As the title says -

I really didn't know how he would do as a duck dog. He is pretty good with pheasants and quail and likes the water fine, but this weekend was his first experience with ducks.

We set the deeks well before daylight



And before we knew it mallards were buzzing us. We dropped one a good long ways beyond the deeks and Tye went after it. At first he wanted to retrieve the deeks but once he saw the duck he was off in a beeline.



As he brought in his first duck we cheered him on.



He brought it ashore and you could tell he was pretty proud of himself.



By the end of the day he had retrieved eight ducks and was acting like an old hand.



The funniest thing that happened was that I tied his leash to a five gallon bucket to keep him near me in the blind. I later forgot he was tied to the bucket and told him to go get a duck that fortunately dropped close to the water's edge. He dove in and drug the bucket out to the duck and then back to shore. We were calling him drift sock boy after that.

The next day we got a bunch more mallards and two huge geese. He was okay with retrieving the goose until it came to life and began flapping around. That spooked him and he dropped it like a hot o potato. But he seemed to get used to the idea once he could examine a dead goose.

All in all a great hunt.

There is always a sense of pride when you see months worth of work successfully applied and obviously your training paid off.

Congratulations Mr. Vetter- you have a duck dog!

nothing like watching your dog do a great job

Looks like a dang good trip!

Great Stuff, Dave!! Really good shot of the pup with the birds at day's end.
Question......did you eventually get that goose that came back to life?

We did get that goose, but Tye did not. We had another, much more expirenced lab that went and got it. If you look closly at the photos of all the birds on the fence you can see two geese. The second one is hard to see, kinda like where's Waldo.

It's been fun watching your dog grow and develop. Thanks for sharing the trip. Now, if those labs could only pluck those birds, too.

Atta boy, Dave!

Ducks and dogs at dawn. Love it....

Way too cool... I'm headed out of the maiden voyage with my new boy "trigger"....

Looking forward to some good shoots again this year!

Keith

Nice job guys! I took tye's sis to crescent lake yesterday. Kind of slow. She did teach herself to hunt the corn, though. She flushed and I missed.

Bill,

Sorry bout the miss. But glad Kenna got one up for ya. I hunted quail both on the way to my duck hunt and on the return. Tye did awesome flushing two coveys and two singles. I got a grand total of one.

Man when those little rockets fly right at ya they might as well be wearing bullet proof vests.

Much like tye we had a young lab hunting geese in the skagit valley. We knocked a big snow down in the water, it to was not as dead as it looked and when the young lab went to pick it up the goose bit him on the nose. The lab turned tail and swam but the goose chased him for a bit. Long story short it took quite awhile and the confidence of a much older lab to get him back on the geese. Nice to see your training is paying off with tye, you gotta love those labs.

Outstanding Dave. In addition to being a perfect companion, Tye is earning his keep. Pretty darn cool I must say. Thanks for sharing and nice haul!

Before and After

He's all growed up!

Proper force fetch training would likely solve the dropped bird/returning without bird problem. Takes about a week to do. Don't let bad habits get started in a young dog....

Awesome pics!

My little female has only been upland hunting and did great her first season. Last year something happened and now she will not pick up a bird. I need to have her forced. I haven't hunted duck in years but would love to get back into it

Dave -
Congrats on Tye"s progress!!

Hunting behind your good dog is what bird hunting is all about. As you are learning part of the reward of the training process is watching the "light blubs" click on in your dog as they gain experience. You should continue to see great progress as the two of youy become "one" in the field.

BTW -
Great to see you expanding your outdoor adventures but you have to do something about that wardrobe. Tye looks good in the field and so should you -LOL!

Curt

Fun, fun, fun!!

Driftin

If a problem seems to be developing I will consider force fetching, but i don't think it's likely. He got several ducks after the goose and I think he will get a goose now too, if its not a wounded greater. That goose was HUGE! Thanks for the food for thought though.

Curt,

I own one piece of camo gear, a $3.00 walmart hat, but I do wear a tan windbreaker andarmy green raincoat when actually hunkered down in the blind. The ducks seem okay with it. That's gonna have to do, until Tye gives me that "Were you planning on wearing that?" look.

Is this more what "real" hunters wear?