Thread: Has everyone shot their dogs and given up?

I kick stones at my dogs when they point birds

mine still lick pots as good as any.

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Originally Posted by Tahr

None. You asked. Make your own mind up.

Agree, none at all, my dogs are still bird mad after several rounds of Kiwi training. When I got my first pup done I was a bit paranoid so I took him the same afternoon onto some pheasants, didn't make a difference. The early certifiers used to zap them on the followup as well but Willie didn't even put the collar on them last time and there was no way they were going anywhere near the kiwi. It would be interesting to see what they would do with a real life kiwi but I think it would help.

My dogs all get the odd belt from a fence and still hunt.
All but one of mine are also fine with chickens too, but even that could be fixed with a set up and a collar.

Originally Posted by hillclima

Get Willie Marsh to do it, dogs will be fine and won't make a difference to their hunting. He adapts to the dog and doesn't give a massive shock like I have had done to some of my dogs by other certifiers

Thanks hillclima and others who have responded. I am near Taupo, but where is Willie Marsh? How would I make contact with him please?

Originally Posted by Woody

I don't know how to start a new thread, but I have a conundrum.

I have owned and successfully hunted GWP's for many years now and have huge love and respect for their abilities and the very large quantities of meat and poultry they have allowed me to bag.

I have never used electric shocks on my dogs and do not believe in training by punishments, but by positive association. My dogs are very strong and willing hunters and setters including upland GAME, WATERFOWL, DEER AND PIGS, EVEN BUMBLEBEES in the garden.

I want to apply for certain hunting area permits but the conditions are that dogs must be certificated as having completed Kiwi aversion certification. The thought of some DoC greeny shocking my dogs is a nightmare to me. Am I wrong to worry and should I just allow my excellent and trusted dogs to undergo this treatment or not? What are the possible negative effects on hunting/ pointing, setting, retrieving and also on dog trust?

Don't do it. Parts of the aversion training are meaningless really. When the stuffed kiwi is set up on the bushedge of course a dog is curious and wanders over to investigate. He/she gets a shock, what does that teach them. Not to be curious?. That's bloody useful.

Now if my older dog the only one that has had the training gets onto a scent of kiwi she will return to the vehicle

so it does work then.......... hardly the methods fault if your dog shuts down and a kiwi lives another day.

strange how a similar method works bloody well for stock training.

I would say DOC has got enough going on with. This is Tongariro our most extensively poisoned Forest in NZ. FOREST OF THE FUTURE they call it.

Signs up in the Coromandel stating 'Dogs Kill Kiwi' are often changed to 'DOC KILL KIWI' .

Originally Posted by kawhia

so it does work then.......... hardly the methods fault if your dog shuts down and a kiwi lives another day.

strange how a similar method works bloody well for stock training.

My dogs have never payed any attention to Kiwi as they don't to possums. And I have always used a dog for my work. I have killed a few kiwis as a DOC contractor when we were made to use ground trap sets while pre and post poison monitoring.

Originally Posted by Andrew46826

And unfortunately her owner won't (for whatever reason) come and visit you so it looks like electricity is on the menu

Might have to see if I can kidnap her and bring her up to you at some stage

Won't help mate. Electricity will destroy it for ever. I don;t fix dogs, i fix their owners, no point me doing anything with the dog if the owner doesn't change the dog won't. The behavior has more to do with the owner than the dog. If he won;t do anything, nothing will change. E-Collar will be the icing on the cake, the last fuck up before he shoots it. Tell him to save the money on the e-collar, rehome the dog and never get another one.

I heard on the radio the other day that the twigs and tweeters reckon that the kiwi on the main islands will be 'extinct' in fifty years...like DOC liberating kiwi in a patch of native forest in upper Hawkes Bay some years ago...they were liberating birds where there was NO LEAF MOULD, humus negliable...you cannot just whack up a fence around a patch of bush in which and through which bovines and ovines graze and camp and throw in a few kiwi...while it might make everyone involved feel warm and fuzzy, it doesn't work like that.

Wikipedia has this to say re 1080 and the kiwi...

In 2004, anti-1080 activist Phillip Anderton posed for the New Zealand media with a kiwi he claimed had been poisoned. An investigation revealed that Anderton lied to journalists and the public. He had used a kiwi that had been caught in a possum trap. Extensive monitoring shows kiwi are not at risk from the use of biodegradable 1080 poison.


The poor dog...gets blamed for most stuff...how many kiwi are eaten by humans every year? Now there's a worthy hypothesis

Originally Posted by EeeBees

I heard on the radio the other day that the twigs and tweeters reckon that the kiwi on the main islands will be 'extinct' in fifty years...like DOC liberating kiwi in a patch of native forest in upper Hawkes Bay some years ago...they were liberating birds where there was NO LEAF MOULD, humus negliable...you cannot just whack up a fence around a patch of bush in which and through which bovines and ovines graze and camp and throw in a few kiwi...while it might make everyone involved feel warm and fuzzy, it doesn't work like that.

Wikipedia has this to say re 1080 and the kiwi...

In 2004, anti-1080 activist Phillip Anderton posed for the New Zealand media with a kiwi he claimed had been poisoned. An investigation revealed that Anderton lied to journalists and the public. He had used a kiwi that had been caught in a possum trap. Extensive monitoring shows kiwi are not at risk from the use of biodegradable 1080 poison.


The poor dog...gets blamed for most stuff...how many kiwi are eaten by humans every year? Now there's a worthy hypothesis

I don't think kiwi are very good to eat. In all the research I did for the book 'Beneath the Southern Cross' I never found one statement on the quality of the flesh of kiwi. This says a lot from a race of born consumers of the flesh of nearly every creature of our forests and seas.

Feathers yes, they were much sought after. But apart from a remark about the birds flesh being musty there was no other references.

Extensive monitoring does show that Kiwi take cereal baits and 1080 has been found in Kiwi droppings.

Was the faecal matter of the bird analysed as part of a post mortem or was 1080 found in droppings...how long does it take to kill a kiwi with 1080?

Originally Posted by EeeBees

Was the faecal matter of the bird analysed as part of a post mortem or was 1080 found in droppings...how long does it take to kill a kiwi with 1080?

I don't want to get too involved in this discussion on this thread. There is plenty of evidence of 1080s effects on all birds including kiwi. Let Google be your friend here.

Kiwi are killed by brodifacoum cereal baits. Same bait just a different flavour.

Originally Posted by kawhia

My dogs all get the odd belt from a fence and still hunt.
All but one of mine are also fine with chickens too, but even that could be fixed with a set up and a collar.

I found a four function training collar was effective for modifying some behavior problems & easier on the dog than then "Shock Collar " used for Kiwi safe certification . I think the later is far to aggressive & too hard on the dog (only my opinion).