Joe left for the prairies the second week of August with a full truck of field trial and gun dogs. Having been an extremely wet summer, the crops were not yet in when he arrived at his camp in North Dakota. The weather was hot so he accepted an invitation to visit Mazie and Colvin Davis in Broomhill, Manitoba. That also made Shannon Nygard’s trip east to pick up Nuvi four hours shorter.
Joe got a chance to work dogs on the historic hallowed grounds of the Manitoba Championship, The Pelican and the John S. Gates Memorial Derby. Imagine what great prairie champions have run on those same grounds! Joe also had a good time training with Colvin and Mazie and had an opportunity to see the progress Ebony has made over the summer. Ebony, a true all age prairie dog, is the grandson of Hard Driving Bev.
Joe releasing Tic in Broomhill, Manitoba
Joe flushing for Lucy, Broomhill
After visiting the Davis camp and running Nuvi with Shannon, Joe headed back to North Dakota. The pothole area where Joe is was hit particularly hard by all the wet weather. Many farmers could not even get their crops planted and many lost or had poor crops due to the increase of water and loss of ground. Birds are plentiful though the dogs have heavy cover to contend with making it difficult especially during humid days. It can be very humid on days that feel cool and breezy to humans. Joe pays special attention to keeping dogs well hydrated.
Ben McKean’s Sam hunting the soy beans where sharptail grouse or chickens, as field trialers call them, are often found on hot days.
All the dogs are making good progress with older shooting dogs, Hard Driving Lucy, Montaro’s Rock, Trillium’s Cockeyed Casey and Pal ’O Mine getting tuned for the championships and the first year shooting dogs, Allegheny May Baby, Hard Driving Rita and Hard Driving Boy all making great strides from their lessons on sharptail grouse. Bob Drew’s nice young derby, Peanut, is also making good progress finding and pointing her first chickens!
Joe flushing for Fin backed by Lucy.
Mabel pointing chickens!
Casey has a find!
Rock points chickens in the soy beans.
Rita and Spike pointing a covey.
Peanut figuring out that the birds are in the beans!
Joe heads for Wisconsin this week to get his dogs ready for the upcoming Minnesota and Wisconsin Championships. Several of the shooting dogs — Rock, Lucy, Fin and Rita will also compete in the Region 19 Amateur Walking Shooting Dog Championship starting on friday at the Namekagon Barrens. Joe will judge the accompanying open derby. Good luck to all!
For a slideshow of this summer’s prairie training, please click on ‘Hard Driving Bird Dogs in North Dakota’ above. You may need to update to the latest version of Flash to view the Slideshows.
