View Full Version : mayfield or lemm
bolero
08-27-2013, 03:45 PM
who was better
Not knowing much about Lemm. Hard to say which was better. I did some fast reading on some posted statements from Lemm. Seems he said Stinson & Glover used his mill keep on Ruby when going into Mayfield's Easy. I was told Stinson was in the road building Asphalt business. That during the day he assigned so many of his workers to walk and road work his dog. That may just be hearsay, no longer remember who told me that.
I was there that day, Lemm may have been also. I was standing by the weigh in station watching Don getting Easy ready to be weighed. I got a good look at Easy and this bitch looked to be in super condition. All the muscles were well defined like a well trained body builder. Don Maloney walked up and looked at her. Said out loud how well conditioned Easy looked.
Later Stinson & Glover brought in Ruby and she looked every bit as good and very well condition. Being a black dog her muscles really popped out under that shiny black skin.
I no longer remember the time or how long that dog pulling show down lasted. What won the day for Ruby was she could bite much harder than Easy. Easy stayed in the front end and tried to bite it out with Ruby. Like Zebo, Vindicator and Molly Bee. Ruby just bit Easy down into the floor. If Easy had not had the type conditioning on her that she had. Match probably would have ended much sooner.
That is not saying Mayfield's Easy bitch was just a walk through, piece of cake. Some months before that I saw Easy win over Irish Jerry's Pool Hall Red. Pool Hall Red was a tough dog herself. These dogs were more evenly matched and Don's Easy bitch showed better over conditioning. Not sure if Irish Jerry used a Tread mill a lot.
The main thing in conditioning that Mayfield brought to the game. Was perfecting the use of the Jenny. Getting it out there to it's correct working length , proper hook up to a wide dog collar instead of a harness. The best working length for the running arm is 40 feet. Taught the need to work our dogs as natural as possible. He was more of a advocate for raw feeding.
At that time we used Mayfield's worming keep, learned to keep dog up off the ground and isolated. V. Jackson used a lot of Mayfield's ideas along with what he learned from B. Davis and the Florida group. At that time the only amount of kibble that was used was the amount that had the dog on weight in the pre keep. In the keep dog was kept on weight with the raw feed.
Tread mills was something we did not use that much. I think Lemm liked to use a tread mill through the whole keep. Those who have read his books and DVD would know for sure.
If V. Jackson had to use the tread mill. Only used it in the pre keep and about half of the first part of the keep. He never went over 30 minutes with it. Most of our dogs were on the smaller size. Liked his road work set up the best.
Well I have this topic started. For those who are more up to date and in the know. If tried it either way let's hear what you think. Mayfield or Lemm? From what I saw if that was the case with Easy and Ruby. Was not one keep better or worse, just one dog better and worse. LOL
FrostyPaws
08-28-2013, 12:06 AM
Not ever seeing the men OR their dogs go, it's hard to really make any type of informed decision. Knowing what I know about jennys and mills, I would always favor a jenny over a mill as I believe it allows a dog to get in better shape. Given what I know about both men in their respective time, I would bet over a 10 individual run that Mayfield would win more than lose simply due to the quality of dogs that people were putting in his hands at that particular time.
Agree with Frosty. I never met either one nor did I experience (with or against) one of their keeps so I could not make a 'educated' vote. If I had to choose between the two it would be because of their chosen equipment. When possible I prefer the dogs feet on the ground when working.
Great post CYJ. Great topic. EWO
Officially Retired
08-28-2013, 06:07 AM
Agreed. Great post by CYJ.
Despite his interesting story of Ruby and Easy, the fact CYJ so poignantly mentioned was it was the dog in the contest that won, not the conditioning. Lemm may (or may not) have influenced Stinson & Glover's conditioning, but he damned sure wasn't involved in S&G's selection of which dog to bring to the contest :idea:
That said, Don Mayfield was associated with some awesome dogs in his heyday, and Stinson & Glover were associated with awesome dogs in their heyday ... but (unless I am just unaware) I don't believe that Robert Lemm was actually involved in selecting/showing/breeding any World Class Ace-level dogs on his own. Building a "free-turning mill" is one thing, and having guys like Stinson & Glover buy his mill is one thing, but Robert Lemm having a proven good eye for a dog, and beating top competition himself, is something else again :idea:
That said, I too join the consensus of favoring a jenny over a mill, but even my personal preference notwithstanding, if you made the conditioning part "equal," I would say a prime Don Mayfield had far more experience, a better eye for a dog (and would probably be entrusted with better dogs) than Robert Lemm.
Jack
True. The free spinning keep with the heart rate monitor is great and quite innovative for its time but at then end of the day it is hard to compare keeps when both dogs are seldom equal. A great keep on a sub-par animal will only go so far. I enjoy the topic, wish I could add more and I hope there are some first handers to offer some input. EWO
bolero
08-28-2013, 12:17 PM
lemm favored free conditioning whether it was a mill jenny bike or car what he hated was strength work said it would bring lets say a natural 45 heavier and move him up in weight, now he may not have chose the dogs stinson and glover used he was involved in the conditioning aspect and they used a free conditioning keep withy no strength work other than road work and a treadmill so another question is many feel strength conditioning is a must but stinson and glover proved during there time it was not so how dom people feel about that
I think there are many avenues to get to a well conditioned dog. If there was only one right way to do succeed then all of us would be on that page. It would not be smart to go a different route (wrong way) if there was only one way, if that makes sense.
I like explosive type work. I like to see the dog go from nothing to wide open in a blur. I like sprint work be it on a slat mill, a carpet mill or on a cable run. I am not measuring the recovery times like in the Lemm Keep. I have never based work times on heart rate but the principle of work-recover-work are similar.
I also like strength work. But like everything in the dogs, strength work has differing definitions for different people. I like to pull chains, usually about a 1/4 or so of the dog's weight. I like the dog to work under a load. I am doing strength work but not to the point of building big muscles, like pulling hundreds/thousands of pounds. I pull that chain at varying speeds for the muscular endurance, the dog is getting stronger but not all bulked up.
Interested in others opinions as well. EWO
gotap_d
08-28-2013, 05:36 PM
I would go with mayfields keep. I dont like the fact that lemm didnt believe in strengh training.
EWO, you and A. Howle would have got along like peas and carrots. LOL He had a circuit laid out around their large farm. Dog pulled a chain so far. Then walked so far. Next day he worked on sprinting, loping and trotting. He believed in the chain pulling.
Howle was a calm fellow who seldom spoke only when he wanted to say something. Some times M. Gainey or others would try to rib him about what their pulling dog was going to do to his dog. He would smile and say you can not kill my dog. I killed this dog myself in the keep and brought it back to life. LOL
Being he was raised up working long hard hours on a Farm. He believed in working a dog hard and feeding him good. The short time he was in it he won way more than he lost. Never saw one lose due to lack of conditioning. He worked my Face bitch for both of her matches. Had her strong as a Bull and with her hard mouth. The dog pulling did not last long. A. Howle worked the famous V. Jackson's Hank dog for his first dog pull against R. Byrd's (2X) Arizona Red dog.
R.E. Bass of Red Boy fame thought he could steam roll over A. Howle. He beat Bass's dog like a red headed step child. Bass never matched another dog into Howle.
Snake Man came down way back and bought a female pup off Howle. Off his Buckshot dog and Howle's (Martin's Lady). Will see that female bitch and the Lady bitch in Snakeman, Fat Bill's dogs and R. Carter's dogs. Cheers
When I was 11-12 I was a 'professional' dog walker. My best friend's dad always had two or three going. He had the jenny/turn table combo set up and a slat mill. He would run the dogs on the mill or the table or the jenny. When they were done he gave them to me and off I went on a predetermined course. He ran the next dog and then his son was off with that one. I walked so far and the chain was laying by the path. I hook up, pull it to a certain spot, drop it and along came C. and he hooked up and did his pull. By the time I got back he was ready for the next mill/jenny/table sessions. Then repeat. Around that field he had surveying sticks with different color tapes. Some days it was the pink course and the next day the orange course. It was quite the setup.
He had a food concoction he used for the keep but I have no idea what it was as a kid. I do remember he fed Field Trial from Winn Dixie as a regular feed. I am amazed those dogs lived on that stuff as I have learned a lot about feed since then. No lie. We filled two buckets half way with Field Trial. Filled the two five gallon buckets with water til the food floated to the top. Within an hour those two buckets would be mounded over with food (canned food consistency). Each dog got half a scoop. To swell up like that it had to have been straight crap. Damn near gravy flavored card board. Times have changed in that area as well.
Times were different back then. Coming off the farm we were use to working and doing, and that sometimes meant doing adult type tasks as a kid. Same with the dogs. My kid played with the pups at that age but I never sent him off walking in the woods with a dog like I did when I was that age. My wife barely wanted mine around a riding mower and at the same age I was pulling tobacco slides up and down the road with 140. Times have changed. EWO
ToTheDogs
09-05-2013, 07:54 PM
Lemns keep is straight garbage. I bought into it and followed it to a T. Ended up with weak hounds with zero strength. That being said there is nothing better than free conditoning.
EWO you mentioned Field Trial dog food and another was Jim Dandy. Back then those local dog food companies used a lot of whole Horse and Cows etc. in the mix. Would just grind up the whole animal. Then mix it all up some way. You could see the hair parts and bone meal in the meat pellet part of the feed.
Dogs seemed to do well on that older feed. Had laetrile in the vitamin mix. Never saw dogs with Cancer back then. Later after the Laetrile was removed. The newer super dupper type dog foods hit the market. Started seeing cancer and many other ailments cropping up. After several years of feeding that Diamond dog food. My older dogs started falling apart.
Today the Vets are treating dogs with Human disease like conditions. Never heard of such way back when. Our main problem was heart worms and fleas. Later the Fire ants showed up. Cheers
Now that you mention it, it did have 'parts' in the chunks. I can remember the 'parts' in a chunk of dog food from thirty plus years ago but could not really tell you what I had for supper last night. I guess the dogs did pretty good on it. His hunting dogs performed well and he would get one off the chain at a moments notice. EWO
Lemns keep is straight garbage. I bought into it and followed it to a T. Ended up with weak hounds with zero strength. That being said there is nothing better than free conditoning.
Can you say what it is you think that fucked up your dogs? Or do you simply think there is not enough strength training integrated in lemmens keep?
I don't know what kind of dogs lemmens was feeding, i can imagine someone with a line who are strong naturally or depending on fighting style, would consider strength training less important. Doesn't mean its a good keep for all dogs.
About interval training on the mill, I think you have to have good eye for when its enough of "all out" for the particular dog on the mill, in the particular stage of keep. Same counts for recovery. When you leave the room or show the dog a bait or animal they might give more then they supposed too. When these dogs scratch with 2 broken legs, why would you count on them to indicate muscle pain or overloaded ligament.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbfEHoBTD_U
Lemns keep is straight garbage. I bought into it and followed it to a T. Ended up with weak hounds with zero strength. That being said there is nothing better than free conditoning.
I don't think Lemm's keep is garbage, although I do think there are improvements that can be made. The recovery and cooling he speaks of is very important, and it is clear he knows a thing or two about how a dog is performing while working. If you end up with weak dogs you've missed, not necessarily the keep. The most important aspect of any conditioning program is knowing your animal, and it is probably the hardest to learn.
While I like "free conditioning" I certainly wouldn't only rely on it. I believe it is best to train all the muscle groups as best you can.
S_B
I have always liked these topics.
I have watched both videos, listened and read as much as I can. With either it would have been great to sit down, and not just talk about dogs but actually watch them run a dog thru the paces.
Like anything, I don't fully agree with either down to the "T", but both have a lot of good things to offer. Sort of like feeding a bulldog. One can go to the research areas and find a lot of information concerning feeding every kind of performance dog other than a bulldog. One has to find what parts are similar and then give them a try. A bulldog dog may need the speed prep of a grey hound and at the same need the strength of a pulling dog and on top of that at times he may need the endurance of a sled dog. The bulldog needs all that and the Mayfield and Lemm keeps can be the same as the research in feeding dogs, use from both what works.
I like the recovery aspects of the Lemm keeps. I try to take advantage of the recovery times as well by working both to recovery and working thru recovery. It's a tough pitch to most and it takes a lot of 'paying attention'. On the outside looking in the dog will never get a chance to recover and will end up over worked and stale. In reality he learns to recover under load. If the dogs went for X amount of 3 minute rounds then I think the Lemm keep would be perfect.
I draw the dogs off of water in a really similar way that Mr.Mayfield did. I hydrate to over hydrate in the food and allow the dog to piss himself to water weight. I leave water out til he comes off of it himself. In the beginning he will visit the water bowl often, mid keep toward the end he will not even touch it. At that point he is really close and I can dial him from the food bowl.
One of the better dogs I ever saw was Mims'/DTA's CH. Charlie (4XW). His keeps were modeled a lot around the influences of Vernon Jackson. We must have made a thousand miles around that tobacco/bean field. We hand walked. We pulled chains. I jogged to change speeds both with and without chains. He turned his chain into a jenny. Rub the dog next to him and he would run in circles in a dead sprint. He was an easy dog to keep.
We worked him similar to VJ, fed a combination of Crenshaw and Mayfield, and used the recovery principles of Lemm. Some influx of Mr. Colopy as well.
After all that, and using any and or all of one of these well respected names, one still must read the dog. it is a team and one must learn the dog is driving the boat.
EWO
Robert Lemm was caught having sex with his daughter by his wife and he then commit suicide.
He has answered to his maker for all of that. I'm talking dogs.
EWO
My response was not to lessen any of what he did. I did not know the man. I'm strictly talking dogs.
People within the dog community are pretty much a cross section of society. If there are issues in society, odds are they within every community, dogs included. Unfortunately there are more people doing bad things and not getting caught, than the ones that do get caught.
That subject is horrible but it hits really close to home. I have a really good friend who invited me, my wife and son to Disney Land on his in-laws time share. Gas and food from NC to FL was my only cost for 6 days. We stayed in a huge place and his in laws stayed in the adjoining studio apartment. They were great people. We enjoyed our time. Stayed in contact with his in laws for a number of years. Never in a million years would I have thought what had happened.
The father in law had molested his daughters and grand daughters for a lot of years. He got caught with his grand daughter. His son beat him just about to death. He got locked up for a bunch of years. As far as I know he is still in prison now. It ruined many lives. His wife of 30 plus years died an agonizing death because of it. Families ruined, good families, the girls turn to dope and shitty lives while the boys seemed to fair much better.
The sentencing was one of those times that should have been a movie line. The opposite side of the family spoke. A grandfather. He said to the other, in so many words. " I would like to thank you for saving my life. I have been a heavy smoker and drinker since my teens. I have always had cholesterol, sugar and blood pressure issues. Since this has happened I have quit all my bad habits and I am now walking 5-7 miles per day. I am eating right and my medication is minimized. I owe all that to you. Now, I am going to live long enough to blow your motherfucking brains out the day they turn you out".
So I have seen the effects of what that does, from the outside looking in, but still I have seen what it does to a family.
I was not trying to lessen the issue, just meaning for me, it is about the dogs.
EWO
He has answered to his maker for all of that. I'm talking dogs.
EWO