American Retriever Field Trials Today

by Robert Milner - 20 April 2000

Retriever field trials originated in England in the late 1800's and early 1900's. These early competitions arose as a way to identify superior animals so that they could be bred to improve the working qualities of retrievers. Field trials in England today still serve that valuable purpose.

Field trials in America have greatly diverged from the original purpose. We imported field trials from England in the early 1930's. When we first imported them, as one would expect, they were very similar to British Field Trials. They were small, with only a few dogs running. They emphasized steadiness and game finding initiative. The tests in the very early trials were all marked retrieves. Blinds and hand signals came along later.

Three significant differences were written into American field trial rules which would cause them to radically diverge from their simple and effective beginnings. A major difference from the early the British predecessor was the omission of any limit on the number of dogs running in a trial. The popularity of field trials thus insured that they must become elimination contests. Recent years have seen American field trials with Open stake entries of up to 80 and 90 dogs. There is no way to adequately judge such large numbers of dogs in a 3 day trial.

With these large entries to judge, time becomes the enemy. Behaviors that require more time to test and evaluate are given insufficient testing and evaluation. The main victim has been steadiness. In early trials steadiness was heavily evaluated and was a major consideration in picking winners. Walkups with several dogs in line were a regular feature, as were a lot of close tempting birds falling. These practices were great tests of dogs' obedience and steadiness, but they are time consuming to run. Thus today's large numbers of competing dogs have practically eradicated the practice of thoroughly testing the dogs' obedience and steadiness.

In today's trials the longest time you'll see a dog be required to sit is about 20 seconds, the time is takes for a quadruple mark to be thrown. After the birds are down, the dog is sent within 5 seconds. Only one honor is required, and that is of not over 20 seconds duration. Even with such a weak evaluation of steadiness and obedience it is not unusual to see competing dogs creeping out 5 or 10 feet from the handler while the birds are being shot. Typically they are not penalized for this lack of obedience. The standard of obedience and steadiness in field trials is lamentably low.

The second major difference that we in America have incorporated into field trials is the practice of setting up or designing artificial tests to evaluate the dogs, rather than evaluating them during their actual working environment of hunting. If we really wanted a valid measuring stick for hunting dogs, we should evaluate them under real conditions. We should judge dogs while they are doing their actual job. This might entail judging dogs as they work at a commercial duck shooting operation, or while they work in a leased dove field, or at a commercial pheasant hunting resort. It should be as close as we can get to the real thing.

The 3rd major difference is the barring of professional dog trainers from judging. The trainers are the main repository of knowledge of dog behavior. Thus we have robbed field trials of the corporate body of knowledge of canine behavior. We have amateurs who are the judges that set up artificial tests to evaluate dogs so as to select for the inherited behaviors valuable for better gundogs. These amateurs are probably wonderful dog handlers, but one must question whether they have trained and dealt with the large numbers of dogs required to develop the knowledge and skill to separate trained behaviors from inherited behaviors.

These amateurs are handicapped by being deprived of the corporate body of dog training knowledge possessed by the community of professional dog trainers. We have thus erected barriers between the field trial judges and the corporate body of knowledge of canine behavior and canine behavior modification.

One must therefore question the validity of many of the testing criteria that have evolved in American field trials. Most of those testing criteria evaluate trained behavior as opposed to inherited behavior, and most of the criteria evaluate behaviors that are of limited or no value in a gundog.

That is not to say that field trials are simple or easy or insignificant. Field trials are a tremendous challenge to the intelligence of dog and skill of trainer. The canine behaviors required to win are very complex and require a lot of complex training. The problem lies in the fact that many of the behaviors being trained have no value in a hunting dog. Retriever field trials have become game unto themselves. They are driving a breeding selection process that produces more good field trial dogs.

A young dog that is a typical good field trial prospect doesn't generally fit the profile for a good gun dog prospect. The field trial prospect would be a very high energy, hyperactive dog that is able to take continuous training and not get bored. The field trial prospect would also be a relatively tough dog that can take the pressure required to train complex field trial behaviors.

The good gun dog prospect on the other hand would be a calm, cooperative soft dog. That dog would be easy for the average hunter to train. Unfortunately the Field trial driven breeding selection produces less and less good hunting dog prospects.

Let me take you to a typical American field trial:

We drive out to the field trial ground on Friday morning arriving about 8:00 am. We go to the open stake. There are 2 judges for this stake and there are 70 dogs running. All dogs that are entered and pay the entry fee are able to run. A drawing has been held two weeks prior to the trial to determine the order in which the dogs will run.

Triple Land Mark
The judges have designed the first test and have started. The test is a triple mark with a live bird shot by guns and thrower stationed out about 150 yards from the line. On the same azimuth as the flyer is a dead bird thrown by a thrower stationed out about 40 yards out from the line. A third set of gun and thrower is stationed out 165 yards and just to the right of the "live bird" guns. For the observer standing on the line, the two long sets of guns are on azimuths about 30 degrees apart.

The purpose of the short dead memory bird on same azimuth as long flyer is too trick the dogs and make the dogs overrun the short dead bird, so that handler has to give hand signals to bring dog back to the mark. Field trial dogs are typically trained very heavily on lining and tend to overrun short birds when tempted with having just picked up a long flyer. To make it harder for the dogs to check back on that short bird, the judges are also retiring that set of gunner and thrower. Retiring means that after the short bird is thrown the gunner and thrower scurry over to hide behind a thicket where they can't be seen by the dogs.

We watch dog number one come to the line. He is 10 or 12 feet in front of his handler. Typically this lax obedience is not penalized. Dog number one gets to the line.

His handler arrives shortly thereafter. With the dog sitting at heel the handler with his body language shows the dog the locations of the guns and throwers. Then the handler signals for the birds.

The judges signal for the birds. The short dead bird is thrown. Dog number one creeps out about 6 feet in front of his handler and then scoots back to watch bird number two which is the dead bird out 165 yards and just a little to the right. It is thrown just after bird number one hits the ground. Again, dog number one creeps out 6 or 8 feet and then scoots back before bird number 3, the long flyer, is shot. The birdboy throws the flyer which is dropped in the appropriate area by the guns. Dog #1 creeps out 12 feet and then immediately scoots back to heel as the bird hits the ground. The judges wait about 3 seconds and then call "number one". The handler sends the dog, which zooms out and retrieves the flyer. Upon number one's return with the flyer, his handler lines him up for the long right hand bird, which number one retrieves with a short hunt. Then comes the key short bird. Number one's handler lines him up toward the short bird and sends him. Number one overruns and must be stopped on the whistle given couple of directional signals to find the bird. He will be heavily penalized for this.

Dogs 2 and 3 have to be handled on the short bird. Dog number 4 has a long hunt on bird number 2 and covers a lot of ground. He will be penalized for the big hunt, but not penalized to the degree that Dogs 2 and 3 are for handling. Dog number 5 does a great job on the marks. Dog number 5 also creeps out 8 or 10 feet as each bird is thrown. He scoots back each time without being told, so the judges do not count it as breaking.

The dogs are all run on this same test A basic principle for American field trials is that the test be the same for every dog. Therefore if a dog gets a bad throw, so that the bird falls out of the area of the other falls, then the judges will call a "no bird". That dog will be taken off the line and brought back later for a rerun of the test.

By 2:00 in the afternoon, all 70 dogs have been run on the land triple. About 50% have had to handle on the short dead bird. The judges huddle and look at there scoring and decide which dogs to call back. They drop most of the dogs that handled on the mark, and call back 40 dogs to run the next test which will be double land blind set up right where the triple was run.

A Double Land Blind
A major element of field trial judging is the commonly accepted principle that the dog must be on the line to the bird as he performs blind retrieves. Regardless of how many hand signals he requires he will be scored higher, the closer his route is to the line leading directly to the bird. Dogs that get very far off of the line will be penalized heavily.

A perfect job on a blind retrieve is done by a dog that lines the blind. The next best is the dog that handles responsively and stays close to the line. You sometimes see a performance where the dog gets the blind in one hand signal, but the dog has gone very wide off the line. Similarly, when obstacles such as brush, logs etc are on the line to the blind, the dog that runs around them will be penalized.

Field trial judges engineer their blind retrieve tests with two further elements of design to make them more difficult. They are suction and hazards. Suction is provided by marks that have been retrieved and hazards are provided by terrain and cover. In the double blind above, the suction is provided by marks 1,2, and 3 of the previous test. The hazard is the large area of brush that the dog must run past. The suction is toward the brush, which is 3 to 4 feet tall. The dog is out of sight when he is in the brush, thus the handler can't see him, and the dog can't see the handler for directions.

A further field trial judging convention is that when a dog is running on a blind and goes out of sight he is judged to be out of control while out of sight and is greatly penalized.

Of our 40 remaining dogs 20 do well on this test. 18 are lost by diving into the brush and having a resultant very poor job of handling on the blind. Two dogs are sent left of the brush and pick up the blind with 3 clean handles. These two dogs are dropped for being too far off line and avoiding the hazard.

The blind retrieves in field trials require a tremendous amount of training in order to condition a dog to charge out on an unseen bird in a particular direction. The charging out part is fairly easy to train. The particular direction is the difficult part. To win field trials a dog must be trained to the level that he will take a line within about 3 to 5 degrees of the azimuth given by the handler. As a matter of fact it takes a good bit of handler training for the handler to be able to communicate to the dog a line of that degree of precision.

The dogs that do well on this test are dogs that are highly trained in directional lining, and the dogs which are low in tendency to hunt in heavy brush. Thus here is an example of the value field trial judges place on the trained behavior of lining. It is also an example of the negative value or penalty placed on the inherited trait of game finding initiative. Dogs with a tendency to hunt heavy cover will not do well on a field trial test designed like this double land blind.

In a hunting situation the typical hunter seldom knows the exact location where the bird fell. Additionally if it is a cripple bird, it will probably head for cover. That is when you need a dog with game finding ability and a tendency to hunt the cover.

Triple Water Mark With Honor

Retriever field trial water tests are where a dog's training in lining is most severely tested and most highly valued. The judges like to set up tests with long angle entries to test the dogs' state of training on lining.

When a dog is faced with a long angle entry his natural tendency is to either run down the bank or to bail into the water early at an angle closer to 90 degrees. In general a

Retriever has a natural tendency to take the fastest route out and back on a retrieve. That means he will generally try to take the driest route. . It has nothing to do with how well he likes the water. He takes the dry route because he is in a hurry to make the retrieve and he inherently knows it is the fastest route.

Field trial judges have made a science out of this canine tendency to take the drier, faster route. Nearly every water test you see in a field trial will have a major bank running component, and any dogs that run the bank will be dropped. The bank running aspects nearly always outweigh the other performance aspects of the water tests.

Looking at bank running from the aspect of value to a hunting dog, one must say that bank running is valuable in a hunting dog. Bank running bears directly on how many ducks a dog can retrieve in cold water. Cold water is a heat sink, and soaks up a dogs body heat. The longer a dog spends in cold water, the lower his body temperature goes. Dogs are susceptible to hypothermia just like people do. When a dog gets cold enough he will die. The drier the route the dog takes on retrieves, the more retrieves he can make before becoming hypothermic. Thus bank running is an asset in a hunting dog.

Our triple water mark in today's trial is designed to arduously test a dogs natural tendency to take the drier route. We have three sets of guns stationed across a small lake. The suctions and hazards in this test are presented mainly by the shoreline.

First, the dogs are running from a point which is 20 yards back from the bank, presenting them with a long angle entry into the water for bird Number 1. The other two main hazards are created by the tendency of dogs to land early when swimming toward a shoreline. On bird number 3 they must swim quite distance parallel to a bank that is only 20 feet away and lined with tempting cattails. On bird number 1, they must swim into the bank at a very tempting angle of approach. There will be a strong tendency to get out early which will probably cause them to hunt for bird number 1 on the wrong side of the guns.

Twenty dogs have been called back to participate in this test. The first dog, number 5, comes to the line. The handler with body language, shows the dog the guns. Then he signals that he is ready. The judges signal for the birds which are thrown in numerical order. Dog number 5 does a good job of retrieving the 3 birds. As in the first marking test, number 5 scoots out 8 or 10 feet as each bird is thrown. Again he scoots back beside the handler without being told, so the judges don't count him as breaking.

Dog number 11 is the next to run. Dog 5 moves over 6 feet to the left and sits beside his handler to honor dog 11, who heels to the line with his handler. Number 11's handler shows him the white-coated throwers, and then signals that he is ready. The judges signal for the birds. After the birds are down, number 11 is sent to retrieve. Just after number 11 takes off, the judges allow number 5 to leave the line. He has been required to honor for approximately 15 seconds.

After 10 dogs have run it becomes apparent that this is a difficult test. The dogs begin having a lot of trouble finding bird number 1. The trouble appears to be that when the first 4 or 5 dogs ran, as they returned with bird number 1, left a lot of duck scent in the cattails to the right of the throwers.. That made a lot of dogs hunt the cattails and hunt behind the guns. A lot of dogs have to be handled to that mark. After our twenty dogs have run, the judges conference and make the selection of which dogs will run the last test. They announce the results and we find that there will be 12 dogs running the last test which will be a water blind.

Water Blind
The judges move to a different lake to set up the last test which will be a water blind. The judges design this test using two frequently encountered tricks to try and further separate the performances of these last 12 dogs.

They set up this water blind incorporating another long water entry with a tight angle into the water. This blind also requires that the dogs go across a point and back into the water, followed by swimming past a second point. The judges have had a birdboy drag a few duck around on the second point to make it more tempting for the dogs to hunt. The idea is to entice the dogs with duck scent to land on the point as they swim by.

The 12 remaining dogs are run on the water blind. Three of them have to be handled into the water on the initial entry. This will count heavily against them. Two dogs are handled around the first point. The judges will count this as avoiding the test and will penalize them heavily. Four dogs fall for the duck scent and head into the cattails on the scented point. Three of them get out of control in the cattails and the judges instruct their handlers to call them in. Dog number 19 is successfully handled off of the point and to the blind.

Dogs that tend to respond to duck scent by diving into the cover to hunt for a duck are at a disadvantage here.

After the dogs finish, the judges go into conference to select the winner. They have recorded every dogs performance and will now pick the winner and the placing dogs.

They select dog number 5. He has pinpointed the marked retrieves and lined the blinds. They overlook his creeping and award him 1st place.

Thus you see an retriever field trial. Lining is heavily emphasized, and tested, and valued. Obedience is not tested much at all, and is not valued highly. No evaluation is made of ability to find crippled birds. Great value is placed on a dog spending the maximum time in the water. Field trials have greatly diverged from their original function of improving the retrieving breeds as hunting dogs.

Hunting Retriever Tests
The hunting community has become aware that something is wrong with field trials. We've seen the rise of hunting retriever competitions in the last few years. Unfortunately

The diagnosis has been off the mark. The hunting retriever community has taken the white coats off of throwers and handlers, and made a better effort at simulating hunting, but they are not quite there yet. Hunting retriever competitions are evaluating the same behaviors as field trials, just to a lesser degree. They have a strong tendency to measure dogs by lining ability, and by ability to stay in the water.

Hunting retriever competitions are not adequately testing obedience and steadiness. They also do not adequately evaluate game finding abilities of the dogs.

To improve hunting retriever competitions as a breeding selection driver, we should look back to the origins of field trials. A back-to-the-basics look would be a look at British retriever field trials.