Heelwork training is constantly ongoing, and during this autumn’s shooting we’ve been able both to train it in “reality” and to feel that it works in “reality”. The goal, of course, is for Keen to walk at my side without my having to look at him. He should simply flow along and keep track of both me and the retrieves, so that I can keep track of what’s happening around us.
The most exciting form of shooting, according to both me and Keen, is rough shooting behind spaniels – that is, we walk in a line of dog handlers, guns and spaniel handlers, and ahead of the line the spaniels hunt to flush the game. After the shot it’s the retrievers’ turn to work and bring the game in. It’s a fairly calm form of shooting in the sense that there’s usually only one or a couple of birds in the air at a time, but in another sense it’s an extremely hot form of shooting, because all the fun happens in front of the retrievers – spaniels running around hunting, birds flying up, and shots. At the same time the retrievers have to walk at heel and hold themselves together the whole time, so it really does place high demands on the dog being biddable and steady.
The film below shows what it can look like. Difficult, said Bill. Very difficult, said Bull. But oh so exciting! Towards the end of the film (around 3 to 3.5 minutes in) you’ll see a bit more of how the retrievers work on the retrieving.
