I bought a Garmin Instinct watch after the season was over last year. I took it and my Astro 320 handheld to the guys at Garmin Service Center. The guy did as much as he could to link them but I didn’t take any of the GPS collars. He gave me a sheet with step by step instructions, telling me how to link them. Before the season opened in Kansas I ordered a new 430 with 5 T5X collars, from Lion Country Supply. I had step by step instructions on how to link them to my watch. So Friday night before Kansas season opened on Saturday I tried to link them.
Sally pointing into a brush pile.
Abby backing Sally. Just a second before I snapped this her tail was up.
Boss backing Sally.
I’m a low tech guy living in a high tech world. I couldn’t get them to link. Oh, well, the GPS collars still worked. No big deal. As I drove to Kansas early on opening morning, the watch would vibrate about every thirty seconds and give me some weird numbers. I can’t hear high pitch sounds so I didn’t know if it was beeping too. I thought maybe I had some kind of timer turned on. I put up with it for a while then pulled over and tried to fix the watch. I hit several buttons but couldn’t find anything that would just stop the vibration.
As I drove on I thought about just throwing the watch out the window. But instead I pulled over and this time, some button I pushed stopped the vibration. When I got home that evening I checked the app on my phone and I had over 1500 floors climbed that day. Evidently, every time my altitude increased it was counting the floors and vibrating the watch to tell me about them. Even a flat state like Kansas has a lot of ups and downs.
With all of the vibrating and the counting of floors the battery was getting low. I decided to let the battery run all the way down hoping the watch would reset to where it was before I messed with it. It didn’t take long for the watch to run down and not long to re-charge. The watch didn’t reset but some way I stopped the counting of floors climbed. Much nicer drive back on Sunday morning.
This morning, Monday November 14, I took the Astro 430, 5 T5X collars, my watch and my phone to Garmin Service Center. The poor guy that was next technician up was really nice. He assured me that he had seen worse cases but I really think he was just being nice. He worked on all of my equipment for over an hour but he has it all working as it should. I may not have had to, but I promised to not ever try to change anything on any of this equipment.
Now to the hunting. The first 3 places I wanted to hunt already had trucks parked on them. I have hunted opening weekend in this area several times without seeing many people but this year is different. I kept driving. When I got close to another place, new to me, there was a guy just turning a dog out. I stopped to talk to him and it turned out to be a friend that I hadn’t seen in a long while. Ten years or so ago we had a lease near Medicine Lodge Kansas with a few other guys.
Jim and Josie at the breakaway.
We talked for just a few minutes and he invited me to go along. He had 4 dogs but was only turning one out so I just turned Mann out. Mann is one of the best dogs I’ve ever owned. I thought at least he wouldn’t embarrass me. Both dogs took off and made a big cast. We were about 300 yards from the truck when Mann came back about 50 yards in front of us. As he swung back to the front about 8 quail flushed in front of him. He had the wind in his face but he never acted like he smelled them. He chased like a puppy.
Before we moved more than a few steps Mann came back and another 7 or 8 quail flushed from about the same spot. He chased these also. I apologized for Mann but that’s not much. My friend was gracious but I felt bad.
We tried to find some of the singles with no success. We started on but my friend was several years younger and was walking faster than I could. That was hard for me to type. Walking was always one of my strong suits but as I age, I slow. I still can walk good but not fast. Any way, I told him I would just slow him down. I was going back to the truck and find another place to hunt. That evening he wrote on Facebook that it was a bad day for scenting conditions. He must have had some dog work that wasn’t up to par, also.
The breakaway.
The next place I saw was a small area that I had found birds on before. A small pasture that was ringed by harvested grain fields. I turned all 5 dogs, Abby, Bodie. Boss, Mann and Sally loose. There was a creek with occasional water puddles that ran through the place from north to south. On the west fence line there were several plum thickets and the dogs beat me to them. All of them were excited and really going through one large thicket.
I think before I got close a covey had flushed from the thicket. All of the dogs were really searching the area. Bodie is 17 months old and this is his first year of hunting. Last year he leaped trying to catch a pigeon that was sitting on a low tree limb. When he hit the ground one of his leg bones snapped, loudly. So he spent most of last season in a cast without being able to hunt. The scent in this plum thicket made a different dog out of him. He really started hunting.
We followed the fence row to the north edge then back down the creek to the south. These dogs are a pleasure to hunt. When I turn to go in another direction most of them turn with me. Even when they are way out front they seem to know. If one doesn’t get in front of me pretty quickly I hit the tone on their e-collar and they come to the front. No whistles, no screaming or electrifying the dogs. When we got back to the truck I loaded the dogs and went searching for another spot.
Bodie pointing a chukar.
The next spot was a large pasture surrounded on three sides by harvested grain fields. Even the field across the road was a harvested field. So I guess it was surrounded on all 4 sides. I left Bodie in the truck. He was really hunting good at the last place and I didn’t want to wear him down. Leaving him wanting more.
We circled this place, that looked really good, but didn’t see anything. The dogs didn’t even get birdy although they hunted it really well. When we got back to the truck I loaded them and headed home. Later in the season I will be able to hunt more but right now the dogs aren’t in real good shape and I was hunting on Sunday, too.
My cousin, Jim Smith, was running a dog, an English setter named Josie, in a field trial in Kansas, on Sunday. I went by and visited with him for a while, then went hunting. There was an 80 acre soybean field that had a small draw that last year had a covey of quail, right at the very end. They usually fly off the walk-in property when they flush but I wanted to get Bodie a chance to smell some wild birds.
Mann running an edge with a smile on his face.
I just turned him and his grandmother, Sally, out. It was cold, 18 degrees with a strong south east wind, as we started to the south. Both dogs were hunting good. Hitting all of the birdy looking places. There were two ponds in this waterway/draw that ran through this place and another draw at the back than joined this one and ran a short distance to the east. I crossed from the west side of the main draw and we went along the draw to the east. At the end we went back to the main draw. I was still about 50 yards from the main draw when a covey of quail flushed. Neither dog was close and neither was I.
One bird flew back to a small pond in the draw to the east. The rest of the covey, I think, flew off the place. Sally pointed in the area of the draw that was the thickest with small saplings. I tried to get to her but by the time I did she was moving. Maybe part of the covey lit there then flew off. Both dogs trailed in that area for several minutes. They just knew they were going to find something any minute.
Bodie pointing a chukar.
We worked through that area and then went toward where I had seen the single go down. I hadn’t seen it to the ground because of the brush. When we got in the area Bodie pointed. Another time I should have taken a picture but I didn’t. He was looking along the edge of a pond. There was some grass that ran into an area of cattails. I watched him for a few seconds then went in front. He didn’t move. I kicked the grass about 5 yards in front of him and he really tensed up, thinking something was going to fly out. Nothing flushed, but he thought it would. He really hunted good the rest of the way.
We went to the south edge then along the west in case something didn’t fly completely off the place. We hunted the opposite side of the draw on the way back to the truck. I loaded the dogs and searched for another place.
The next place, I should have skipped. I turned all the dogs except Bodie out. We circled a pasture next to a harvested soybean field and back to the truck. When we got back, without seeing anything, I loaded the dogs. In this area is a large ranch that I love to run dogs on. It’s pastures are flat enough to see the dogs for a long way. It is rolling but most of the time the dogs, no matter how far they are, can be seen.
Abby pointing a chukar.
On this place I turned all of the dogs out. Just off this place there was a long corn field. We went along this corn field to the end, moved over a hundred yards or so and started back into the wind. We hadn’t gone far when the GPS vibrated. Sally was on point 280 yards east of me. I took about 3 steps and saw her, pointing. She was looking into a brush pile.
By the time I got close the other dogs were backing. I did get a few pictures. As I kicked the brush pile I could hear clicking sounds coming from the brush pile. I think there was an armadillo in the brush pile. Whatever it was it wasn’t quail. I called the dogs off but Bodie kept going back. I walked away and called him. He finally came.
Now, I was at least a quarter mile from the corn field but still moving toward the road the truck was on. Mann and Sally were off to my left 3 or 400 hundred yards but looking really good. I really enjoy just watching them run. About 40 or 50 yards in front of Mann I saw a single prairie chicken flush. It, with a strong south east wind, still flew to the south west, a long way. Well off this place. When I got back to the truck I loaded the dogs and went back to the field trial to watch Jim’s dog run in the field trial.
Boss running the country.
Usually my dogs are in better shape when the season opens than they are now. This year was so warm, most days, I couldn’t get them out for very long. I will just work them into shape during the season, I guess. We do what we have to do.