Hello Ellen, Thank you for your message. Sorry it’s taken me so long to respond to you. Here are some answers to your questions. Are field trials open to inexperienced new comers. Answer: Yes they are. My dad and I got started in UKC field trials 4 or 5 years ago as new comers. Here is a link to the UKC Field Trial Rule Guide (www.ukcdogs.com/docs/hunting/pointing-dog-rulebook.pdf (www.ukcdogs.com/docs/hunting/pointing-dog-rulebook.pdf)). Based on your location, I’d be happy to make some introductions for you. You may want to go and attend an event to watch and meet people before entering in any events. You mentioned your puppy currently doesn’t have good recall. Answer: That would be an important thing to focus on before entering a field trial and make your experience more enjoyable. I’d recommend a check cord and treats. Start working around the house inside and outside calling your puppy back to you. Use treats as a motivator and the check cord to help gently bring the puppy back to you. When outside and walking change directions occasionally. When you do say “here” and when the puppy changes directions and comes towards you give a treat and offer lots of praise. How old does the dog/puppy have to be to enter field trials. Answer: UKC has different classifications based on experience levels. (Open and Gun classes) There is no age requirement to enter in either category. Open class is designed for finished level dogs where as Gun class is for geared more towards beginners. We run our dogs in the Gun Class. In addition to these two levels of competition most field trials offer a “beginner” level of competition for both field and water works. TAN is a Natural Ability Test (offered to dogs before 3 years of age). The objective is for the young dog to find game and hold a point for up to 3 seconds. WRT Water Retrieve Test (offered to dogs over the age of 6 months). The objective is to see the dog enter the water, swim to a dead bird, and bring it back to shore. Both TAN and WRT are set up for the dog to have success. I hope all this information helps. If you’d like more information let me know. By the way, where are you located???

The collars we use are so we know where are dogs are at. They are called Garmin GPS, but they do have a zap feature. I would say try not to use it if you can. Try using something else to motivate the dog to come to you and teach it the recall. But it’s important to have fun and be exited so your dog will feed off your energy and want to be trained.

The dogs that we have gotten are from close friends of my family. But there are multiple good breeders at the field trials we go to.

As well as if you message my father on Facebook, then he could help you out if you looking for a hunting dog. His name is Rob Winchester.

thanks for sharing by the way

There are multiple field trials everywhere in the US, most of the ones we go to are in North Carolina, South Carolina and Gorgia

Carson Winchester bring it on