Hunting in western Europe takes on so many forms, each variant attracting a different type of hunter. Whether it's those seeking the epitome of intensity with a bow or the trophy-seeker who prefers to patiently watch over arable fields awaiting a once in a lifetime Roebuck.

Despite the variety in methods and quarry, each practice shares the common traits of an important and longstanding tradition and heritage.

by Joe Byrne

Picture credits: Sunny Thorpe -Thorpecreek Imagery

Take the rough with the smooth

An understanding

In the United Kingdom hunters have used the spaniel in its various forms to find and flush game for the pot for centuries. This hunting tradition is still alive today in its own guise, with men and women primarily training springer and cocker spaniels to work under their own gun in a partnership between hunter and companion that is impossible to replicate or imitate.

Simply put, rough shooting is the exercise of hunting your dog through various types of ground and cover to produce game for your gun. This could be searching for pheasants and pigeons in the bramble-drenched copses and arable margins of southern England, or on open, rabbit dense moorland much further north. Rough shooting is completely aside from any class structure often associated with driven shooting, the most popular game shooting in the UK, and offers opportunity to a huge variety of ages and abilities. Some from rural upbringings learn to shoot over a dog at a very young age, where some only discover the passion for it later in life and often in retirement.

Despite the straightforward premise of the craft, working a spaniel for this purpose requires consistent dedication to your companion and task, with success following a deeper understanding of how your spaniel thinks and works. In addition to this commitment, you'll need to know how your diverse quarry behaves and survives on the landscape and in varying weather conditions and types of cover.

This is typically not a fair weather endeavour, nor is it for the fickle minded. The biggest rewards in this game often appear on the most bitter of winter mornings in the steepest of gullies. It is worth noting that if your hunting enjoyment comes purely from pulling the trigger, rough shooting is likely not for you. The primary reward here is gifted by the connection and hard work shared between dog and handler.

However, if you put aside the time to learn and you offer your spaniel the dedication it deserves, fewer countryside pursuits offer anything as rewarding as shooting over your own dog alongside good friends. As with any form of hunting, equipment plays an essential role and in rough shooting, nothing is more essential than the dog at your feet.

He gets that from his mother

Finding a partner

When choosing a rough shooting partner you should take every step possible to find your best chance of a good match, you’d not want to spend hours on the hills stalking deer with someone you despised, so equally you wouldn't want to spend valuable time working with a dog that hasn't quite got what you need.

Fortunately with spaniels, breeders in the UK have spent generations refining the breed through competition to provide a baseline of spaniel genetics that commonly produces pups that are capable and fit for purpose.

The subject of breeding is lengthy and open to opinion, so I will not delve too deeply here. If we look holistically, a pup with a strong pedigree of field trial champions (FTCh), particularly in the dam line, will offer you a good chance of finding some capable blood.

It is of my opinion that the best value pup, with the highest chance of success would come from purchasing a well bred springer spaniel dog. Dogs are typically cheaper, more available, and the average springer spaniel is generally the most capable of doing the rough shooting work to a good standard.

When it comes to picking the individual spaniel, there are some traits you'd like to see in its parents that will hopefully have been passed to its offspring. Notably and perhaps most importantly, you need a dog who wants to do the job, this is summarized as “drive.” Much like its human counterparts a pup can be born with work ethic and desire. You need a dog that is motivated by game and shows courage in all covers in order to seek it out. You cannot train a dog to want to work therefore paying attention to the breeding is essential.

In addition to drive, I would hope for an honest dog. Honesty in a dog presents as an animal that wants to do right by its owner and isn't seeking to self reward wherever possible. For every ounce of drive, you’d do well with a pound of honesty to follow it.

Once your partner has been chosen, prepare to spend between eighteen months and two years training it to a watertight and dependable standard. My persistent recommendation here is you seek a trainer who has considerable experience with the pastime and you yourself are prepared to endure early starts and shifting priorities in order to put the training time in with the dog.

When you're ready to open the kennel door with gun in hand, your dog should have proven it is steady to flushing game, steady to shot and will have already had game shot for it in training to make sure it is familiar with retrieving feather and fur. The dog should respond attentively to whistle and verbal commands, and hunt a quartering pattern within range of your gun. Any training step missed or not sufficiently proofed will become apparent usually the first time it is required, and you will likely cause lasting damage to the future training of your companion.

If you find yourself wondering whether you have put enough time into the dogs training, then it's likely you are correct. This is where an experienced trainer can provide considerable value, in the knowing of whether your dog is at the required standard to allow you enjoy the tasks required of it.

Conquering cover

Learning the craft

Working a spaniel for rough shooting can be as clumsy for some as it can be an art form for others. Spending time watching and shooting with experienced peers before bringing your own dog out of the kennel can fast track your learning process and enable you to make better decisions and less mistakes out in the field.

There are those who crash and thrash through cover with a dog somewhere nearby, and there are those who carefully take their time to consider their dogs natural instincts and that of the quarry itself, keeping their dog smartly in range of their gun. The most experienced with rough shooting make the job look effortless and easy, their dogs appear to be on the end of some invisible length of twine and the back of their trucks are always adorned with shot game. These are the individuals you want to spend your time around, with ears very much open.

When approaching different types of cover, you can expect your dog to work in different ways in order to be effective. For example, when faced with a thick bramble thicket, sending the dog in and waiting to one side with a gun ready whilst the dog works its way through the barbed limbs is often a good practice. Often due to the bramble density a dog will have to chase game until it is produced (a bird flying or a rabbit run) where it will then sit to the flush and await the shot and command. In contrast when hunting a shallow cutting or ravine full of white grass and rushes, the shooter may choose to position themselves higher on the sides of the feature, keeping the spaniel low into the cover working away. This tactic often provides the best shooting opportunity and maximizes the effectiveness of the dog.

Quarry

Understanding the game

When it comes to working your spaniel for its rough shooting task, understanding how the game you seek behaves and operates in the varying covers and conditions is essential to your success. Oftentimes the weather conditions will dictate how game uses cover and as hunters we can apply a modicum of common sense to this.

Typically, harsher weather will drive game to seek shelter, colder and wetter weather will keep birds and the like sat in thicker cover whereas warmer temperatures will have you finding game in more open areas. With this in mind it is often more advantageous to hunt your spaniel in colder temperatures, as this climate condition will “hold” game in the cover you’re working your spaniel through.

Cover type will also play a role in quarry behavior and you should factor this in when hunting your spaniel. For example, if you're choosing to hunt a strip of cover crop it is common for birds such as pheasants and partridge to walk on in front and quite often to walk back through your line. If you are not maintaining a steady pace and working your spaniel methodically, your target may slip past you both and evade flush and shot.

When out for rabbits in white grass, rushes and moorland you must be very thorough with your ground treatment indeed. Any clump of grass could hold a rabbit in its “seat” (a small parting or hole in the grass where the rabbit will lay up) and over many outings rough shooting, a good dog will learn the game on rabbits, checking every patch as it hunts for the chance of a flush. Nothing is more rewarding for a spaniel than a morning hunting rabbits.

Over time and consistent outings rough shooting, both yourself and your dog will become better at understanding game behavior. You will learn to hunt your spaniel differently, more effectively and you will see your dog change its behaviors as its experience grows.

Food for the nose

Understanding scent and wind

Game-finding ability is a spaniels’ greatest asset. The ability for the spaniel to trust a good nose, understand scent and locate game not only increases your chances of filling the pot whilst out shooting, but is also a huge part of the excitement of working a spaniel. Standing over the dog you trained, gun in hand as it suddenly snaps out of its hunting pattern to feverishly investigate scent is one of the true wonders of dog work. A well bred dog will quickly (sometimes instantly) figure out what its nose is for and consistently find the hiding spots of its quarry for you.

With this use of a good nose comes a responsibility for a good handler to understand how to feed it. We can look at two major points that will affect how scent reaches your spaniels’ nose and how the hunter can manipulate and understand it.

Firstly you have weather conditions and temperature, briefly put, hot and dry conditions will not hold scent onto the ground or foliage, as there is nothing for the scent to bond or adhere to. These conditions can be very hard for a spaniel to scent and detect game. In contrast, damper, cooler weather can provide ideal conditions for an abundance of scent for your dog to work, however heavy rain and more inclement weather can have the opposite effect. If you understand that scent is delicate, over time you will build the experience to know what to expect on the ground.

The second and perhaps most important factor to consider is the wind, its strength and direction. A good rough shooter will handle their dog according to this wind, it affects how your dog hunts in its pattern, and will affect how you will choose to approach cover. On the face of it, it is a question of common sense, having the wind blowing towards your dogs’ nose is the ideal condition for enabling the dog to sniff out the locations of game. Therefore if you have the opportunity to approach cover from downwind not only do you give your dog the best chance of using its nose in its hunting pattern, you also limit the chances of game smelling you first. However, rough shooting by nature rarely offers ideal wind conditions so the good handler must change how he or she handles their dog, and what to expect in the changes in its behavior.

If we consider an ideal headwind, we expect the dog to quarter side to side through cover with the wind constantly blowing any scent across its path, however if we switch the scenario and the wind is blowing from behind (a backwind) the dog should hunt accordingly. Personally, a dog naturally taking on a backwind is one of the highlights of a well bred hunting spaniel. Your spaniel should punch out forward a short distance and then quarter towards you turning the backwind into its own headwind. This is an essential part of the craft for the new rough shooter to learn and understand, but is rewarding in its entirety.

In Summary

Understanding and connecting to the whole purpose behind the breeding of your spaniel is a facet of hunting that is truly under appreciated by those who have not put their time and efforts towards it.

Traditional rough shooting as a concept and a pastime is rewarding even on its worst days, it offers the hunter and their dog a bond and a partnership seldom found anywhere else in modern hunting. Those who have devoted themselves to the craft are blessed with stories of that impossible woodcock retrieve and share memories with friends over the best hunting spaniels that have come and gone in their lifetimes. As a hunting endeavor it offers sustainability and is democratic in its nature, not gate kept by a human class structure or hamstrung by economic factors when it comes to the spare cash in ones’ wallet.

If you've the patience for the training and the eagerness to learn something you cannot find anywhere else then you could be part of keeping this tradition alive and healthy in this century.