By: Tom Dokken of Dokken Dog Supply

0:31 Announcer: GundogsOnline.com helping you get the most from your hunting dogs. Brought to you by Dokken Dog Supply, quality dog training products and accessories.

0:47 Teaching your dog how to trail is not only a great conservation tool to find birds that you've knocked down but it's also something you're going to use if you're an upland bird hunter in order to get birds put in the air.

0:58 It's easy to do but often overlooked in your training program. What I'm going to do is, I'm going to start off with one of my dog's favorite training dummies. Or yuo can graduate or start off with birds if your dog is used to it.

I'm going to use a commercial scent and I'm going to put a lot of scent to start with on whatever object I want my dog to retrieve. Now one of the things you can do, you can take a rag, attach a rag maybe to your dummy. But I want a lot of scent to start with because I'm going to overcompenstate for maybe my dog's lack of experience to begin with.

1:29 I'm just going to take my training leash and I'm going to hook onto my dummy so I can start my drag. Now, we're here at the training kennels in Northfield, Minnesota on our proving grounds for our Dokken Dog Supply products to show you how we're going to take that line, start off easy and then what we're goign to do when we finish up here- I'm going to do my drag, I'm going to go get my dog, bring him in, get him down wind of where my drag is and see if he can work it out.

1:58 So let's start off, first off and we're going to scent our dummy liberally. One other thing that you can do also is if you're using dead birds to do this, is you can take, and I like maybe getting that bird dunked into a little bit of water and on a dry day like we have today, it's going to leave a lot more scent. So I'm going to take this, do my drag and then we're going to go get the dog.

2:25-2:32 (sound of dragging dummy through the grass)

2:33 Alright, we have our dog now ready to do our drag. Now you can give your dog a various amount of commands. The one thta I'm going to use right now is just a general hunt them up command. But if we have a bird that we know is down, I'm going to give the dog, dead bird, dead bird. And I'm going to continue to say that. And that's going to always indiate to your dog that there is something actually down right here that I want you to find.

2:56 Now this is a short drag to begin with. You need to keep it short when you're starting your dog, pretty much in a straight line. As your dog gets better you need to challenge him more, a little longer line of drag. Maybe you're going to put some twists and turns in it and increase the difficulty. But it's important that your dog is always successful. Let's give it a try.

3:30-3:34 (dog moving in the grass)

3:35 Good. Sit.

3:44 [Closing]

4:06 Announcer: GundogsOnline.com helping you get the most from your hunting dogs. Brought to you by Dokken Dog Supply, discover the Dokken's difference.