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Bloodlines & Bird Dogs: Inside Waterfowl Training · DuckFellas Podcast

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This is a duck fellas podcast your weekly
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dose of waterfall wisdom line banter and hunting stories that might just be
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mostly true hosted by tyler kade and austin three fellas chasing feathers and
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good times do us a favor and hit that like button or subscribe wherever it is
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that you're listening in at today.
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Welcome back. As promised, we have a special guest here today, Mr.
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Ryan Cam. How's it going, fellas?
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It's going. It's not good.
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But it's going.
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Well, I guess tell us a little bit about yourself here, Ryan.
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About, I guess, your background with dogs and stuff.
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Oh, let's see. 30, almost 34 years old.
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I've been waterfowl hunting since I was like nine, do mainly construction.
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Then I got into the wonderful world of dog training for about five years there.
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And now I just kind of do it on the side for myself. It's a fun little gig.
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You still help out with Tony? Yeah, yeah. Whenever he needs help,
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I'll swing by and help him out.
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Let him know. I kind of help him out with anything he needs,
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mainly doing some obedience dogs or just kind of hanging out,
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seeing what he's got going on.
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Filling in where you can. Filling in where I can.
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Nothing wrong with that. Well, did you get to go out hunting this week much at all?
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Not really, you know, got to work those normal people hours.
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That sounds terrible. Those hours suck. Dude, tell me.
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Got out a couple times this weekend. Nothing too exciting. It's Iowa duck hunting.
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Tyler just shoots them all during the week while the normal people are at work.
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It was a lot better while everybody else was at work.
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Someone's got to do it. I'm just a man of the people.
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It's nice here for. No complaints about our weekday hunts. What do you mean,
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our weekday hunts? You were working all week.
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Here we go I came with you twice conveniently that was also the only two days
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that you shot birds this week you shot birds three days this week oh I think
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you need me more than I need you anymore I mean,
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I gotta have somebody to make fun of and you are the number one draft pick for that,
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absolutely you know as long as we're shooting birds I can take it it was funny
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yesterday yesterday I was going to set the boat up and I'm like,
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dude, I haven't done this in a long time. Where's the boat guy at?
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Dude, that's my jam. I love setting
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the boat up. It's kind of like its own process. Now I just get in there.
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I would rather you guys just get out and start doing everything else and then I'll get it set up.
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I have my own process and I'm able to get out real quick and help you guys finish
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up and get back into a ready boat.
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Good little housewife. Then I
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still have to get in there and yell at him because he did something wrong.
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It ain't much, guys, but it's honest work, I'll tell you. Exactly.
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You got to have the boat guy. Every group's got to have the boat guy.
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Especially with that freaking castle.
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King of the castle. King of the castle. I have a chair, I have a chair.
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No, it was a decent week, but it really petered out as we got into the weekend. God.
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That it did. And then we had all the weekend warriors out. So, yay.
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Yeah, the amount of people out today compared to yesterday, which yesterday
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was like a shitty rainy day. Supposed to snow, never really did.
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And today, everybody and their brother that didn't go out yesterday was like,
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hell yeah, let's go party.
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It was definitely a party. It was more like, it was just boat races all day.
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And I feel pretty left out that I wasn't invited.
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No one invited you for pink slips? No.
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Dang. They know better. They even had a pretty sweet trophy for first place.
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There's a coot mounted with some gold chains and stuff.
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Damn, did it have a grill? I don't think Brett said it had a grill. Damn. Damn.
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Pretty sick, though. Maybe we'll make it a weekly thing.
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Racing for pink slips at Elk Rock.
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Today would have not been fun at Elk Rock. That would have sucked.
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I would have watched you guys, though. It would have been fun.
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I'd have sent it. Yeah, we know. Whoa.
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All right, enough with the shitty weekend of hunting. I think we all can agree
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that it was not a great time.
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Let's jump into the first kind of little segment we want to talk about with you, Ryan.
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Pedigrees and like different breeds of dogs. Obviously, you probably work with a lot of different dogs.
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And how important is it to you to look deep into the pedigree and like know what you get for a dog?
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I feel like it's it's probably one of the most important things you should look
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into is pedigree wise is obviously it's going to tell you the parents of your
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dogs maybe the qualifications down to all the way down to great great grandparents
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but it's also going to give you,
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you can check into health clearances through it too like pedigrees you can see
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if really any of the other dogs have any health issues or carriers of,
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bad eyes bad hips eic stuff
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like that it's i feel it's pretty darn important that you should do your homework
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on the pedigree side just to see what's proven and try to carry that on you
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know because if you're gonna invest money into something like that why not why
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not get the best, you know,
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like, yeah, it definitely makes sense.
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How, like how, I guess I've never really done it. I got one of those,
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I got lucky with one of those $400 Facebook dogs.
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Oh yeah. He's all right. He's not, he's not a freaking grand champion dog by any means, but.
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I got one. It's a grand champion rock retriever.
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Don't you talk about Ellie like that. She's the same.
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I mean, like, yeah, there's guys out there that get, you know,
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four or five, $600 Facebook dog or the Marketplace dog, Craigslist dog, and they turn out.
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I mean, no one will ever know, really, I guess.
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But you definitely, you take a bigger gamble with that kind of stuff, you know, not knowing.
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Yeah, for sure. How hard of a process is it to, like, look into the pedigree?
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Is there, like, a, how does that work? Well, as long as they're,
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as long as they're registered litter,
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like as long as the breeder registers the litter and the parents are registered
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and down the line is registered, you can get right onto the AKC website and type in your info.
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You'll normally get like a number, like some sort of catalog number for your
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litter, and then you'll be able to go back and see the parents and then those
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dogs' parents and grandparents and great-grandparents. It's actually pretty simple.
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Good to know. Good to know. I'm sure you probably work mainly with labs, right?
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Yeah, we mainly focused on labs, but we did a little bit of everything.
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We've done some Chesapeake's and some Boykins, a couple of poodles. Sick.
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We've dabbled in a little bit of everything, but mainly just labs.
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Chessies are obviously getting more popular. What are your thoughts on that versus the lab?
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Personally, I'm a lab guy. I think Chesapeake's are, I think they're good dogs,
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but that also correlates back to checking your pedigree.
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Do your due diligence and research your breeder, ask questions, look at the pedigree.
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Do you want a house dog? Do you want a working dog?
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You got to do your homework on Chesapeake's. They're, they're not,
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the Chesapeaks nowadays, I don't feel as they are back in like the early 2000s.
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I heard, I heard Chessie's got like a high drive. I've never hunted over,
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over one or with one, but I've heard they have a pretty good drive.
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They're just an aggressive dog.
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Yeah. From, from my experience, they're either super, super hard driven and
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a little aggressive or they're just really soft.
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Like we've had a couple that were in between, you know, to be your friend,
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be a good house dog, kind of hangs out with you, goes out, does a killer job
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hunting, and then can come home and be the family dog.
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But most of them, they just want to do their own thing.
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Tyler got to find out. That's what my lab's like too. He doesn't get in a hurry
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about much. He just, he's just there.
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He's just, he's there for the party. There's plenty of those too. Yeah.
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It's funny, he'll run out and full bore to get the duck, and then on the way back, he's just...
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He's sightseeing. I'm coming, I got stuff to do.
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Don't rush me. Exactly. I'll hurry up when breakfast is ready.
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Oh, he knows. He actually gets in the boat whenever breakfast is starting to cook.
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He got in there the past two days. As soon as he smells it, he's ready.
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The biggest thing that like i could add about a chessie with like i know tyler
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you can kind of relate to this where we hunt there's a lot of cocklebers can
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you imagine digging cocklebers out of that little bush no that would not be
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fun that would be terrible it's bad enough with a lab,
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yeah it really is they just got that thick curly matte coat between the cocklebers
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and like those stickers, oh, it'd be, it'd be awful. It'd be a whole evening event.
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Yeah, the little arrowhead stickers would be a full day's worth of work to get
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out of that dog. Oh, terrible.
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So it really sounds like you're only been familiar with Chessie's more in the
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training slash hunting side of it.
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What would you think would be the biggest differences between the two breeds?
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The biggest difference?
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In my opinion, I'd say the biggest difference is like the willing to please.
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Like you can train them both to do the same job and the same task.
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But like i said the the lab is gonna do
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it because it wants to make you happy but the chess he's
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gonna do it when he wants to do it on his
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time more or less like just
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let me do it when i want to do it yeah more of
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a to make himself happy exactly when
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he feels like doing it he'll do it understandable that's
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probably just not the case for all of them but just in
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the the few that i've dabbled with that seems to be the
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the case of i'll get to it
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when i get to it right right do you
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have preferences on when to bring
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dogs and for training like age wise more specifically i guess i mean age wise
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we typically you know you typically want to start doing big stuff around like
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six months because they kind of start losing their puppy teeth and getting their adult teeth in.
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So right around that time, they can be a little sour because their mouth hurts,
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you know, teeth are falling out.
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I'd say six months is usually about the time to get them in for training and
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start everything from basic obedience on up.
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But there's a lot to be accomplished at your house from the day you bring them
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home to that six month mark.
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When is kind of like too late to bring them in?
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Like, is there ever a time, like other than obviously if they're just past their
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prime, but is there ever a time it's too late?
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In my opinion, it kind of breaks down to like what all you want the dog to do and accomplish.
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Like if you're just looking for a good hunting buddy, go out,
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pick some ducks up, go home.
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I'd say two years you're behind the ball.
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If you're wanting to run field trials or hunt tests or NARA tests or anything like that,
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I'd say like a year old because some dogs will pick up on bad habits very quickly
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and they are very hard to break out of that.
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So whether it's not sitting straight or not running straight or just basic obedience
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commands of, you know, not healing right or just being kind of lazy, you know.
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He's all in that phone right now. Oh, yeah. So if you guys didn't know this about me, slow reader.
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Got to read it at least a couple times to get the question out.
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That way I don't sound too dumb.
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But I'm trying to figure out exactly how I want this question to come out.
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Really? Because I'm not super familiar with waterfowl dogs. I own upland dogs.
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So, I mean, as a sense for working dogs, like I'm familiar with working dogs.
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But my short hair and wire hair, if they can't stand in the water,
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they want absolutely nothing to do with it.
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So on that side of things, I'm completely foreign to, but we'll see how this comes out.
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I just want to know what your maybe quote-unquote favorite myth that you hear
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from people constantly that people think set their dog back,
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But in all reality, it's not that big a deal.
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The biggest myths.
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Oh, I don't know. There's, there's a bunch of things that people say,
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don't do this or don't do that. Cause they'll set it back.
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Say like the biggest myth would probably be like the
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banging the food bowls over them when they're
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young like eating to like break them of you
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know get them used to gunshots per se i don't
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know i that to me i've done i've
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done it and i've not done it and i don't see a difference
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i say you just you you just gotta
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take take your dog with you everywhere you go and let
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it get used to everyday environment loud noises cars driving
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horns honking doors slamming people screaming
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drive you know drive by the shooting range on the
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road or something let them get used to it but i'd say that yeah to me myth wise
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i'd say the bang the bulls over their head as puppies when they're eating is
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just a little far out there in my opinion no i feel like that's a good one too
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because across all dogs like Waterfowl, Upland,
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other types of working dogs too, I constantly hear people talking about that.
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I've never personally done that with my dogs. Neither of my dogs are gun-shy
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at all, but I mean, they do.
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We constantly have people over. We constantly have other dogs over.
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A lot of stimulus, a lot of loud noises too.
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So yeah, I mean, I would have to agree with you saying, just like getting them
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out, and every day to, or with those everyday sounds definitely helps in that regard.
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Yeah. And that's, that's a big thing too, with puppies coming back into like,
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when's the, when's the right time to bring them in is we see a lot of dogs that
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are not socialized, as they say.
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And I mean, I know Tyler did it when he got Ellie, you take her everywhere.
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They go everywhere with you. You got to get them used to everything, every day in life.
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The more you expose them to at a younger age on the daily, the more they get used to it.
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They're not startled with new people or new dogs or new things, you know, like...
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And my dog was like, oh, six or seven months old. It was taking it out on the boat already.
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Like, let's go for boat rides. Get used to the engine noises.
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Get used to the environment, you know.
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I was taking Ellie hunting, I mean, almost right away when I got her.
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Yeah, exactly. She was brought into it immediately.
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Yeah, and if you have that opportunity, you know, whether you're by yourself
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or with another person, get them started as soon as they can.
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I mean, teal season's awesome for that.
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And that's that's when i started because i think i got ellie in like august
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or something like that and i took her teal
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hunting right that season yeah i
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mean that's the that's the best thing you can do is if you have the i
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mean obviously you're not going to take a new new puppy per se on a 10 guy teal
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hunt but if you can get them out there and get them exposed with one guy shooting
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and you showing the dog the ropes that's that's the best thing you can to get
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them exposure and socialization.
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I can agree.
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Yeah, LA is well socialized with the group now.
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She goes and lets everybody know that she's there when we get to the boat ramp.
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There's people there. Yeah, absolutely.
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Yeah, it took me an extra five minutes to walk her down the boat ramp this morning
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because she had to walk up to everybody's boat and say, what you got? You want to race?
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They might have snacks. You have to say, my dad makes better breakfast.
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Yeah. He makes fire burritos.
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She's out there getting people Venmo for you. I wish. She needs to start doing something.
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Earn the kibble. No kidding. We haven't been doing our job for her to earn her kibble. No.
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I feel that. I've been giving the dog an extra scoop because I'm like,
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I'm sorry, we just sucked a tear.
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I think, I think that pretty much does it for that topic.
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Unless you guys got anything else that you wanted to add for that one.
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I mean, the next one kind of just rolls right into how we were leading.
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I think you're good. Yeah. sick so the next topic is going to be,
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basic training and hunting styles just kind of how you'd like to train your
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dog for your hunting style how important that is.
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For me I trained Ellie she's the only way she's done it it's the way I do it,
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every time I go with somebody else I just leave her at home because I know she's
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going to be a pain in the butt so.
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Exactly yeah but i
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feel like if you if you are getting a dog
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and you want to train it you need to you need to
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train it exactly how you're going to hunt whether it be small
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marshes big lakes long boat rides
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short boat rides anything they're going to see that
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they could anything that you're going to put them through they got to
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get exposed to whether it's um a type of dog stand
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or some sort of dog kennel
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or you know sitting on the bow of the boat or
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do it all like a lot of times when we do basic obedience
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we have the those mo marsh dog stands and a
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lot of people are rocking those nowadays so we got
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a couple of them and we work on basic obedience on that so when the hunting
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scenario comes they know oh i've been jumping on this thing all year might as
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well jump on it right now right you gotta just get them exposed to everything
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that that's the biggest thing is just getting them exposed to everything that you're going to do.
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Like take them, take them out to where you're going to hunt and work on walking
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through the tall grass or walking through the cattails or swimming in shallow
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water, swimming in deep water, retrieving in any type of water.
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Yeah, they got to see that. That's the biggest part. I mean,
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obedience plays key in it, but getting exposure to the elements and the style
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of hunting they're going to do is the biggest part.
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Absolutely. Absolutely.
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Cade loves, or not Cade, Hank likes his Mo Marsh blind that he's acquired from Ellie.
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He hunts out of that most of the time when we're hunting out of the boat,
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just because he's not used to the boat yet at all. Right.
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That's hard for him. Like, if he can't see it fall, he runs out in the middle
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of the decoys and he's like, what the hell?
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I don't know what's going on. It was funny.
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The first day I took him with Tyler this year, I was getting pissed at him and
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I'm like, I see what's going on we gotta fix that yeah Hank's standing out in
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the decoy saying who shit my pants.
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I mean hopefully we get into swing at some point and I feel like that actually
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could be a really good resource to have Hank at the front of the boat and the
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Mo Marsh and Ellie at the back in the boat too I mean,
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hopefully I'm just praying that we like shoot more than three birds at one time this year,
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and I'm leaving the child somewhere so it was fun I'm out of here we actually
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had it today you wouldn't know you were working but yeah you're right I was with that wind,
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he was protecting the streets yeah with that wind it was nice to have two dogs
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and they actually like went their separate ways they didn't go after the same bird,
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it worked out pretty good yeah they did have that was gadwall wasn't it when
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we dropped that mallard and the two gadwalls or whatever it was,
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pretty sure that was the only time we dropped more than one bird yeah let's not talk about it.
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We suck the suck we did
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we did suck at shooting today because we should have had more than we had for
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sure on the bright side i did talk to some other groups out there and just because
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you guys sucked at shooting like it doesn't really sound like a whole lot of
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people had much more success than you guys did.
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I know of one group that did, well, a couple groups that killed their birds
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today, but I mean, they just, they stuck it out a little longer and had more
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time to stay out there too.
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Yeah, two out of the 27 groups that participated.
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We've seen a couple guys on a canoe today. I don't know if they jump shot them
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or what, but they looked like they had a good handful of teal.
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That sounds like fun. Other than I hate being in a canoe.
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And a super windy day and two stout guys on a canoe does not sound fun.
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They were in one canoe? They were in one canoe. Oh, boy. Together.
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That was something to see, but hey, get your birds how you get your birds,
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I guess. This is a team effort if you flip it over.
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It'd be a bad day to flip it over today. That's no kidding. It was cold.
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Dude, that canoe had been gone. See ya. I can't wait till next week or this
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coming week here when we get warmed back up in the 70s I don't even want to talk about it,
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maybe the geese don't want to play yeah so we kind of talked about it,
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about you know about that six month range when you good time to bring them in
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and start their training but like for guys that are going to kind of do it on
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their own like I did most of my training on my own but not that she's all that
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in a bag of chips either yeah,
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a good time to start working with bumpers or if you're gonna
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if you're gonna force fetch your dog to start doing that is
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it like around that six month mark or can you start with little
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on the bumpers a little sooner i'd say
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if we're if you're if you're specifically targeting force fetch
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wait till after that six month mark just because like i was saying they're they're
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in the transition of losing their baby teeth to their adult teeth so their mouth
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is sore they're gonna have bad days they're really not going to want to cooperate
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probably too terribly much but going back to,
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when to start bumpers start that as soon as you bring them home i mean you can get.
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Anywhere from really small soft bumpers
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like canvas bumpers all the way up to really small plastic bumpers
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or just a standard two inch hex bumper and
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just start playing fetch i mean the biggest
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thing is it's never too early for obedience you can work that right out of the
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gate as soon as you bring them home what from eight nine weeks all the way up
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to six months you can throw bumpers for them you can introduce them to bird
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wings you can introduce them to small ducks,
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you know sometimes i'll keep a couple teal or a mallard back from season just give to somebody to,
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use for a young dog or we buy
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ducks from a couple places around here
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and pigeons are a good one too but get
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them exposed to it right out of the gate right it is like that stuff you can
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get like a cabela's or bass pro or any of them major hunting stores like that
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where you can get the soft bumper and you can coat it with that duck scent or
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pheasant scent does that make much of a difference compared to using the wings.
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Obviously the wings or something like that can be way better.
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Yeah, I feel like, um.
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When they're puppies young dogs anywhere from like
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nine weeks to three months old the
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scent works pretty good just gets them used to like notice or
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like get them used to knowing that like oh this is what I'm
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supposed to be looking for or searching for so when I smell that I can grab
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that and pick it up carry it around or bring it back whatever the case may be
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other than that I think if you can get your hands on the real deal whether it
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be wings or whole ducks that's going to be better.
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It just seems like it's a lot of puppies have the, the texture going on.
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They want to, they want to feel the wing.
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They want to feel the body. Right.
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Yeah. I, that, but always the real things seems like it's a better option to me.
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Uh, I guess we kind of touched on it a little bit, like get your dog out hunting
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right away, you know, or get it not necessarily in a group, but,
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introduce it lightly so when would
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be a good time to work it
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into or it's like a slow process to work it into groups or you know
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do you want to slow roll it to into party
26:52
hunting or you know bigger groups yeah i'd say definitely definitely work it
26:59
in slowly like i've seen it firsthand a couple times a dog's first hunt is eight
27:05
guys in a cornfield goose hunting and it just goes south very quickly.
27:12
It's a lot. I mean, that's a lot for anybody or any animal, really.
27:16
I mean, think about the first time you hunted with eight guys in a cornfield
27:19
and guns blazed. You're like, dang, that's kind of excessive.
27:23
I was done shy. I took off. He worked on shy.
27:28
It can definitely scare him a little bit or startle him or like,
27:31
I just feel like if you've got that much time yourself invested into getting
27:36
your dog to the point that it's got, why ruin it?
27:39
Over one little hunt you know like work
27:42
on go out with you and a buddy let them
27:45
shoot and you work the dog and then
27:48
the next time you know you try to work in a couple shots while
27:51
you're working the dog so they understand that oh my
27:55
owner's probably going to be shooting too so i should probably pay attention a
27:58
little bit more and then just kind of roll it into like you know eventually
28:01
three guys and then four guys it's definitely a slow process and they will get
28:06
the they will get used to it the hang of it eventually but i would not jump
28:10
into a six-man hunt with a fresh dog very quickly,
28:15
so you're saying don't go to canada with eight guys and a eight-month-old puppy,
28:22
for the first time yeah for the first time probably not but heck you never know.
28:30
I got lucky when I got Hank, it was the year we had a lot of water everywhere.
28:34
So really close to home, I could go shoot a limited teal and just let him do his thing.
28:40
Let him get used to it. Yeah, that's about the time that I had got mine too.
28:44
And it was, yeah, like you said, it was very nice to go out and just kind of
28:48
cherry pick a couple of ducks that you want, make sure the dog does right,
28:52
end it on a good note, go home. Yep.
28:55
That was the hardest thing too. Like there's so many ducks around,
28:57
you want to shoot them all.
28:58
But like I was good about it with Hank. I always started with like I'd shoot
29:02
two or three and then we'd leave and then I'd the next week I'd bump it up a
29:06
little more and yeah. Oh, exactly.
29:09
That's the biggest thing for me too is especially a young dog on our first hunt
29:13
is making it try to make it as successful as possible and then ending it on
29:18
a good note, whether it be you shot your limit or not.
29:21
But if they made a really good retrieve and they listened, you know,
29:27
very well and it right there.
29:29
So then that sets the dog up for success on the next one because they'll pick
29:33
up on, oh, if I just do that every time and pay attention to what my owner says, we get to have fun.
29:43
Obviously there, your dog will let you know on this one, but when is it too cold to hunt your dog?
29:50
Oh, I mean, it really comes down into a safety factor. It all depends on like what you're hunting.
29:58
I'd say if it's like, if there's a couple inches of ice out there and you're
30:01
wanting to hunt the river, I'm not bringing my dog.
30:04
That's just, that's too cold. I mean, like you said, they'll let you know when
30:09
it's cold, but I'd say once stuff starts locking up pretty good,
30:15
it might be, depending on the dog and the dog's attitude, it might be pretty
30:20
well done for hunting dogs on the water by the time everything starts locking up.
30:24
But I'd say normally around, oh, that 20 degree mark, I start getting a little cautious.
30:34
Yeah. Do you think, I mean, I kind of have my opinion on it,
30:38
but do you think it's good?
30:40
Like, I know a lot of people will take a dog out when it's really cold and they're
30:43
like, oh, well, I'll just put it back in the boat when it gets done with the
30:46
heater. Do you think that's good for the dog?
30:49
I mean, nah, probably not.
30:53
I mean, I wouldn't want to be wet and sitting on cold aluminum all day, even if I had a Mr.
30:58
Buddy in front of me. But, you know, I guess if you can carry a a small stand
31:03
or something to get them up off so the water drains off of them or,
31:07
something but if I pull the dog in the boat and ice starts forming on the vest
31:12
within a couple minutes I'm like it's probably a little cold for the dog yeah,
31:16
Ellie won't wear a vest neither will Hank he hates it she freaks out,
31:22
walks like a drunk penguin. It's hilarious.
31:27
And somehow today she managed to get out of her vest.
31:32
Both her front legs got out of her vest. I'm not entirely sure how that happened.
31:36
And I was wondering why she was swimming
31:37
funny and I realized her vest was acting like a drag in the water.
31:42
I was like, I don't know how you did that but I'm not mad. I'm kind of impressed.
31:48
That's pretty funny. Does your dog swim fine but just walks like a drunk penguin?
31:52
With that vest on yeah she swims like a champ like it's not even there but she looks like,
31:58
yeah she wobbles side to side when she walks with it on and just stares at you
32:01
like i don't know what you want me to do with this oh my god the exact same
32:06
way it's been wearing it for four years and she still acts like every time i
32:10
put it on it's the first time she's ever worn it.
32:14
So but what is the main reason that you want your dog to wear a vest for protection yeah,
32:23
i feel like i mean it depends on the type of
32:26
vest you get really but i mean a neoprene vest is
32:29
going to help them stay a little warmer just like us with neoprene waders i
32:33
guess and then obviously it'll add like a tad bit of flotation form but it mainly
32:38
my concern is protection and i don't care if we're pheasant hunting or if we're
32:43
hunting open water or running through the grass because,
32:48
you just never know like spot we hunted today i just happened to be walking
32:53
back through the water and kind of tripped on something and i found a cut off
32:56
t-post sticking through the water and i was like yeah what if my dog would have
33:01
snagged that you know like.
33:04
Seen it or running through a barbed wire fence out pheasant hunting or
33:07
you pull into a parking lot and you know the
33:10
dog runs down the ditch and tries to cut through the fence and that barbed
33:13
wire gets a hold of him do you carry like a dog
33:16
first aid kit with you we do we have one
33:19
in every boat and there's about
33:22
three of them sitting at at the shop at
33:25
all times that's something i
33:28
don't i've never even thought of carrying i know i just literally just
33:31
clicked in my head when he said something about running through a barbed wire fence it you
33:35
yeah you have to because you just never know what's going to happen that gundog
33:38
outdoors makes a really nice first aid kit and you can use it on yourself you
33:44
can use it on your buddies you can use it on your dogs it's got everything everything
33:48
you could think of is in there tourniquets band-aids blood clotting powder,
33:54
saline you name it it's in there's scissors tweezers pliers like you name it
33:58
you just don't know what you're going to run into.
34:03
Also never know what other people are going to have sticking right underneath
34:07
the water like a freaking T-post. Oh, yeah.
34:11
You just, yeah, you never know. I'm glad I found that and was able to kind of
34:15
stomp it down in the mud a little bit, but I'd really hate for that to go right
34:18
in the dog's chest. Yeah.
34:21
We, the lake I grew up hunting, we used to have trot lines out all the time,
34:24
and sometimes people would forget their trot lines out and not pull them before
34:29
hunting season. Oh, yeah.
34:31
Another big thing too is if you're hunting shallow water creeks or like shallow
34:36
wide rivers, a spot I used to hunt back in the day when I had upland dogs,
34:40
I'd go pheasant hunting on and they'd run down to the river every once in a while to get a drink.
34:46
And my dad and I actually had our Brittany step in raccoon foothold trap down on the river.
34:53
Some old boy out there trapping raccoons and dog went down there playing the river and stepped in.
34:57
I mean, granted, it didn't hurt the dog's foot or anything. You know,
34:59
it's just a flat mouth trap, but still it's like, geez, what if I would have
35:03
broke a toe or a toenail or something?
35:06
Be a bad day. Be a bad day.
35:11
You got anything you want to ask here, Pookie? Oh, wait on you.
35:15
He's just calling me out just like that. Just like that.
35:19
All right, well, so I know it's pretty hard-pressed to get Tyler off the water,
35:24
so Ellie really only hunts water.
35:27
But how important to you, I guess, is it to have a dog that can do all of those
35:34
things, whether it's hunting out of water or hunting fields or different stands,
35:38
like being versatile or well-rounded in all of them?
35:43
Having a versatile dog will never be a bad thing.
35:48
If you can go hunt ducks in the morning on the water and then jump over to a
35:53
field in the afternoon and hunt geese and your dog just kills it both ways,
35:57
you're not going to be mad about it. Nobody's going to be mad about it.
36:00
I mean, obviously, if you only do one thing, like if you only hunt ducks on
36:04
water or geese on water, or you only hunt geese on land, and that's only what
36:09
you want your dog to do, that's fine. Ain't nothing wrong with that.
36:12
But a versatile dog will never be a bad thing.
36:17
Who's got time to go hunt water in the morning and the field in the afternoon?
36:21
We're still on the water in the afternoon staring at empty skies. People that kill birds.
36:26
Not us. Brutal out here. It is brutal. Brutal.
36:32
Waiting for i'm just on the water till the geese show up my geese
36:35
yeah that's uh that's what i'm saying yeah never
36:38
heard of her yeah i've never seen one they're all
36:43
up in ankeny chilling casey's yep
36:47
sitting on the casey's pond yeah they're all in they're all in johnson
36:50
soccer fields eating grass and throwing red cards yeah
36:54
we need quick start to put a pond and slick
36:56
switch it up every now and again no kidding yeah maybe
37:00
they want breakfast over there one day i had
37:02
to go to an all-star baseball game this summer
37:06
for my little brother and it was hosted at ankeny high school pull in the parking
37:12
lot walk by hundreds of birds left and right they're just all banded i'm like
37:16
you guys never leave just hang out them dang city geese just start tackling
37:23
them getting their bands.
37:26
I mean, nope. I have to.
37:29
Start laying some skippers on the ground right towards your car.
37:33
I could see it. Austin's just walking around. Got geese chasing him.
37:38
No. Hey, there was that hurt goose in town the other day, and I really tried
37:43
to get Cade to go check and see if it was banded, but he wouldn't get out of bed.
37:48
Why would I? Because what if it was? You were out and about.
37:52
You could have went and got it. No, I wasn't.
37:54
He's scared of geese. Cobra chickens.
37:58
They are quite scary. He got a bad experience when he was a kid.
38:01
One bad experience, and I just don't fuck with him anymore.
38:07
That's it. I'm done. Taking my ball and I'm going home. Yeah,
38:11
I don't shoot geese for fun. I actually shoot them because I hate them.
38:15
And you're terrified. It's a fear for your life. I understand.
38:18
Yes, absolutely. It's self-defense.
38:20
That's his flight or fight response. Yeah.
38:26
See his face whenever they're coming in. He just thinks they're coming straight
38:29
for him. Yeah, flashbacks, nightmares in the boat.
38:33
It's dead of winter. He's got hot sweats and shaking. Yeah, absolutely.
38:38
You'll see me in the fetal position in the corner of the boat very fast.
38:42
It was kind of weird. A couple years ago was when I met Austin and we took him
38:47
out on the lake and a group of geese started coming in and just this blood-curdling,
38:53
scream coming off the bow of the boat as this 12-pack of honkers was coming
38:57
in. I was like, what is going on?
39:01
Cade just looked at me and said, yeah, this is normal. Yeah.
39:04
I hope our listeners all know that they should never believe a word that comes
39:08
out of your mouth. Wow. Damn.
39:13
It's ridiculous. I say nothing but the truth. No. No.
39:19
Stop lying to our fans. All 12 of you, we appreciate you. Absolutely. Every week.
39:25
It's honest work. Somebody's got to do it.
39:29
Pay much. Someone's got to carry the boat.
39:34
Period. That's a lot of weight. It's got a motor. Yeah.
39:39
Dude, you know how much breakfast we have to call around with us? Like, phew.
39:43
I know. You've got like 18 boats lined up at the ramp every day.
39:47
Man, I hope. We might not kill a duck, but we'll get a good burrito.
39:50
It was crazy. I pulled in today, and it was just like, well,
39:54
Cade with the little boat, and then one other boat in front of us behind me.
39:57
Dude, like eight boats pulled in right away.
40:00
They knew it. They could smell the burritos. should
40:03
just park that thing don't even launch it just park it and cook
40:06
in the boat in the parking lot and just start passing
40:09
it out to people we've talked about it wow that's
40:13
high but i could i could if they're gonna pay it i'm down for it inflation yeah
40:17
today's economy eight bucks seems like a good deal hey tariffs there's gonna
40:22
be a whole tariff thing on those that's what i'm saying we have another chicken
40:27
incident how are we gonna get eggs i'm telling you right Right now,
40:30
them boys that walk in in the morning that didn't bring breakfast,
40:33
they would pay 15 bucks for that burrito.
40:37
He's not wrong. There's a lot of truth to that. Honestly, I probably would have this morning.
40:44
See, you missed the market. Damn it. Yeah, but we weren't near where he was, though. Dang it.
40:50
I drove over there. I was that hungry. I was getting ready to say,
40:53
see, you just mark your location, say, this is where I'm at.
40:57
I was like, start a food truck site for the boat. Yeah.
41:01
It's a food boat. Yeah. That, that would negate the Apple air tag that Ryan
41:06
has hidden Tyler's boat.
41:08
So he can actually just follow him around. Yeah.
41:12
That's how I found you the other day. My phone pinged. Yeah.
41:15
No, I, I get the notification. I get near my boat that there's an Apple air tag nearby.
41:20
I actually want to put one in your boat just to fuck with you.
41:23
I would find it pretty quick.
41:26
I would find it pretty quick. I don't think so. There's a lot of space in there.
41:31
Like, like I could, I think I could probably hide one for at least a couple of weeks.
41:39
In that boat like more than my house that is
41:43
true that's true yeah especially when
41:46
you sit out there all day and not kill anything yeah that you
41:48
tend to spend a lot of time in it bro you are attacking like it's attack mode
41:53
yeah well you know what like we're back this week we're back i'm not nearly
41:59
as sick tomorrow's my friday i'm ready to get back to hunting you guys hunted
42:04
without me all this weekend.
42:06
I'm a little butthurt about it, but it's fine.
42:09
Well, you missed a lot. Yeah, I can tell. You missed a banger.
42:12
I mean, some of the things we talked about was pretty cool, but other than that,
42:17
no, there was no bangers you missed on. Just breakfast.
42:21
Other than the teal that almost ran into the front of the boat this morning.
42:25
There was a couple yesterday, too. Yeah, there was. We didn't shoot at them.
42:30
We had to start shooting at teal.
42:32
Yeah, it's time. It's time.
42:35
If it flies, it dies. Yeah, I don't ever give Teal a pass. No.
42:40
Well, but you're not a Mallard purist, so.
42:46
No, he likes the Greenheads. The off-brand ones. The Teemu ones. I do. I do.
42:53
Fan of the free shipping on them it's fast too fast shipping it's fast shipping bam they're here,
43:00
i just wish i wish they loved me as much as i love them
43:03
don't we all we did
43:06
see more geese today though i will say that like today was the most
43:09
geese i've seen all year i'd agree
43:12
with that we saw a decent amount today too anybody else
43:16
have really anything else to ask or you like that yeah I know you said you have
43:23
a female do you prefer a male or a female for I guess I mean that's probably
43:27
all the same thing for preference but is there one that's better at something than the other.
43:35
I personally I personally prefer a female I just I like the tender heartedness
43:40
of them a little bit more but I can I can change your mind on that,
43:46
she hates you I love Miss Ellie She hates me. Yeah, she loves everybody but Tyler.
43:53
I think most dogs just don't like their owners. They like everybody else because
43:56
everyone else is nice to them all the time. Yeah.
44:01
I don't tell Ellie no. You tell Ellie no.
44:06
Ever tell her yes i say
44:11
yeses no good jobs no nothing nothing i
44:15
say it's all personal preference you get a lot of guys that are stuck
44:18
in the oh i want males and i'll only hunt males and
44:21
you get i want female and i only hunt female it's i think
44:25
they each can play their own i think they each can hold their own
44:27
against each other but i think
44:30
that's just a big when you break it down it's a
44:33
personal preference but what do
44:36
you do and you're another one in your
44:39
experience what does like fixing a dog do to
44:42
it does it do anything oh you're talking like
44:45
spayed or neutered yeah i think it does
44:48
change them it really does in my
44:51
opinion i i really think it does but i think
44:54
a lot of people do it too early i know that like i mean if you don't ever plan
44:58
on having a litter with your female or studying your male out you can get them
45:05
fixed probably earlier the better but in my personal opinion i think whether
45:11
you're going to breed them or not you need to.
45:14
Wait until they're after two years old because they need all those hormones
45:19
to grow and you know just kind of become adult dogs you know kind of like us
45:25
like you just get wiser the older you get some say,
45:29
but they need all that stuff, hormones and whatnot.
45:33
So I think spay or neutering them too early can have kind of an effect.
45:40
It can make some dogs lazy, and it can make some dogs not want to do anything at all.
45:46
About color does color matter to you and labs color yeah black labs no mexican dogs no hey.
45:59
How dare you holmes i like my brown
46:02
friend yeah i i'm
46:06
a big yellow guy i have
46:09
a fox red which is just a color a shade of yellow
46:12
but i'd have to say you know black labs are right up
46:15
there with them and then chocolates after that dang dude
46:20
everybody shits on chocolates and i love it it it's
46:24
another thing dude there's just like i don't know if it's the genes the
46:28
the you got to look into your breeders i've
46:31
seen some kick butt chocolate dogs i've
46:35
seen some lazy ones too but you get them in all colors yeah
46:38
it it doesn't matter it's honestly it's all about how
46:41
you bring the dog up but going back to that if
46:44
you want a chocolate a yellow or a black do your
46:48
homework check into pedigrees check into your breeders don't be afraid to ask
46:53
your breeders questions if they don't answer you back or you feel like they're
46:57
yanking you around go to the next one yeah i've always had blacks growing up
47:04
we had one yellow lab and that dog was psycho.
47:09
See i've always had upland dogs and she's
47:13
really my first i have a i also have a yellow lab golden
47:16
retriever mix pretty decent waterfowl dog
47:19
one heck of an upland dog for some god
47:22
forsaken reason not sure how that happened but he'll hunt
47:25
pheasants with the best of them but my little yellow yellow
47:28
female now it'll be hard to find another one
47:31
to replace her yeah it's always tough i've
47:35
only ever had upland dogs so like yeah
47:39
those off switches that your guys's labs
47:42
have at times my short hair and wire hair don't
47:45
have them just doesn't exist my mail
47:48
will be eight in december of this
47:51
year it doesn't matter if like we'll go
47:54
up to south dakota at the end of the month to do our
47:57
second five days of pheasant hunting up there he'll work
48:00
for five days straight and still just bounce off
48:03
the walls those dogs are in
48:07
a whole nother category by themselves yeah crackheads the crackheads straight
48:12
crackheads my sister has two of them as house dogs yeah mine are both house
48:18
dogs as well no i pray for your furniture yeah it's it's tough it really is.
48:26
Nothing is safe no matter where you
48:29
put it or where you keep it yeah that
48:32
that that's the truth my britneys were experts
48:36
at getting in the cabinets yeah no child
48:39
blocks or no children at our
48:42
house but a bunch of child locks for the dogs exactly
48:46
yeah we have
48:48
we have a locking garbage can for that reason yeah absolutely
48:52
tell you
48:54
what one of the hardest things though is when it's time to retire them or like
48:59
just watching them when they get like for me for labs it's always been like
49:02
once they get over about seven maybe eight you start seeing that decline in
49:07
them and it just it happens so fast it's like they're in their prime and all
49:11
of a sudden it's just they're losing it quick.
49:15
Does it goes it goes downhill pretty quick they say your labs are in their prime
49:20
from five to seven and then they're just doing it because they want to do it
49:24
after that yeah yeah i know ellie and well hank too because i think they're both the same age or,
49:33
it's gonna be about the same time when they both start falling off
49:36
the the wagon yeah my
49:39
uh yellow golden mix he just i think
49:42
he just turned nine and it went from when
49:45
he was eight 20 is nine is a big difference um
49:49
and he's got more gray in the face and he's struggling jumping
49:52
up on stuff i'm like uh buddy don't be doing this to
49:54
me now hank's hank's
49:57
gray beard was glowing in the sun this morning when he was out
50:00
there looking at us it was that dog's been gray since he was
50:03
three years old ain't that
50:06
wild yeah how they're just like my yellow female she's four four four and a
50:12
half yeah she's got everything underneath her eyes is gray i'm like you shouldn't
50:17
have any gray at all yeah hank's like that perfect chocolate color too so when
50:21
he first started getting it i'm like what the hell and then the next thing you
50:24
know his whole face is just white,
50:27
yeah even his like eyebrows are too yeah that's wild like at first I thought
50:34
he had ice on his face this morning when he was out there getting one of the
50:37
ducks and I was like no that's his hair,
50:41
that's his hair that's his hair.
50:44
A bunch of wisdom wrapped up in those years. Something like that.
50:49
Well, hopefully you get to hunt with Hank some, so hopefully his wisdom rubs
50:52
off on you. I could only hope.
50:58
Got him. I can only hope. It's alright. I gotta start being nicer to him.
51:02
We were being to him all week while he was at work.
51:04
Yeah, I took it pretty good this week.
51:07
All week long for no reason.
51:10
Didn't even see you guys in person once this week and just got shit on every day.
51:15
He kind of even quit texting in the group chat one night. He just wouldn't respond
51:20
anymore. I had to send him a message that was nice just to cheer him up a little bit.
51:24
Yeah, well, you know, sometimes like, I mean, some of us do have other lives
51:29
outside of duck hunting and have other obligations too, Tyler.
51:32
So like, I have to do other things.
51:36
That sounds terrible. Yeah, you know, it has its moments for sure.
51:40
Yeah. Well, I think that will pretty much do it this week, as far as I can see. Anybody?
51:49
I mean, Austin, you got anything else you wanted to add?
51:52
Thanks, Steve. While I'm blowing my nose, that's awesome. Very good timing. Yeah, very good timing.
51:59
No, I don't. I just really want to thank Ryan for coming on,
52:03
especially for someone like me that's not familiar with waterfowl dogs, or at least good ones.
52:10
Yeah, I think you can have me on. What did you just say?
52:15
Nothing. No, I just, a lot of good information, a lot of things that I really
52:21
wasn't aware of, and a lot of things to look for if I ever do decide to switch
52:28
away from my upland dogs.
52:31
Absolutely. Don't be afraid to shoot me a message, too, if you've got any questions
52:34
about anything. You can always get pointed in the right direction. Absolutely.
52:40
Yeah. You're pretty much, like you said earlier, pretty much out of the training
52:44
game, but you work with, I mean, you're good friends with Tony Nizzi over at
52:47
Lakota Creek, and you help him out still quite a bit, right? Yeah.
52:51
So if anybody ever needs any help with anything or questions,
52:56
So I'm sure Ryan or Nizzy or any of them guys wouldn't mind answering some questions for you.
53:04
Yeah, feel free. Head on over to the Facebook or Instagram at Lakota Creek and
53:09
shoot us a message and try to get you pointed in the right direction.
53:14
Perfect. On that note, I am looking forward to going to bed because I've been
53:20
up way too much this week.
53:23
Thank you for tuning in this week. As always, subscribe on your preferred podcast
53:28
destination to keep up with our latest episodes. We're on everything out there.
53:33
I mean, Apple, Spotify, YouTube, Amazon, Oddbean, and iHeartRadio.
53:40
If you don't see us, wherever you like to listen in, shoot us a message.
53:44
I'm sure we can figure something out. Don't forget to follow.