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Training Grounds We have access to hundreds of acres of training land, including ponds of all sizes, a wide variety of terrain and cover, flooded timber, etc. The kennel sits on 25 rolling acres with six ponds designed for maximum usefulness in retriever training. Our ability to landscape our own grounds, and to maintain the cover exactly as we wish, with blinds and decoys, makes our home grounds an extremely productive training location. We can teach almost every concept a retriever needs to know, from gun dog skills through field-trial multiple retrieves, without leaving the kennel. Working on blind retrieves through cover variations on our grounds Of course we do take the dogs out to a variety of locations and expose them to a wide range of conditions, to prepare them to adapt to the circumstances they might encounter in hunting with their owners. Grounds we use by permission include the Becker property at Bennettsville, site of the 1997, 2001 and 2005 Nationals. We have several ponds for "technical" work plus a variety of hunting-type setups. We choose training locations with great care for dogs' safety. No activities are allowed on our property that might create a hazard for the dogs. We maintain close watch on our other grounds to make sure no new hazards (such as abandoned machinery) appear, and avoid remote areas in the heat of midsummer when snakes are most active. Shooting a flyer pheasant in cover near the 5-acre pond next door.