doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com OT- Dog question

Just curious. In March, I took my dog hunting at a "Happy Jack's" bird farm where they put out a lot of hen phez. She seemed to be having trouble scenting the hens.

My dog (Lab) had been on two trips (2 diff seasons) of several days each of hunting wild roosters in SD and had performed extremely well. She found and flushed many wild birds and retrieved every bird I saw go down in heavy cover.

Is there something about hens in general or hens in the spring that is a difficulty for dogs to scent?

Regards
Chuck

I doubt it. If there's any scent at all a Lab will find it. My guess is that it was just one of those days, Chuck.

Maybe she is upset you didn't take her to Hawaii with the rest of the family Chuck? I know mine would do the same thing,those chocolates are very smart.

She does love the beach...hmmmm.

I agree with King, just one of those days. Some combination of humidity and temperature and all my dogs go noseblind. I can't look at the weather and tell when it is going to happen but I know it does. I have been training some dogs with pen raised quail in 90 degree weather this week and the dogs are picking them up at 10 yards. This winter I saw the same pups run 5 feet downwind of a wild covey and not pick them up.

Best,

Mike

Chuck,

My experience is that hens "loose" their scent in March and April. Their body chemistry also changes. They produce a lot of fat. I speculate that this is part of the reproductive process. I'm sure that your dog will do well next season open.

Phil

Chuck:
I concur with all the above. When my setter was young I put down in a field of birds in the Spring and worked him upwind and he never found a thing. A few weeks later he found them all. Go figure.

I have read young deer have very little to no scent when they are young and I suspect this is true to some degree of all natures creatures.

Mike

Pheasants and quail loose their scent in the spring to protect them from predators when they sit on their nests. I can't say if the scent loss also applies roosters.

Chuck, it wasn't the dog. As a few have said and I believe it also that ground nestng birds start to loose some of their scent close to egg producing time. All game birds like quail, pheasants and turkeys,(includes ducks, geese) the hens won't sit on the eggs until the last egg is laid so that they will all hatch around the same time, so I do believe that it is nature helping out.

Fawns have no scent at all when first born, within a day though they are keeping up with mom, but she will make them lay down to thwart off danger.

Two weeks ago I let out a few quail that I had left, first the males were picking on each other, then the hens were doing the same. Let them out and the only one that stayed around was a cock. Every time I let the dog out he would look for that quail and most of the time he found him, sometimes around the pen or in the hay field. The last week no bird, didn't hear him calling, nothing. The other day let the dog out does his same thing, looks for birds and the rabbit that lives under the shed, I see him on point but it isn't as intense as on the quail, I go over with my flushing stick and beat the grass and a young starling comes out flying low, before I could tell him to stay he is after it and the thing lands on the ground screaming, so I go and pick it up and naturally it grabs my finger with it's beak. I take it and put it away from him and tell him no.
Hated to make this so long, but some young birds do have scent and I know the cock quail do. The day after I let the quail out it had rained during the night, I went out to work in my garden and I see him in the hay field, I figure he is doing his business, well he was on point. I walked back to the house to get my flushing stick and when I caught up to him, I walked in carefully and a hen quail flushed and then I saw the cock still on the ground. He found the hen again so I quess she still had scent.
Maybe it's only when they are in the process of laying eggs.

Chuck,

Years back I field trialed my english springers. The held trials in the spring as well as the fall. I stopped going to the spring trial because scenting and conditions were so bad. I'd watch the best of dogs nearly step on a bird and not scent it. I was always told it was because the hen birds were sitting on eggs and that natures way of protecting them was that their scent was diminished during this time. They did not use roosters during the spring trials because they were to hard to control during the breeding season. I'd stick to fall phez hunting.

Bill G.