I spent yesterday afternoon hunting wild pheasants with my friend
and neighbor Paul g Mcgagh. We were working a couple of nice
young dogs, had many flushes, some nice work and eventually killed
our limit. We talked about many things, lamented our bad luck,
and thanked our mojo's for the success's in the past years trials. A
couple of the field trial related items are worth repeating.
In North American field trials once a dog is sent on a retrieve
it is out if it does not return with the bird. In the British
trials (as I understand it, I have never been) a judge can deem
that a bird is unretrievable and carry on with a dog that has essentially
failed on a retrieve. Paul and I saw just such a situation
yesterday where Shelby flushed a cock at about 15 yards.
I raked its back and turned up a wing tip with my first barrel
and wiffed the 2nd as the bird was gliding downward into the
grass. Before it hit the ground at about 65 yards I sent Shelby,
she went directly to the spot it light and worked around fruitlessly
for a few minutes before I recalled her. As we sat and talked
afterwards and were both of the opinion that she had little--essentially
no chance of retrieving that bird. During the course of
my guiding season we kill 300 to 500 wild pheasants, I see
too many wing tipped birds and I would venture a guess that 95 % of
them are not retrieived. In fact, when one is retrieved,
it is cause for celebration. I often chastise my
hunters for shooting at birds that are too far away, something I'd
like to have done many times at field trials. Paul
and I came to the conclustion under certain circumstances while judging we
could carry on with a dog that has not retrieved a bird for
which it had been sent. Certainly it would have had to go directly
to the fall and make a good effort, but there are birds that are impossible
to pick.
Even though birds were plentiful and we had them cornered, the dogs
needed to get out to at least 30 and often 40 yards laterally from
the handler to produce many. I liken the movent of the birds
to the wake produced by a boat. As the boat moves through the
water the wake is pushed off either the side of the
bow. So too with pheasants. As we moved through the grass
the birds peeled off left and right of us. When the dogs hunted
ten and fifteen yards to each side of the gun, production was low.
When the dogs were hammering the ground and really getting out they
found many more birds. Not to say that the dogs were hunting
far out in front, they weren't. The dogs were not advancing
more than 5 to 10 yards per cast, but they were getting out to
the side in pretty rapid fashion, which allowed them to find
and flush many birds before they were able to run out of harms way. To
paraphrase our departed brother Keith Erlandson. The legs provide
the locomotion for the nose. The more ground that the legs transport
the nose over, the better the chance it will encounter game.
We are back to it again today, certainly rough duty, but somone has
to do it.
Thomas Ness
Oahe Kennels
6400 158th Street SE
Menoken, North Dakota
(701) 673-3322
Email:thomasness@hotmail.com
www.oahekennels.com
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