Hunting Washington Forum
Other Hunting => Bird Dogs => Topic started by: atfulldraw on December 29, 2011, 09:53:33 AM
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My wife is starting to get on me about a dog for the family and i was thinking about a vizsla. I was wanting to know how they are with kids, how well they point and retrive. Also what should I expect to pay for a quality dog.
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I have a female Vizsla. She is almost 6 and has been the best dog. She is a great family dog. Awesome with kids of all ages. I have small nephews who crawl all over her and she loves it. But at the same time she is a great guardian as well. I don't think she would ever bite, but she's got a mean bark to her and knows how to use it. In the field she is great as well. I also have a male GSP and she has a far better nose. I have never done any training beyond obedience training, so all of her hunting skills are purely instinctual. She holds a very solid point and I've never seen her creep. She doesn't retrieve well, but that is because I never trained her too. My GSP is usually the first to downed birds and she has always just let him take care of them. On the occasion where she is the one to find the downed bird and another dog hasn't challenged her for it, she has brought them to me all on her own. I think if I worked with her she would be a good retriever. Vizslas are a very needy breed though. They want your attention constantly and do not do well if isolated for long periods. They are also extremely loyal and very eager to please. Which makes them easy to train. They are not as high energy as a GSP but still have lots of energy and need to be exercised regularly. I think Vizslas are the ultimate combo of family and hunting dog. I only have direct experience with Vizslas and GSPs, but have been around a lot of labs and springers and I will not ever own anything but Vizslas and GSPs for hunting/family dogs. Oh and one other thing is that my Vizsla does not shed half as bad as my GSP does. And the little bit she does shed is very short course fur that falls to the ground and stays there. It’s not light and fluffy fur that floats up in the air and get all over everything. Mine was not registered although she is pure bred (her dam had a no breeding clause) so I picked her up fairly cheap ($200) from a guy in Lewiston. But when we were looking into them females were running anywhere from $600 to $1000 and males from $400 to $800. This was back in 2006 so I'm not sure what prices are like now.
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I looked into getting a Vizsla last year but decided against it for a few reasons.
1. I like to hunt both waterfowl and upland. Vizslas do fine at both but aren't cold weather dogs.
2. From reading online I noticed that they take a little while to mature, so don't expect to hunt with the dog before its 2 years old.
3. I heard about the attention/neediness thing and the wife works 10's and i work about the same in the summer time.
Keep in mind that these are just my opinions with the research that i did. I never owned one and i'm sure that your situation is different than mine. Good luck!!
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I myself would go more mainstream, since upland is all I do I have setters,I've yet to own one that hasn't been huntable at 6 months old.Pointers and German shorthairs would be the same.I've got a couple pups right now that are coming 5 months old,no doubt in my mind that I could take them hunting and they would do just fine even with the young age.I plan on yarding them over the hump after the first to let em try.
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I started hunting with my Vizsla at 7 or 8 months. She did just as good as any pup in their first year. In fact I would say she did better than my Shorthair did his first year, but she did have the advantage of having another dog to follow and learn from. I would agree that they are not the best cold weather breed as far as waterfowling goes, but they have no problem upland hunting in cold weather. But this is just from my expeirience. I have heard of Vizslas (mainly males) that make decent waterfowl dogs.
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I would agree with everything that andersonjk4
posted. My viszla isn't registered either, (she's about to be 7) picked her up for $300 and that price range he gave you was similar to what I was seeing.
She wasn't really into training with dummies, but has always retrieved for me in the field, so I never felt I needed to work on that. Only had one problem hunting in cold weather, but it was about 30 out with rain/slush coming down. Dry cold is not a problem.
I would consider my dog's working range to be close for a pointer, but she's productive. Like any breed, I would just do my homework on the breeders. Hope that helps.
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Thanks for all the great input guys I'll keep all this in mind. :tup:
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Being a Vizsla owner will echo the above posts. Mine is a very good bird dog but probbaly not quite as good as the GSP's I have owned
For a combo house family and hunting dog the breed cannot be beat IMO
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Love that second picture ribka. :tup:
