Labs
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Anybody who has trained and/or owned several gun dogs has one that stands above the rest. Share some stories...
My best lab was the first I trained from a 7 week old pup, under the mentoring of pro Mark Jansma. Josie (Jacie's Dakota Gold) had 13 litter mates (The Thundering Herd), who we whelped at my farmstead in exchange for 2nd pick (turned out to be 1st pick, and I knew she was the One when she was 4 weeks old). We learned together, me to be a gun dog trainer and she to be superb gun dog. She had thousands of hunting retrieves during her career and was a legend in the Lake Region.
Josie believed the bigger the bird, the better the retrieve, so she loved hunting geese and roosters most of all. At the conclusion of a goose hunt she would refuse to leave her field blind until all the decoys & blinds were packed into the trailer. Clearly she had decided as long as she was in her blind, the hunt continued. To watch her dig late season roosters out of snow filled cattail sloughs was a thing of beauty. She would actually disappear under the snow, then presently a pheasant would explode out in a shower of snow with Josie on it's tail. She was a gifted blood trailer and recovered a number of deer that otherwise would have been lost.
I teach my dogs to article search & shed hunt as an extension of scent trailing and retrieving, and Josie was hands down the best at it. She considered it her duty to sniff out & bring me any empty hulls we missed after a goose hunt. She absolutely loved to find arrows that were lost under grass. She once found a set of keys lost in a stubble field.
When she was 14 months old and nearly finished with our training program, she and I were invited to an American Water Spaniel hunt test to run the scenarios before the AWS that were there earning their titles. I had never been to a hunt test so had no idea what to expect, but I figured it would be good for us as a team. She was razor sharp that weekend and ran every test flawlessly from the simple marks for Junior Hunters through multiple bird long blinds for the dogs pursuing Senior and Master titles. At the conclusion of the first day, the judges called us out in front and commended her, to a standing ovation from the handlers & owners. They said her performance was astonishing given her age, the fact she had never run in a test, and were stunned she had no title. I was so proud of her, I cried.
We lived, trained, & hunted together for 10 years and she died of cancer at 11. I still miss her badly. I've owned and trained a good number of labs since her, and the only one close to her abilities is my upland machine & leader of the Wrecking Crew, Harley...
My best lab was the first I trained from a 7 week old pup, under the mentoring of pro Mark Jansma. Josie (Jacie's Dakota Gold) had 13 litter mates (The Thundering Herd), who we whelped at my farmstead in exchange for 2nd pick (turned out to be 1st pick, and I knew she was the One when she was 4 weeks old). We learned together, me to be a gun dog trainer and she to be superb gun dog. She had thousands of hunting retrieves during her career and was a legend in the Lake Region.
Josie believed the bigger the bird, the better the retrieve, so she loved hunting geese and roosters most of all. At the conclusion of a goose hunt she would refuse to leave her field blind until all the decoys & blinds were packed into the trailer. Clearly she had decided as long as she was in her blind, the hunt continued. To watch her dig late season roosters out of snow filled cattail sloughs was a thing of beauty. She would actually disappear under the snow, then presently a pheasant would explode out in a shower of snow with Josie on it's tail. She was a gifted blood trailer and recovered a number of deer that otherwise would have been lost.
I teach my dogs to article search & shed hunt as an extension of scent trailing and retrieving, and Josie was hands down the best at it. She considered it her duty to sniff out & bring me any empty hulls we missed after a goose hunt. She absolutely loved to find arrows that were lost under grass. She once found a set of keys lost in a stubble field.
When she was 14 months old and nearly finished with our training program, she and I were invited to an American Water Spaniel hunt test to run the scenarios before the AWS that were there earning their titles. I had never been to a hunt test so had no idea what to expect, but I figured it would be good for us as a team. She was razor sharp that weekend and ran every test flawlessly from the simple marks for Junior Hunters through multiple bird long blinds for the dogs pursuing Senior and Master titles. At the conclusion of the first day, the judges called us out in front and commended her, to a standing ovation from the handlers & owners. They said her performance was astonishing given her age, the fact she had never run in a test, and were stunned she had no title. I was so proud of her, I cried.
We lived, trained, & hunted together for 10 years and she died of cancer at 11. I still miss her badly. I've owned and trained a good number of labs since her, and the only one close to her abilities is my upland machine & leader of the Wrecking Crew, Harley...
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