July, 1920 
FOREST AND STREAM 
371 
Chesapeake Bay dogs in their natural element 
pursuit. It got dark before the puppy 
showed any signs of returning, and I 
drove into town, thinking the pup would 
come on in, but she did not, nor could I 
find her next day. One week after she 
returned home. Home was 55 miles from 
the lake. She was as fat and healthy 
as if she had never been away. I had 
taken her to the lake after dark and by 
railway train. 
A friend of mine, a breeder, was pass- 
shooting some years ago off a point. His 
dog had retrieved the ducks and had 
piled them on a cattle path which led 
from the farm yard to the lake and 
passed near the point. Near the path 
was a brush fence. About 4 P. M. the 
cattle came down to drink, following the 
path as usual. As they got near the 
ducks, the dog growled and stopped and 
held them there. In the meantime my 
friend, a hundred yards away continued 
shooting as opportunity offered. In 
about half an hour the situation stood 
like this: there were several dead and 
crippled ducks in the lake, a dozen or so 
cattle wanting a drink, a Chesapeake Bay 
dog preventing them from approaching 
the ducks, or passing them, and this 
same dog rapidly getting peeved. All at 
once, the dog grabbed a duck, jumped 
the fence, left it on the other side, jumped 
back, chased the cattle back, grabbed 
another duck and repeated the perform- 
ance until he had all the ducks safely 
over the fence. Then he paid no more 
attention to the cows but went out into 
the lake and retrieved the balance of the 
birds. And some people think a dog 
cannot reason. 
Another friend owned a Chesapeake 
which, during the night after shooters 
had been on the lake would go down and 
bring dead and cripples home, pile them 
on the veranda and wait beside them un- 
til daylight and the household’s awaken- 
ing. This fellow lived about 2 miles 
from the lake and would never go there 
until about 10 P. M. and then only when 
shooting had been going on during the 
day. His sagacity evidently told him 
that he could get the birds which the 
shooters had overlooked, or could not 
find, and he wasn’t retrieving ducks for 
any other than his master anyway. 
Another friend of mine has at present 
about twenty young mallards which his 
Chesapeake caught alive this summer at 
or near a slough 5 miles from his house. 
This man breeds English poly-call ducks 
and has probably 100 in his farm-yard, 
which the dog never molested at any time. 
Needless to say these young mallards 
are, or will be, very useful to cross with 
the poly-call. Perhaps the dog knew 
it, I don’t know. 
FIELD TRAINING OF THE PUPPY 
By Edward Russell Wilbur 
I T is now presumed that the puppy 
which has been put through the pre- 
liminary stages of his education has 
become practically a graduate so far as 
house and yard training is concerned. 
That is, our pupil now knows his name, 
is obedient to the whistle and words of 
command, will come to heel when ordered, 
will charge instantly and stay put where 
he drops. Now we are ready to take the 
puppy into the field and teach him how 
to hunt for and to handle game— to 
steady him on point and when the birds 
flush — in fact do everything we can do 
short of the actual killing of birds over 
him, for we are presuming that this edu- 
cation is taking place well in advance 
of any open season — in fact, we are striv- 
ing to have a gun dog ready for our 
pleasure when the season opens. 
The writer has selected and broken a 
great many puppies — both pointers and 
setters — and there is one method which 
if pursued will almost always result in a 
perfect dog and achieve results in much 
less time than any other way. If one has 
the territory, even though it be a very 
restricted area, say a few acres of swamp 
grass — a few alders and a stubble field 
or two — procure one or two pairs of 
guinea fowl and allow them to steal their 
nests and raise a brood or two of chicks. 
Just as soon as these little guineas are 
old enough to run about and up to the 
time they can fly about, we have the 
finest opportunity in the world to perfect 
our puppy in bird work; that is, teaching 
him to hunt and point — to stand steady 
and obey motions of the hand for direc- 
tion in ranging. 
The little guineas will run all about in 
the thick cover and hide very completely 
from the dog, and there is no surer way 
of getting the dog to locate accurately 
than to work him on these close hiding 
birds. An hour or two of work in the 
morning and again at night on game is 
all sufficient. The other part of our day’s 
work should be taken up with teaching 
the youngster to obey motions of the hand 
and also the whistle and to encourage him 
to hunt the thick and likely covers rather 
than running in the road ahead of you. 
We are presuming now that we are edu- 
cating the dog to be used primarily on 
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