Using a place board streamlines the bird dog training process

By Jordan Horak

Ten years ago, I was having a casual conversation with a fellow dog trainer. At some point in the conversation, he suggested I should try incorporating "place boards" into my training process.

I remember being very skeptical at the time. I wanted hard-charging flushing dogs, not dogs that looked pretty sitting on a platform. So I brushed off the suggestion and happily went back to my old methods of training, which were occasionally successful, but admittedly had shortcomings.

How could sitting on a platform help a bird dog do its job better?

A few weeks later, mostly out of curiosity, but also because I had the sawhorses out for another project, I put together a couple of very basic place boards and threw them down in the backyard.

 

Amazingly, my dogs almost immediately jumped on top of them and sat there looking at me.

The Place Board Concept

My place board training process started out very elementary.

I used them as a starting position for retrieves, and I found they made it easier for my dogs to be steady while waiting to be sent.

Over the years, my place board training process has evolved and now encompasses many aspects of my dogs' training. I've now used place boards regularly with 4 different National Champions and countless hunting dogs, and I find place boards to be incredible tools for shaping behavior.

Incidentally, I also saw a lot of shortcomings with homemade place boards and in 2019 I launched the "Cato Board," which is a commercially made place board, and a tool used by many trainers today.

While the concept of using platforms for dog training has been around for decades (I've discovered that some trainers may have been using them back in the early'90s), in the last five years they've exploded in popularity.

A quick perusal of dog training on social media will no doubt reveal numerous photos and videos of dogs sitting on a Cato Board or a homemade place board. I often get asked the question, "How do you use a place board to train a dog?"

It seems like a simple question, but the answer is a little bit more complicated than you might expect.

WATCH: PURINA Sporting Dog Shorts — Place Board Training

Not "How?" but "Why?"

The question of "how" to use a place board to train a dog is complicated to answer for two reasons.

First, not everyone has the same training objectives. For instance, one person might use the tool to assist with training blind retrieves, while the next person may have no interest in training that skill.

Second, not all dogs are the same, even within a particular breed. One dog might be more naturally inclined toward place boards than the next dog.

So the way place boards are incorporated into a dig's training will look different out of necessity.

For these reasons, I've generally stopped answering the "how do you use them" question and instead suggested the better question to ask is "why." Why should you be using place boards in your training sessions? That question is a bit easier to answer.

Dogs typically love climbing on top of things. We have to teach dogs to not jump on the furniture because they're naturally inclined to jump on furniture; and if you put a platform in a pen full of puppies, it usually doesn't take long before they have their own version of "King of the Mountain" going on.

Going to a higher vantage point is a natural tendency for dogs, and it's that tendency that makes using place boards so effective in training. It's just building on what most dogs already want to do naturally.

If we take a young puppy and introduce it to a platform, and then reward it with a treat when it climbs on the platform, we're programming that puppy not only to keep an eye out for that platform, but to also go to it whenever it sees it. So instead of using pressure to force a behavior, we have a puppy that is offering a desired behavior willingly on its own, anticipating that it's going to be rewarded for that behavior.

That simple behavior is the starting point for future learning. The inclination the puppy has toward that place board can be used to shape almost any behavior, which includes behaviors outside of the bird dog world.

For example, agility trainers may use a place board at the start or the end of an obstacle to give a dog clarity on where they're supposed to be. At home, an owner may teach their dog to head toward their place board when the doorbell rings — again using the place board to provide clarity to the dog.

The applications really are endless; and within the bird dog world, there are many ways in which you can incorporate place boards.

Practical Applications for a Bird Dog

While the applications may be endless, there are a few ways that I consistently use place boards in training my spaniels, and you may find them helpful with your dog as well.

It us crucial you start out by making sure your puppy sees the place board as a positive place — somewhere they want to be. If your puppy doesn't see the platform this way, it's your job to change their opinion. You can do this by making sure everything the puppy enjoys (i.e., food, retrieves, etc.) is associated with the place board.

Delivery

One of the first ways I'll use a place board with a puppy is to shape their delivery while retrieving. Puppies often perceive pressure when bringing a retrieve close to their owner, and this can often result in dropping the retrieve or avoidance. Because the place board is a positive destination, many puppies will feel less pressure jumping onto a place board with the delivery. When working retrieves with young puppies, I like to position myself next to a place board with my shoulders turned away from the puppy. This encourages them to bring the retrieve to the place board with very little perceived pressure from me. For many puppies, this works a lot better than having the place board directly in front of me. I want, as much as possible, for the puppy to think it's returning to the place board and I just happen to be next to the place board.

As your puppy grows and matures, you're likely going to want a more formal delivery — either with the dog coming directly into you, or coming in and sitting at your side. By positioning a place board either directly next to you or in front, you can provide a target for your puppy that provides a clear expectation of where you want them to be.

Steadiness

Place boards are an excellent tool for teaching a dog to wait before being sent on a retrieve.

The elevated position provides clarity for both your dog and for you. If the dog comes off of the platform prior to being sent, it isn't steady. Clarity gives confidence, and confidence typically results in enthusiasm, and an enthusiastic learner is a fast learner.

Place boards make it easier for your puppy to understand your expectation of steadiness, which results in a shorter learning process and a more consistent result. I can say with certainty that I've found that the steadying process has been exponentially faster for my dogs when I started incorporating place boards into the process.

Going away

One of the hardest things a puppy can learn is to go away from its owner on command; yet I think it's nearly as important as a good recall.

The ability to go away from us on command will make it easier for the puppy to learn to respond to hand signals while quartering a field or to take directions while on a retrieve. With that in mind, I typically use place boards to start teaching this concept fairly early in a puppy's life.

There are two reasons that going away can be a difficult concept for a puppy.

First, puppies often don't want to leave the source of their rewards. Because retrieves and treats come out of your hand, it may seem counter-intuitive to your puppy to go away from the source.

Second, puppies often lack the confidence to operate at a distance, and they feel more secure if they stay in close proximity to their owner.

Place boards are a great tool for overcoming both of these obstacles. Your puppy is going to naturally feel more confident if they're able to go away from you to a familiar place (the place board). And although the reward is still coming from your hand, the cause of the reward is the place board.

With a little patience, your puppy should be able to quickly learn it is more productive to go to the place board than it is to come stay close to you. I do this by starting out with the place board close to my feet, and then gradually moving farther away from it as the puppy learns to go farther away from me ‐ each time getting a great treat when it jumps on the place board.

Be Creative

In the big picture, I think place board training is still in its infancy and will continue to develop in the coming years.

While hopefully you have a better understanding of why place boards are effective and have some ideas on how to start incorporating them into your training, I suspect that with a little creativity you'll find even more ways to use place boards beyond what I've mentioned here.

The important part is that you get yourself a Cato Board or build a place board yourself, and then get busy turning it into a place your dog wants to be.

Good luck and enjoy the process!

Want to learn more? View the entire Sporting Dog Shorts catalogue of educational episodes HERE.

Jordan Horak is the owner of Cato Outdoors and Juggernaut Gundogs. He has had a life-long obsession with hunting dogs that goes back 30 years, and in that time he has trained countless gundogs as well as trial dogs for spaniel field trials. His most notable achievement was winning the Cocker National Open Championship and the Amateur Championship in the same year (2018) with two different dogs. While not currently running in field trials, Jordan spends the fall chasing pheasants in the Dakotas and grouse in in northern Wisconsin. In the off-season he enjoys developing young dogs.