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07/20/09 |
  
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In November of 2007, again at the invitation of friends, I traveled down to NJ for a day in the field with Karen Cooper. Because of the lateness of the season, we didn't expect to find any quarry, but we wanted to give the newbies, both dog and human, a good feel for what hunting was all about. Karen had a couple of her seasoned dogs with her to show the new kids on the block the ropes. Karen has permissions on mostly tree farms, and we headed out to one bright and early. I was still kind of nervous about letting Bailey loose to roam around, because I had absolutely no idea what he was going to do. He has always been good about coming when called, but not in this type of setting.At the first stop, Karen put collars on Bailey, his son Navaho, and Daisy, another newbie. We put the three on the ground, and the two boys immediately started harassing Daisy. We scooped them up, gave the boys a good talking to and put them back down. Amazingly enough, the three of them were fine for the remainder of the day!We spent a few hours just letting the dogs investigate everything and getting used to following commands/directions. All three dogs took to investigating holes with great enthusiasm. At one point, we were walking uphill along a steep bank, and down below was a good sized pond with some geese in it. Karen told me to head to the right so that the dogs didn't see the geese. She no sooner had the words out of her mouth when someone behind me says 'There's a dog in the water!'. Without even looking, I just knew it was Bailey! By the time I looked, he was half way across the pond and headed straight for the geese. I called him, and he turned to look at me, then he swung around and started for the geese again! I started down the bank calling him and after another few seconds, he finally started making his way back. He climbed up the bank, shook himself off and continued on down the path! We checked his collar to be sure it was still working, dried him off a little, and headed off.At the top of the hill, there was a huge pile of brush that the farmer had pushed all into a heap. Of course, all three dogs made a bee line for it and were deep inside the pile by the time we got to the top. All of a sudden, Daisy opened up on something and we could hear a lot of growling and barking from inside. We all set to work trying to locate exactly where they were. Karen managed to find a spot that looked like an entrance and what seemed to be a small den. It was actually pretty cool looking! As we were trying to get to the dogs, a raccoon bolted out through the top of the pile and scooted up the nearest tree, and sat looking down at us! Daisy worked her way out of the pile and we tied her out while we looked for the other two. We located Bailey and got him out, but Navaho was sitting just out of Karen's reach staring down another raccoon, and he was not coming out! Took us a while to get him to him, and when we finally got him out , and once we did we decided it was time to head somewhere else before they all got back into that pile again.We drove over to a hay field next for our last stop of the day and let of few of the other dogs out. They all had a great time checking out the holes and we were all pretty tired when the day was done.I was simply amazed at how Bailey reacted to being in the field and how much at home he seemed to be. He was a gentleman with the other dogs on the ground, another thing I was nervous about, and I couldn't have been happier with his performance that day. He had this presence about him. He knew exactly what he was there for, and he has since proven to be an awesome little hunting dog. Here are a few pictures that I managed to take that day. You'll see that we're all bundled up - it was kind of cold that day! Hunting: November, 2007 Karen Cooper Beautiful view as we entered the first property!
Bailey getting into a hole
Daisy giving it a try too.
The Happy Hunters!
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This site was last updated 02/18/09 |
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