

All remained perfectly quiet, watching the ducks.
#Nova scotia duck tolling retriever dog full#
Joe, lying flat behind a thick tuft a few yards to our right and about fifteen feet from the water’s edge, had his hat full of chips and held the young spaniel beside him. The two dogs, Rollo and Jim, lay down close behind us. The ducks were swimming slowly up before the wind and it seemed possible that a large body of them might pass within a few hundred yards of where we were. Joe left the dogs with us and, going back into the woods, presently returned with his hat full of chips from the stump of a tree that had been felled. We made for a sheltered cove and were shortly crawling on our hands and knees through the calamus and dry, yellow-tufted marsh grass, which made a good cover almost to the water’s edge. declined to answer my question and said the only way to find out was to see it for myself. One such luring method was ‘tolling,’ a technique that hunters learned long ago by watching wild foxes draw ducks closer to shore.ī. They had two choices: crawl, wade or paddle closer to where the ducks were or, somehow, lure the ducks closer to shore. And even when the first shotguns did appear, they were too heavy and inaccurate to use for wingshooting, so hunters still had to somehow get close to sitting ducks so they could shoot them on the water. So for centuries before the invention of the modern shotgun, the main goal of waterfowlers was to get as close as possible to sitting ducks. Eventually, techniques were even developed to lure ducks into cages. They were caught with snares, shot with a bow and arrow or driven into nets. However, before the invention of firearms, ducks were not shot on the wing. Nowadays, when we think of duck hunting, we imagine scenes of wing-shooting mallards in a marsh or stubble field.

Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retrievers with Grant St. Listen to more information on the Duck Tolling Retriever with Hunting Dog Confidential:ĭuck Tolling and the Murray River Retriever New England Grouse Shooting, by William Harnden Foster.The Upland Shooting Life, by George Bird Evans.They Have the Longest AKC Breed Name – The Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever breed name, with 5 words and 34 characters including spaces, is the longest name of all of the AKC recognized breeds. The Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever was officially recognized by the AKC in 2003 and was the 150 recognized breed.ĩ. Owners, with persistence, can train their Toller not to scream.

To the uninitiated, this can sound like something terrible it is high-pitched, frantic, and loud. Tollers have a penetrating high-pitched bark that sounds like a scream, which they produce to indicate excitement and eagerness. They like new experiences and are easy to take traveling. They are able to go from couch potato to bounding retriever in mere seconds. The Toller is happy to be wherever his people are - whether that is in the conformation ring, hunting, watching a movie, etc.

The Toller is well adapted for water, and they love it! Males are 18-21 inches and females 17-20 at the withers, with medium bone and weight proportion to the height and bone of the dog, which makes them the smallest of the retriever breeds.ĥ. The Toller is medium sized, compact, powerful, and balanced. They Are the Smallest of the Retriever Breeds One of Only Two Dog Breeds Used for Decoy Purposes – While their methods are a bit different, the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever and the Nderlandse Kooikerhondje are the only two breeds of dogs used for decoy purposes.Ĥ. The breed was originally known as the Little River Duck Dog or the Yarmouth Toller.ģ. The breed was developed in the community of Little River Harbour in Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia, Canada, around the beginning of the 19th century, to toll waterfowl and as an all-purpose hunting dog. They Were Originally Known as the Little River Duck Dog They are lured within gunshot range, and the dog is sent out to retrieve the dead or wounded birds.Ģ. The playful action of the Toller retrieving a stick or ball along the shoreline arouses the curiosity of the ducks offshore. The Toller was developed to toll, lure, and retrieve waterfowl. “Tolling” is a Middle English Word Meaning to Entice or Pull Check out nine fun facts you might not have known about this sporting breed.ġ. Intelligent, outgoing, affectionate: that's the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever.
