E-collar adn E-fence

[freberd]

We have a 6 month old chessie
and its time to start training on ecollars

The e-fence is new to us in the last couple years so our other dogs were already trained.
It was a little confusing as when they were buzzed they wanted to come to us like with the e-collar but soon they figured it out

So for a new dog
which should we train him on first?
the e-fence or just the e-collar for hunting

Thanks

[AspenBud]

They kind of go hand in hand. You train a dog how to "turn off" the stimulation with the e-collar and the same principle applies to the invisible fence.

There should however be a big difference in the voltage. The fence should deliver enough to tell the dog to stay the hell away from that area. The e-collar on the other hand should only deliver enough to get the dog's attention, no yelping necessary.

I would start with e-collar work first. Once the dog knows how to turn off the stimulation the transition shouldn't be too bad. Just don't turn the dog loose in the yard without some training on the fence.

And remember, dogs don't generalize well. What applies in the yard may not mean anything to them in another location.

[Happy Gilmore]

If you plan on collar conditioning your dog properly, I'd put up a kennel. Properly collar conditioned dogs typically will "GO" on pressure not accompanied by a whistle sit. Chessies find contradictions such as this particularly confusing. A confused Chesapeake is not fun to train or attempt to get something out of with advanced training.

In a vague order:

Dogs are forced fetched and taught to "reach" early upon the application of pressure. Often from the e-collar or ear pinch or both used concurrently.
Dogs are forced to the back pile via the use of the e-collar and/or in conjunction with stick pressure.
The proper response to said pressure is given via stimulation from the collar. The learned and taught response is for the dog to "GO" away from you with great enthusiasm. The more pressure, the higher the drive response to "GO" further and faster.

Saying "NO" and putting a correction on a dog makes a location "hot". This is similar to the invisible fences. Should you use your invisible fence, what ends up happening is the dog will learn the fence line. Learn it gets corrected for getting near the fence.

Fast forward to a training day. Lets pretend you've collar conditioned your dog properly. You make a correction in the field. The dog now understands a correction is a barrier. You will likely get one of two responses; the dog will bolt through the area or, simply refuse to go near the area which it now thinks has a fence. The owner(you) have now just created a situations which confuses the dog. Chessies think about stuff and when they get something on their brain is sticks around for a long time. Getting a dog confused because of corrections is particularly dangerous ESPECIALLY with a Chessie. Tip toe carefully around this notion of e-fences, e-collars and Chesapeakes. You can get all your eggs cracked in one basket in a hurry. 

Easy answer, put dogs in a kennel when you are not doing something productive or active with them.

[AspenBud]

If you plan on collar conditioning your dog properly, I'd put up a kennel. Properly collar conditioned dogs typically will "GO" on pressure not accompanied by a whistle sit. Chessies find contradictions such as this particularly confusing. A confused Chesapeake is not fun to train or attempt to get something out of with advanced training.

In a vague order:

Dogs are forced fetched and taught to "reach" early upon the application of pressure. Often from the e-collar or ear pinch or both used concurrently.
Dogs are forced to the back pile via the use of the e-collar and/or in conjunction with stick pressure.
The proper response to said pressure is given via stimulation from the collar. The learned and taught response is for the dog to "GO" away from you with great enthusiasm. The more pressure, the higher the drive response to "GO" further and faster.

Saying "NO" and putting a correction on a dog makes a location "hot". This is similar to the invisible fences. Should you use your invisible fence, what ends up happening is the dog will learn the fence line. Learn it gets corrected for getting near the fence.

Fast forward to a training day. Lets pretend you've collar conditioned your dog properly. You make a correction in the field. The dog now understands a correction is a barrier. You will likely get one of two responses; the dog will bolt through the area or, simply refuse to go near the area which it now thinks has a fence. The owner(you) have now just created a situations which confuses the dog. Chessies think about stuff and when they get something on their brain is sticks around for a long time. Getting a dog confused because of corrections is particularly dangerous ESPECIALLY with a Chessie. Tip toe carefully around this notion of e-fences, e-collars and Chesapeakes. You can get all your eggs cracked in one basket in a hurry. 

Easy answer, put dogs in a kennel when you are not doing something productive or active with them.

I think this depends on training methods. If you're burning dogs all the way out to the retrieve and all the way back until they deliver to hand I could see such problems. That's a somewhat controversial training method depending on which message boards you read but it is done. I have heard of some field trialers running pointing dogs doing something similar to keep dogs to the front and at range. Again, controversial and not the norm. But under such circumstances you make a fair point.

[Happy Gilmore]

Controversial? You are joking right? Nobody ever burns to a retrieve. When you are doing force fetch, you apply pressure until the bird is in the dogs mouth. When working a back pile, you may mix a burn with a nick and the word "back". There is no burn all the way there and certainly the only correction you'd give a dog on the way back is part of collar conditioning. That would never be done on, around or near a retrieve.

and to add a quick edit;

the OP was talking about training a retriever certainly not a pointing dog. Pointing dogs have little in the way of collar conditioning in comparison to the most commonly accepted methods of retriever training(very simply described above). Pointing dogs do not handle in any precision as retrievers are required to do and beyond a very loose cast and breaking out a pointer.....there are no similarities in training methods.

There are exceptions with those who chose to run some of the other versatile hunting dog venues. I've trained with some high level and titled dogs. They still come nowhere close to Master Hunter Retriever in their requirements for precision handling. Not saying one is better, it's just a different game and very different requirements which falls over into the time spent collar conditioning, doing basic handling drills such as T, Double T, Force to Pile, Force to water, Swim by, cheating singles, wagon wheel etc. All of the beginnings I mentioned in my first post are part of the collar conditioning for a retriever. They are the most widely accepted methods which are outlined on numerous videos etc. Mike Lardy, Evan Graham, Amy Dahl etc all use the same general collar conditioning and force methods. All developed by Rex Carr and basically copied by others.

[AspenBud]

Controversial? You are joking right? Nobody ever burns to a retrieve. When you are doing force fetch, you apply pressure until the bird is in the dogs mouth. When working a back pile, you may mix a burn with a nick and the word "back". There is no burn all the way there and certainly the only correction you'd give a dog on the way back is part of collar conditioning. That would never be done on, around or near a retrieve.

No I'm not joking. I'll see if I can dig up the reference I'm thinking of.

Pointing dogs have little in the way of collar conditioning in comparison to the most commonly accepted methods of retriever training(very simply described above). Pointing dogs do not handle in any precision as retrievers are required to do and beyond a very loose cast and breaking out a pointer.....there are no similarities in training methods.

I'll agree that pointers are generally expected to think more independently. I'm not so sure I would agree that they aren't collar conditioned as much. But the training is very different, no argument there.

[freberd]

We decided to use training collar and long lead
So far it's working good on our property

Thanks for the tips