Latest dog outing, your feedback appreciated
Hi, I trained my vizsla up with the Blueprint program, she's two now and I've had her out hunting about 20 times. She does pretty well, stays close and remains calm and quiet for the most part (the exception being when I'm waiting at the edge of a clearing and there are deer around, then she shakes and gets nervous). Of those twenty or so trips, I've shot about 6 deer over her, and the success rate seems to be improving (and is now better than when I hunt alone, as you'll see below).
In the bush, she is always wanting to follow ground scent, naturally, but most of the time it's in a direction that doesn't work for me, either not into the wind or off into some dense supplejack or other scrub. And although she's quiet for a dog, she's still patters around sniffing and therefore louder than I would be on my own. For that reason, I've been hunting without her more, but the other day when we were out she spooked a hind which I assume was sleeping, and it crashed off a little ways, then seemed to stop. I crept up another 30 meters and there was the deer looking back at us, so I dropped it. Thinking back, I now recall that 2 of the other deer that we took in the bush were in a similar way, she would spook them and they would stop a little further on, as if they were startled by the small 4-legged and wanted to have a look, meanwhile either not hearing me at all or too distracted by the dog to notice me.
It seems to be a good system, and I can't argue with the results. Is is possible that light dog noise = good noise, and has anyone else had this experience with their dog? Thanks
