Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Pet cemetery visit
‘Heritage’ dogs part of Wildrose experience
OXFORD, Miss. — Mike Stewart removed his hat and placed it over his chest when he entered the small, oak-shaded cemetery east of the Ole Miss campus.
Southern men customarily remove their headwear to show respect for the departed, but this isn’t an ordinary cemetery. It is the resting place for the “founding fathers” of Wildrose Kennels, one of the premier breeding and training facilities for imported British Labrador retrievers.
“We call them our ‘Heritage’ dogs,” Stewart said. “We’re in our fourth generation of Wildrose dogs. Once they pass away, it’s great to have them with us in the cemetery. It’s a real reverent place to me to go back and visit my best friends. We go way back, over two decades.”
Besides Oxford, Wildrose also has kennels in Hillsborough, N.C., and in Dallas. There’s also a Wildrose training facility near Jasper along the banks of the Little Buffalo River.
Wildrose Kennel is like a campus. The first thing you notice is the vast amount of dogs that inhabit the kennels and the outside training areas.
The second thing you notice is the quiet. A topnotch hunting companion must also be a good citizen, Stewart said.
The third thing you notice is the smell. The kennels are clean and mostly odorless.
On the campus is a water training facility consisting of ponds with duck blinds and decoys. There also are drilling areas that simulate upland hunting environments in the upper and lower Great Plains. There is a bridge structure with clear views out both sides and beneath. Dogs do not like to be on such structures and resist them initially, Stewart said. This structure conditions the fear out of them.
Next to the bridge is a long, elevated corrugated black plastic tube. Dogs really don’t like being inside dark tubes.
“In North Dakota, when you wound a pheasant, a lot of times they run into culverts to hide,” Stewart said. “This conditions a dog to go into a culvert and retrieve a bird that would otherwise be lost.”
The training makes a game out of it so that the dogs come to enjoy it.
There’s also a big aviary containing several hundred pigeons, ringneck pheasants and quail. A Wildrose trainer demonstrated the progress of a 10-month old yellow Lab. He walked the Lab from one end to the other as hundreds of birds flushed and flew all around. The dog scarcely looked at the birds.
Then, the trainer threw a bumper to the other end of the aviary, where all of the birds concentrated. On command, the dog retrieved the bumper amid fluttering chaos so intense that it created a virtual gale.
This part of the training conditions a dog in a pheasant field to keep its focus on a single downed pheasant when other pheasants flush around it.
“A dog has to repeat a behavior five times in five different places to create a predictable habit,” Stewart said.
A Wildrose dog is trained to break at the sound of its name.
“If you’re in a duck blind with a bunch of dogs that are trained to break on ‘Back!’ what do you think is going to happen?” Stewart asked.
“You’re going to have a bunch of dogs break all at the same time.”
Stewart uses a whistle that lacks a pea resonator. Such a whistle makes different tones with different pitches to represent individual commands.
As six Labs sat expectantly, Stewart’s assistants placed and a threw half-dozen bumpers. At the sound of its name, each dog retrieved a single bumper, and it was totally orderly. There was no yelling and no additional commands given.
Another exercise sent all of the dogs after the bumpers at once. Each retrieved its designated bumper in an orderly fashion, which is certainly not natural.
“Dogs are not real big on sharing,” Stewart said.
Stewart simulated a situation that might occur when a dog goes to retrieve a downed duck when other ducks are hitting the water. Many dogs will abandon a bird to retrieve another.
These dogs stayed on task with a single bumper.
What happens when a Wildrose dog is in a blind with dogs that aren’t as well-disciplined?
“You need to find some better people to hunt with,” Stewart said.
Stewart’s training method is reminiscent of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, an approach to personal ethics and organization developed, appropriately, by Stephen Covey. The similarities aren’t accidental. Stewart said he taught the elements of the book at Ole Miss.
“There’s no electric collars, no force fetch. It’s all positive reinforcement,” Stewart said.
Wildrose trains a dog to a customer’s specifications. Some owners only want obedience training, Stewart said. Some want a waterfowl hunting dog, and some want an upland dog. Some want both.
“They’re custom dogs,” Stewart said. “None is produced exactly the same. Each is a custom trained dog.”
A new category is “adventure” training. “Adventure” dogs are trained to be companions for all sorts of nonhunting recreational activities, like hiking, biking and even fishing.
“They’re prepared to go anywhere,” Stewart said. “They’re the best companions can have on trails.”
The adventure dog has helped create an entirely new market of outdoors enthusiast that is eager to get outside to interact with their dog,” Stewart said.
“At my age, I’m in the zone of passing it on,” Stewart said. “I want to see this legacy of training in a positive way passed out get people in the outdoors, and the dog is the vehicle to do that.”
There is a fierce rivalry between devotees of the British Lab and the American Lab. The differences are too numerous to list here, but Stewart said he prefers the British Lab.
“We like them because of their size, their temperament and their natural game-finding ability,” Stewart said.
As his words settled in the cool October breeze, Stewart’s gaze lingered for a moment before he donned his hat. It really was a splendid day to visit a cemetery.