Hello All, Apologies if this has been asked-and-answered already, but I searched and could not find much of relevance. Our 8 month old yellow lab, Abbey, is lucky enough to live with us on a farm. As part of the farming 'enterprise' we keep rare breed hens. about 40 or so, and they have traditionally been free-ranged to avail of the available pasture. This model has worked well and produces marvelous eggs and meat, but then I had the bright idea of introducing a retriever to the mix Training has been progressing slowly and Abbey now has a tenuous recall (not helped by our 7 year old's untraining schedule), but I think we're having impulse control issues. The problem is I can't trust Abbey to be out with the hens. If the hens could be trained to pass no heed of the dog I'm certain there'd be nothing to write about, but the hens take flight as soon as Abbey bounds up to say hello/have a sniff/eat the hen poo. When they take flight the dog must give chase and then the Benny Hill music starts in my head. Birds scatter, Abbey gives chase and before long domestic poultry are scattered over acres and acres. As yet, no hens have joined the choir eternal at the paw of Abbey, and I laughed when I read the recent post about 20 poultry lashes for any indiscretion, but is there a way to train the dog to take a more benign approach to the fowl? Some of the rough shooters around here have made vague mentions of making her sit with the poultry until she has become accustomed to them but I don't think her impulse control is nearly developed enough for that yet. Unfortunately there are no gamekeepers nearby, as presumably they have to train their dogs to leave the thousands of reared birds alone until the start of the season. Any thoughts/experiences would be greatly appreciated. At the moment Abbey owns the early morning and the twilight with the hens having fragile dominion over the day but I'd love to reach a more relaxed truce
We have rare free range poultry here (lots!) Really the earlier your dog is introduced the better, but only in a calm environment. Saying that we have had a fair few labs here various ages and have not had a problem. One way to do this is set up a situation with one or two hens or cockerel nearby, have lots of treats on hand, (high value cooked chicken..err maybe not! Cheese, cooked beef etc...) dog on a long line or longish lead. Then scatter high value treats close by. You could also have a squeaky ball or favourite toy if that is a greater reward. As this point because the dog is not chasing the birds the birds themselves should be fairly calm, this makes them less interesting to your dog. Poultry are a predated species, so can flap around in a panic quite easily, but if they don't perceive a threat are happy to potter around dogs. Another useful training tool is using hand touch, which is training your dog to touch your hand, then reward with a high value treat is a really good distraction and focus technique, however this only works of the dogs excitement threshold is reasonably low. You can try this when Abbey has been out for a walk, so tired and less excitable. If at any time it looks like Abbeys interest is directed keenly towards the chickens, stop immediately, the risk being that chasing chickens is associated with a fun game and becomes more of a learned behaviour. In summary, give Abbey something to do, and have rewards that carry greater value than chasing chickens. By creating a calm environment where the chickens themselves are not stressed should also reduce any inclination to chase. Failing that invest in a couple of large Muscovy drakes.....
I introduced Monty to our chickens a couple of days ago. Monty is approaching 7 months now and he's seen them daily since he joined us at 4 months, but he's never been able to get to them thanks to the electric fence. I took him into the enclosure on the lead and we just sat calmly with lots of treats. To my surprise he wasn't in the slightest bit interested and thought the poos were much more interesting. I dread to think what he'd have been like a month or two ago however!
It's best to start things off with the poultry behind a fence that the dog can't get through. Lots of treats for sitting calmly in that situation, over many sessions till the chooks don't care about the dog. Then repeat with the chooks out but the dog on lead. Practice sitting, recall, and generally ignoring chooks. Then with a long line instead of a lead. It's something that must be done over weeks and months, not days. The idea is to never allow a situation in which chasing happens. You don't want a dog/pup to know that such a thing is even possible. As your pup has already had the thrilling experience of chasing you have a bit of work to undo that, but just start at the beginning and you'll get there. But as I said, think months before you get reliability around the birds. You're aiming for a dog that calmly walk through a flock and shown no sign of interest or wariness. You'll get there. But don't allow any more chasing from now on
Thanks for the great replies. Gentle introduction and good association seems to be the order of the day then. I might set up a training ring of poultry netting (and clip a few primary feathers) and see how we get on. Jaymz, was it electrified poultry wire that kept Monty out? Abbey's thick coat means she slides under our polywire cattle fences without even flinching.
