Underground

Many associate the jagdterrier with underground hunting. The association hasn’t come from nowhere. The dog is breed to be a confident “predator sharp” hunting machine. But also here it is important to do it right from the beginning, regardless of breed. When the youngster dog is mentally mature for the task it’s time to prepare him on “predator game” in a artificial cave. Here it is important to “read” your dog. If it doesn’t understand what to do it just hasn’t got it yet and the thing you can do is to just take it easy and wait a month or two and try again. You can never force a dog to be a good underground hunter. If the aptitudes are right it will come by itself, sooner or later. The only thing we actually do is to guide and encourage. If the dog feels that working underground is the best there is, then it is a good indication that the dog should be a good hunter.

You should also train retrieving from underground so the dog learns to pull the game out of the caves.

A good way of preparing the dog for underground work is to “track down a fow duting snow” in a cave that is classified as ”simple”. What I mean with a simple cave is that it’s somewhat accessible and with few exits in case something would happen. As with other hunting methods silence is very important when hunting underground. A good idea in the beginning is to follow a experienced underground hunter. A German jagdterrier is a typical “flusher” even though there are many skilled “markers.”