Taking a Cast and Keeping it, Help.

[blakegober]

If this has been covered before feel free to post a link to a past thread. I have a Seasoned/Senior level dog and need some help. he runs blinds very well. He will take a great initial line and carry for as long as I need him to. He never has no goes, or confidence issues at the line. When I train/hunt/run tests I am always looking for something to improve on. I would really like him to take a cast and hold it as long as he does his initial line out. What I mean by this is if I give him his line and he goes 50-100 yards and starts to drift offline and I give him an angle back, or straight back, he will take the cast and turn to the appropriate side w/o any problem. But he may only take that line for 10-20 yards sometimes before drifting left/right/in/out whatever the direction maybe, it seems random. its not really a bad problem and I can cast him again if I have to. I would just like to know if there is a good drill out there to work on this, or if I just need to continue running cold blinds. Right now I run a few blinds everyday. but I also run a few drills each week, WW or an 8-handed casting drill. When I do this drill I normally put the bumpers about 20 yards out from him, is this a problem? Is this drill teaching him to run only 20 yards and there should be a bumper? Can you run a drill too much? Or should I run the drill and just put the bumpers further out, like 50 yards? Any help, drills, advice would be helpful. thanks.

[BHB]

Have had the same issues. Hope somebody answers.

BHB

[Grant Wilson]

I'm not a pro but here's what i do when i have a dog do that. i have a field that we will go to where there are four places that i put bumpers. Say a tree 200 yds back left, a point of land 150 yards straight back, a ditch 250 yds back right etc. These are school blinds, so the location of the bumpers never changes. But i do change the spot of the line. I do this to change the angles of the line to the piles but only half the time i run the blind i line up for at the line. I may get him halfway there and switch to another pile. This builds teamwork and refines his casting as well as teaches him to take the cast given longer aka "go as sent". Hope this helps.