Maximus Ferret

Good luck with it Gibbo. There was a litter of deer/grey on a thread on here recently, I think in Northumberland, so if it works out and you're looking for a dog they may be worth contacting. Racing whippets with a lot of greyhound blood often make good hunters so why wouldn't a pure have a good chance.

I've had lurchers all my adult life too, mostly from pups but occasionally older and in my opinion pups are easier to train (obedience train that is). Here's why. Pups have their drive and enthusiasm untampered with and as long as you have a bit of patience and savvy you can direct this along the right lines. What you're experiencing does sound to me like puppy stuff so I'll tell you how I'd deal with it. 1) The recall. I'd keep him on a lead when other dogs are around to begin with. Practise recall when you're alone with him and run off if it needs speeding up. High value food treats like small cubes of boiled chicken, fried liver etc. are good for recall to begin with but they can't match the excitement of running after another dog or squirrel or rabbit for that matter. You should be aiming to become more interesting to the pup than other dogs are. This may take a while but make the walks exciting by playing a lot. Limit retrieves to 2 or three at first to keep him wanting more and be prepared to take a step back if you see him losing interest. 2) The jumping up. You obviously don't want a dog that jumps on you or anyone else but I'm prepared to tolerate this a bit in younger pups to keep their drive high so I just avoid situations where they'll jump on anyone else and discourage the sort of people who praise the pup when he does this. Pups do need to be disciplined at times but this needs to be carefully done depending on the temperament of the pup. The impatient type of person that let's say smacks a small pup for growling gets either a slinking, nervous dog if it's a sensitive border collie type, or if it's a dominant type it may decide aggression is king, and may behave for the trainer but bite people it sees as weaker like the trainers spouse or children or pets etc. Good training means assesing situations quickly and responding with the right response quickly. A pup I have on ATM started growling at an older bitch of mine (over food). My reaction was to grab him quickly by the throat, no shaking, just "no" in a quiet and firm voice. This was enough for him though I've had to reinforce it a time or two as I have 4 dogs living in the house and two are older retired types. I'm beginning to woffle on so I'll leave it at that but if you want to look at youtube vids on training I'd recomend Michael Ellis and Stonnie Dennis as two good trainers with good vids on tug play retrieving etc. Hope this helps. PS. He will grow out of messing with other dogs if you play it right and he'll get to like you better but it can take a while with some so play with him and enjoy your time with your pup while he's young.

Not for me it isn't. I'm sipping an IPA as I type this. Nothing else to do as it's a bank holiday and e3verywhere's on lockdown. Had the mutts out early and now I'm relaxing so happy saints day!

I'd go with most of that Morton except that moorhens are most definately edible! I've eaten loads but you do need to skin them before roasting (hot for a shortish time). One of the things that irritates me most about going out with other people is when they have dogs that make a dash at everything they see, usually clearing the ground before a more sensible dog has a chance to work it up properly.

I wasn't knocking people who test their rabbit dogs, just comparing dogs who choose easy game for choice to people who do the same and personally I'd always choose to run easy rabbits and make a better bag. ( I was playing devils advocate and fishing for a bite too.) As said before, this is one of those subjects that people will always argue about.

And yet we all admire dogmen who drive hundreds of miles to run in the dales, the brecklands or the scottish islands rather than run local where they'd be pushed to get one or two.... So dogmen like easier rabbiting too???

This https://www.policeconduct.gov.uk/ may be of use to you. If you do it through a solicitor to do it I'd suggest you ask them to make sure you're informed of what disciplinary measures were taken. I'd be wanting a personal apology and compensation for wrongly taking your dog. Police wages are paid by the taxpayer and they've no business using their job to pursue a personal agenda.

Can they? No, they can't. Sounds like a vindictive or anti cop to me. Get a good solicitor and keep us informed. If you weren't trespassing and genuinely hadn't done anything they can't do that and as for the rspca, they have no business in it at all either.

I imagine you're right and it would be better to buy from someone breeding for themselves but if the parents are any good the pups may still turn out well. After all, if you never buy anything sold for profit you'd be riding a horse or walking everywhere and wearing homemade clothes and living in a house you'd built from trees, mud and grass. It's all for the cion these days.

You'd get 10 pairs for 200 and the dear rubber ones with the little belts crack and leak like any others. Been there, done that.

Get someone to sneak around outside, in sight, then ducking behind things and hiding when the dog looks. the person needs to be good and convincing but still be spotted. If the dog gets interested you go whats that, whats that excitedly. If this is going to work you both need to be good actors. Like westyorkshire said, it might be too late but it's worth a try.

What's it bred from? (I know it's deer/grey but from where and what way?)

Yes, I realised that and to be honest, I'd pay that if I really wanted a pup but the parents would need to be doing more than bushing.

If that's a good price that's even worse.

I'll take a wild guess and say you like bull crosses, LOL.