around pots and pans all day and she doesn't care, and play the sounds of gunshots over a speaker as loudly as you want and she doesn't care, but if a real firearm is shot around her, she will tuck her tail and suck herself right next to my knee and won't leave my side for anything. The clicking noises of breaking open the firearm also makes her nervous, along with the motion of shouldering the gun, which I find really weird, as this was not the case in the past.

The only thing I can think is that something happened to her involving a firearm while I was away. I used to live with family members and an in-law who loved to shoot his rifle a lot on the farm. He wasn't fond of my dog though, I caught him a couple times hitting her for things that were well past the point of being able to punish her for like finding a turned over trash can 1 hour later. Our neighbors would constantly shoot handguns and fireworks off as well, and the dog kennel was about 70 yards from where they would cause mayhem.

I have started her back from the bottom with using a little cap gun. We have made enough progress to where she will start looking around when it is fired for the dummy and she finally started working without having her tail tucked between her legs the entire time. I am trying to convince my fiance to assist me with reintroducing the shotgun very slowly at a distance, but finding a time when he is willing to do it has been very difficult. He gets irritated because she will not listen to his commands very well at all.

I must know Billy, why do you think women make better dog trainers? I have seen some very fine dogs that are the product of a man's training. Are you saying that in the hands of a woman it would have been an even better dog? hehehehehehe

Billy, I agree with you. There. Now I've done and ed off some of my male friends. Oh well, if the truth hurts, so be it.