I’d be careful about walking your cat.

A_A, yes the lurcher scenario is what worries me.

It’s not so much that we ‘walk’ our cat, we don’t especially want him to come with us, he just tags along. He’s not on a lead or anything like that.

But I’ll use your comment as weight in my attempts to persuade Mrs Knob that it’s actually quite dangerous, not sweet, and we should maybe lock him up when we go out.

It should also be remembered that just because Pointers are used as gundogs it it doesn’t mean the ones CG saw were trained gundogs – in fact I’d say it was doubtful as they’re not ‘mainstream’ gundogs now.
So it was just doing what dogs do.
Frankly CG you got away lightly – if it had been a Jack Russell it would have torn the furry thing to shreds in front of you.

I’m sorry but I have NEVER seen an animal die of shock by being picked up by a dog. I have two working labs and I pick up on driven shoots twice a week during the shooting season. The rest of the year I shoot pigeons, rabbits and squirrels. I have seen literally hundreds and hundreds of birds (and rabbits) retrieved by mine and other people’s dogs over the years – many of which are not dead – that’s the point of a good dog; to find wounded game. Not one has ever “died of shock”.

Wild animals have a strong “flight” instinct – they don’t just give up and die at the first sign of trouble! Imagine how many times your average rabbit or pheasant gets chased by a fox, dog or cat in it’s lifetime – if they keeled over every time they got a fright the countryside would be littered with dead carcasses!!

Pointers are used as gundogs it it doesn’t mean the ones CG saw were trained gundogs

Indeed, I mean, why would I train my pointer as a gundog? She’s a Gundog breed, of course, but I don’t have any plans to shoot innocent little wild critters in the near future.

TJ’s law of control

I wouldn’t take much notice of it, as according to TJ’s law of control all guide dogs are ‘out of control’ as they are not in the owners sight when off the lead…..

Thats why I am glad UK law is applied and not TJ’s law, as it has some common sense

animals kill animals.

if you want to moan why not harp on about how the largest killer of birds is the domestic cat?

It’s not so much that we ‘walk’ our cat, we don’t especially want him to come with us, he just tags along.

There’s a little colony of feral cats on a regular walk of mine and one of them has taken a shine to a spaniel a woman walks regularly on the same route and it tags along. Whenever another dog appears it climbs a tree and waits ’til the coast is clear and then trots besides the spaniel again 🙂

FWIW my two labs (not trained gundogs) have caught a few young rabbits who have all hopped away quite happily even after a couple of minutes of being ‘carried’.

you should never ever trust them for a second not to do something incredibly stupid entirely out of the blue.

Never mind dogs. Sounds like some of my friends

Thisisnotaspoon

+1 for the first point, my parents prefer’s to eat poo than roll in it though!

………..I’m not sure I like the sound of your parents!!

My springer often brings me back rabbits (not hares) and they hop off when he drops them at my feet, not trained, its a bit like a scene from Bambi!

my cat caught a little bunny once and took it into the house by the scruff of the neck (she had bunny/kitten confusion issues). I picked it up to let it out in the field, and it died in my hands as I was carrying it, was a bit sad really!

Chose the squirrel tonight. Delicious. Time to pop a few more off for the pot!

Guys – you need to stop multi-tasking/speed-reading!

I did state that I ascertained that these dogs were working dogs, ie trained to the gun. Of course the size was a dead-giveaway as working dogs are considerably smaller than show dogs.

Thinking about this a bit more, the perpetrator was pack leader (mother) and the other two were daughter and grand-daughter. So of course her action may have been just to show the youngsters that she’s top dog and there’s life in the old gal yet.

HTH. 🙂

Dancake – Member
If it is a fresh dead thing, my Springer may pick it up. If it’s old and rancid he’ll just roll around on it.
edit: He will run after furry things though without success

This.

Two springers (neither trained to the gun – just pets). Both will chase anything that moves. One never gets close as although he’s the younger he’s clumsy and thick as s**t – he will also ignore dead stuff.

The other will ‘collect’ anything freshly dead and carry it around for a bit until he gets bored. He will roll in anything dead that’s rotting a bit. VERY occasionally he catches something still breathing (usually young/old/weak rabbits) and dispatches it. He then treats it exactly as something he found freshly dead.

Always a little distressing/awkward when he kills, but not really a problem as he’s a ‘hunting’ dog who has been raised as pet and not had those behaviours trained out of him. Grew up with ‘proper’ trained to gun working Springers and never saw any of them chase/take/kill anything still alive.

slainte ➡ rob

The best one was when he brought us a pheasant. We took that home and ate it. YUMMY. Even gave Max some.

GOOD DOG!

Animals are food. Dogs see animals as food, just like we do. If they see one, they may well try and kill it. Good dog! Time to eat it.

I’m sorry but I have NEVER seen an animal die of shock by being picked up by a dog. I have two working labs and I pick up on driven shoots twice a week during the shooting season. The rest of the year I shoot pigeons, rabbits and squirrels.

I have, my best friend had a farm and a chicken coup that his field spaniel managed to infiltrate…..then plonked one of his chickens down in front of him proudly.

The bird had gone into fight or flight mode, flaps around like a mentalist in the dogs soft mouth and gives itself internal injuries.

So the bird didn’t die because it got ripped to shreds by some psychotic dog, they died because they went into shock combined with injuries caused by struggling which would have lead to a slow death had they it be dispatched.