Does anyone know of any training classes where I can take my 18 week old Springer spamiel. I have been advised that he would benefit from Gun Dog training classes to give him some discipline, but I am unable to locate any. I believe I need to be looking for working test classes as he will not be used for shooting etc.Thanks in advance for your help.

I would not worry too much about the type of gundog training. Most clubs do everything. Working Tests are a summer test, Field Trials during the winter. Just about all training is with dummies and no one is going to try to make you do anything that you don't want to do.

Many years ago one of my ex petdog club girls came to see me. Her Labrador was getting old and she was thinking about getting a puppy. This time she wanted to do something with it. I suggested showing but she was not keen. Nor was she about the idea of competitive obedience. I suggested gundog work but the idea of handling dead birds did not appeal at all! I pointed out that there was gundog working tests which only involved retrieving dummies and she decided that might not be so bad. She asked me where she could see it going on so I told her. The next time I saw her she had joined! After a while she worked in some working tests which she enjoyed. Later she came to see me and said that although it was good fun she would really like, just once, to see her dog doing what it was bred for! I had a word with a friend and we organised a day for her. Cutting a long story short, she is now secretary of a training society, instructs there and picks up with her dog throughout the shooting season!

As you probably know, I'm retrievers rather than Spaniels and my contacts in that area are very limited. Also you are way out of my area. I don't know of anything which might help but if no one posts on this thread I'll give it some thought and see if I can come up with anything.

Regards, John

I have a copy of the Field Trial Societies from the Kennel Club.  I'll pm you some of the names and address of the ones in Yorkshire.

Helen

Thanks Helen, anything you can provide will be greatly appreciated. Dave

Thanks John

Smashing. Looks like you should be ok now so I'll leave you to it. Just remember this. Gundog people are a close knit community. Just because an address you have is too far away it is still worth a phone call. People enter tests at clubs quite some way away so a phone call to one person often results in another phone number which is rather closer to you! For the cost of a couple of calls you could end up with exactly what your looking for.

Regards, John

Not my area either, but if you have a look on : http://www.gundog-magazine.com/clubs.htm

you will find a list of all the gundog clubs in the UK. I'd suggest Yorkshire Sporting Spaniel Club & Yorkshire Gundog Club would be a good start.

Spaniel training is brilliant fun (even more fun than retriever training!) although it is arguably more problematic combining a pet dogs free-running with spaniel work than retriever work.