Spud in his 5th Season is dialed in and a pure pleasure to hunt behind. I call Tess - "Tess Mess". She is wild raw material. Looked like a big dog at times and a wild ass puppy at others. No other way to build a birddog that I know of.
My A900 point and shoot Nikon shot craps the first day of the hunt so I was reduced to an antique iphone 6 but I got a few photos. Narratives to follow.
This was the second day we hunted. I hunted Tess first, (as I always do at the moment), in a large field of weedy grass CRP laying between milo and sunflower stubble which took us about 1.5 hours to get covered throughly. One wild flushed rooster was all we put up! I would have lost that bet!
Spud was up next and he was pointing pheasants in the draw in short order but none of the roosters were holding for quality shots. We proceeded in the direction they flew and much excellent dog work followed in the weedy fence rows and waste swales around the corn stubble.
This is Spud retrieving our first rooster that day. He had done beautiful work pointing and relocating for some distance before the rooster stuck long enough for me to get in front and put it in the air and bring it back down to earth.
Spud and I continued on. He pointed two more single roosters in the weedy fence row and I bagged each on easy shots.
Our 3 shell limit over Spud's points and retrieves.
Tess got the first drop the next day in a big weedy, grass waste area laying between corn and sunflower stubble. Little gal pointed two single roosters, I did my part and she retrieved them to hand. I fully expect we could have continued on and got our 3rd but I wanted to give Spud a drop so I turned us around and we hunted back the way we came to the truck. Moved to another spot, dropped Spud and he went 100 yards and went on point at the edge of a cattail slough. I dropped my 3rd rooster and we were done.
Tess and I with another 3 shell limit over points and close range flushes.
I got photos of Tess's retreives that day but it was in heavy cover and they are poor. I captured this one of the 3rd rooster that Spud pointed. Best photo of the trip.
Tess got the first drop again on the last day of our trip. She got completely out of control and I will share more about that in a moment. We moved onto a second spot and she went to work like a big dog. Tracked a running rooster up a grassy waterway to where the culvert ran under the road and got him pointed. I flushed him, fumbled with my safety panicking, recovered and dropped him. Got this poor quality photo shooting into the morning sun.
Tess with a face full of Rooster.
Spud's turn next and he put on a clinic hunting big patch of grass and cattail slough between milo and corn stubble.
Spud pointed this one in the cattails.
Short while later Spud pointed another rooster and retrieved our 3rd bird for the day.
It was warm and perfect weather for some grouse to hold so we continued on. Spud made a beautiful head high point in the prairie grass, I moved ahead and this single Prairie Chicken flushed well ahead. I shot twice using my hot Fiocchi GP 5s in a mod choke and broke a wing on my second shot. Spud ran to the mark and tracked for another 100 yards to recover that Chicken. Don't let people tell you that crippled grouse won't run because they do.
Spud bringing in our Chicken.
I drove to another potential grouse spot and dropped Tess. She hunted ahead got birdy, went into a tentative point, I moved in front and a huge cock prairie chicken flushed long ahead. I fired twice breaking a wing on the second shot, he fell and Tess raced to the mark. She snuffled around and then moved on tracking. About 60 yards away she went on point, dove in and grabbed her prize.
Tess bringing in that big Cock Chicken.
Darn shame I shot up the wing. That Cock was a taxidermy bird otherwise.
Tess pointed a huge rooster pheasant in the draw as we made out way back to the truck. I had to let it fly off. I was worn slick. Still not right from the Covid. Had one dizzy spell where I nearly passed out, right hand is numb, lungs are not right. I had little energy to stage a proper photo and deal with both dogs at once so this is what I did.
Wife took this photo of Tess hunting from the truck with a 300mm lens.
Moments later she took this one. That doe came running down the hill to attack Tess. I saw it and moved in as the doe ran towards Tess. Tess became aware of the doe just as she arrived, the doe became aware of me and broke off the attack and ran past Tess in full view 5 yards from her. Deer avoidance training followed that.
Tess broke off her pursuit of the attacking doe and swung back into the draw with cattails in the bottom but she was high as a kite as she did. Pheasants of course were on full alert from the commotion and some began flushing wild ahead at the edge of gun range. Which caused more to flush ahead of them as they flew over. Tess lost her mind and began a full pursuit up the draw. I alternated between hitting the tone recall button on her ecollar and stimulating her when she continued running after the flying flushing pheasants. I have seen this movie with every good GWP pup I have raised.
Tess broke off her wild ass run and returned to me. Her eyes were big as saucers, tongue hanging out 10 inches, panting as hard as she could. I watered her and put her in a down position until her breathing returned to normal and we proceeded on back to the truck.
A drop that would likely have produced two grouse and a limit of roosters with Spud, had instead been a wild ass puppy run for Tess. Such is the nature of developing a puppy in its first season. I think she might turn out to be a really nice dog.
Limited by a 300mm lens but got some wildlife photos. The Prairie teams with wildlife.
Our Nations symbol still flying high.
Golden Eagle flushing off of road kill.
Mule Deer Bedded.
Antelope
Antelope running towards a big 10 pt Whitetail Buck
Those Dakota strain Whitetails are massive.
See ya soon.
