Dolly honoring Tur Bo
Luke
Luke
Vince Dye and I hunted some private land, in Missouri, on the last day of 2015 without much luck. The farm we hunted had some CRP next to a harvested corn field. The CRP was waist high with about 4 inches of snow added to the mix to make the walking even harder. We had a lot of rain in the spring that made the CRP taller and thicker than normal.
I turned Lucky and Tur Bo out with the Garmin GPS and Sport Dog e-collars on. Vince turned a young English setter, that belonged to a friend of ours and his English cocker spaniel, Maggie, loose. We hunted these dogs for about an hour. The cover and snow was really tough on Lucky. He’s over 11 years old so I put them up and got Blaze and Dolly out. Vince put the setter up and got his pointer, Buck out.
Not far from the truck Buck pointed. He was closer to me than Vince so I stopped about 20 yards from him waiting on Vince. Before Vince got close the covey of quail flushed. We both shot but neither of us connected. Some of the covey had flown down a draw that ran into the corn field. Vince was on one side of the draw and I was on the other. As we started down the draw I saw Blaze go on point about 75 yards ahead of us. As we started to her a quail flushed in the draw and flew right toward Vince. He knocked the quail down and Maggie saw it drop. She made quick work of the retrieve.
As we continued on toward Blaze’s point I saw the quail flush. Just a few yards from where Blaze had pointed Buck pointed. It was in the brush down in the draw. The way Buck was pointing, with Blaze and Dolly backing, I thought I could flush the bird out for Vince. I went into the brush but the bird came out my side. I tried a shot through the brush but it would have been a miracle.
We made a circle and went back to the north. Dolly pointed at a small brush pile along a fence row. Just across the fence the land dropped off about 4 feet. Blaze came in and honored as I waited for Vince. When He got there he sent Maggie in to flush. Some quail flushed on the other side of the fence and we never even saw them. We thought they had flown on to the north so we continued on.
Vince’s pointer Buck has some back problems. He hunts fine for a while then he acts like he can’t control his rear end. We were almost to the end of the property when Vince decide that Buck needed to go to the truck. Dolly, Blaze and I continued to the end then started to the truck, in the CRP, along the edge of the road. Blaze went on point along the fence with Dolly honoring. The road at this point was about 10 feet lower than the fence row. As I got close I heard a quail flush, over the bank, down close to the road. Blaze didn’t move but when I kicked around in front of her nothing else flushed.
We started on to the truck. I was walking in the CRP when a rooster pheasant got up almost at my feet. It dropped into the CRP at my shot. Blaze saw it go down and was holding it for me when I got there. This was her first pheasant. She finally picked it up. I petted her until she dropped it in my hand.
We started over a little hill and Blaze pointed right in front of me. Just as she went on point a hen pheasant flushed. As soon as the hen flushed I yelled, “whoa”. Blaze took a step and stopped. I released her and she went about 15 yards to my right and pointed. Before I could take a step a rooster pheasant flushed. The first pheasant I had shot as a reflex action. Some people in Missouri don’t want their pheasants shot thinking it will increase them on their land. I hadn’t talked to Vince about this, not expecting to see pheasants. I didn’t shoot. Later he told me the owner wouldn’t care.
Vince and Maggie rejoined us just a little way from the truck. As we started to the truck a Missouri game warden stopped to check us. I should have gotten his name but I never thought about it. He was a really nice young man.
Maggie had flushed a covey of quail when they had been bringing Buck back to the truck. It had flown into an area of almost no cover and Vince thought it would be a good place to get either Blaze or Tur Bo into some birds. I turned Blaze loose first and we checked the whole area without seeing a bird or even a track in the snow. I put her up and got Tur Bo out and we went over the area again. I saw one quail track in the snow and it came out of a small draw, then I saw wing marks in the snow where it flew away.
This is my experience on fresh snow. It seems to me as if the quail know that their camouflage doesn’t work and they flush ahead of the dogs. We got some dog work and the birds flushing so easy can only make our dogs more cautious.
I’m getting worse about taking pictures. I’m now recycling pictures from the summer. I’m not only forgetting to get pictures, the last 2 hunts I have even forgotten to take the camera. Maybe I will get better in 2016.
Lucky
Blaze
Dolly