How much "steady" do you need?

Just so we are all on the same sheet of music, I found the classic graphic I believe most "pointer people" can agree on to define the various "levels" of steadiness.. The further to the right, the "higher" the level of steadiness.

Levels of steadiness

In the world of pointing dogs this can be quite the debate. In Real World hunting situations, with all of the people I have hunted with and all the different dogs I have had the opportunity to hunt over I have heard a lot of things, mostly yelling, cussing, copious whistle bleating and even witnessed a tantrum or two over dog performance for one thing or another. The one thing I never heard a peep over is a guy complaining his dog was too steady.. Let that soak in for a quick minute. Hell, I'm guilty of this. Please allow me to digress...it is my blog after all...In fact my first real bird dog from puppy is Paxson. I thought knew a lot about dog training already, read a half dozen books on Bird Dog training - man I got this, I thought. I was living in New Mexico at the time, and The Poof was about eighteen months old. He spent his first year and change living in Amstenrade, The Netherlands and had only seen a few pheasant and Grey Partridge when I took him out for walks in the South Limburger countryside.... Back to New Mexico. It was a banner year for Scaled quail, the coveys out on the mesa where epic - hundreds of birds, just in a single covey! It didn't take long and Paxson began to point naturally, doing an amazing job really. People have paid more to trainers and got less - just saying and since I thought I knew so much I allowed Paxson to be hunted with my dear friend's yellow Lab, Drake. I love Jim, and I really thought the world of Drake, but he was no pointing dog! True to type, he'd blaze on in and the quail would fly. Soon this became a competition for Paxson and turned into a behavior I have never been able to completely rein in. I learned I couldn't hunt him with another dog and so Paxson, despite being an amazing bird dog, has never had his talents showcased to anyone wanting to run their own dog during the same hunt.

So if I haven't lost you yet...I am talking about STEADINESS, a dog's ability to "hold point" until the boss says otherwise - really that is what it comes down to.

If you plan to do trials and reach high scores with many of the testing organizations, yes you need maximum steadiness. My favorite TV show host, Harley Jackson from American Gun Dog, took a lot of flack from this group over his dog's "lower level" of steadiness.

For hunting, I really think Steady to Shot is necessary. This keeps the dog on point, and safe through the first shot happening. The upside is, the dog can immediately begin recovery on the downed bird. The downside is - what if the covey didn't all go? Well, it'll be put up by the charging dog for sure.

Even in the markedly down season this year, I did have the opportunity to have a covey flush into another sitting covey. Having a higher level of control would have yielded many more opportunities to bag birds. As the situation unfolded, I had a dog set free by the gun shot chasing down a hit bird and ran right into a new tightly clustered covey - they launched up the steep slope and in turn the flushed birds flushed yet again - opportunity lost. Climbing down that steep and crumbling slope wasn't as easy as it could have been, if you are picking up what I am putting down.

So there is some personal preference involved, there is some practicality involved and well, to be honest, there are some bragging rights involved. In the early season I hunted with Booker, who when he is feeling it, can be steady all the way to fall. It was was super cool, and happened with a couple of witnesses, since we were "hunting" one of Washington's release sights. He stuck a solid clean point, I walked up, the bird flushed, I made the shot and it fell to mother Earth. I looked to my left, and there the old boy was still on point. He looked up at me and I told him, "fetch it up boy" and off he went. Perfect delivery to hand and then went right to his healing position at my left.