Bird Dog Days 5 Wrap Up

Lion Country Supply would like to thank everyone who attended the Bird Dog Days Customer Appreciation Event held on Saturday 19^th, 2015. Not only did we have a great visitor turnout but we also had a great turnout from several gundog product manufacturers and dog experts. This was my first Bird Dog Days event, and what a learning event it was with good questions asked and lots of useful information shared by the experts.

The first session was given by Derek Daly of the Pennsylvania Game Commission. Derek spoke about the K-9 program that was recently rejuvenated by the Pennsylvania Game Commission; he also demonstrated his new Labrador puppy Gunner. The new K-9 program is designed to protect wildlife and assist special investigations leading to criminal prosecution. During his session Derek demonstrated Gunner's human tracking and article detection abilities that will be used in field investigations across the Commonwealth.

The second session was a demonstration of basic gundog training given by Ed Rader. Ed is an English setter breeder and an innovator in gundog training equipment and founder of Innotek. During Er's session, he talked about how dogs are pack animals, and pack animals respect, obey, and accept the leader of the pack without fear. Ed gave plenty of tips on how to become the leader of the pack, teaching through association and repetition, and other useful techniques. I have been using Er's advice of the command lead and notice an improvement in my dog handling ability in just a few days.

The third session presented by veterinarian Dr. Bob Rider from the Metzger Animal Hospital was all about sporting dog first aid, and dog first aid turned out to be a very popular topic with plenty of questions asked. Dr. Rider touched on many topics related to maintaining your sporting dog's health, both in the field and in the home. Topics ranged from dog nutrition to snake bites and gunshot wound treatment. He did a great question and answers session and offered some great home remedy tips that we will be posting on our blog shortly.

Lion Country Supply gave away door prizes every hour, including a SportDOG Tek 2 and a Lucky Launcher Kit by Retriev-R-trainer, and various nutritional supplements. At noon there was a huge feast of roasted pig, baked beans, potato salad and coleslaw. Throughout the day there was the opportunity to test fire some of Benelli's latest shotguns with Scott Sipple, and view hunting products from Retriev-R-Trainer and Mud River. And plenty of visitors took time to shop bargains at the tent sale and in the store.

There was so much useful information shared during this event that we decided to publish it online for future reference, so watch for more blog posts and videos coming soon. And be sure to watch for next year's Bird Dog Days Customer Appreciation event.

" Darren