The old logging road on which my dogs and I walked was no longer drivable. It was covered in grass and clover, bordered by Scotch broom on one side, timber on the other. It was the perfect habitat for the mountain quail we were hunting.
Echo, my three year old pudelpointer, took the lead. Nose to the ground she worked hard, 40 yards ahead. By her side was Kona, my three month old pudelpointer. Echo had been on numerous hunts and was proving a good mentor to Kona.
As Echo moved forward, Kona stopped and went on point. He held, looking into a tiny clearing along the side of the road. Figuring he saw a squirrel or songbird, I kept approaching. Then Kona pounced out of sight, appearing seconds later with a bleached shed antler.
Kona’s giraffe-like legs, big paws and floppy ears speedily whirled in every direction, as he couldn’t get the shed to me fast enough. I praised him and tossed the shed out for a short retrieve. Kona was immediately on it. We repeated the fetch, then I praised him and put the shed in my pack. It was a moment I’ll never forget, Kona’s first shed.
I trained both of my dogs to locate bleached shed antlers. I also taught them to sniff out fresh sheds, something we weren’t going to find on this October outing. In this case, I wanted to reward Kona for finding the shed, and we did that through a quick game of fetch, rubbing his hears and praising him. I put the shed away when Kona still desired it. I didn’t let him chew on it, engage in tug of war or let him run off in a possessive manner. I wanted him to give up the antler while excited and let him know he did good.
With spring shed hunting upon us, when taking your pup out on its first shed hunt, make the effort to guarantee success. Training a dog to hunt sheds is far different than hunting them, as actual finds can be hours, if not days apart. But you still want to instill success in order to let the pup know what they’re supposed to be doing, and doing it right.
Just because you’re shed hunting with a dog, don’t expect miracles. Dogs can’t find sheds that aren’t there. Hunting in areas you know bucks to be in January through March, when dropping their antlers, will obviously boost success rates. The same goes for elk which are dropping their antlers from late February into mid-April.
If your pup hasn’t found any sheds after an hour or two of looking, plant one or two. Prior to leaving home, slip a couple sheds into your pack. Be sure and wash them and handle them with rubber gloves to eliminate your scent. I like roughing them up with abrasive paper to enhance the smell of fresh bone so the pup can detect it.
When the pup is in the brush, searching, take a shed from your pack and toss it into a place where the pup will find it. Ideally, this is into a headwind where the dog can smell it prior to seeing it. Make sure to toss out the shed when the pup can’t see you. Wearing a rubber glove when doing this will keep the oils from your hand getting on the shed, which the pup will surely smell.
Planting sheds, even when hunting for them, keeps pups optimistic and educates them as to what it is they are looking for. It’s not an overkill to do this a few times a morning when you’re not finding any sheds.
You can also plant old, bleached sheds for the pup to find. Again, handle them with rubber gloves to mask your scent. When the dog is working a brushy draw or timber, out of sight, toss the bleached shed as far as you can, into an open place where you can see it. Sometimes I’ll have my dog sit, and I’ll walk 75 yards ahead, out of sight, plant the bleached shed, then call my dog. From there, the search is on.
Encourage the pup to work the area where the bleached shed is laying. If the pup can’t find it, guide the pup to it by hand and whistle signals. I’ve had my dogs retrieve many bleached sheds that I guided them to in this way. Keep in mind that when a dog is sniffing for sheds, their eyes are only inches off the ground, so they can’t see what we can. For this reason, be sure to position the white shed where they can see it. Bleached sheds carry little or no odor, and are located and fetched by sight, meaning the dog has to initially see them, not smell them. By guiding pups to bleached sheds, they’ll learn to trust what you’re communicating to them while simultaneously learning what to look for, and sight-recognition is a big part of shed hunting success.
If you’re not finding as many shed antlers as you’d hoped this spring and summer, take the time to teach your dog what to look for by planting sheds. Besides, practice makes perfect and the more success a pup has, the more they’ll learn and the greater their desire to find sheds will be.
Note: To watch Scott Haugen’s series of basic puppy training videos visit scotthaugen.com. Follow his adventures on Instagram and Facebook.
