training update

Well, we just got back from a big training day up in Bernardston, MA, with Team Vizsla -- Northwestern MA chapter -- aka Forest King Vizslas, aka Kim + Mike + Jaida, Cedar + Kyler. As ever, you try to get as much as you can from a whole day -- you may never get everything that you want, but you take what you can get. As you might imagine, scenting conditions were hard with little breeze, temperatures in the high 70degsF, low humidity,

I am now trying to get both boys steady-to-retrieve, ie. once they have pointed and a bird flushed, they need to wait to be told what happens next. Jozsi seems pretty close not to bolting on a gunshot -- whether the bird drops or not -- so he's definitely making progress. This picture is of him pointing a chukar that he had bumped inadvertently and took off -- and which we came back around for about 15mins later. It was an impressive find bearing in mind the fern coverage.

Momo, as ever, is a little too smart for his own good. So, for example, I proved to myself that he is now completely wise to both checkcords and pinchcollars when it comes to remaining steady-to-fall. I started weaning him onto the e-collar (as a replacement for the pinch-collar), but that will be the next training step to get him where I'd like him to be. And here's a picture of Momo pointing a chukar Mike had slept extremely well. (It woke up abruptly as I was hollering to Mike to come up and be ready to shoot.) On the upside, though, both boys seem to stop-to-flush and will even stay put through a blank pistol shot... but birds dropping out the sky are still a little too much temptation.

One major highlight, though, was meeting Kyler's puppies. I warn you, those faint of heart, that what you are about to see may induce a spontaneous desire to either a) own one, or b) vomit. They are barfably cute. They are 4weeks old and just starting to explore the world. They still have their adorably cute blue eyes and way too much skin. And they have an activity span of about 10mins... before they have to nap again. It's hard work growing up to be a primo hunting dog.