If you are coaxing and coercing a "natural" retriever, it's imperative that you instill the reaction to return to you with anything picked up. Multiple "fake birds" are valuable aids in getting through to a dog. While not a finished job, basic retrieving is a simple combination of a dog's willingness to pick up an item, carry it and come when called.

Whatever dummy you use, it can be "educated" to make it cleverer in getting the job done. If you haven't saved some wings from birds you've bagged, find the nearest gamebird farm or shooting preserve and acquire a couple of pairs. Tape these onto your dummies. Scent in the nose and feathers in the mouth go a long way to acclimating a dog to the real thing when it's finally encountered.

When your situation is such that you must use dummies exclusively to get in the necessary training, try stimulating as much as possible what will occur on an actual hunt. Hide dummies in cover for your dog to find on his own. Fire a shotgun (after proper introduction to gunfire insures against gunshyness) when dummies are thrown for the bird.

Have a helper do the dummy throwing. If your training has been limited to nothing but you throwing a dummy for your dog, a bird appearing out of nowhere and being shot "out front" can rate as a combination mystery, puzzle and "what should I do, Boss?" tentativeness for your dog.

A throwing motion in the direction of the fall (what the dog associates with retrieving) may get him to the bird. Teasing and tossing the bird for him, if he won't forthrightly pick it up, may flip his "on" switch. But some fun training that stimulates hunting, prior to the season's opening, will afford you more hunting time with a dependable dog.

Most of the training dummies being marketed nowadays are smart ones. So let's get the dumb ones immediately behind us. My distaste for artificial and mechanical extremes prompts the conclusion that very hard plastic dummies are stupid. As previously noted, dogs seem driven to munch, gnaw and chew on hard objects, possibly an atavistic urge dating back to their bone-chewing days.

Since pro trainers have converted almost en masse to force-fetch breaking and many breeders have abandoned efforts to produce inherently soft-mouthed dogs, my read is that the difficulty hunters have lately been experiencing with hard-mouthed dogs has been exacerbated by rigid training dummies, wooden retrieving bucks and other hard objects.

While a force-broke dog should pick up a beer can if told to and should gently carry anything in his mouth, very few "shoe leather" bird hunters attempt force breaking. The exclusive use of hard dummies can cause hard-mouth in retrievers and contributes to difficulties in getting a gun dog to fetch "naturally."

There are semi-soft plastic dummies. Most of them (and the rigid ones) have knurls on them (the knobbiness you referred to) that encourage taking hold, unlike those with a slick, slippery surface. Being heavier than the preferred canvas covered, kapok-stuffed dummies, they can be flung farther.