Border Terrier
hunting and family dog
The Border Terrier as a hunting dog
Since hunting is only a small part of the hunting dog's and hunter's lives, it is important that the hunting dog also functions as a family dog. One characteristic of many border terriers that is now particularly appreciated by hunters in modern times is its ability to be something of a "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" - a patient playmate for the children at home one day and the next day on the hooves of wild boars in the forest. The dog's size also makes it easy to handle, it stays healthy and is, according to sambla.se, one of the three cheapest breeds to own.
Research shows that there is a greater difference in "personality" between individuals than between breeds, so you can't really talk about a breed-typical mentality. But what many border terriers have in common is that the dog is social, calm and can get along with children and other pets, in the hunting forest it is persistent, has a fair amount of game hunting sharpness and great courage. But it is important to remember that it is a terrier, outside the family circle cats and other small animals are often seen as hunting prey.
A Border Terrier will hunt anything, whether it has hooves, paws or feathers, but over time the dog will tend to prefer to hunt the game you shoot for it. As with all hunting dogs, behavior changes as the dog gains more experience and training.
The Border Terrier as a short-running and offensive hunting dog
The Border Terrier is particularly well suited to smaller hunting grounds or where hunting is conducted in divided fields. It usually has a not too large search, which is an advantage when smaller fields are to be hunted with breaks in between. You don't want the dog to hunt through all the fields at once or simply disappear on its own adventures. This is especially important if there are major busy roads nearby. There are few things that make a dog handler feel so sick to his stomach as seeing his dog on the GPS running towards a busy road.
One question when discussing the Border Terrier's qualities as a hunting dog is whether they bark on the run. Most Border Terriers bark when they are just starting to get caught but can then fall silent when they are following the game on the run, but there are Border Terriers that bark. It is often appreciated that the Border Terrier barks just when in contact with the game, then the shooters know where the game is and which direction to take right then and there. With modern equipment in the form of GPS trackers, one can also question how important it really is for the hunting dog to bark on the run.
The question of how long a Border Terrier drives game is also discussed, but that too is highly individual and influenced by many factors, so the answer to that question is "how long is a leash?". But in general it can be said that the Border Terrier is a short-distance or offensive dog, long-distance Border Terriers are more unusual.
The Border Terrier as a hunting dog in a pot
Borderterrier.se deliberately does not use the term "pot dog", see the reason for this on the History page.
The Border Terrier is used for hunting, guard hunting and searching for fox, badger and raccoon dog in the pot. Training for hunting game in the pot has become more difficult in Sweden because the rules for keeping badgers in captivity and for conducting pot tests have been tightened. But in Finland, for example, the importance of having trained hunting dogs to hunt the invasive raccoon dog in the pot has been recognized. In Finland, 170,000 raccoon dogs are killed annually, in Sweden it is now spreading from the north and perhaps we will get a different view of the need for hunting dogs trained for the pot here too.
In the context of potty training, we usually talk about two different behaviors in border terriers. Which behavior the dog has is individual, more laid-back or more explosive.
A hunter looks for the game in the pot and lies a short distance from the badger or fox and barks, this if the game goes to a dead end or nest down in the pot. The hunter then digs down and makes a descent into the pot behind the dog to get to the game and dog. Since it can take time, it is important that the dog is persistent and does not leave the game. If the badger or fox moves in the pot, the dog follows.
A blaster is used for hunting foxes. A blaster has a moving method of operation that makes the fox insecure and chooses to leave the pot. The dog seeks out the fox, breaks contact and looks for new paths in the pot. The dog can also sometimes come up from the pot and go down again, preferably in a different entrance. This makes the fox anxious and causes it to leave the pot.
The Border Terrier as a search dog
Search dog, male born 2016, "Enzo" Wästborders Porthos
A Border Terrier generally has a great desire to track and is therefore easy to train for tracking. Because of the high willingness to work, the tracking pace is often high and the tracking is often rough, especially in young dogs. However, if you get your Border Terrier to track calmly and methodically, it can become a really good tracking dog.
There are border terriers that are used to search for traffic-damaged game, a disadvantage when searching may be that the dog is too light to pull down an injured animal if necessary. But even here there are individual differences and many border terriers can, despite their relatively low weight, pull down injured deer, for example.