Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Hunting With a Blue Heeler

Deleted. Duplicate post.

I dig all the pictures and stories. Keep them coming.

Personally, I chose heelers because they travel well and because they are smart and adapt well to whatever situation. I'm happy that mine love to hunt.



This dog is packing out about 15lbs of elk in the picture below. Not that much but over several trips with 2 dogs it helps.


This photo below is from a NAHRA hunt test. This dog really likes NAHRA and HRC hunt tests. She earned an HRC started title but I never entered her in more advanced levels.

Is it just me, or is this a straight up awesome photo?

Was thinking the samething.Awesome photo.

My female Blue Heeler is an incredible dog. She is almost 6 years old now. She may be the smartest dog I ever owned and she "owns" the place. Nothing moves that she doesn't know about. many times she has woke me up at night with her "tree bark". Nothing will do but for me to get the old .22 rifle and go to her and shoot the offending possum or coon out for her. She usually catches them before they hit the ground and she is a savage until she is sure they are dead. After that, she has no further interest. Yeah, Ruthie is my best girl!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5249518974978628334&q=skidboot&hl=en

SN - Check out Skidboot, if you've never heard of him. If can find on this site, check out the video where he won the National Pet Tricks one year on Animal Planet. Try to figure out HOW MANY commands and signals the dog understands during the perormance.

AND THIS DOG IS ONLY PART BLUE HEELER!!!

Amazing.

My Blue Heeler went blind at about age 13 also.

I've been around a number of blue heelers. For every good one there is a dozen of them that are totally worthless.No shortage of inbreeding and piss poor training.

A friend of mine has a couple that are good dogs and obey well,but they fight amongest themselves so bad that you end up breaking up dog fights constantly.Every other day they have to have their asses launched by a quarter horse also.

The same friend uses these heelers in camp to keep out grizzlies. I've had the dogs sleep through an entire night of bears in camp,with bear tracks right outside the tent. Dogs inside sound asleep. One year we had one of the heelers hauled up into a tree cache by a pissed off black bear. The two fought and finally the dog was evicted from the cache a little torn up.

My favorite on going heeler hunting stories,involve a local hunting club. The club is owned by an oil company who use it for their rich execs to hunt,needless to say they have a dozen or so high end bird dogs that the company owns,plus trainers.Its also open to the public for pheasants. Being wyoming,you have all kinds of cowboy wannabe's with heelers and aussies. They book a hunt and use these cow dogs on birds. Needless to say the majority get their asses skunked,because the dog just runs around eating deer [bleep] and whatever else it can find. I showed up for a hunt this past season and the club had a couple idiots in their clubhouse crying about being [bleep] out of birds on the hunt. The manager was genuinely suprised and asked about the dog they were using. The reply was they were using one of the best pheasant dogs in the country. The manger asked to see the dog. It turned out the dog was a heeler.So he told them to get in his truck and they'd use a couple of his lab pups that he was training to get them birds. Took them back into the same 40 acre piece of ground and limited out in an hour. Asked him about the ordeal and he claimed that he gets all kinds of idiots using every breed out there for bird dogs then trying get out of paying for the hunt. The club runs around 3000 birds a year and i've never been able to not limit out in a half day hunt.

Lots of heeler owners will recognise Skiboot's attitude and intensity of purpose, even if their own (like mine) ain't nearly that accomplished. I was reading a pretty funny piece recently about a lady who had three heelers while her friend had two labs.

In the house the labs would pretty much crash out on the living room rug while the owner moved around the house, but all three heelers would invariably get up and follow their owner around everywhere, while intently watching whatever she was doing.

Easy to see how a heeler can grow up twitchy and compulsive, they ain't inclined to be overly fond of strangers or worse, strange kids, and WILL home in on the ankles of a stranger or kid on a bike from behind. Another thing too to watch for is that they are mouthy and bite and snap readily.

All of which can be ironed out with proper socialization, but ya gotta put in the time, these ain't usually dogs that can grow up neglected in the back yard and still turn out OK.

On the other hand, if you DO put in the time, you get a dog that you can bring anywhere and trust to stay focused. In run mine off-leash at heel behind my bike through the big city all the time, in fact its the usual way I exercise them. Add to that the general overall tougheness of the breed and Outback roots and you have a perfect all-around South Texas companion dog.

Mine live to tree stray cats, run off stray dogs, and chase rabbits. On cottontails they are comically inept on account of they try to chase 'em through thick brush by sight.

About twice a year they bounce a skunk with predictable results. I never have seen them kill anything they brought to bay though, not even a bewildered possum or stray kitten. Maybe on account of they both grew up around cats in the house. Mostly they just bark until whatever they have bayed runs again, the chase being what they are interested in. Fine with me, them killing stuff could be a problem in my urban setting.

What they DO have that makes them good in the woods though is an observant attitude, they'll be constantly zigzagging back and forth investigating stuff, that and a willingness to pay attention to what you're doing and a desire to please. Prob'ly I could train 'em to do most anything.

Bear watchdogs? Depends on the dog I'd guess, one of mine will sit up nearby and watch all night when we sleep out, the other just wants to crash out under the blanket.

Birdwatcher

Well done, Birdwatcher!

Sledder said 99% of the "dog" problem in his first sentence in the post he made.

The name "heeler" I would think should be self-explanatory, especially when one realizes they were bred to be working stockdogs.

The trick with a dog problem, is to focus that "problem" into an response that is not a problem for each situation. By denying what is innate in the dog (wolf), you can create even greater problems over time, and in some cases make the dog insane.

Much simpler to solve problem than many realize, or just to lazy to follow through on. For instance the heeler: Their primary instinct (at different "innate" levels, all individuals are different as to character)is to drive the prey for the pack, usually where the alpha has trained them. Going through gates, into pens, to your hand, is a trained response that is the alpha's responsibility. Heelers can also be very agressive, as they are inclined to protect what is the property of the pack, space, animals, yards, farm or ranch property. To what degree they do this is the alpha's responsibility.

Heelers can make very good housedogs, farm and ranch dogs, and while not the best choice for a specific type of hunting, their versatility can be adapted to many useful functions as a member of the pack. And as individuals, they will also differ in the amount/type of behavorial characteristics each dog has.

It is the owner's (alpha) responsibility to bring out the best, and their fault if the worst exists. There is NO magic!

Kind of like raising a kid, isn't it!

In case anyone is interested, a very great deal of human psychology was found from study and understanding how dogs related to each other that applies to human bonding as family groups, type of characteristics in social adaptability. and maturation of a particular individual.

We are able to learn exactly when a puppy "bonds" with it's mother, how the puppy learns to form charater and behavorial and interact within it's environment. We also learned a geat deal about what causes mental illness from the study of canines. All of these same traits exist in the human species also. (e.g., with the puppy "bonding" to it's mother, it can actually be witnessed (measured), and the exact same scenario exists with a human infant and its mother. There is a time and a place for it, that if denied, can be difficult for the human infant or the puppy to overcome. Oh yeah, father figures are important too!

All dogs have the instinct to hunt, to a greater or lesser degree. The work different breeds do is the result of certain aspects of the hunting instinct emphasized by breeding and training. The herding breeds all have strong stalking and coursing instincts.

When I was younger, the family pet (Great Dane) turned out to be a very servicable rabbit dog. Danes are bred from sight-hunting hounds and that's the way she hunted bunnies. Her head was higher than the waist-high grass and she'd bust 'em out and chase them through the cover. The most ridiculous thing you ever saw was this giant animal "sproinging" through the tall grass, like Pepe Le Pew, after a cottontail. Even though she was the dunbest canine I've ever encountered, she figured out how to push them into the open where I could nail them with a .410.

There were a lot of quail in those fields but I could never get her the least bit interested in birds. She was also adamant about not picking up dead things. As in all things: run what you brung, but if you want a pheasant hunter that'll get birds in the bag with minimal training, you massively improve your odds with a field-bred Springer or Lab.

My blue heeler on an elk hunt.....



My current red heeler (as a pup) ferret hunting over stuffed animal bait.....

My red pup grown up and still hunting ferrets.......


Her first litter of ferret hunters.......

Yes, they were bred to be working stock dogs and for my money they are the best there is. Mine would go get a cow for you and put it in the shed by simply pointing the cow out and telling her "Go get her girl". She would have done about anything for me but was also obedient to my Wife and son. In fact my son when he was young could roam anywhere on the farm and she would follow him and watch out for him.

She wasn't particularly hard to train, I started out by teaching her what "NO" meant. When I had to reprimand her, I made sure I showed some affection to her about ten minutes later to prove to her I still loved her and she soon learned what was acceptable and what was not.

She was an exceptional watchdog and one thing that amused me is that when a salesman drove into the yard she would run out and sit looking up at them before they could get out of the rig often with the hair on her neck standing up. I would watch from around the corner and if it was someone I wanted to talk with I would call and tell her it was okay and she would wag her tail to show she was friendly with them. If I didn't call they usually just left and she saved me wasting time talking with someone I had no desire to. I had several people tell me that if they just went about their business if we were not home she never bothered them but that she did like to keep them in sight. If they went into a building she often followed them in so she could watch them.

Another very humorous thing that happened involved my neighbor who had a pickup that was nearly identical to mine. He came over one day to borrow a wagon of mine when I wasn't home. He simply backed up to the wagon and got out to hook it up to his truck. He left the door open and Tina knew that if I left the door open it was an invitation to hop in which see did. When Cliff got into the truck she realized she had mad a mistake and Cliff said if you could visualize the look of an embarrassed dog, she was it. She usually waited by the door to make sure it was me before jumping in after that.

I could tell many stories about what a great companion she was but most folks can probably see by now why I say she was a once in a lifetime dog.

Cool pics Huntsman. I don't know anything about ferrets, but I never would have guessed that one would play with a pup or a dog.

I've got a heeler that is with me 24/7,greatest dog and friend I ever had,he hunt,fish and truck across the USA. People ask about the dog and could care less about me.

Good stories, and sounds like you got a handle on the Heelers. Also good looking litter of puppies there.

I never could figure out if it was 40% versus 60% the dog training the owner, OR 40% vs: 60% the owner training the dog, LOL!

Edited to add: NO is one of the most valuable commands to teach a dog. Can save the dog and/or even a persons life sometimes.

Most interesting.
I own a female Blue Heeler and she is a tireless fetcher.
If you throw it she will go for it and bring it back every time.
Trouble is she doesnt want to let go of it.
These dogs are also very good in the dog obediance ring and fly ball trials.
What i use mine for primarily is guard work.
Yes,for my house.
I dont live in the best of neighborhoods and i keep Venus in my house.
She is without a doubt the most suspicious bitch in the world of dogdome.
Very aggressive in regards to perceived threats around the house or yard.
Hates cats even more than strangers.
And she is constantly dogging the poor squirrels in the yard.
This dog has never destroyed any of my furnishings or clothes.
Was very easy to house break as well.
The only negative is that they do shed a lot of hair.
But then again anyone that keeps a dog in their house cant expect a super clean home.
I bought her for $100.00 off of a working cattle ranch when she was eight weeks old.
She was the dominate dog in the litter and i knew i was gonna have my hands FULL with her.
And she lived right up to that prediction.
Working with her constantly finally ingrained in her that i was boss dick around the house,not her!!
These dogs SHOULD NOT be owned by inexperienced people who have little knowledge of working breeds.
I would strongly urge if you are going to buy one to try and get one from a working line.
Mine is now eight years old and has never had one health issue.
Very sturdy animals!!
Unfortunately I have already seen first hand how the AKC show breeders are gutting these fine dogs working abilities.
Never heard of one as a hunting dog until i read this thread.

My heeler only hunts the warmest part of the bed at night. When I had a horse on the place ,she would easily go get it and put it in the barn. After two attempts with the mules, she said the hell with that, put them in yourself.

This is actually my wife's dog. Spoiled rotten, but would kill anyone touching my wife. She even bites me if I get too personal with the wife. All day long, she is at my wife's heels.

Only have to say "Do you want to go" and she is setting on the center console of the Dodge.

These are high maintenace dogs and if they don't have a job to do, you better plan on playing with them at least 1/2 hour per day, hard. ( My job)

I have a border collie here, and they are also very high maintenance due to the "work" instinct. What I do is channel that "work" routine into daily routine, easier on me, easier on her and helps to fit her to the "pack" routine, and establish her position in the pack.

e.g.: When going outside or somewhere: We're going to the barn I just talk to her, any words, but the signal is barn, garage, shop, truck, car, north field, etc. Over time they learn by direction you walk or head, what specific you head for, and will learn to key on the specific sound or word. To the point if you don't move, they will head to object, and in her case if I don't go there, he will sit or wait when she realizes I'm not moving yet. Also in her case as a high energy "work" type, she will do her best to beat me to the place, thing, whatever she thinks we are going to do or go to. If it is a routine, I need to heel her before she gets there, if for some reason I need to be first.
If in the garage, and I pick up the chainsaw she will immediately head for the tractor and trailer. If I don't head for the tractor first, she will sit there, waiting to see if I put the chansaw on the ATV. When I feed the birds of a morning she will be sitting outside the door, and if I come out say nothing, she will immediately head to the drum holding the bird feed, and if I open one up, she will head to the feeders, waiting for me to show up. When coming around the corner of house, she will be sitting at the feeders, waiting to see what I want her to do. Usually I will find something for her to work with. Could be carrying one of the buckets back, sending her afer a cow or calf I want closer look at, whatever, something she is responsible for doing as her "pack" or place function. I also like to throw in something "new" or at least not done often, to keep anticipating" a command. May point to the orchard and tell to CHECK it out, let her "perform" then call her back for reward, usually a good girl(tone of voice important, a signal also), pat on the head, a bisquit, just vary routine enough to keep her looking for direction from me. In short I'm am adjusting what I do, to enable her to fit in with what I expect from her behavior. Varies much from dog to dog, even in same breeds that "specilize" in their function.

Dogs pick up on signals we give that are so obscure to us at times. I think is what makes it so difficult sometimes to correct a problem behavior. All of the smaller interactions we do with dogs, when it is routine to them them, can be considered work, when it is part of their RESPONSIBILITY and INTERACTION in the pack. The excercise is also important, promotes good health both physical and mental, as it does for humans.

My border collie gets about ten to fifteen minutes of frisbee or tennis ball daily, if she does not have any stock work that day. Working and hunting dogs are HIGH maintenance, and can develop some very bad behavorial problems if that is neglected.

That being said, they also make some of the best pets and family dogs, if the owner is able to provide the bahavorial conditioning they need to be healthy.

Border Collies can be some of the sneakiest, destructive, vicious livestock killers if they are neglected.

And, Saddlesore, you need to get your wife to teach your heeler to let you come up a notch on the dominance pole in the "play" category, LOL!!!