Ashleygrove Gundogs

           Please be aware that the adverse weather can mean I have to cancel or move bookings during the winter months. You should also note that if the training field becomes water logged during sustained wet weather I will call to re-arrange your booking. I am happy to train in the rain but must be mindful of safety and damage to the paddock. 

I hope you have noticed the new TESTIMONIALS page where you can leave feedback from your training sessions at Ashleygrove Gundogs for others to read. Who will be first???

GROUP TRAINING

Following the success of the evening group last summer I will offer some more classes in 2010. This time they will be for novice level retrievers and we will be working in small groups problem solving and planning exercises to practise at home. Last years tuesday evening group will continue to work together but in a more relaxed way. 

There are plans to do some workshops for clients who would like to start hunting young spaniels and  maybe a session on introducing the whistle for all gundogs breeds. To qualify for these your dog must have reliable recall and understand the basic verbal commands.

Let me know if you would be interested.

Here are 2 of my hard working students, with Gundog Club assesor Paul Harper, after passing their Grade 3 Retriever standard. Well done girls and Dogs!

 I have asked Howard from Mullenscote, Steve from KimberleyGundogs, and Paul from Redbeards gundogs to join us again and dates are appearing on the calendar page. Adem Fehmi is coming along for the first time to give us a day of obedience training and problem solving for novice handlers, as this is a new course for us I am offering the day at a discounted price.

(check out the links page to find out more about these trainers)

Working with different trainers will allways be useful to you when building your own training schedule. They each have a different regime to show you and you will definately pick up something new to try.

The Instructors course with Tutors Avril Munson and Sue Horn will go ahead this spring/summer and we are having a behaviour day in April. If you think you would be interested in learning more about dog behaviors get in touch with Avril Munson 'The Dog Clamer'(see the link) to see if there are any places left.

Getting out with the dogs during February is always hard work. The weather is so wet this year and the ground is really difficult to walk on. I made the mistake of going down the tramlines on the feild at the weekend and my boots almost came off with the weight of mud!

My dogs are resting now following a hard seasons work and they are just realising that shooting is over for a few months. Once all the girls have had their seasons and everyone has chilled for a bit we will crack on with dry training again. I have 2 cockers and springer and a labrador to bring on this year so lots to work on.

A Day Out in Hampshire

This week I took a small group of trainees down to Mullenscote Gundogs in Hampshire for a days training. We set off fairly early but of course the traffic caught us out and we arrived about 10.15am. We were warmly greeted and with bacon rolls and tea inside us set off with Howard Kirby to his training fileds. I had put away my training hat for the day and joined my group as a trainee. A welcome rest for me and a joy to spend the day with my new cocker, Megan. Howard set us up for a mock walk up line to check steadiness, handler confidence, marking, retrieving and stop whistle in one exercise. A great start as it got us working as a team and gave the dogs something to do straight away. It is all to easy to start a session with lots of talk and loose the attention of people and dogs right at the begining. We were then taken through strutured exercises to solve the problems we were each experiencing. Howard was very careful to cover everyone's problems in detail and by the end of the day I think we all had a clear way forward with our training. The teaching style is very relaxed and with a good injection of humour so although we learnt a lot it still felt like a good, fun day out with our dogs. Thank you Mullenscote and we look forward to welcoming you back to Ashleygrove later in the year.

Here's the proof!

You will notice that I am huggin' the dogs while Sue (of course) is attacking the trainer!