THE WORLD OF

WORKING GUNDOGS

"One of the pleasures of shooting is the company of a well trained gundog.  The choice of the breed of gundog is a matter of both personal taste and the type of shooting one is engaged in.  Different terrain and differing quarry dictate the choice of gundog.  Some will prefer the busy spaniel quartering the scrubland for pheasants or rabbits, others the questing of setters or pointers on the moorland, whilst others enjoy the retrieving breeds when wildfowling or at the driven game shoot." Bill Beckett Irish writer and broadcaster
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Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever

This breed hails from the Canadian Province of Nova Scotia and it is used both as a dog for attracting birds and as a retriever.

The use of dogs to decoy ducks is not a new idea.  It has been around for centuries and was used extensively in England until the advent of sporting firearms.  Foxes in the wild use the inquisitive nature of the duck as a means of securing their dinner.  One fox frolics about on the shoreline, dashing in and out of cover and this has an attraction for the duck that come closed to investigate.  A second fox that is concealed pounces on the duck when they venture close enough.

Using that logic, the sportsman bred a fox-like dog for the same purpose of attracting duck closer to the shoreline, in his case close enough to shoot.  Whilst dogs that attract or ‘toll’ duck have been used for centuries, the North Americans have gone one better by training their tollers to retrieve.  With a waterproof coat, webbed toes and a thick, rudder-like tail the duck-tolling retriever is build for serious water work.