Flint Hills Retrievers is advanced college for dogs
Staff writer
Flint Hills Retrievers, operated by Cindy Ragland, south and east of Marion, on 150th Road, is thriving after nearly two years in business.
Tom Masella of Newton is Ragland's trainer. The company, at 2286 East 150th Road, began in July 2001.
The firm's purpose and expertise is in training, breeding, and raising dogs to be hunting and field trial dogs, both Masella and Ragland said.
They work almost entirely with yellow, chocolate, and black Labrador Retrievers. They have capacity for at least 20 dogs at one time, Ragland said.
Masella said no Chesapeake Bay retrievers have "shown up" yet, but if they do, the company can take care of their training, etc., too.
They have customers from many states in addition to Kansas — hunters and dog-show people.
The company's Web site is www.flinthillsretrievers.com. The telephone number is 382-2294.
"Right now, we have one female from Ohio and one from Minnesota," Ragland said. "We get dogs from all over the United States."
Some are sent to Flint Hills for training only. Proven lines can be trained and titled, Masella said, and make excellent hunting dogs and companions.
Field trials are the proving ground for retrievers, he said — it's "like getting a degree from college" for them.
The pure line dogs have "a higher priority, to want to play the game," Masella said. "They WILL hunt, if they're from good lines. They'll find you some birds."
The dogs must be American Kennel Club-titled — ribbon winners. These are the criteria for breeding stock.
"We train dogs from this area and from all over," Masella said. A good hunting dog, fully trained and finished, can carry a price tag of $1,250 to $1,500, he added.
They get three to four months of professional training at Flint Hills Retrievers.
"It's a matter of degree or interpretation (with the dogs)," Masella said. All that some owners/hunters need for them to be able to do consistently is "come when called and retrieve a bird to hand."
Only the top 10 percent of AKC-titled dogs are ever entered in field trials, he said. And only 10 percent of those dogs place, in other words, one percent of the entire AKC bunch.
A good, trained dog is obedient, knows what to do with the bird, and knows how to deal with, respond to, commands.
Currently, a physician living in Kansas City wants an obedient dog to walk with her, and Masella is training the animal to fill that order.
The dogs are "an elite group. We keep the gene pool high-quality. This ups the odds of producing good-quality dogs," Masella said.
Breeding is 10 percent of the success formula, and training is the rest, he said.
Golden and flat-coated retrievers have been and are being trained at Flint Hills, too.
If a dog is under control, obedient, and delivers a bird to hand, he or she's doing well.
Handling refers to the dog's responses to whistle commands and hand signals.
All dogs at FHR go through the same program for their first three months there. "Introduction to birds, boats, gunfire, basic commands, decoys, duck calls, anything they might encounter in a hunting or in a competitive situation," Masella said.
"It depends on what it's being trained for, a contract or some other situation." The training is like "going from first grade to junior high," he added.
Older folks, or anyone else, can bring in their new puppies, and Ragland said she will train them and raise them. Refraining from chewing (improper chewing, that is, like on slippers), housebreaking, learning to sleep quietly through the night are the lessons she teaches.
Tom then takes over and finishes the puppies' training. This assures they're "well-started," he said. "She gives them Head Start and then I give them final training."
Ragland said owning her Chocolate Lab, 5-year-old Ruger, got her interested in establishing the business. She did not know just how to go about training Ruger, and then she met Masella.
They formed a friendship, and then a business.
FHR sometimes has puppies for sale, too, and started dogs as well. "They're trained, or partly trained," she said. She invites anyone to "come out and watch us work them and handle them, if you're even thinking about buying a dog or having one trained."
Visitors are welcome, but please call first.
"Our dogs perform well. You can see for yourselves," Ragland said.
From every litter of pups born at FHR, Ragland said, "I try to donate one to a service organization such as dogs for the blind or deaf, or the handicapped, or a law-enforcement agency.
Some of the other dogs Ragland and Masella showed us last Thursday included 3-year-old Molly, a Black Lab breeding bitch, and Hunter, a Yellow Lab, 3 1/2 months old. Hunter, interestingly enough, is not named for the skills he will develop, but for his "hunter green" collar.
Cindy's husband, Michael, is a long-haul truck driver.
