Heading dog x Continental pointer?

[Neal 1,857]

To start off, I wasn't sure where to put this, so feel free to move it to gundogs or wherever.

There's been quite a lot of talk recently about individuals stopping using lurchers and moving to slower mooching, bushing etc dogs. I moved from lurchers to kelpies (as some of you will know) in 2000. However, recently, several people I know have told me that (partly because of the obedience level of my dogs and partly because of my temperament) they think I'd suit a gundog. 

I must admit that, although I still enjoy catching the occasional pest, I get a lot more enjoyment out of simply walking, mooching, wandering (and wondering) with the dogs and seeing the various amazing wildlife in our sceptered isle. Having a dog which says, "there's a deer over there" rather than me watching it disappearing into the distance ("FENTON!!!") makes for a more enjoyable walk. I hasten to add that this is purely my outlook and I know a lot of others want different things in their canine companions.

As a result of these two points I started to think that maybe I needed to do some more research on various gundogs. I've done a lot of reading (not just t'internet) and spoken to people I've met about Labs, Cockers, GSPs, GWPs, Vizslas and HWVs etc. I also found an interesting site on "big game indicating dogs" which used New Zealand heading dogs. More recently, while general googling, I found a New Zealand hunting site which had a thread about the benefits of crossing heading dogs (they mentioned collies and kelpies as well as their own home grown types) with various European HPRs. The main claim was that they had the benefit of the HPR but with more "willingness to comply" from the collie-types.

Does anybody have any thoughts/experiences of this?

Id like to add that this is not me being highly unsubtle about accidentaly mating Maud to an HPR and shifting the pups. 

Edited June 9 by Neal

[forest of dean redneck 11,543]

Think there’s been similar breeding in pig dogs and deer tracking dogs but end of day it comes down to each individual dog the time put into it and the chances it’s given work wise .

On a side note there’s the Python hunter guy on YouTube and instagram his wire haired pointer hunts feral hogs , scents pythons and their nests and dispatches and retrieves wounded iguanas .very impressive multi tasking animal .

[Neal 1,857]

Thanks, I'll take a look.

[tatsblisters 9,509]

It seems you like the qualities of the dogs you have mate and probably like I have done in the past wondered what they would be like with a different breed in the mix. Even though I like and enjoy watching a buisey spaniel working it's head off part of me is thinking about a Lab as my next dog just for a nice steady companion on a mooch about. A walk I had yesterday with the daughters springer that was manically working some sett aside out when I spotted this roe deer watching her before she got to close and disappeared into cover. 

[Neal 1,857]

Good point. My first thought had been the obvious "I'll get a lab then..." because every thread I read about advice on gundogs is always heavily laden with "Don't be daft; just get a lab. It'll be so much easier."

But there's something about the HPRs that I like. Can't quite put my finger on it.

I forgot to add in my first post that, for me, one of the advantages of the cross bred rather than a pure gundog would be that I'd "understand" them better after a quarter of a century of getting to know them. 

No rush yet. Noggin is slowing down considerably (shorts walks only now) but Maudy is only three in August.

[gnipper 6,426]

I recently moved to a gundog from terriers and lurchers and I'm enjoying getting out and about for a mooch with the pup but the way they work is completely different to what I'm used to, spaniels seem to run around for the sake of it where my borders could kind of head straight for the scent.

 I was trying to decide for ages wether to go for a lab, gwp or spaniel and ended up with a mental cocker that was a lovely chilled pup at first so he duped me. This was my first family dog so that swayed us towards the cocker and I probably should have got something calmer although the rest are all big shit machines.

[gnipper 6,426]

Retrieves to the airgun so might get out a bit more roosting this year.

[tatsblisters 9,509]

I was tempted to get this pup the daughters mate bred but the wife had the same breed of dog as the sire when she lived at home and said bloody likely 

Guess the cross. 

[gnipper 6,426]

Sprollie? 

[tatsblisters 9,509]

2 minutes ago, gnipper said:

Sprollie? 

It was a large litter of 14 though a few didn't make it I think they ended up with 11. And what seems common when a springer is bred to another breed black seems to be the dominant colour. 

[gnipper 6,426]

They'll probably end up looking like a munsterlander?

[tatsblisters 9,509]

40 minutes ago, gnipper said:

They'll probably end up looking like a munsterlander?

Thought that myself mate. 

[forest of dean redneck 11,543]

Or a Brittany type ? 
my sister  had a show bred spaniel  oh back in 80s ? It was a tall thing jumped Barb wire fences like a lurcher , 

few years back  I seen it’s double so went and talked to the owner and she was from nz it was apprently half show strain /half working  ? 

[gnipper 6,426]

Numb nuts just goes through them 

[Neal 1,857]

I bumped into a bloke in the wood yesterday afternoon who I've met a couple of times before. He walks his parents flatcoated retriever and stopped me for a long chat once as he's in a similar position to me i.e. wondering which dog to get as (in his case) his first dog, and he was interested in finding out about my kelpies. 

Complete coincidence, yesterday he said one type he'd considered, and which he thought might interest me, was a borador (so half collie half labrador).

He then went on to ask if I'd ever heard of Australian cattle dogs! It turned out he'd just returned from a holiday in France (Chamonix and Paris) and said he'd seen several out there after never meeting one in the UK. Oddly enough (and I think I've mentioned this on here before) most of the ACDs I've met in this country have been huge barrel chested things with short legs. But once, about ten years ago, I was walking through Southsea in Portsmouth behind what looked like a really nice rangy blue merle collie. As I drew level with it the dog turned around to look at me and I thought, "that's not a collie." I was right. It was a working strain ACD imported from France and the bloke walking it was dog sitting for his mate while he was on holiday. Most of the ACDs I've read about being workers in this country (in recent years) seem to have been imported from either North America or Europe.