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Socialization, what does it mean in terms of training a dog and preparing a puppy? To begin with, socialization of puppies is the single most important activity a trainer can invest in with his or her puppy. If proper socialization does not occur at the puppy stage, it is likely that the puppy will fail to realize its full potential. Puppies must be nurtured and cared for physically with food and warmth. Socialization is what nurtures a puppy psychologically, and it is every ounce as important as food if the puppy is to attain its best. Socialization of a puppy begins with the litter and continues for the dogs’ life. As a dog trainer you cannot do much to effect the puppies’ development from birth to seven weeks of age because he is part of a litter and spends a lot of time with his mother. Sure you can make sure the puppies are fed and watered correctly. You can also make sure the mother is well taken care of, that they are whelped and vaccinated correctly. Your job begins in earnest when you take the puppy from the litter, which should happen at seven weeks of age. At seven weeks old when you take the puppy from the litter make sure to have a name chosen for your prospective hunting partner, along with a comfortable run and kennel. You then must begin introducing the puppy to new experiences and get him used to everything that he may encounter during the rest of his life; this is socialization. The first thing I do is place a collar on the puppy, as with most new experiences he will resist the collar and try to get it off. After a day or two he will not even notice the collar. Begin play retrieving with the puppy, and make this experience fun and enjoyable for both you and the puppy. Use a piece of white rope or a small white dummy for play retrieving, and if possible, play retrieve in a hallway or some other confined area where the puppy must run to you as he returns with the dummy. We do not want to permit the puppy to run the other way and get in the habit of running away from you. Pay special attention here to key aspects of dog training. Dogs see the world in black and white, everything in between is a shade of gray. When training puppies and young dogs, I always use white dummies to assist the dog. We want to achieve high levels of success with the puppy and help him find the dummy every time he runs out to retrieve. As the young puppy progresses with retrieving at home or in the yard, graduate up to football fields, these are ideal; they allow a white dummy to be easily seen, and their featureless aspect makes retrieving easy. When you begin retrieving in the outside world with your young dog, do not run after him when he does not return with the dummy. Tie a check chord to his collar and gently get him back to you, or do as I prefer, run away from him and he will soon give chase. Always stay low to the ground and show excitement when the puppy is returning to you. Puppies will be more likely to return to you if you are at their level. If you remain standing they will slow their return or not return at all. Between the ages of seven to sixteen weeks the puppy should be exposed to as many new experiences as possible. A word of caution, do not push the puppy too fast and do not try to expose him to every experience in one day. Do not overwhelm him. You should get the puppy socialized with crowds. Walk him down a street, preferably with some light traffic and pedestrians, then graduate him to a full blown shopping area. Let passers by pet and play with your puppy. Build this activity up to taking him to a football game where crowds shuffle by and there is lots of noise. Take him to sandy beaches, grassy fields, muddy fields, areas where trains pass by, busy intersections, beaches, pebble beaches, bogs, marshes and especially take him where you will be hunting. Take your puppy on trips in your car or truck. Get him used to the experiences that he will encounter as an older dog. This is the process of socializing a puppy. It is easy to see how well balanced and well adjusted a dog will be if he experiences these things in a controlled manner early in his life. We also need to introduce the puppy to walking on lead. Another critical socialization process will be to introduce the puppy to gun shot. Dogs are not born gun shy, they are made gun shy. Introduce the sound of a shot to the puppy when he is feeding, use a blank .22 pistol. When you do graduate to a shotgun, have a friend discharge the gun at least one hundred yards away while you play with and comfort the puppy. When this has been achieved move the gunner closer and begin throwing dummies for the dog, he will soon get excited at the sound of the gun and look for retrieves. The observant reader will have noticed that every introduction to new experiences is graduated. Introduce to a few pedestrians, and graduate to a football game. Introduce to a .22 blank, graduate to a shotgun. This is the way all lessons should be taught. Introduce every new concept in as simple a form as possible. Do not expect a puppy to retrieve a green dummy in long grass at one hundred yards. Begin every new concept or lesson in a simple manner. Strive for success in the beginning and then add complexity and difficulty. Only after the dog understands the concept, then begin introducing complexities. Complexities can be added in the form of increased distance, angle entries, multiple entries, wind direction, terrain, obstacles, water and memory. The use of white dummies mentioned earlier cannot be underestimated. I understand that many readers may well disagree with me on this one, but when training young retrievers, the goal should be high levels of success, coupled with teaching the puppy to mark the downed dummy by sight. This helps develop great marking ability in retrievers. If your retriever has to hunt every time he retrieves, he will rely on his nose too much. This can, and will, hurt a retriever when you have to develop his blind retrieve ability. It is merely a question of what you want to manage. If you have your puppy hunt a lot, you will have your work cut out teaching him to run straight lines while completing complex blind retrieves. If you use white dummies early in the puppies’ life, and have him mark the fall visually, you will have to develop some hunting ability later in life, a very easy task on average. I guess what I am saying is that it is easier to develop hunting abilities rather than blind retrieve abilities. Hunting comes natural to retrievers, it has been given to them from above; lining a blind retrieve is a trained standard developed for hunting and field trial enthusiasts and is not something that retrievers naturally do. Having hunted and competed in tests on both sides of the Atlantic, I have seen the differences in training cultures. Europeans in general have developed their trials around driven shoots where steadiness is a key attribute; North Americans have developed their trials around the individual hunter. There is not one absolute correct way, just different preferences and challenges. I have developed my training standard from both sides of the Atlantic, and I highly value certain standards from both. To summarize socialization so far: My next article will deal with the sit and stay command. The sit command is the most important command in all of retriever training. This is the foundation which all other commands will be built upon. To achieve excellence in retriever training the trainer must demand, and attain, exacting obedience to the sit command. This means that when a single blast is blown on your whistle, no matter how far away your dog is, or how fast he is running or swimming, he must turn, look at you and sit. This is the platform from where you can direct him to the area of the fallen bird. This is not a difficult task to attain if trained for correctly. For help with retriever training contact dave@canadianwingshooter.com to review video clips from our up and coming TV show, visit our web site at www.canadianwingshooter.com. Watch out later this year for our dog training DVD where we demonstrate how to train a competent retriever from puppy to working dog in one year.
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