Hi Paul, I know many peole with gun dogs and i can assure you that they dont go deaf The people who shoot are a lot closer to the gun than the dogs. Gaz
I havent ever trained gundogs but Ive done a little work with security (type) dogs that were desensitized to gun shots, what we did involved basically feeding and 'hanging out....relaxing' with them and then did some obedience work at a distance from the gun shot and then gradually decreasing the distance. We used a variety of noises that they might hear at a riot....banging trash can lids, people yelling, car horns beeping etc. They never went deaf. Theres a section for working dogs and gundogs though, youll probably get much better advice/info in there.
Hello there, I have trained gundogs for a number of years and getting them used to gunfire is not as difficult as it seems. The first part of the training is getting the dog used to sharp/ loud/ unexpected noises from a long distance away. I use two pieces of wood to start with. You have the handler doing something with the dog that the dog really enjoys. While this is going on the two pieces of wood are banged together.What you want is that the dog shows no reaction to the noise. You then over a period of time move closer until you are standing over the dog. You then repeat the process with something small like a starting pistol and then progress to a shotgun. Generally, this will not take too long as the dog becomes accustomed to the noise and will then use the noise as the trigger to go out and retrieve. Mike
Sounds interesting, thanks for the information. I think I'd still be a bit worried about the effect on their ears, shooters seem to wear some sort of protection. Maybe dogs are tougher than us.
Hi Mike, Nice to see another working flat coat owner on here ! Paul , I started mine off by just dropping a lot of things when they were young (keys on the tiles in the kitchen their dinner bowls which are steel I used to drop a lot) and generally being very noisey so they wouldnt worry about loud bangs. Mine werent introduced to gunshot though until they were older. My golden was 100% with fireworks and doesnt care a jot about loud noises or anything else. My flatcoat however hates them. When I started working my flatcoat, I basically threw him in the deep end, I could only get away with this though because I know the dog and I know roughly what makes him tick. He lives to work, and so when out on a training day with other gundogs in a walk up, I had always done walk ups previously with a no noise, but I dont train with a gun of any sort but my boy had been training for some time before I did this, and there was a starting pistol used on this day. He was fine as he hates not having a retrieve/ or seeing other dogs working and a very very keen worker and I was 99% sure that he would be fine. Casper wasnt introduced to a shotgun until we were actually at a shoot one day and because he was fine with a starting pistol I assumed once again he would be fine and he was. I still have a nervous dog though when it comes to fireworks !
