Scandinavian bird hunt 

In the Nordic countries we hunt birds in a special way – with free running, barking dogs. This technique was developed a very long time ago, when the furs from marten and other small animals were valuable at the trade markets, and the meat from the birds was a question of life or death for the hunter.

The dogs used for the hunting technique, Norrbottensspets and Finnish spitz, is way older. They likely originate from small grown Siberian laikas, brought in by the migrating people, several thousand years ago. The Norrbottensspets is the oldest and one of Sweden’s national dogs - still the healthiest kind of dog there is in Sweden. They are very special and among other things they are unique in using nose, eyes and ears simultaneously to find the birds in the tree.

In the hunt, the dog finds the bird occasionally at the ground and then makes it rise and fly away. Then they follow the bird in a furious tempo, just to stop all of a sudden, to listen and locate where the bird lands. They can localize the position of the bird just by listening to the sound of the bird landing on a safe branch of a tree several hundreds of meters away. Then they go there to localize the bird, start barking and pointing the nose at the bird. To show where it is and to divert the bird from the hunter who is advancing the bird with scoped rifle.

Still the hunt is not over – even if the dog is showing you all – you need to find the well camouflaged bird without scaring it away. They are extremely cautious and a careless movement can be fatal – even 100 meter away.

Once the bird hits the ground – you know that all work and all missed opportunities were all worth it. The missed ones can actually be almost as exciting…

Welcome to the woodlands of Swedish Lapland.