Banty Roosters for Training

[lokidog]

Maybe not originally, but that is the common reference today.  It could be the original bantum was a smaller variety of chicken or closely related fowl found in indonesia.   Although I can't find any references to a different breed of fowl called a bantum.    There are birds referred to as "true" bantams such as Silkies and Malaysian Serama that do not have a large counterpart.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bantam

[Heredoggydoggy]

I don't know what mine were.  My neighbor said they were some sort of cross.  I went through the poultry barn at the Waterville Fair this year, and there were breeds I'd never even heard of...

[AspenBud]

So what this conversation seems to be evoling into is "What is the best bang for the buck/effort for having training birds... Pigons, bantums, guinifowl, and??? Which are the best and why?

Homing pigeons, because they are tough and you can build a pen for them and reuse them. They are also generally stronger fliers than a lot of pen raised quail.

[AspenBud]

My dogs will not chase anything unless told to do so- hence "training".

I'm hoping you mean that your dogs are trained to whistle sit or "leave it" and not that you tell them when they can or can not flush a pheasant or grouse once they are hunting for you...unless you're attempting to hunt like the Europeans do with pointers.

That said, while I'd be leery of encouraging a dog to view chickens as game, I think all dogs are at risk of being chicken killers if they get loose and are unattended by their owners. Not my first choice for training a dog, but birds are birds I suppose.

My dogs find chukar left behind from the pointer hunt tests all the time on their morning jaunts. They bring them back alive like clockwork. Properly force fetching a dog(completely) will teach the dog birds are not to be killed by his mouth.

Chasing and retrieving are two different things.

An angry chicken owner probably won't see the difference. The bird is being chased and/or the bird is in the dog's mouth, bad bad news for a dog owner and his dog.

[Stilly bay]

So what this conversation seems to be evoling into is "What is the best bang for the buck/effort for having training birds... Pigons, bantums, guinifowl, and??? Which are the best and why?

Homing pigeons, because they are tough and you can build a pen for them and reuse them. They are also generally stronger fliers than a lot of pen raised quail.

I agree 100%

bantams and guinea fowl are very helpful for certain applications but not nearly as useful as homing pigeons.

yeah they are almost as good as guinea hens.

same thing

used for the the same situations maybe but bantam chickens and guinea fowl are nothing alike. Nothing beats a guinea fowl for teaching a dog to work running birds. I think they can fly farther than your average Bantam too.
The tricky part is finding an area where you can actually use them, those guineas can out run a pheasant.

[AspenBud]

So what this conversation seems to be evoling into is "What is the best bang for the buck/effort for having training birds... Pigons, bantums, guinifowl, and??? Which are the best and why?

Homing pigeons, because they are tough and you can build a pen for them and reuse them. They are also generally stronger fliers than a lot of pen raised quail.

I agree 100%

bantams and guinea fowl are very helpful for certain applications but not nearly as useful as homing pigeons.

yeah they are almost as good as guinea hens.

same thing

used for the the same situations maybe but bantam chickens and guinea fowl are nothing alike. Nothing beats a guinea fowl for teaching a dog to work running birds. I think they can fly farther than your average Bantam too.
The tricky part is finding an area where you can actually use them, those guineas can out run a pheasant.

I forgot one, train the dogs on the birds they are going to hunt if you live within a reasonable (you determine that) distance of them. One of the best bird dogs I know of is a German Shorthair that gets run on pheasant several months out of the year and spends about an equal amount on ruffed grouse.

There is no better trainer for a bird dog, or at least a pointer with some natural point in it, than wild birds.