Shed Antler Training

[BHC]

Jus got my first pup, I plan to train to hunt antler sheds. She's 12 weeks now and loves to play fetch. I'm think through around thanksgiving were goin to work on basic obedience (sit,down, here,crate train and kennel up). Also probably do up to 5 retrieves every day or two, releasing her on "find a bone". Does anyone have any advice her? I've ordered dokken's shed dog book and roger singlers DVD...

[Daniel J Simoens]

still pretty young yet. might want to hide it around the yard and have her find it rather than a typical retrieve. you can also do a search as it's been discussed a few times on here already. dokken also came out with a shed hunting dvd recently and he goes into the different steps of teaching a dog to find antlers.

[Andrew Fairchild]

+1 on the Dokken DVD. Goes a lot more in depth than the 8 page pamplet they give you with the shed dog training kit!

[BHC]

I believe the dokken's I got is 21 pgs not that that can be extremely discriptive. I reckon I'll order it as well. The reason I am planning to start with fetched is from my understanding you have to get a que for the pup that says go get antler, so you throw the antler and say "fetch a bone" or whatever. Once she knows fetch a bone means fetch antler you begin to go out and place very visible antlers outside. Then bring your pup out and say fetch a bone and begin transitioning away from throwing it. Then begin making them less visible and try to remove scent and so on until she is finding them with no visibility and as little scent as you can leave on them. The retrieving also gets the dog used to bringing you the antler.. Again this is all new to me so feel free to critique, this is what I have gathered thus far in a generalized form...

[Andrew Fairchild]

From my understanding of the Dokken training you do start with fetch saying "fetch the bone" of whatever you want the que word to be. After he understand your que word or phrase means go get the antler and bring it back, stake your shed cutouts you got in the kit in the yard and throw the bone to to the cutouts. Then you start putting them on the ground by the shed cutouts and using your que word without throwing anything. Start short and work farther. Then start putting the shed 5 or 10 yards from the cutouts. Once you can use your que word and your dog starts running to the cutouts on que and finding the bone consistently, start getting rid of the cutouts and hiding them somewhat in plain sight but with nothing to que the dog there might be an antler over here. One thing i found useful when you first start hiding them with no cutouts is using an alley way between backyards thats a little grown up. That way he can't get too far off the path. The Dokken dvd is great on showing the training techniques to get your dog to zig zag back and forth and cover lots of ground. You've got a good foundation to start on. Lots of scent at the beggining. Try and use gloves, you want the dog searching for the antler not your smell on the antler. Use the wash from time to time. Tons of praise everytime he brings the antler back. I use small hot dogs, if you bring me an antler i'll trade you for a hot dog. Most dogs wouldn't argue with that. Good luck. P.M. me if you have any more questions. I've only trained one dog that just turned a year Sept. 6 to hunt sheds, we went out the last weekend in September at a local national park battlefield my buddy works at. He put us in the right place to find sheds, so that helped, but we found 10 total and 2 whole pair out of the 10. Hope this helps.

[Daniel J Simoens]

is there any idea what the dokken antler wash is made from/ingedients?? I'd assume it's something someone can make on their own.

there are some videos (2 25 minutes) from a seminar here: http://www.huntemup.com/DokkenShedAntler_ShedDog.html

[Andrew Fairchild]

I'd assume its baking soda maybe with a little somethin extra. When i ran out of wash i just used baking soda!

[Daniel J Simoens]

baking soda, perfect! thanks for the tip.
this summer I got a box of antlers from a guy on another forum. very gracious of him. this spring I plan on washing them up and placing them on my lease land and finding them, after marking them with ribbon. we tried that this past spring when he was more of a pup and didn't have much success. had a buddy put them out the day before we got up there. the dog went off on his own and came back with some random bone however!!

any possible idea what the rack wax is made up from?? what smells like marrow????????

sheds.JPG

[Andrew Fairchild]

That i have no clue. They sell it at cabelas for $5 and i'm sure gundogsupply.com has it as well.

[Paul "Happy" Gilmore]

I had a guy telling me what a great shed dog he'd trained. I happen to have a bunch of sheds I'd picked up in SoDak hunting. I went out around the farm stashing them in obvious upwind locations. His dog couldn't find a single one. He was baffled.

I asked him to come back with his antlers a few days later so I could watch his routine. He kept the dog put away, he walked out and placed an antler in open view not far from where he'd start his walk to give the dog the idea that they are hunting. He placed a bunch of pieces he'd cut up in cover here and there marking the locations. He came back and got his dog. His dog did a perfect job of finding all the sheds.

Only problem, he'd just taught his dog to be very skillful at tracking his own scent. The dog followed his foot path with near perfect precision straight to antlers. What made this the most evident was because the dog hooked on ground scent ran straight downwind into thick cover and pulled out a piece of antler. Dog also had his nose on the ground. A dog searching for objects further in the distance will hold his head higher trying to catch scent on air currents at distance. Dogs with their face to the ground are not. They're hunting close. The antlers were just like the piece of cheese that tracking folks place on gloves as rewards for the track. I felt bad because the guy spent a lot of time over a few months with shed hunting in mind.

If you teach shed hunting, my opinion is the sheds need to be stored away from your home or, anything which smells like "Your stuff". You need to have someone with a scent the dog doesn't recognize place the sheds adn use a different person to do this regularly. If you can do this on private property where the sheds can be put out and left out for a few days to lose a little scent it is a good idea. Remember, this isn't an HRC or AKC test with a rule book to follow. This isn't live birds producing excitement which get a dog pumped up. This is teaching a dog to find something which to them is just a funny smelling stick.

Just my observations on shed hunting stuff.