Steadiness help

[Tater]

My man.

[Spur hunter]

So my dog is about 20 months old. She is steady to shot and birds falling, runs blinds, etc. However, I hunted a small hole the last few days of the season and had birds landing about 10 yards from me and the dog. As soon as the birds would land, she would break. I can’t think of a way to address this for the life of me. I have tried putting a duck on a fishing rod and flopping it around but I don’t think it is enticing enough. Does anyone on here have any suggestions on how I would address this? Also, just to clarify, these are live birds landing. Not shot birds.
Thanks for reading


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May or may not be relevant but here goes. I grew up bird hunting and dad trained dogs, setters mostly. If he had a dog breaking point, and I think that's similar enough here, then he'd put a long lead line (leash etc.) on the dog and work live birds in the yard or woods at home. When the dog would point he'd stand there with the line and if/when the dog broke he'd yank the line, give loud verbal commands to reinforce it. I've seen him flip the dog. Then he'd work the dog without holding the line. The point is, eventually the dog would not know if he was on the other end of the line or not. In a short time the dog would be conditioned and wouldn't break point with or without the lead line attached. I can see where you might do the same with your retriever.