# Puppies that try to eat birds



## goldlover68 (Jun 17, 2013)

My first 'field bred' Golden went on his first hunt with me at around 7 months. He was well trained to mark and retrieve, so I thought taking him to opening season dove hunting would be the ticket. It was a perfect day and we were in an area where we had lots of birds flying and not to many other hunters around us. Perfect! The first bird I hit, was about 45yds out and he 'helicopter' down right in front of us. My pup marked it well and when released drove hard to the bird, grabbed it and promptly returned. Perfect! He ran directly back to me and as I bent over to take the bird, he promptly changed direction and ran into the center of a bush behind me. He set their and promply swallowed that dove, feathers, feet, beak, and all....no chewing, just gulp, BIG EYES, gulp, and gone! 

Scared the crap out of me, thought he was going to kill himself..... we watched him and kept him on lead, he seemed ok...later my son shot a bird and walked by my pup on lead. The pup jumped up and grabbed that dove in my sons hand and promptly swallowed the head of that bird! Crazy...

On the way home I called my breeder who also was a vet. I told her we were on the way back from his first dove hunt. She could tell I was upset so she ask me, how many dove did Max eat???!!! Come to find out this behavior is fairly normal and they can digest the birds just fine. I never did see any feathers, beaks, feet, or anything come out.....so do not worry...it is normal for some.....

I know this is not an explanation for your training question, but I had to share....


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## K9-Design (Jan 18, 2009)

Bally's breeder introduced his litter to birds very early -- 3 weeks old -- and of course at that age they are entirely too small to try to pick up or even drag a bird. The puppies were crazy for the birds even then and would snuffle them, lick them, pull feathers, etc. We thought this was marvelous. Until they did get big enough to carry them, and all they wanted to do was eat them. 
I ended up waiting until Bally was 4-5 months old then introduced him right to live ducks. If he tried to hold still and pluck feathers, the bird took off. Took ONE session with the live bird to teach him to pick the bird up rather than tear out feathers or crunch its head. Of course he went through FF eventually but I have not seen that behavior repeat itself. 
Pigeons, doves, quail and chukkar invite that behavior since they are so small and their feathers tear out easily. The last time Slater retrieved a pigeon he came back to me like "Holy crap it's a Chicken McNugget with wings"!


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## TrailDogs (Aug 15, 2011)

Alaska7133 said:


> I had someone pose this question about puppies that want to eat birds.
> 
> This is what happened to me:
> 
> ...


It is not unusual behavior for puppies that have not been through FF. It sounds like this pup has a decent recall so I would suggest the owner put a line on him and physically bring the puppy back to him if he starts to play with the bird. 
I would not have the thrower correct the pup. You don't want the pup to become nervous around gun stations. Let the dogs handler work with getting the puppy back. Use radios to communicate that the pup is playing with the bird if the handler can't see him.


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## Alaska7133 (May 26, 2011)

The good news is, I don't think the dog got nervous around the gunner stations. He was run several more times last evening and was fine. But it will stay in his memory, so no telling if it comes up in the future. I chose to correct him because I had seen people do it in the past with puppies in the field. This particular pup was getting after a pigeon that had already been crunched by a previous pup at another training session. So once it thawed a bit it was kind of bloody. A perfect puppy pigeon popsicle! Yuck!


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## tpd5 (Nov 7, 2013)

I introduced my dog to live pigeons at about 10 weeks old. I did not know what to expect but he immediately charged the pigeon down and began to eat it. Being a newbie I freaked out thinking he would be ruined forever. Was told by some smarter than I that it was not a bad thing, we know he is birdy. Put the birds away until he was ready and never had another problem. 

Depending on how old the pup is, I would maybe put birds away (especially small ones like pigeons) until he ready to handle them properly.


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