>>2484165Very good advice. Upland hunting is the dog man’s sport.
>>2484957It depends on your game. Pointing breeds are harder to train but are more effective for birds that hold well like quail, grouse, prairie chicken, etc. and take longer to develop but the man with a good pointing dog is the most enviable of upland hunters. A flusher is going to be better for pheasant which fucking love to run around and escape before a hunter can catch up to a dog on point. Flushers are easier to train but come with the downside of having to work within shooting range so inside 20 yards typically. This drastically shortens the amount of ground your dog can realistically cover whereas a close hunting pointer works around 50-100 yards and a hot blooded dog will chase the horizon. My advice for any novice dog man would be a labrador. They will flush game, retrieve them, are easy to train, and a joy to have around. They’re just all around great hunting dogs. The English Pointer is king of pointing breeds. German Pointers are the most versatile pointing dogs. Springers will break up brush better than a lab will but are harder to keep still in a duck blind. Chessies are probably the best waterfowl breed but often overheat in the uplands and are typically more hard headed than a lab. At the end of the day if you talk to any upland hunter 9/10 will tell you that the dog work is what drives their passion for the sport.
