TRAINERS

 

 

Steve Herring - Steve is a full time guide at one of the most exclusive shooting preserves in the Midwest from October - April and a full time trainer the rest of the year. Steve has an uncanny ability to get inside a dog's head and work them through their issues, if they have any. He is excellent at developing the natural abilities of a dog. He also is one of the most complete trainers I've ever met, in that the dog that you get back does not have any trainer developed holes and does all the little stuff that a lot of trainers don't take the time to do (teaching to load, teaching to heel, etc.). Steve also is one of the nicest guys you'd ever meet.

 

Bryan Camper- Swift Rock Kennels.  815-716-3597 As good of a gun dog and NSTRA dog trainer as there is.  He's honest, reliable and when he says a dog is done it darn well is.  He will also meet you or pick up/deliver dogs to you if you have a few.  One of the very few trainers I know that will go that far out of his way.  He's as quality of an individual as I have met in this crazy dog world.

 

Ray Brooks-  Ray develops dogs the old fashioned way.  He takes his time and brings out their natural abilities first.  If I had to rate him as both a trainer and as an individual on a scale of 1 to 10 we'd have to hire someone to invent a new scale because it wouldn't do him justice.  We put 1 of our Snakefoot sons there originally and put the other 2 at other trainers who were complete flops (no effort on their part, just money suckers) with them and he did wonders with his.  He's got 2 of them now and the other is on the west coast with a party to be named later that is extremely talented.

 

Initially I was going to use this space here to list off a few of the bottom feeders that we have had train dogs for us in the past that either directly stole from us or tried to rip us off in other ways.  I struggle internally between a deep, innately human sense of needing to expose these frauds and the desire to be the bigger person and let "by gones be by gones".  I truly despise these ones for what they have done and feel that they should be exposed so that others don't fall prey to them as well.  Anyone that is willing to steal from a person (and thus their whole family) really needs to be dealt with.  What better way to do it then with in all likelihood the highest traffic kennel website on the net.  It has been VERY difficult for me to rise above those feelings and honestly, I teeter on the edge sometimes.  When we first built this page I put a couple of them on here but have since removed them.  For now I hold my tongue.  However, if I continue to hear more and more instances of where they have cheated others we may very well develop a page for these folks and invite honest, well intentioned others to share their experiences as well. Granted, there's no way to make some people happy and no matter what you do and how hard you try, there will always be some that can't be satisfied. We all have people that don't like us.  Bottom line though, there are a lot of people in this business that give it a bad name out of true lack of moral character and greed. I don't know how much good it would do to expose them.  I would think though that it would have to help clean up the business and ultimately benefit everyone involved if we did.  I just don't know if it's worth the headache.  They say to "Never argue with an idiot.  They'll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience."  That saying rings so true.  There are a lot of beautiful aspects of this business and just avoiding the problems makes for a much more peaceful life.  Intentionally walking into a hornets nest for the greater good is a tough step to take.  Any intelligent, well intentioned thoughts on this issue would be welcome.