This was Craig’s first trip to come and see me with two young dogs. Craig had acquired Bruiser two weeks prior to coming to see me so he did not know what he would be like on the pigs. His other dog Pumba was only about six months old and as yet had not been on pigs so Craig wanted to see what these two dogs could do. We first took Bruiser down to introduce to Mr Pig, I was quick to see that he would need to have a rope on his collar to hold him back. It has been a while since I have had to use the rope but Bruiser just wanted to go straight in and attack Mr Pig so we needed to hold him back. The behaviour that he was showing out in the wild would break a lot of the bigger pigs and he would scrag the smaller pigs but could get hurt on a big boar. For this reason we needed the rope to be able to change the way that he was thinking. Another problem with Bruiser putting so much pressure on the bail was that he was wearing himself out so fast. He would go and try to attack the boar then lie down puffing and panting while he tried to get his breath back. At one stage we put Bruiser on the opposite side of the fence so that he could not try to bite or break the boar. When we added young Pumba into the bail she was quite happy to stand back and bark. When we took both dogs into the main block we were walking up the gully when Fog bailed up above us. As soon as Fog started barking Young Pumba stood beside us and went to town barking away but she did not want to go and join in. Because Pumba is only six months old this is a habit that no hunter wants to see in a young dog as a dog that trail barks chases a lot of pigs away and does not normally stop many. I suggested to Craig that he would want to try and sort this problem out before he got her out on the hill because if she starts getting used to barking too much it will become very hard to change. Craig needs to stop her from barking at the other dogs when she is playing so that she gets used to being a lot quitter. As for Bruiser when he caught up with Fog and the black and white boar he just kept on wanting to go in for a hold. Bruiser has a temperament that he is going to have to change, he reminds me a lot of my son Sloan’s dog Mack. When Mack was younger he had a bad habit of wanting to growl at any other animals without thinking of the consequences. If Mack was left out of the kennel with my dogs over the day I would see him growl at a cow then another time I would see him growl at a sheep or another dog. It was not as if he wanted to attack them he just could not help himself. The turning point for Mack was when the dogs bailed a 148 pound boar and Mack flew in thinking he was ten foot tall and bullet roof. The end result was two holes in Mack one in his stomach and the other in his back leg. This helped to change the way that Mack reacts around other animals. While he still has trouble containing himself he does know think more as he now understands what the consequences are if he tries to fight a pig.
