Spaniels for Sport: foreword by Wilson Stephens editor of The Field.

Spaniels for Sport by Talbot Radcliffe

Based on H.W. Carlton's classic Spaniels: Their Breaking for Sport and Field Trials With a foreword by Wilson Stephens editor of The Field. Hardcover5.2 x 8 inches, 136 pages
"A comprehensive and indispensible guide to training any animal, from a working gundog to a family pet". This is a revision of H.W.Carlton's Spaniels: Their Breaking for Sport and Field Trials (1915) and has gone into many reprints and new editions over decades. A minor classic in its field. Contents include: Part One, Psychology: Psychology before trianing; Spaniels for sport; The perfect spaniel; Basic requirements - standing rabbits, stamina and perserverance, steadiness, retrieving, comments. Part Two, Handtraining, early puppyhood lessons - humanization, retrieving, dropping to command and hand, dropping to fur and feather, waiting for orders before retrieving, other methods of teaching retrieving, dropping to shot, answering to whistle and 'back'. Part Three, Subsequent Training: A natural retriever is a gem beyond price; Hunting - in cover, in the open, check-cord, dropping, chasing, hunting down-wind, hunting within gunshot, missing ground, in hedgerows; Hunting with the gun. Part Four, Mixed Bag, the trained spaniel at work: Retrieving from water; Wildfowling and flighting with spaniels; Lending a hand; Jumping; Spaniels as beaters. Appenices are: Breeding and early care of puppies; Exercising ---------------A spaniel is a type of gun dog. Spaniels were especially bred to flush game out of denser brush. By the late 17th century, spaniels had been specialized into water and land breeds. The extinct English Water Spaniel was used to retrieve water fowl shot down with arrows. Land spaniels were setting spaniels—those that crept forward and pointed their game, allowing hunters to ensnare them with nets, and springing spaniels—those that sprang pheasants and partridges for hunting with falcons, and rabbits for hunting with greyhounds. During the 17th century, the role of the spaniel dramatically changed as Englishmen began hunting with flintlocks for wing shooting. Charles Goodall and Julia Gasow (1984) write that spaniels were "transformed from untrained, wild beaters, to smooth, polished gun dogs."