by Jennifer Broome 

0:31 Announcer: GundogsOnline.com helping you get the most from your hunting dog.

0:39 Bup, bup, bup, bup. Thatta boy. There you go. Good for you.

When it comes to retrieving with your young puppy, less is often more. Well, what do I mean by that?

0:57 Well here's just a little Chucker stuffed animal I threw for him. And let's compare it to one of my favorite things- chocolate. So if I have this big chocolate cake in front of me, and I love chocolate; I love chocolate cake; if I ate that whole cake and you showed me just one more piece, I'd be sick of it. I really wouldn't want more. I would not want more chocolate cake for probably a couple days.

So if I continued to throw this for him until he got sick of it, we're really taking away his retrieving desire. Let's compare that to, you show me a slice of chocolate cake; I eat that chocolate cake and now I'm thinking, I want more, I want more.

And we're going to compare the retrieving the same way. So If only throw him a couple retrieves and treat them like a nice, really sweet dessert, he'll want to come back for more. And when he really wants more, I'm going to take it away and leave him on that thought.

1:50 So let's do some retrieving games with our puppy with the mindset that less is often more. And since he's only about nine weeks old, I think towards this time of the day, he's getting a little tired, I think this puppy is probably only good for about four or five retrieves. If I see him getting tired before that, I'm going to quit, because remember, less is more.

2:10 In our corridor right here, we've just got some short cover. I like the pup to see the object I'm going to throw. Throw it in a corridor area and there's short grass here. And I had him on a long line and the idea with this is, once he picks up the retrieve, I can guide him to come right back for me. That way he's not going to pick this toy up here and run and take off with it. And that would be a not so good habit that we would create early on. So let's work on creating good habits. Let's get some excitement. Throw the retrieve out. He picks it up and I'll guide him, hey pup pup, Thatta boy, right into me. Good for you kiddo.

I'll gently remove it from his mouth. Good for you! Still going to work on manners so if he tries to jump on me or bite me, I'm going to correct that.

2:59 Now let's go into a little bit of cover here. And there he goes into some cover. Hey puppy! Thatta boy! I'm going to gently bring him in, guide him in with the leash. Good for you! There you go! Again he's getting a little tired towards the end of the day here.

We're going to go in a little more cover. And there goes our puppy right in some grass. Good boy! There you go! Good for you! And let's see what that angle looks like coming right at you. So I'll back away a little bit. Get myself situated...with my lead so it's not tangled.

Alright! I'm going to back away and call pup. Hey pup pup! Thatta boy! Thatta boy! Little tugs of the leash. Back away calling him. Good for you! Alright kiddo!

4:02 So just a couple retrieves here, you can see he wants more. And let's end it with this idea in his brain that retrieving is fun. And he wants more and we're done. Whoopsie! So we have a great attitude. We have a puppy here that had four fun, successful retrieves. He even went into some cover to get his retrieves and he really had a good time. And that's what it's all about for our introduction to retrieving.

4:30 [Closing]

4:53 Announcer: GundogsOnline.com helping you get the most from your hunting dog.