[tahunua001]

my mom used to breed yellow labs. we usually started "playing" with them at about 4 weeks or so(about the time we started advertising them). start throwing balls and bones for them...if you cant get them to fetch spread a little peanut butter on them. once they get fetching down use something that smells like what you want them to hunt(we kept goose or pheasant wings in the freezer for dog training but if you want it to be a coondog then some form of a raccoon will do.

here is were it gets tricky, you'll have to decide what kind of hunting dog you want the pup to be. if you want him to be a bird dog you'll have to teach him to follow smells and quarter or point without barking(pointing and quartering are more of an instinct thing and are very difficult to teach but not barking is pretty easy) but if you want him to be a hound dog then you want him to bark when he smells a raccoon or fox but this behavior will be detrimental for bird hunting.

8 weeks is a perfect time to start since he'll be at the height of his playful age and he will learn to associate hunting with playtime.

sitting, not barking and gunbreaking him are going to be the main things to teach a waterfowl dog. gunbreaking is your biggest concern for a hound dog.