My name is Mandy Rigby, and I am the founder of Scent Work Academy and Yes Good Dog Training and Behaviour. Mandy
05/05/2025
Adding some 🐕🦺 ‘HP’ 🐶
🐕🦺 Having always owned Retrievers my recent current experience with a different type of gun dog has been an incredibly insightful journey.
📚 🐾I have completed many behaviour courses, diving deeper with an ethology course and worked with hundreds of different breed types over the years but sharing your heart and home with a dog breed that I have limited exposure too is a unique education.
🐶Rusty, my Stabyhoun, is a rare breed, presenting an exciting opportunity to explore his ancestry and genetics. He surprises me daily with is personality traits and novel behaviours.
🐕For those unfamiliar, "HP" in this context stands for "Hunt, Point." Rusty is an HPR, Hunt, Point, and Retrieve – a category that includes breeds like Pointers, Vizslas, Munsterlanders, and Brittany Spaniels.
🦅 These dogs are bred to work across various terrains, typically locating birds by hunting, flushing out pointing and retrieving them after they've been shot.
Originating from the Friesland region, Stabyhouns were historically all-around farm dogs, performing the HPR tasks alongside acting as alert dogs, rat and mole hunters, and even on ocassions pulling small milk carts.
Due to the ‘H’ Rusty exhibits a far strong innate prey drive, noticeable motivated to chase, catch and shake his ‘toy’ but displaying a remarkably soft mouth.
Whilst he will retrieve, his motivation is less and the game seems more geared towards bonding with me rather than a strong inherent desire.
In contrast, Reenie, my Flatcoated Retriever, embodies the "R" dog in the Gun Dog category, bred specifically to hunt out, pick up then retrieve the shot game.
Both my dogs are gundogs, but the addition of "HP" in Rusty's classification creates a significant difference in understanding his fundamental drives.
When we ask our dogs to engage in activities outside their original breeding purpose, such as agility, flyball, hoopers, obedience, or scent work (which I consider a very natural canine sport), we must deeply consider what truly motivates them.
My Retriever thrives on working for me; pleasing is ingrained in her DNA. Her drive to hunt out and retrieve is powerful, influencing her approach to scent work. Her inclination is to find the source by air scenting, to retrieve it.
This made for a colourful journey in obtaining a passive indication, a challenge we've largely overcome aided by maturity.
Her work ethic and unwavering joy of completing the job is truly impressive. I often joke she's my 35kg Spaniel!
With Rusty, I'm still deciphering his personality, navigating the genetic predispositions of this uncommon breed to discover his strongest motivators
I've learned food is a significant reinforcer, but the thrill of the chase, grab is becoming increasingly potent. This led to using a treat clam, satisfying his desire to chase, catch, dig, and then receive a reward, a quadruple win!
He steps on the accelerator pedal with a game of chase - catch - tug with a furry bungee toy. A Kong presently does not tick his box much preferring the rope of it and softer items than the harder rubber.
Despite having two gundogs with similar play styles, sleeping positions and the need to carry around soft items in their mouths, the underlying drives are like night and day.
Their search styles are vastly different, yet both achieve the desired outcome.
Note: (See the snaps shots above of the natural search body positioning of both dogs, one head up, one head down)
Rusty has the ‘P’ element of ‘Point’ genetics, fabulous, I won’t have the trials of the high drive to retrieve the scented item! but undoubtedly my focus will need to be on other areas of his scent training.
There are of course are hundreds of different breeds under different categories, I have only highlighted the differences in my two breeds.
✅ In conclusion, when considering engaging your dog in any activity, it's crucial to delve into their breed history, understand their genetic predispositions and original purpose, and of course, factor in their individual personality.
❤️Observe your dog in their natural states, and let that guide your approach in their training.
Mandy
P.S. I'll never look at a bottle of HP sauce again without thinking "Hunt, Point"! 😂
