Ever heard of an antler dog? Maybe you think they’re some sort of a mythical character. Kind of like the Jackalope. Well, I suppose they could be—we’ve all seen those crazy holiday photos of someone’s pet with a set of furry reindeer antlers strapped to their head. But that’s not what I’m talking about. An antler dog is one trained to seek out antler sheds by sight and scent.
I have trained dogs, mostly bird dogs, for most of my life. I’ve also had experience with drug detection dogs, and I’ve trained many other different kinds of animals; my love of animals made it a natural interest for me to participate in as many different types of training programs as I could possibly find. I took classes all over the country and learned many different types of training methods. After years of researching all these different programs, it was clear that they all had something to offer, but I also knew I had to form my own program.
I use a type of reward-based program, but one enhanced with some additional techniques that help the dogs learn and enjoy every minute of his training. I call my program, “The Science of Participative Training,” and it is this program that gave me the idea to train dogs to find antler sheds.
After some trial and error, I found that Labrador retrievers were the dog of choice for the job. They are smart, easy to get along with, and have great noses. I have worked with young adult dogs and I have started puppies, and done properly, training either age successfully is achievable.
North To South & Zero To 90
I had just returned from a Canadian trip with 11 of my dogs, a journey on which we’d found more than 200 sheds in five days. Our early spring trip had been cut short because of late snow storms. The temperature had been near zero. It was very shortly after my return that I received a call inviting me to come to Texas and hunt sheds on the prestigious Herradura ranch in South Texas, very near the Mexican border.
I was concerned that the extreme change in the weather would be harmful to the dogs. My antler dogs cover a lot of ground, and the heat in South Texas on a usual spring day can easily be in the 90s or so. Too, the dogs had just returned home and were recovering from the cold they’d experienced in Canada, but my inviting host assured me that Texas was having an exceptionally cool and wet spring. The trip was on.
I was excited to work with the great people at the Herradura, John and Jess Beckett, Phil Farris, and Aldo Maldonado. The ranch is a spectacular place, and the food and the accommodations were matched by the genuine graciousness of my hosts. My task, and the reason the Herradura folks invited me and the antler hunting dogs, was simple. Sure it was to hunt sheds, but not just any sheds. They wanted to find the six sheds from three of the really big bucks on the ranch.
I am asked all the time how I’m able to train a dog to find sheds. For me the answer seems simple. Antler dogs are much like a bird dog and a drug detection dog all rolled into one great shed-hunting companion. As I said, I’ve found Labs to be my dog of choice. The dogs do their job like a close-working bird dog, quartering 25 to 50 yards ahead of me. And they are trained like a drug dog to seek out an inanimate object, the antler, and they do it while covering all types of terrain from wooded areas to cactus fields, sniffing out the antler and retrieving it to their handler.
Since I had to fly to Texas, I took only one dog, my yellow Lab, Ayla. She is just over a year old, and she is an antler-hunting machine. Because of the hunting conditions—the cool temps were good, but the wet spring had left the vegetation waist high—we could use her for only about two hours each day. In our three days, though, we found more than 30 sheds and both sides of “Ocho.” Ocho is the smallest and youngest of the three biggest bucks on the Herradura, and the Becketts look for him to be the future of the breeding program for the ranch.
The ranch is comprised of three different types of terrain, including heavy cactus, open savannah, and about a 500-acre burn area. The open areas were the best for dog work (cactus is really hard on tender dog paws). My Ayla located about half of the total find and was able to retrieve most of the others, simply because she is able to get in places that we could not reach.
I have hunted all kinds of game in my lifetime, but nothing thrills me like watching a really good dog work. Hunting sheds is the greatest treasure hunt you can imagine. You never know when or where the dog will find antlers. They can be years old or fresh, in a brush pile, cornfield, or out in a pond. On our Texas trip, we also got a special treat. Aldo was hunting a large pasture and radioed that he’d found something we had to see. Reaching him, we saw he’d found two four-point antlers. They were both from the left side. Aldo had found them very near to one another, and though the antlers themselves weren’t overly remarkable, the fact that they’d come from the same buck—one was the most recent year’s shed and the other was from the previous year. The deer had dropped both left sides at the same tree two years in a row. Now if that’s not remarkable, I’m not sure what is.
With the vegetation being knee-deep in most places, we decided to use horses in the afternoon. We could cover more territory with them, and they naturally gave us a much better view. The other reason that the horses were a good idea was the snakes. It just made sense to be up above the terrain.
South Texas’ rattlesnakes can be a problem if you don’t know how to deal with them. When it comes to the dogs, we do what’s called “snake proofing.” The dog has a natural curiosity for the smell and sound of the snake, so we have to make them realize that snakes are a bad thing and that they should stay away from them. We caught a six-foot snake for Ayla our first day in Texas, then put an electric collar on the dog. The snake is restrained so that it cannot strike, and the collar is adjusted for a low setting. As the snake tries to strike the dog, a mild shock is administered. The negative correction of the collar does not harm the dog, and they quickly learn that the snake is not a friend.
I have been invited to hunt on a number of ranches, but this short shed hunt on the Herradura was outstanding. I was certainly happy that I’d decided to make the trip.