French Brittany doing her thing

[Edward Bussa]

I went out today to enjoy the beautiful spring morning and grab some images of my friend's dog, a French Brittany. She is being trained to hunt birds.

All shot with my new D300 and my 16 yr. old Micro-Nikkor 60mm 2.8:

It will be a little while before she is fully trained, but I'd like to get a shot of her with a bird in her mouth!

 

[Kathy Rappaport]

Working Dogs

I love to see dogs doing what they were bred - great photos - to do but I can do without the dog having it's prey in it's mouth. As it is I have a Cairn Terrier who loves to chase any small vermin around the yard and once dug a big hole in the wallboard when we were not home. We don't want to know what was on the other side but we never found any of it.

When I was a little kid, we had a dog - now I think it was a Jack Russell or Fox Terrier and a Daschund mix - and he brought small sparrows in the house and buried them behind the living room couch all the time. The couch was a heavy original style hide a bed with metal frame and it took two men to move it to get those birds out. My mother ws not too thrilled with my dog for that.

The hawks leave the remains of their dinner on our front lawn occasionally and we've twice had to pry open the mouth of our growling Lhasa Apso to take away his prize - mostly eaten leg of rabbit and the bait was a piece of my own uncooked steak dinner. Glad to have had some fresh meat in the refrigerator so no one got hurt.

I'll take the pictures of the dogs sans prey, thank you. Love the series - thank you for reminding me about what working dogs do for their keep.

 

[Edward Bussa]

I have my own reservations about the bird in mouth thing as well. I love to get outside into the wilderness with a purpose - shooting with my camera - but the idea of killing something turns me off, so I don't do it.

I just think the bird in mouth shot is such an important milestone in the dog's training that I'm looking forward to it. Besides, I imagine that is the dog's favorite part!

 

[Mike Shimwell]

We have a lurcher, who was a working dog before she came to us. She remains very keen to hunt and will occasionally pick up and kill rabbits or even ducks. It's not nice, but it is a very natural death for a rabbit. A short run followed by, usually, a very quick death. On the odd occasion I've taken a picture of her with a kill my wife has usually taken exception, 'though with that type of dog you have accept that it goes with the territory.

Mike