Innehållsförteckning för September 2017 från Gun Dog

Six-month-old French Brittany MOE pointing a quail in Missouri. — Ron Wynn, Winthrop Harbor, IL BUSTER is a 9-year-old Llewellin Setter owned by Mike Deshore. He gets his kicks in Montana’s Bitterroot Valley. — Justin Karnopp, via email Nine-week-old German shorthaired pointer RILEY with her first bird. — Toni Liljedahl, Inver Grove Heights, MN This is our 41/2-month-old wirehaired pointing griffon pup ELI having a fireside chat with his buddy Macadoodle Schnoodle, maybe telling him about all the birds he’s going to find next fall? —John & Sherry Walter, Campbellsport, WI PHOTO SUBMISSION GUIDELINES ❑ Please send digital images (not print-outs) by e-mail, or online archives, such as dropbox.com or hightail.com; or they may be submitted on disc to: GUN DOGMagazine Attn: Snap Shots 2 News Plaza. 3rd Floor Peoria,…

IN AN EARLIER column I spoke briefly about my distress at how many dog trainers bring a young dog to the clays course or gun range to introduce gunfire. A gun-shy dog is not born, it is created, and once the damage is done, gun-shyness can prove virtually impossible to completely “cure.” The topic of when and how to introduce a dog to gunfire comes from an email I received from Ted Lagala, a reader from Long Island. Ted is both excited at the prospect of shooting live rounds over his dog, and somewhat nervous about the potential for doing so before the dog is ready. Having seen hundreds if not thousands of dogs move smoothly through an introduction to gunfire, I can confidently say that if the correct steps…

PROBLEM Once again, the subject is retrieving. For the past few months most letters have described a retrieving problem of some sort. The majority are dogs failing to retrieve the bird from a drag track and so failing the test. There are also problems with retrieving shot birds. Any retrieve demanding more than chasing down a tossed tennis ball or bumper or Frisbee seems to fit this equation. Examples: “My dog always retrieves a tossed ball and a bumper with pheasant wings tied to it, but failed to retrieve any of the birds we shot for her.” Or, “My dog retrieves any bird I throw for her but failed the retrieve from a drag track.” Specific problems include: the dog wouldn’t take the track or the dog wouldn’t pick up…

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, European gentries were busy perfecting upland hunting dogs by crossing large land spaniels of that era with various hound and pointing breeds. These crosses resulted in a class of dogs known collectively as “setting spaniels,” or, more commonly today, setters. After years of distillation, three primary setter breeds remained; the Irish setter, the English setter, and the Gordon. The Gordon setter owes its name to Alexander, Fourth Duke of Gordon, who is largely credited with establishing and perfecting the large black-and-tan setter. In the late 1700s and early 1800s, Alexander crossed various strains of setters to develop a breed that was best suited to hunt grouse on the extensive “dogging moors” around Gordon Estate. The rough country required a solid dog with plenty of…

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I COULD BE the world’s biggest fan of GPS collars for pointing dogs. I was introduced to them shortly after they came out, and I’ve used them ever since. Yes, I’ve heard the complaints, and I sympathize: They’re too gadgety, just one more thing to go wrong. They run out of juice when you need them most. And sometimes they just don’t work. I won’t argue any of those points. But I’d still rather have them on my dogs than not. When I got my first GPS collar, which was something like 10 or 12 years ago, I used it in conjunction with a beeper collar until one day when one of the more perceptive men among the misfits, legerdemain artists and outright charlatans I hunt with asked me why.…

I KNOW WEÕVE touched on this subject a few times in the past but I feel it is important because it affects how we approach a day’s hunt. With the knowledge, tools and strategies in place going in, we’re better positioned for a successful hunt so let’s take another look at scent and scenting. Scientists have proven a dog’s sense of smell is thousands if not millions of times more sensitive and discriminating than humans. According to Scent, Training to Track, Search and Rescue (Alpine Publications, 1982), “The dog can smell some odors at as much as one part per trillion. While man’s nose has five million receptor cells with six to eight cilia per cell, a dog’s nose has 125 to 200 million reception cells with 100 to 150…

Quail and pheasant hunters are overdue for some good news. Until last year, drought wreaked havoc with western bird populations and CRP had been in a downward spiral since 2007. The CRP program dropped from 40 million to just 24 million acres nationwide. But those losses have now stabilized, and some states are adapting to the new normal by creating their own programs to improve habitat on private lands. And, thanks be to God, the drought has ended throughout the West. Only some areas of the Southeast now are suffering drought as this goes to press. Additionally, birds throughout the country enjoyed their second mild winter in a row. As a result, with few exceptions, quail and pheasant populations are up across most of their range. This should be a…

Dismounting for the thousandth time that steamy morning, sliding gun from scabbard, cramming shells into breech, I approached the quivering setter. Eyes bulging, tail at 12 o’clock, his nose betrayed our prey’s location. I was finally getting a shot at one of the wily birds that had taunted us since daylight over square miles of pursuit. Whir of wings and boom of 20-gauge—the prairie chicken dipped behind a knoll. We raced for it—a trophy as much because it was the first shot of a long week as for the rarity of the bird. Frantic minutes later I found it as if laid to rest by an artist, the bird’s wings spread as though in flight. It was a talisman, and a tangible reminder of wildness. Even in death it was…

Shotshell makers keep finding ways to make more effective loads, and choke makers e No. t effectiveness, so we can put mor respond with tubes designed . The to con enhance verse is tha true as well, with shell mak ers designing 5 shot on the pheasants ictions or configura tions. The result is a synergy w e shooters all loads bene for fit speci from fi , c and tube her constr e’s a quick rundown of some of the la test and greatest. FEDERAL HI-BIRD Federal matched hard-hitting lead with a specialized wad to create high-power 12-gauge loads with long-range lethality. Their lead shot was engineered to the optimum blend of hardness and density for even patterns. Meanwhile, the two-piece wad features SoftCell technology to decrease perceived recoil…

I ENJOY HUNTING my home turf as much as anyone, partly because I live in a state that has much to offer sportsmen. Maine still has an abundance of wild land, with plentiful habitat and a diversity of game. That said, I admit to an equal love of traveling to hunt. And by traveling I don’t mean flying. It’s too impersonal, too abrupt; the space between leaving and getting there is too condensed, too abbreviated to build anticipation for what is to come and savor the possibilities. I’m talking about driving, hitting the road, rolling along “blue highways”—those thin, wandering blue lines that once designated rural roads on paper maps. A road trip offers time to envision the great possibilities ahead. But whether or not mental snapshots dredged from a…

IN PART 1, I stated the city is an ideal place to train a retriever gun dog. I need to clarify that remark.You cannot complete a retriever gun dog’s training entirely within the city. There are certain training tasks for which you will need to make an occasional trip to the countryside. The city generally lacks three important features for gun dog training: birds, complex cover and the freedom to discharge a real firearm. However, a large portion of a retriever’s education can be accomplished without these resources. Several common urban features can be put to good use to simplify retriever training. If you lived in the country, you’d have to create these features artificially in some way, but they already exist in the city. In fact they are likely…

QUESTION I recently had x-rays done on my 29-month-old Labrador retriever. The OFA report came back and informed me that she had a mild case of hip dysplasia, unilateral subluxation on the right side. I was encouraged by the Jim River HRC members to have a second set of x-rays taken and get a second opinion. The vet sedated, palpated and x-rayed the hips again. This vet indicated she has a fair amount of luxation in the right hip. The x-rays pretty much confirm his diagnosis. He also advised me to not let her jump in and out of the truck or be on slippery floors, to keep her weight down, etc. My questions are: What about running in or training for HRC hunt tests? Or some pheasant or duck…

CAESAR GUERINI HAS significantly made its mark in the shotgunner’s world and has garnered one heck of a lot of market share…and deservedly so. The Tempio line has been a part of the company’s over/ under mix since its inception, and the Light has been offered to shot-gunners for almost as long. When it comes to hunting guns the Tempio models have probably been the company’s best sellers. The first year this model was introduced Field & Stream magazine dubbed it their “Best of the Best!” What is the Tempio and what is the Tempio Light? Again, both are hunting guns and are tailored to the uplands as opposed to, say, competition. Further, both models are offered in 12, 20, 28, .410 (on special order) and a combo 20/28 set.…

I have never purchased a winning lottery ticket but I consider myself lucky beyond any reasonable expectation by virtue of the fact that last fall I was invited to revisit R&R Pheasant Hunting, a large family-operated farm and ranch with 6,000 acres set aside for hunting near Seneca, South Dakota. It is, without question, one of my favorite upland bird hunting destinations on the planet. The purpose of my most recent visit, along with several other outdoor scribes, was to field test three new shotgun models from Browning and Winchester, in three different gauges, along with a variety of Winchester and Browning ammunition. On a previous visit to R&R several years ago, I hunted mainly with Labs. They were great dogs—seasoned pros, really—but R&R owner Sal Roseland had a surprise…

It was the middle-of-nowhere-at-10-at-night feeling that prompted my buddy to temporarily forget how fast he was driving. As we crested a rise and saw a pair of sheriffs parked on the shoulder, he remembered quickly. We were still an hour from the Bessey National Forest when the sheriff walked up to Ryan’s window with a flashlight in his hand. As he did he eyeballed a pair of Labs and an SUV packed full of hunting and camping gear before asking us where we were heading in such a hurry. We filled him in on the plan that instead of overeating on Thanksgiving, we’d gotten the green light from our wives to spend a few days following our dogs around on public land in search of some upland adventure. He was…