Colorado Opening Weekend

[CO_Weimar]

Since it was opening weekend in Colorado, my wife and I headed up to Nebraska! :laugh: We headed up and over the border on Friday night. On Saturday morning, we spent a lot of time in one area that was mostly grass, incredible cover and scenery, but didn't find any birds. Headed east in the afternoon, found a spot with some good cover and corn nearby. I hunted Dakota, my big blue boy, and he put up a rooster. We bagged that one, and then put up 3 hens. A short while later, I took Blitz out. I was trying to get Blitz into some Russian olive trees while he appeared to be screwing around in some wheat stubble. I kept walking to get Blitz to move along with me. I looked back, he did a quick flash point and up went a rooster. I shot and missed, shot again and missed ... grrr! That was our fun for Saturday, aside from Blitz being distracted by what seemed like a dozen or so jackrabbits!

We went further east on Sunday, and Sunday morning was a repeat of Saturday morning. Nice cover but no birds. We hit another WIA property that was all CRP with a row of cedar trees just outside of the property - within 2 minutes, several birds flushed out of the cedars, away from the WIA property. Dakota was birdy and tracked all over the area, but no birds.

We hit another field that was all thick, tall grass, with uncut corn on the far end. It looked perfect. Dakota was birdy, but we probably ended up pushing birds out of the CRP and into the uncut corn.

Finally, we hit our last field - with a mix of winter wheat and CRP - it looked perfect. Not so much. :laugh: I ran Blitz around there for over an hour and didn't see a thing. With that, we called it a day. As we were driving out, we saw 2 guys with 3 - 4 roosters in the back of their pickup, just a mile or so from the field that we were hunting.

I will probably head north and east in Colorado this weekend now that things have settled down. It sounds like it will be cold - I can't wait - it felt a bit odd to be hunting in 70 degree weather on Sunday.

A few pics from the weekend.

Retrieve

Happy boy. He has had issues with seizures this past year, and I wasn't sure that I would be able to hunt with him again. It did my heart good to see him out there.

Blitz - happy to be hunting pheasants and finding jackrabbits.

:cheers:

 

[brittboy]

It really sux when your dog is having seizures. Hope the vet can get the dose right. One of my britts had that issue and he's doing fine now. :thumbsup:

 

[CO_Weimar]

Thanks BB! The first vet said "phenobarbital" after the first seizure. We got a 2nd opinion, he did a blood test - found low thyroid and put him on thyroid meds. We changed up his diet (mostly raw, high protein and high fat) and he seems to be doing better. At its worst, he was having one every 2 to 3 weeks, starting last November. After the thyroid meds kicked in, the seizures went down to once a month. His last seizure was in August. Interestingly, if he is going to have one, it happens at ~10 minutes, only during exercise or training. He has some anxiety at 10 minutes; I put him on the leash; give him some reassuring attention and off we go. After bagging the rooster on Saturday, he didn't seem to have any anxiety at the 10 minute mark for the next 3 hunts. :cheers:

It really sux when your dog is having seizures. Hope the vet can get the dose right. One of my britts had that issue and he's doing fine now. :thumbsup: