I was drawn to Labradors years ago because of the little things that made them seem so “easy.” Getting good results started building my confidence in my training and belief in myself, and that early success is a big reason I’m still hooked on them some 25 years later. But the reality is, a lot of what those dogs did well, like retrieving, game finding, and marking, was due more to their genetics than anything I ever did.

Over time, I came to understand that the good stuff didn’t just come from training them as much as it came from raising them. It wasn’t about teaching tricks; it was about drawing out what was bred into them and then shaping it to fit my specific needs.

More recently, working with a few pointing dogs has moved that understanding even further. It has reinforced the idea that our success isn’t accomplished by forcing compliance. It’s built by understanding how to give a dog the right opportunities to develop. My experiences with both retrievers and pointers hasn’t created a blurry line that separates breeds, instead, it has clarified something way more important. Whether it’s a setter, spaniel, bluetick, or beagle, their training will never be a one-size-fits-all endeavor. The mechanics might be similar, but the art lies in balancing each dog’s natural ability with our desired discipline, while maintaining the patience to let it come together on its own.

Problems from Improper Dog Training Tools

In a few weeks, I’ll be hosting what we call a Handler’s Workshop, and people from all over the country will bring their dogs to attend. Our focus is on training the trainers, though the dogs always seem to benefit too. If the past 15 years are any indication, the most popular breed in attendance will be the Labrador. Ironically, the most common issue I’ll see from a dog with “retriever” in its name will be their struggle to retrieve. It’s been the same story, every year, and it’ssomething I’d love to see changed.

For a hunter with a hunting dog, retrieving isn’t just about marking and picking up a bird. It’s about their dog’s ability to focus, line to the fall, make the pick up, and deliver the bird cleanly to hand, undamaged and without fuss. Some of those things are genetic, but the balance is really quite unnatural to the dog and has to be shaped and then polished by us. Without all of it, the picture is incomplete.

If you were to observe one of our workshops and then say what the biggest challenge you saw was, I’m betting it would be one of, a combination of, or a variation of the following:

1. Dogs that can’t sit still long enough to focus on a thrown dummy.
2. Dogs that run off with the dummy.
3. Dogs that play keep-away.
4. Dogs that make big victory laps.
5. Dogs that lie down and chew on the dummy.
6. Dogs that are mouthy, chomping, or carry it like a cigar.

Meanwhile, we watch their handlers run through the emotional gauntlet, pleading, begging, and bribing. Frustration, anger, anxiety, and embarrassment is a tough combination to watch.

Ask most American retriever trainers how they would fix the problem, and the answer is almost always going to be somehow connected to “force fetch.” Ask a trainer in the UK, and you’ll likely hear about some version of “hold conditioning.” That used to be my answer, too, until I realized, there’s a better way.

Dog Training Tools can Help You Avoid Training Problems

The root of the problem is that by the time these dogs show up at our workshop, the issues are already in place. And that leaves all of us with no choice but to treat the symptoms to find the fix. But what if they had never let the problemdevelop in the first place?

I used to work with an old carpenter who once told me, “I can build a house driving nails with a crescent wrench, but it’s a lot easier to just use a hammer.” His point was the importance of using the right tools for the job. That’s something we’ve all heard before, and when it comes to dog training, it’s true as well. There are as many variations in training tools as there are training philosophies, and when the two are combined and used properly, it can make all the difference.

A lot of what we do as trainers has a cause-and-effect impact. One thing I’ve learned to do when trying to understand a dog's behavior is reverse engineering, in hopes of figuring out why it exists. In part, to learn from it and hopefully notrepeat it when the outcome is undesirable. Conversely, I can replicate it when the effects are positive. Our dog’s actions have consequences, and those consequences shape its behavior. It’s the “law of effect,” dogs learn to associate behaviors with positive or negative outcomes, and over time, those patterns become their habits.

The behaviors varied some in this situation, but the result was always the same, a poor delivery.

What I first needed to figure out was the cause, and here's where a pattern started to show up. Almost every time, the handler who had a dog with poor delivery, also had a training bag filled with plastic or rubber bumpers. A small detail, sosimple that I overlooked it for years, never making the connection. It started to dawn on me one day when I was working with a dog on hold conditioning. I used an inexpensive plastic bumper, and the dog immediately changed his behavior to mouthing and chomping on it, almost as if it was some kind of stress ball. I changed back to a canvas dummy, and the dog held it nicely. That moment shifted my thinking. Rather than relying on treatment of the symptom, I decided to focus on avoiding the problem altogether.

I switched everything to canvas dummies at that point, before eventually I upgraded again to a dummy made of firehose material. They offered equal function but far more durability, and I used them for years. I finally felt so strongly about how important the actual dummy design was to our success that I redesigned them again in an attempt to build an even better mousetrap. We started sewing them ourselves, making them exactly the way I wanted. We filled them withgranulated cork, so they'd float high in the water but wouldn’t be absorbent. We also added a small amount of gravel on one end, giving them virtually the exact weight and feel of a real bird. I changed from a throw rope to a smaller loop that’s less likely to tempt the dogs to carry, and it made throwing them with more distance and accuracy easier.

Teach Good Habits Early

That was how I managed to figure out the right dog training tool part, but the job itself had to change too. Not long after I made the dummy switch, I watched a DVD series called, Life of a Gundog. It was over ten hours long, documenting the training of four labrador littermates at Brindlebay Gundogs in the UK. That was the first time I saw such an unwavering emphasis put on quality over quantity when it came to making every retrieve perfect, right from the very start. They weren’t doing more or bigger retrieves with the pups; they were doing less. But they did less, much, much better.

I decided to try it, and using that approach, I saw by attrition an immediate change in how my pups carried and delivered. If the pup carried the dummy off centered, I would fix it. Every repetition I encouraged and supported by holding and sharing the dummies back and forth. Every retrieve opportunity we made perfect, and by the time they were a year old, there was nothing there for me to fix. No more need for hold conditioning or force fetch because the bad habits never had the chance to form in the first place.

That video series was what opened my eyes to the idea of getting the delivery right from the very beginning. I just recently listened to an interview with another accomplished trainer from England who won the International Gundog League Championship, essentially the UK equivalent of the U.S. National Open Retriever Championship. His insights were well worth the listen, but one of the things he made clear was that he doesn’t worry about delivery with his young dogs,figuring he’ll clean it up later—when it’s needed. I cringed a little knowing that’s the exact thought process so many seem to hang their hats on here in the states. I wondered how many people will hear that and continue ignoring early issues with their own young dogs? It made me question what “cleaning it up later” actually meant to him and just how far he is willing to let it slide before stepping in? And then, how exactly does he fix it? All unanswered questions for me, but for most of the people that listen to it, the takeaway is going to be much different than the point I’m trying to make here.

In reality, it has nothing to do with the origins of the training—although there always seems to be a teeming buzz around comparing American vs. British training styles. I guess in the end, it doesn’t matter whether our training looksAmerican as apple pie or British as a cup of tea. What does matter is figuring out the best way for you and your dog to get the best results. One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned is that my success in training is as much about what I do early as it is about fixing things later. In my experience, the old saying, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” applies to the retriever trainer, too.