Do you love dogs? If so, you might even love them more, knowing that they are useful to hunt upland games, especially ducks. Nonetheless, not all genres are good duck hunting dog breeds. Some of them are too active that might act even before you ask them to do, while some are too slow to keep up with the games.
10+ Duck Hunting Dog Breeds
Labrador Retrievers
The Labrador Retrievers are among the duck hunting dogs you can find in the market. Their notable characteristics are intelligence, mature fastest, quick learner, and a water-resistant coat. Although they are a bit high-energy, they are also obedient-dispositioned – meaning that it will take less time to get them ready with your very next duck hunting in the blind.
Good as this duck retrieving dog results in widespread breeding of parents with little retrieving instinct or water-loving. In other words, you will need to be careful when choosing ones that exhibit your fancy looks and temperament.
Golden Retrievers
Know what?
Golden Retrievers love playing with ducks like the dog above. They are also built with duck-hunting abilities. They can catch and kill ducks in a matter of a minute. They have thick and fuzzy water-repellent fur to keep them warm in the water and even in cold climates as a natural retriever. Their soft mouths allow picking up the waterfowl games as well.
Besides being one of the best duck hunting dog breeds, Golden Retrievers are also great companions for families – similar to the distant cousins: Labrador Retrievers.
Chesapeake Bay Retriever
Compared to the retriever, the Chesapeake Bay Retrievers are well-known for being big, healthy, and hearty, and their capacity to hunt in freezing weather for hours to come.
If you train the Chesapeake Bay dogs for the first time, you might find it harder to handle the dogs than a typical lab. It is because they are very aggressive and strong-willed. The dogs will hardly listen to strangers. Nonetheless, they will be super-supportive with well structure and discipline. Then, the Chesapeake Bay Retrievers are loyal and do not waiver from you.
German Shorthaired Pointers
As the Chesapeake Bay Retrievers, it takes time and money to train the German Shorthaired Pointers into a waterfowl hunter. But knowing that the dogs are enthusiastic, high-energy, and very intelligent, you will want to have one for your next upland bird hunting games. Their short and taut coat makes it easy for the German Shorthaired Pointers to hunt in mud and duckweed. However, they cannot suffer from swimming for hours in the cold weather. Rather than that, it would be best if you allowed the dogs to take some rest to avoid hypothermia.
Beagles
Although they are small, the Beagles are excellent at hunting – this is unquestionable. Their talent is proved for centuries as coon hunting dogs. And we confirm that the Beagles also hunt ducks very well.
It is their small size and their agility that allows the dogs to dart through shrubs and bushes. Not to mention, the ability to track a scent is second to none. The dogs can sniff the ducks out at ease.
American Water Spaniels
The American Water Spaniels are born to hunt, especially in water fields – as their name suggests. It makes the dogs be a retrieving knack for ducks.
Firstly, mentioning its fur, the dogs have a beautiful curly thick coat, helping them handle wet and cold weather very well. Secondly, they develop an excellent scent-tracking ability in nature, so you can save lots of time and effort in training these American Water Spaniels.
The only problem is that the dogs are not very fast because they work methodically close to the gun when hunting games.
English Cocker Spaniels
Back then, the English Cocker Spaniels were trained to hunt small rabbits and woodcocks. However, once the hunters knew their powerful swimming skills, they started using the dogs for ducks. They all love the water like any other duck dog breeders. Under the water and field training, the English Cocker Spaniels will soon be reckoned when hunting and bring you good. Their small size makes the dogs ideal to bring in your hunting boats without fear of unbalance. Moreover, you can also keep the Spaniels as a house pet, friendly, obedient, and cheerful.
Poodles
Do not be surprised!
These lovely and beautiful poodles are excellent duck hunters because they were bred for those purposes for the last centuries. Take their natural coat, for example. The dogs can spend hours swimming in the water to help you have a successful hunting harvest. On top of that, the Poodles are extremely intelligent and loyal, as most hunting labs are.
Just for your notes, the poodles have to be in a standard size to hunt ducks. The miniature is just useless.
Brittany Springers
We strongly recommend having a Brittany Springer in your house because she will be the child’s friend at home and duck hunters in the fields. They learn quickly, so to turn them into good duck hunting dog breeds, all you need is to take them along with several hunts and walk them thoroughly along with the routine they are supposed to track. They will then develop their capability to find, point, and move around the hunting fields quickly and discreetly.
Weimaraner
The last on the list is the Weimaraner. They definitely are not the worst duck hunting dog breeds here. You can quickly spot on the dogs in the duck hunting grounds because of their typical coat color – black, we might add. The most outstanding feature of Weimaraners is its speed and energetic characteristic. They are even powerful enough to hunt deers and other massive games!
They do not mind getting wet, but it would be better to take him along in warmer weather because their fur is quite thin.
How to Train Retrievers into Duck Hunting Dog Breeds?
Despite having retrieving-instinct in their blood, duck hunting dog breeds like some above still need training for a while before they are ready for their first actual game hunt.
Practice short and long retrieves
One of the common problems encountered by most duck hunting breeds is the distance that they will retrieve. At that time, a dummy launcher is very helpful. You can hand-throw the dummy to the length you prefer the dogs to reach when hunting the duck.
Work with the decoys before the real waterfowl.
Once the dogs are familiar with the dummy, you can change to any actual hunt details like decoys or calls. Calling is excellent for its steadiness; meanwhile, decoys are more real and challenging for the dogs to enhance their a-been-there-done-that attitude.
Prepare extra dummy
Get multiple dummies to train your dogs so that there might be multiple ducks in the fields, and they have to make the right choice to get as many ducks as possible. The duck hunting dog breeds should stay while you start with the first dummy and let them go after the second dummies.
Are You Ready to Hunt Ducks?
You can choose one or several out of the 10+ best duck hunting dog breeds above. They are all helpful and lovely. It is better to buy a puppy one so you will have time to spend and make them loyal to you and have time to train them to be the best duck hunters ever. No needs to rush for hunting, and remember to take the right care of your fellow animal!
