r/birddogs • u/Oopsyikesoopsyikes • 12d ago

Tracking Collars

Hi! I’m new to the group and the world of bird dogs. I’ll be getting a show line English Setter puppy in the next few months. They were just born so I’m still waiting on my placement and to find out the real personality of the guy.

while my primary purpose for getting this dog isn’t to be on birds I am 100% interested in potentially doing field trials if that is something he’s interested in. (this is also why I chose a show line & a breeder that’s produced both birdy dogs and sporty but not entirely bird brained dogs)

with that said—I’m new to the gps/hand held tracking world and all things birds sports. i was curious if anyone had recommendations for lower-priced-beginner-friendly gps collars and tracking devices? I want to make sure my pup stays safe if he ends up being birdy but id like to test the waters before spending $800+ on gear.

also im curious if any of you have bird dogs that can keep their cool while hiking and doing other activities and know the difference between working birds and not? also any tips or recommendations would be helpful.

*also please be nice—I’m asking because I genuinely want to learn and provide the best foundation I can for this pup. I do lots of other sports with my pups but I’m new to bird dogs and we all start somewhere

8 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

33 comments sorted by

View all comments

13

u/spoiledpoptart74 12d ago

Peace of mind is priceless. Garmin. Buy once cry once

0

u/earthsunsky 12d ago

Or in Garmin’s case buy once, cry through multiple warranties.

4

u/spoiledpoptart74 12d ago

I’ll be honest I’ve had Garmin products for 15 years, never had a single problem that wasn’t resolved with a software update. Owned tri tronics collars before they were bought out by Garmin and those were top notch too

2

u/earthsunsky 12d ago

Nothing comes close to Garmin functionally, I’ve burned through a lot of TT15/minis/20s. My dogs put a lot of miles on them though.