Nina changed my mind
I was convinced that having a hunting dog doesn't necessarily mean you need to take up hunt training. Nina, a Field Trial Labrador, and the epitome of a working retriever, changed my mind.
Meet Nina. My fourth gorgeous black Labrador lady.
Being a Labrador she’s a retriever: born and bred to fetch the game shot by a hunter.
I stayed away from hunt(ing-dog) training with my first three Labrador ladies.
But then came Nina.
And a dilemma.
Where I live, there’s little to no hunting for food. Heck, in many areas having a hunting breed dog off lead can get you fined for hunting (or poaching). Because, obviously of course, it can only mean you’re hunting.
Where I live people don’t hunt for food1 as much as to “manage nature.”2
What gets up my nose is the hunting community using “managing nature” to justify their pastime. Even taking pride in their role and the time they dedicate to it.
If you like to hunt, have the guts to own that. Acknowledge that you enjoy it. Don’t weasel out and hide behind an artificial justification.
I didn’t think about doing any hunt training with my first two Labradors, BeeJay and Jessy.
But I gave it a lot of thought with my third, Sofie.
Because she was half “show line” and half “working line”. Meaning she had more of the genetic makeup and supposedly drive (she didn’t) to work as a retriever.
I didn’t because I don’t like the atmosphere and attitude in many hunt training groups. Their hypocrisy in justifying their pastime. Their nonchalance towards the dead animals used in training. And their “the dog just has to [x]” master-slave attitude towards their dogs.
I didn’t because the groups I found used aversive, harsh training methods. I’m not proud of it but I did use similar ones when I didn’t know any better yet. Jessy proved them counterproductive. She responded with a long, thick middle finger and inspired me (forced me, more like) to get to know better and do better.
I didn’t because the idea of working with dead animals just didn’t sit well with me. Mind you, I don’t balk at handling a dead animal, but using them for what would essentially be a hobby for me and Sofie? No.
And then came Nina...
A 100% Field Trial, Labrador.
Field Trials not only want to work, they need to work.
From day one, when she’s was all of eight weeks old, it was crystal clear that Nina is happiest when she has a job to do. Hunt training was the obvious choice of job for her and that presented me with a dilemma: do I let Nina’s breeding or my sensibilities about the groups and their methods prevail?
Nina’s breeding lost.
She’d have to “make do” with other types of mind and nose work.
Nina didn’t object once. She took to every job with gusto.
Tracking and trailing, taking my shoes off, detection (sniffing out cloves in the strangest places), getting my slippers, “gymnastics” (body awareness and balance exercises), brain puzzles (figuring out how to get at wrapped and concealed food), searching the house or pushing a snack ball around for her kibble, tricks, obedience, back exercises.
Nina — not knowing any better — was happy. I was happy.
Still, her true nature couldn’t be denied. I couldn’t close my eyes to the fact that Nina will work herself to death retrieving tennis balls and to exhaustion fetching everything else. I have to put the brakes on, she won’t.
But I still wasn’t going to take up hunt training, though. For sure, I’d not do that.
Until… a trainer at the Kwispelacademie (Tail Wagging Academy) pointed me to a group she said only trains with dummies and doesn’t use force or coercion.
Wasn’t going to take her word for it — even if she had first hand experience. And I wasn’t going to take their word for it, either. I wanted to observe how they trained, first. Before exposing Nina to one of their training sessions.
Different cup of tea entirely to what I’d seen some 10 years before. So I caved.
It’s been such a joy.
I can’t help but smile watching Nina do what she was born and bred to do.
I can’t help but smile watching Nina grow her skills and confidence.
I can’t help but smile watching Nina brighten up every time we get near a training location (we have a few and she recognizes them all after a first visit).
And such a revelation.
I had thought it didn’t matter how I kept her brain occupied and found that Nina will actually do more for a tennis ball than anything else. Even dummies as it turned out.
(The video shows her jumping a ditch to fetch her tennis ball - when she’d never done that before, and hated going into water where she can’t feel the bottom.)
But anyone who cares to look, can see that hunt training — engaging in the skills for which countless generations of Field Trial Labradors in her lineage have been selected — is what she enjoys most.
She was born and bred for it. Literally. And it shows.
Edward de Bono asked the question:
“If you never change your mind, why have one?”
You have a mind. It isn’t meant to be closed to different ideas. Be open to changing it!
Though a good proportion of culled animals do end up in the pot — in hunters’ kitchens or when sold to restaurants.
Nature doesn’t need managing. It can manage itself perfectly well. Has done for eons. Until we started believing that we are separate from nature and interfering. We created the circumstances that allow many species to grow their number to proportions we don’t like. And then we “manage nature” by culling. Very strange. Giving with one hand and taking with the other.
What a wonderful story of how you found positive reinforcement training.