Norwegian
version of this site
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More on
Groen. working history - after the herding The Groenendael
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Tracking and retrieving - training and real work
Doberman Groenendael
Dobermann Belgian sheepdog
"Tracking, of all dog sports, is the most mysterious to trainers while,
seemingly the most natural to working dogs."
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Østpå satt den gamle i Jernskogen og fødte der Fenres unger; |
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blant alle disse skal én bli en soltyv i trollham... |
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Ancient poem: Eddadikt, Voluspå .
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From a hunting trip to Sweden: Ulv is on the blood track of a roe-deer.
One of the hunters was unlucky and hit the roe-deer a little too far back. We try to be extremly carefull not to wound any animal, but it happens - occasionally to all of us. You'll find more on training a blood tracking dog on the menu on top/left on this page. |
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Ulv, André and Gunnar Kjellin |
Main page on blood tracking |
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Training the new pup. On this picture I am training him on his first track ever! More on the new pup: Click here | ||||
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The dogs are with us everywhere - this picture is taken after a 7-8 hours mountain trip and we've just established the camp.
Jappe, Ulv, André & Hege. |
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| Ulv has just retrieved a grouse on the top of Fuglhø. Nice to have a dog that both retrieves and carry the grouses. |
And here he's retrieved a mountain hare. |
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Reideer hunting in Findalen. Ulv is searching the terrain...
Every year his with on the reindeer hunt - he really enjoys staying in a tent for days and walk all day long is search for the herds...like the rest of us, I guess. |
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This hunt ended well, and Ulv is carrying his fair share down from the mountains - a four hours walk.
He's in very good shape and don't mind carrying 10-12 kg. of meat in this steep rocky terrain. |
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Arve and Ulv after a sucsessful reindeer hunt up in the high mountains. | ||||
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Arve, André and Ulv in Russdalen. On a fising trip. Ulv's carrying all the food.
Some say that to get up in the mountains is to get away from it all, but for us it is to come back home. |
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Arve and Ulv after a fine grouse hunt. The hunter seems saticfied with both the four grouses and the retrieving dog. | ||||
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Ulv saved that day. Because of him it was no problem finding the roe-deer in the dense and bushy woods.
When we hunted in Sweden, Ulv was with as a tracking dog for all the hunters. Durin the actual hunt we used a couple of German Terriers and Dachs. We also hunted together with hunters from Sweden and Denmark on day. |
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Succesful tracking - André og Ulv |
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Ready for tracking. I always use a harness when tracking or training. Call it a ritual, but when Ulv sees the harness he knows exactly what's going on.
This winter we'll appear in a book on Groens and Malinoises - Ulv showing how to track succesfully. I've been told that the book'll be in Swedish and Norwegian. |
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Ulv |
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Arve has shot 2 roe-deers (doublé!) and we get together to talk about the hunt.
from left: Nils H. Baggerød, Arve H. Brun, Gunnar Kjellin og Arne Aaberg. We're hunting at our friends ground, Gunnar Kjellin. |
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Arve has shot 2 roe-deers |
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Ulv as a puppy |
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When you're just a couple of months old, it's better to practise roe-deer hunting indoors... A smelly roe- deer foot is exciting for a puppy... |
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Ulv and his kind of toy |
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Ulv and the Pointer Imiak.
Ulv is playful and full of energy at the age of 4 months. Imiak often visited us and was the kindest and happiest dog I have ever met. |
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Ulv and Imiak |
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Ulv is investigating the fox. Exciting for a young puppy, but now when he's grown I can't show it to him anymore because he'd tear it apart in seconds. |
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Ulv's first winter - learning the basics of fox hunting.
After a day out in the cold (minus 10-15 Celsius) the puppy coat is all iced down. |
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Arve and Ulv return from a day in the woods. |
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Ulv - a proud puppy on one of his first fishing trips. We went to the local river, Gudbrandsdalslågen in April to fish grayling (still freezing cold in Norway at that time). I nymph fished some graylings - let some go and took two of them back home.
I still remember the first time he went with me on a days fishing (some days earlier that year). |
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The fall of 1999. Ulv has tracked down his first roe-deer. This seem to be the great meaning of life for the dog. |
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Ulv and roe-deer |
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More pics |
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The fall 2000: Ulv has been with us hunting 12 roe-deers and a moose. He's already beginning to be an experienced hunter. He's also retrieved some grouses etc. |
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Ulv and a reebuck |
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Even if I am carrying my rifle when tracking on this picture, one should be very careful not to shot straight over the tracking dogs head when suddenly the wounded game appear in front of you. It may harm both the fully consentrated dog, but first of all his ears.
It's much better to have a second hunter (or two on each side) walking beside you ready to shoot. |
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| Reindeer hunting again...Ulv and Arve an early morning in Findalen. |  |
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| Ulv's retrieving grouses again in the high mountains - and as always with a lot of enthusiasm! |  |
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Thanks. You've been working hard today? I saw that particular duck wasn't dead when you grabbed him, though. He is now, so stop scweezing his head now, will you?
No, actually, the dog Ulv is not one of those "I'll chew on him as long as I can"-dogs. He's a great retriever, which in my opinion includes NOT being a chewer. It's not funny to have to outrun the dog every time you shoot a bird - and if you don't you'll end up with an all-chewed-up-grouse when you want it for the freezer. :-) |
Ulv and wildboars
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In Sweden they had wildboars inside a large fenced area. The big one on the picture weighted 270 kg. (about 550 lb. I think) and he was fast as a bullet. The owner, Gunnar Kjellin asked for fun if we should have a contest: "We'll run across the fenced area and the one who GETS over has won"... :-) |
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Ulv, the dachs Lucas and wildboars |
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Gunnar often fed the wildboars with what was left of roe-deers and mooses. The wildboars preferred this over fruit and ordinary pig food. I think it's the same in the wild.
If, for example a roe-deer was killed by a car in the area, he gave it to the wildboars and it was gone in 15 minutes... |
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A wildboar with a roe-deer |
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On two occasions some of the wildboars ran away...
Gunnar asked if I would send Ulv after them to get them back. I said yes (with mixed feelings!) and ordered Ulv to get them back. It was a wild run, but in short time Ulv had chased the wildboars back inside. |
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Ulv is herding the wildboars back inside |
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The wildboars are extremly fast. We've hunted wild wildboars a couple of seasons in Poland and know what they are capable of - and wildboar herding is probably a little dangerous - on one occasion one of them turned back against Ulv for a counter attack. But it ended well. (After the herding, Gunnar asked if he could buy Ulv) |
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Cutting off... |
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Full control.
We also went back to Sweden the fall 2001. |
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Ørjan, Ulv and Maja |
Ulv and Maja |
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The Bulldog, Maja belongs to a neighbour farm and sometimes visits Ulv. |
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Spring...Jappe, Ulv and sheeps.
More pics: Click here. >>> |
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A winter day at the trout lake Tesstjønn.
In the background you see Tessfjellet - a great winter habitat for grouse. |
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Winter hunting in the high mountains. Cross country skiing in Russdalen, February. |
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Cross country skiing on Tesse. When Ulv was 12-13 weeks he was on many 15 km. trips from Tesse to Lemonsjøen. Maybe a little bit too tough for such a young dog, but down hill be used to sit on my shoulders.
On this picture he's some months old. We're having a break...and train some retrieving skills. |
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Ulv and André
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Ulv, André and Hege
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These pictures are taken on a grouse hunt in Salia. Ulv's first grouse hunt at the age of nine months, but there'll be many days like this. We really enjoy the early fall grouse hunting, but also the late winter hunt.
That day, my father and I shot two grouses each and Ulv retrieved them like he'd been training for it all his life. |
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Photographies by Arve |
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This picture is taken april 2001. We got a call from a neighbour and he told that a wolf had crossed his fields. We tracked the wolf until dark, just to see how he had moved through the terrain. Very interesting. The day before, the wolf had taken three reindeers a little bit further north (a female and two calfs). |
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Ulv's tracking a wolf |
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Ulv and a moose shot by Arve. |
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Ulv and moose2. |
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| On a fishing trip. Ulv's carrying the net. |  |
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Back at our place in Vågå. |
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"If every day you work hard to teach your dog to walk on water, and then one day, after much work, he does so, do not be surprised or upset when other people say that he does this, only because he is afraid of being in the water."
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Start of track - training routine clip 
Retrieving with a 8 weeks old puppy
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If you can't watch the video clips, click here
to download Microsoft Media Player7 for free.
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The dog, Ulv has appeared in a couple of books about his blood tracking skills |
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[More on blood tracking training etc.] [The Groenendael, Varg]
[Groen working history - after the herding] [Video clips] [TrackingDogs Message Board]
[The Groenendael as a working dog] [Loke - the new pup...]
Blood tracking 