Gun Dog Forum

So I force fetched my 1 yr old gsp in January/February and have been running drills with him ever since. My question is has anyone had any luck with moving into whoa breaking right after ff? I understand both are hard on the pup and usually I would put a hunting season between the two, but training season hasn't really kicked in yet and I'm looking into options other than more force to piles and such.

Whoa training is no more than obedience, similar to the "stay" command. I ff'd my 9 month old this winter and also obedience trained her. She hunted all fall as a 6 month old. You have to understand that sometimes when you try to steady a dog AFTER ff, the two are contradictory. Now pup has to stand the bird instead of diving for it and retrieving it. Hopefully, the pup had a ton of bird encounters before the ff.

Thanks for the response, I guided with him so he had lots of birds. I think I'm going to give it a shot. Have an agressive target for him to be finished for fall, but don't want to be stupid about it either.

With FF completed your dog has learn how to learn. personally i have found this to be great time in the pups life to teach steady to wing and shot. Keep up a good pace in teaching new standards and reinforcing previously learned behaviors.