Good dogs and handlers make mistakes. Nowhere is this more obvious than at a retriever Field Trial.  Small errors committed by either dog or handler separate the top four finishers earning place ribbons from the balance of the field who go home empty-handed. Same rule can apply to hunt tests. It’s not unusual to see a Hunt Test with only one-third of the dogs passing. Seasoned hunt test dogs and handlers make mistakes too.

The sunrise had just peaked up over the horizon for our morning training session. The last mark down/go bird was long and she pinned it. It was one of those moments when you start thinking, “yeah, she’s on fire this morning.” Regrettably, I was about to smother out the flame.

As she sat down to pick up the short memory bird on my left side. I tapped my left leg, rotated my stance slightly clockwise and gave her the command “here” to realign her spine, head and eyes from a position of 12 to 2 O’clock. She reluctantly complied on the second request. I cast her off from my side with her call name with a quiet tone to remind her it’s a short mark.

She promptly ran out about the same depth as the fall, hunted a little circle, gave up and sat her fanny down. Ugh, she “popped” on me!   I crossed my arms and barked at her, “hunt’em up!”  This is a mark not a blind, nor did I whistle you to stop.  Out into the field I walked fussing at her all the while to hunt it up.  She found the bumper in the dense cover and returned. I was still upset and oblivious to my error.  We are going to re-run this set up!

She sat perfectly still as we watched the short memory mark hit the ground together. Oops!  Immediately realized I’d lined her up incorrectly on the previous mark.  Big mistake to pull her position from 12 to 2 O’clock. She was right all along. I pulled her off the direct line to the mark.  My fidgeting with her at the line was probably interpreted as leave the mark alone, it’s now a poison bird to be picked up after a blind.  Strong possibility I created confusion as to whether or not it was a mark of blind in her mind.

Normally, good marking dogs don’t need to be lined up. Best to leave them to their own resources. The proper job of the handler is usually to watch the dog’s line manners while the bird is in the air during training sessions.  There are instances however, when it is beneficial to help them focus on the correct path to the mark in an effort to keep them out of trouble. Long tight water entries where the dog is expected to get in the water and eraser marks that tend to wipe out the dog’s memory are just a few examples. Bottom line…. if you line them up on a mark you better be right!!!

We work hard together as a human/dog team to develop communication tools. Watching each other’s body movements constantly searching for cues. I didn’t listen to her or trust her normally keen marking judgment in our training session. Care to guess how far we would get in an actual test with that type of dialog?

We spent the next day’s training session on marking fundamentals. Goal of our session was for me to watch line manners and leave the driving to her.   She pinned every mark without my two cents.   Mark my word…. the only handler/dog team that doesn’t make mistakes is the team sitting on the couch at home.