I haven’t been working the older bird dogs during this hot weather we are having. It’s really warm even early in the morning. I have been turning the puppies out several times a day. I sit in a chair in the shade and every once in a while let a pigeon fly in front of them. I, also, toss some dog food in the grass so they will learn to use their nose.
Using their nose to find dog food in the grass.
Man on the left and Babe on the right.
On the road with two puppies.
My chair in the shade is about 5 to 10 yards from the pigeon coop. When I get up to get a pigeon, even if the pups are playing, they meet me at the door of the pigeon house then follow me where ever I go with the bird. When the pigeons come back to the coop they sometimes land on the ground. Man has learned to go around the coop real slow looking for the pigeons. When he sees them he goes on point. Usually, it doesn’t last long. The pigeon flies.
Since I’m not working dogs I decided to go back over some hunts from the past. Mostly from last year but I may get into some from a long time ago.
Last year I hunted with Dottie, my puppy’s mother, only a short time. I sold Dottie to Jim Smith, my cousin, when she was about 8 weeks old. He has done a great job with her and she has made a good bird dog. She was in heat when we were hunting her so we could only turn out our females.
Dottie was less than two years old. She was across a ditch and was cruising along a hillside as Jim and I watched and as I commented on how smooth she moved she slammed into a point. Her head was up and her tail was twelve o’clock. She looked like a calendar girl. I told Jim when he bred her I wanted a pup.
As we crossed the ditch I checked the GPS and Sally was on point about a hundred yards behind us. When we got close to Dottie, with Jim on the left, the quail flushed flying my way. It dropped when I shot. The dogs found the dead bird right away.
We started back across the ditch to Sally’s point. Jim started sliding down the hill and two more quail flushed in front of him. He shot but it’s really hard to hit anything while you are sliding down a hill.
I was ahead of Jim and when he shot two quail flew over me from the direction of Sally. I knocked one of the birds down. Sally came over the hill right behind the quail. She saw the bird drop and ran to it. She didn’t retrieve the bird but she did hold it until I got to her.
Jim bred Dottie to his good male, Willie. She had 6 pups. Two females and four males. I told Jim I wanted a male pup. He sent me some videos of the puppies and I picked a white and orange male from the litter. Later on I was texting a man in Kansas about a female, Jim texted me asking if I had room for another pup. I told him I would take a female. That worked out great. After thinking about it I texted him again and said I would take a male or a female. When I picked them up I had a male and a female.
Last season Don Hansen and I were hunting near Emporia, Kansas. Don’s dog had come up lame and she was in the truck. We were hunting with Luke and Sally. Sally went on point in some CRP. When we got close to her she moved up about 25 yards and went on point again. She waited for us to catch up and trailed into the wind. She had followed these birds for at least 150 yards when Don saw some quail flush about a hundred yards ahead of us. Three of the quail flew into a soy bean field.
Sally backing Tur Bo at Black Kettle Grasslands.
As we walked toward the soy bean field Don said that at 18 or 20 months old Sally shouldn’t know that much about running birds but she did. As we went into the soy bean field Luke pointed in front of us. Before we got to him a quail flushed and tried to fly back past us. I was between Don and the quail. It dropped at my shot and Luke was right behind it. He grabbed it when it hit the ground. He didn’t retrieve but he did hold the bird until I took it from him.
We continued through the soy bean field then crossed the road into a CRP field with both dogs pointing then moving up. Finally, the other two quail that Don had seen flush into the soy bean field flushed ahead of the dogs and flew away without getting close enough to us for a shot. Some of the closer walk-in properties are hit so much that the quail are really well educated.
Another area I hunted with well educated quail was at Black Kettle National Grasslands. I hunted a place that the year before I had found several coveys on. I turned Sally and Dolly out. We had a strong south east wind and after checking some heavy cover we went into the wind. Sally went on point along the fence row on the east side of this property. She was standing in the edge of a plum thicket that ran down the fence row.
Before I got to her Dolly saw her and honored. When I got close to Sally she moved down the plum thicket and went back on point. Dolly moved up and honored again. Over about a quarter of a mile she pointed 4 or 5 times. When she came to the end of the plum thicket she crossed into the road. Dolly crossed the road and started down a fence line. The other side was private property so I called them back.
There was an open gate in the fence and I walked into the sandy road. I saw where several quail had run across the road, off of the place I was hunting. Black Kettle gets a lot of pressure, too.
Sally in Oklahoma on quail.
I was hunting farther out in Kansas last year, near Hays. One of the places I wanted to hunt already had a truck parked on it. The guys were loading dogs so I stopped and talked to them for a few minutes. They said that a covey of quail had flown into some CRP but they didn’t find them. I drove around the section but they were still there so I drove around again.
The second time by they were gone. I pulled in where they had been parked and turned Luke and Sally out. About a hundred yards in Luke went on point. Before I got to him a covey flushed. I don’t remember whether I got a shot or not but Luke followed in the direction that the covey had flown. Sally had been honoring and moved up and went on point close to where Luke had been. I thought she was just pointing the hot spot but I went to her. When I started in front of her a single quail flushed. I missed with the first shot but hit it on the second.
Dolly on point.
I had watched the covey down when they first flushed. There was a small tree beside a harvested soy bean field. The covey had lit next to the small tree. I got both dogs in and never found the birds. The dogs got birdy where they landed but that was it. I checked both sides of the road but never came up with them.
If the quail don’t learn to run and flush ahead of the dogs they would get wiped out. It’s not a game for them. Where they have radio collared birds they have found that the quail sometimes run several hundred yards then flush before the dogs even get close. I have seen their tracks in the snow and have seen where they ran around us and went behind us.
I followed one, years ago, through just a little melting snow. It ran for maybe fifty yards and I saw it’s track go into a clump of straw left in a wheat field. I kicked the clump and the quail flew out. I missed it. Twice. I was surprised it was in the clump. I don’t know why I was surprised. That’s where the tracks stopped. Oh well, that’s quail hunting.
Sally on point.
Sally near and Luke. Divided find.
Jim’s dog Willy.