i would totally do this for the shock factor...

I am thinking of getting a puppy to attempt to train solely as a field dog (key word.. attempt) . In that I mean retrieving ducks, geese, etc. I think the biggest challenge I will have is crunching birds, lol. I DO understand these dogs were not bred for this purpose.

So, I want opinions and ideas. I also was wondering if anyone knows bloodlines that can take the most "pressure" and learn from it.

Who knows, I may not do it at all. Just thought it would be interesting to try...
imagine peoples faces when they see a pitbull out there retrieving with my Goldens.

 

you would be lucky if your goldens werent red after that-not a good idea dude its the total opposite actually

 

i shocked the hell outta the locals here by bringing an APBT out coyote hunting for the first time. theyd never saw a good one, and boy did he leave an impression. theyre a little more suited for that tho, i dont think i could bother with the ducks or geese, the water would be way too cold around here:eek:, and all my buddies hunt from a boat.

 

I say go for it! I truely believe that the apbt is the most all around dog in the world. I think you'll have your work cut out for you, but I think you can do it. As far as the line to use..... I'd try to use a bolio/tombstone dog, out of all the dogs I've been around, they were the smartest on average. Good luck

 

it sure could be hard to get a bulldog to give the bird up tho. lol

 

I'm sure the right APBT could be trained to retrieve a duck,some are smart enough to do nearly anything and some are dumb as rocks just like other breeds.The biggest challenge would be doing it with other dogs,to do it with other dogs you'd have to get you a cold dog.Problem is sometimes it takes quite awhile to figure out if your dog is cold,some don't turn on for quite awhile and I'd hate to put all that time in training a dog to find out it just turned on and can't have it with the other dogs.

 

I read about one (please stay on topic as I know some will chime in with he's a soft mouthed Am Staff and what not) that went hunting. Full story here: http://www.victorinoskennel.com/thunder/THUNDERSPAGE.HTML

* Hope posting a kennel link for this topic is ok.

 

it will either work, or the bird will come back looking like its had a stick of dynamite shoved up its ass!!!!!!!!

 

good point GH

 

I would love to see this! My husband wanted to train our baby Zilla to do the same thing my only fear is the quality of bird you will get back :p either way you should totally give it a shot and take some pics lol

 

Heres a retriever for ya

 

Now, that dog looks very happy

OP: I say try it.

 

Hes a great alrounder, and this one is a great marking dog

 

I tried to teach Buster to hunt upland game (birds and rabbits). He ends up more of a sight hunter versus being able to scent game which is helpful but he isn't a pointer or lab by any means.

For water fowl, not sure where you live but our season and frozen water come around the same dates. I'm not sure if the dog's coat will work out if the water is super cold, but if your doing geese in fields, I think it will work perfectly.

The other thing that tripped up me and Bus was gun training. I read a few ways to do it, decided on one and things went great the first 2 or 3 times we went out. It went soo well that I decided to bring him along for the season opener of Pheasant with a bunch of my buddies. He ended up wanting to "sprint" back to the car after a couple of hours of shells going off all over the place. I think I screwed up there and now he isn't intersted at all....

If your taking votes, I say do it!

 

some could work out ok and then they may not but the key here is for you to be 100% devoted. the attitude of "i may not do it at all" or " just thought it may be interesting" will not get you very far and is destin for failure. what im say'n is, that what ever you apply yourself to, if you don't give it 100% and be posative all the way, you may as well not start.
this breed has excelled at just about everthing over alot of years and i can't see that if someone puts the effort in, why they couldn't get to their goal.