jesus it’s a good job it wasn’t me you met.
i’d be SO proud if my little lad caught a hare.

think you need to get out and about a bit more matey.

bit gutted, the only thing mine has every brought back alive was one of these*

He’s too slow/easily distracted to catch anything else.

* For some reason it was stuck in some shallows on it side, and he managed corner and pick it up.

Trained gundogs should never kill anything, regardless of the breed.

Gundogs breeds (i.e. labradors, spaniels, pointers etc etc) who are not trained as gundogs may end up killing stuff.

did you have to leveret out of its mouth?

Who is the ‘bewildered woman’ here?
CG or the dog owner?

My psycho cat recorded kills of 5 rats a mole 4 mice and 3 rabbits in about 2 months .I just wish she would leave the headless rabbits outside and not eat them in the living room

Saw a blue tit savaging a worm in my garden this morning.
Not sure if it was already dead though.

Zippy – phone it in.

I think I saw the same bird on crimewatch.

My parents Irish Setter has caught a few rabbits but hasn’t harmed one yet. She just picks them up and then drops them when shouted at. A gundog should have a very “soft” mouth so as not to damage the prey.

A gundog should have a very “soft” mouth

worth knowing.

If it killed a Hare, I expect that animal was on its last legs anyways. Survival of the fittest innit?

It was a leveret – when spooked they simply cower down and freeze, easy prey when spotted
Over the years, our dogs have killed one or two like this

They’re good eating though

I remember staying at a cottage in Hope. The owner’s farm was next door, and they had a blind Jack Russell called Jim. I remember we were sitting at the breakfast table, overlooking a field, and Jim trotted past, proud as punch, with a dead rabbit in his mouth.

Sadly he wasn’t the dog equivalent of Daredevil or Rutger Hauer in Blind Fury – apparently their two cats tended to do the rabbit killing and would let the dog retrieve their efforts. That’s teamwork!

dashed – Member

Trained gundogs should never kill anything, regardless of the breed.

Thank you dashed. 🙂 You and I are the only ones that seem to understand this!

Everyone – yes, if it was a terrier then fair enough. But, as stated, it was a working Pointer and it shouldn’t have done it. Then, of course, what do I know, I’m from That Lahndun … many moons ago. 😉

that totally depends on the type of training rather than a black and white trained/not trained im afraid.

to say a trained gun breed wont kill is daft.

a trained gundog (of any breed) shouldnt…

Merlot, my cocker spaniel did once catch a very sick rabbit and in picking it up, it died with a squeal. He’s chased rabbits but never caught a well one. He also chases cats out of our garden to give the birds a chance.

To give you an idea of his killing capacity, we had the guinea pigs on the kitchen table recently, and Merlot is normally kept well away. Of course this time he wasn’t. So he jumps up on a chair, onto the table and before you can say “couchons d’inde sont mort”, he’s taken their cucumber and jumped down!

Yes I have a gundog who prefers to eat raw cucumber to fresh kill 😆 . Anyone else?

we had the guinea pigs on the kitchen table recently, and Merlot is normally kept well away

You do right – a good Rioja is better with guinea pig

Yes I have a gundog who prefers to eat raw cucumber to fresh kill . Anyone else?

Our German Shepherd likes raw veg better than anything else, broccoli in particular
I often feed him a couple of handfuls before leaving for a couple of days working away 😈

Other day I was out and watched a spaniel and a lab chase a rabbit round a field.

I was quite shocked when, all of a sudden, the spaniel appeared at my feet (as spaniels seem able to do) holding the freshly-caught bunny in its gob, not quite dead.

The owner got the dog to drop his prize, and it lay twitching and half dragging itself towards shelter.

Whereupon the stupid irresponsible owner said “Oh I can’t do it” and just walked off, leaving the half dead rabbit to suffer.

She left the unsavoury job of dispatching the poor blighter to me (which I accomplished with a handy log found nearby).

It’s that sort of thing I don’t like – I guess dogs will take wild animals but I’m glad mine doesn’t.

…it bothers me that owners can’t stop their dogs taking chase when it’s inappropriate* (TJ’s law of control applies here, I suppose, although it pains me to say it), if only because one of my cats likes to come on quite long walks with us and the dog – up hill and down dale.

If some chasing dog found it in a field, how would it know it’s domestic and not wild?

I’d hate to see my cat killed by a dog. Law of the jungle, I might drop a log on the dog’s head if I thought it would help.

* I know what it’s like – I can’t stop mine once she’s got the nose down. But I am, like, 100% certain that she doesn’t have it in her to kill anything. Whereas you take my brother’s whippets and the opposite is true. So on the lead they stay until the coast has been verified as clear.

…it bothers me that owners can’t stop their dogs taking chase when it’s inappropriate (TJ’s law of control applies here, I suppose, although it pains me to say it), if only because one of my cats likes to come on quite long walks with us

Presumably the cat is on a lead or at least under your control and comes when you call it?

ha ha. some irony there. can you get your cat to stop baiting my dog please?

Presumably the cat is on a lead or at least under your control and comes when you call it?

lol

No he is free to catch rats, or to get caught and dismantled by a longdog, most likely.

some irony there.

If my cat killed a dog while I was arguing with the dog’s owner about whether or not the dog was under control, that would be ironic (I think).

I guess dogs will take wild animals but I’m glad mine doesn’t.

dogs are dogs, even the most domesticated inteligent well trained dog can just one day out of the blue see blood and just have a go at catching and killing something.

i had to intercept the GF family dog from going for the chickens once, first time any remotley agressive move of the dog in 9 years..

when i shouted its like he acknowledged it but thought im a dog and cant help but chase it for that moment, then reverted to be stupid family dog again.

Gun dogs don’t kill things? You what?

Have you ever seen a Springer Spaniel meet a live pheasant?

I’m sorry but even well trained gundogs will sometimes bolt and kill a pheasant if it suddenly springs up and surprises the dog.

higgo – Member

A gundog should have a very “soft” mouth

worth knowing.

i think higgo may have coined “savaging the leveret” as a handy euphemism

Dorset knob, if my dog saw your cat before i saw your cat and there was nothing for it to climb up it would be a dead cat, so if i were you I’d be careful about walking your cat. I’ve seen a cat being walked with some dogs before and was able to put my dog on the lead. A lab had a run at it but the cat backed it up, it wouldnt do that with my lurcher. The only lurchers i’ve seen that can be called off a chase are ones that regularly get to kill stuff. Once they go its just a case of waiting them to catch it or it gets away. The trick is to call them before they run.

Everyone – yes, if it was a terrier then fair enough. But, as stated, it was a working Pointer and it shouldn’t have done it. Then, of course, what do I know, I’m from That Lahndun … many moons ago. 

How do you know it was a working Pointer? Anyway most working dogs will pick up the prey given the chance. The baby hare may have died of shock.

Yes, gundogs will sometimes and more likely pick up live rabbits etc and not actually bite into them very hard (soft mouth) and bring them back to their owner and drop it, like they would a fresh kill. The animal more often than not dies from the fright.

My old lab when i was a kid was a trained gun dog. The look on peoples faces when i used to send her in the village pond after a duckling was priceless. Ducklings all survived if a little tramatised. I have since grown up (a little).

Could easily happen though. I’d suggest contacting the authorities and having the animal (the pointer) destroyed immediately.

When have you ever heard of a pointer killing a random baby on the street? Really?

Generally most gun dogs have what is called a nose, babies smell like humans. Dogs tend to be socialized not to attack humans. Those dogs like Rotweillers or German Shepards that were bred as land sharks designed to attack people, generally are not so good at being socialized to make this distinction.

I’d suggest a lot of you grow up and potentially send your toddler to a creche that can’t be broken into by a psycopathic king charles spaniel.

PS: One of our old really soft docile Springers used to stand guard next to me like a Coldstream Guard outside Buckingham whenever my mother put me on the floor to play or in one of those bouncy cradle things.

bwaarp – I believe he was joking. People do that.

I’ve met to many animal rights loons or risk averse nimby types to assume people are automatically joking.

In regards to this thread, since when did people start becoming so wet and anthropomorphising animals to such a degree?

My dog swallows rabbits and squirrels whole..
then he does furry poos

Tell it to get a rabbit next time, yum yum. I saw a little jack russell drag a rabbit about the same size as itself out of a bush, the owner was horrified but we were impressed and were going to cook it, but weren’t sure if it was healthy before it was killed or if it was already dying of poison or something.

bwaarp – Member
Gun dogs don’t kill things? You what?
Have you ever seen a Springer Spaniel meet a live pheasant?
I’m sorry but even well trained gundogs will sometimes bolt and kill a pheasant if it suddenly springs up and surprises the dog.

Much experience of working gundogs then??? 🙄 have seen lots of springers meet lots and lots of pheasants – never seen one kill a bird yet.

Yes, a working gundog will sometimes pick up a live bird if it sits really tight in cover or gets trapped against a fence but they don’t kill them – they retrieve them. What’s the point in a dog that ruins perfectly good food??

And dogs are rarely (never?) surprised by pheasants – they can smell them a long time before they see them.

Yup, did you notice what I wrote earlier. The birds often die from shock, just because the Spaniel bites softly doesn’t mean it won’t injure the bird because they struggle like hell.

Struggling bird = injuries even with a soft mouth. They don’t tend to play dead.

And yeah, they can be surprised by them… pheasants can be dumb idiots and will sometimes wait till the dog is on top of the bird before it goes ape-shit and flies into the dogs face. If it’s close enough sometimes the dog is overwhelmed by the chase impulse predators get when something bolts. I guess some dogs are better than others.

One of my friends here at uni has a Spaniel that does pretty well in field trials, yet is still liable….once a year roughly….to see a rabbit and decide “sod it, I’m chasing that”.

Springers are lovely gentle dogs, but you have to be on your toes when out with them, they are mischief seekers and you should never ever trust them for a second not to do something incredibly stupid entirely out of the blue.

What I would say, is that they get worse for chasing things if you are not working or playing with the dog. If you are not working them, having them retrieve balls on a walk is the best solution to stopping the behaviour. It keeps their attention elsewhere.

5 Springers, including 2 that were gundog trained to a reasonable level and kept outside till they got a bit too old for it has left me with the impression that all Springers are daft. The ones that appear not to be, are in the closet. I don’t have any experience of top level gun dogs though.

I was v surprised to read the OP but not nearly as surprised as when I went out for dinner tonight to find (for the first time in my life) roast squirrel on the menu! Quite a coincidence having read this thread pre-dinner. I was tempted but settled for carpaccio instead!!!!

Anyone tried it?

I agree with bwaarps comments about animals dying from shock (or playing dead) from being picked up by dogs. I have two retrievers with very soft mouths. They don’t bite rabbits, birds etc but they have certainly shocked rabbits in the past by merely picking them up.

I had squirrel and rabbit stew at the Kings Head, Holmbury the other week. Quite nice it was to. A local chap takes his air rifle out on to the hill.

3 pages in I have no idea what this thread was about…..

If you don’t like things in the countryside stay in the town..(probably)

Seems that the OP was wanting to take somebody to task for something that was none of their business, which is very un-STW.
As for gundogs not being hunting dogs – nonsense. When I was a child our springer would often disappear into the wood and emerge with a dead pheasant which would be placed under a coat in mum’s bike basket. I’d pluck it and we’d have a tasty dinner. It was when he started bringing back geese we realised we had a problem.

Right as an ex-gamekeeper (que murdering b$%&”£ard comments)and having trained and used gundogs for a considerable time I’ll chim in here.

In general gun dog retrieve game to be dispatched by the best preditors on the planet, us. Most dog are trained not to bother with fur (rabbits etc)as in the gun line or beating line there job is to flush and retrieve birds.

If a rabbit is shot etc (maybe on a walkup day, shooting ground game is never really done on a main driven day as there is danger involved with fireing a gun towards the ground with maybe 20-30 people around you!!) then said dogs would also fetch said furry thing back as well as it’s been shot and it’s there job.

BUT if joe blogs is walking his gun dogs and there hunting around, they could pick said furry thing up, there would be more pressure on this as there was more than one dog present and the one that got to it first wanted to keep HIS find to himself.

In any case the animal in question must have been either very young or ill as usually normal gun dogs would not get a look in on a hare or rabbit even. as there far to quick for them que running dogs, lurchers etc…