You say Tomato, I say Tomahto

Nobelles Scout on Point

You say backing, I say honoring. But what is it? Both terms describe a hunting dog that stops and acknowledges another dog on point. It's important if you ever plan on hunting your dog with other dogs. Nothing is worst than a dog that steals points. It's also important if you test or trial your dog in an event where honoring is required. Yesterday Jim and I drove to Sussex County, NJ to train with Bob Corsaro. We focused on backing because we are hoping to finish off Cleo's AKC Senior Hunt Title sometime this spring and it is a requirement.

We took turns having one dog go on point and then bringing the other dog up to honor. We are on private land so we can also flush and shoot the birds and have the dogs retrieve.

Cleo backing Scout

Scout retrieving

Cleo on point

Cleo cleared for landing!

When Cleo runs in an AKC event she isn't always running with another GSP so we not only worked Cleo with her brother Scout, but also with Rafael Franco's two Llewellyn Setters. He has three but only ran two today. They are such beautiful dogs and are a blast to photograph.

9 month old Biscuit

Cleo backing 9 month old Biscuit 

Caleb

Biscuit and Caleb on the go

All three dogs on whoa

Cleo had a pretty decent day. She did some things well and needs to work on other things. But overall we made progress. 

Check us out Cleo's facebook page: Adventures of a German Shorthaired Pointer

It's Been a Hard Day's Night....

And I've been sleeping like a dog. Which isn't much of a stretch since Cleo is spoiled rotten and sleeps in our bed. I don't know if I would actually call it sleeping what she does. It's much more like hogging. It's an amazing feat almost like a magic trick how a 54 pound dog can elongate and contort itself to take up an entire king size bed. I have no idea what we will do when we get our puppy in a few months. At least having the puppy sleep in a crate for the first 9 months will buy us sometime.

Cleo claiming her spot in our bed

Every night we place Cleo in between us at the bottom of the bed. She has her own blankie to burrow under. We turn off the light, close our eyes, she starts to snore and somehow in the middle of the night the dog sleep walking begins. She manages to roll on her back and hold the blanket up like she pitched a tent with her extended paws. Which scared the hell out of me the first time I woke up and saw this big outline of something in the darkness.

An early paws in the air by Cleo as a puppy

Cleo with a more developed paws in the air technique

Then she creeps up army crawl style between us until I wake up with paws jammed in my back and a snoring snout in my ear. When I drag her back to the bottom of the bed where she belongs she lays across Jim's legs before somehow managing to make it back to my pillow. Eventually around 4am she gets off the bed on my side, runs to Jim's side and noses her way under the covers were she stays till he gets up at 6:30.

Puppy Cleo crashed out when we were gutting our house

Jim blames me for her need to be under the blankets because when she was a puppy I would wrap her in a blanket and call her the puppy taco or puppy burrito.  But in my defense I never wanted the dog in the bed in the first place! He's the one who broke the no dog in the bed rule I set. Which I busted him for when I came home from work on my lunch break one day when she was 5 months old and I found him arm in arm napping with her.

Me breaking my own rules (For the record I am the biggest offender)

Jim with Cleo and Bailey

When she was a puppy she would get us up everyday like clock work at 5:30am. She ran like a banshee all day and would crash out in puppy coma at 8pm every night. Since she turned 2 she has turned into a lazy bum. She will lay snuggled under the covers wrapped in my arms with her fuzzy face on my pillow till 10:30am on Saturday mornings. I love it. When I get up for work during the week it's nearly impossible to get her out of bed. I'll stand in the kitchen why I make my breakfast or lunch and yell to her in the back bedroom to get her lazy bones up. Even goading her with a truck ride won't pull her from the warmth of our blankies. Most days we have to rub her belly and then physically drag her out of bed to get her going. I have a feeling the puppy will remedy all of this laying about.

First Training Day of 2012

Scout on the run

Today was the first official training day of 2012. Jim has been working force fetch at home the last two weeks but this morning we traveled to NJ with 7 pigeons to work with Bob Corsaro. We wanted to focus on getting Cleo steady as well as having her honor. Cleo's brother Scout from a later litter was there to help.

It was a beautiful and chilly morning 

Cleo on point

Cleo looks absolutely bat s#%t crazy to me in this pic. Makes me laugh.

Cleo had a so-so day. The moment Jim let her out of the truck and he called her around and she blew him off I had a feeling we would be in for a rough day. She was intermittently defiant which was uncharacteristic and frustrating. I'm not quite sure why she wasn't acting like herself but she came home and threw up everywhere and has been pretty lethargic and needy. I'm not sure what the deal is but I'll watch her and if she's not back to normal we'll head off to the vet. She goes there every Tuesday anyhow for daycare.

Jim with Cleo and Jim Given with Scout

It was super fun training with Cleo's little brother Scout today. He is a full blood sibling from a later liter. He is just the sweetest and most handsome boy. Its nice to have him there to train with Cleo because she is so competitive with other dogs and selfishly I love to photograph Scout. Below are some pics of him in action.

Bob had them take turns finding and pointing birds. Then we would cut the other dog loose to honor. They both did a fairly decent job. Cleo would get pretty impatient when it wasn't her turn. So this week we will work her on whoa and keeping her steady. Up until today she was doing really well. I'm hoping it was just a fluke. Below are some more fun pics.

Scout catching major air

Cleo on point

Scout on point

  Check us out on facebook: Adventures of a German Shorthaired Pointer.

2011: The Year in Review

2011 was an interesting year but then again I guess they all are. In terms of dogs for us it was a huge year that was full of lessons learned. Some more enjoyable than others. For instance, I learned Cleo is more apt to eating my favorite shoes when I'm home rather than when I'm not. This lesson has hopefully been truly learned and I won't be taking any remediation courses in 2012.

Compliments of Spottyrella - AKA Ill behaved Cleo

In all seriousness I started this blog 364 days ago on January 1st, 2011. Tomorrow my blog turns one and Jim and I are celebrating it by doing the same thing we did last year to kick it off. Were taking Cleo hunting. No doubt I will be hungover. No doubt I will take a zillion pictures and no doubt I will be excited to share the whole experience with you. I do believe that this is a new tradition for Jim and I, the New Years Day Hunt. I can't think of a better way to christen the New Year.

Since starting this blog it has taken on a life of its own. In June the blog got an extension of its self on facebook. Cleo got her own page title Adventures of German Shorthaired Pointer. The facebook page allows me to capture her spontaneous antics and quickly share when blog posts are published. It's also a great way to interact with people who love their quirky GSP's. Please check us out and "Like Us" if your on facebook.

I thought it would be fun for me to share with all of you some of this blogs analytics. The month I started this blog I had a whopping 83 hits. That has grown quite a bit with my highest month, November totalling  1,714 hits. The month of December was a very close second so were moving in the right direction. There was a total of 97 posts in 2011 with the most being written in May and the least in November.  The top 10 countries that visit this blog are the following: #1. The USA, #2. Canada, #3. The UK, #4. Germany, #5. Russia, #6. Australia, #7. South Africa, #8. France, #9. Netherlands, and #10. Greece. That's not to say we don't get lots of other welcome visitors from all over the world.

Our little party animal screaming Happy New Year!! Guess we should 

have told her we don't do that till midnight...

Although I can't see who you are or where your from I can tell how you got here. Some of you have landed here through hunting dog forums, email links, facebook and a good portion of you through search engines. When you land here from a search engine I get to see what key words you put in to find me. Lots of you are looking for the GSP Hunting Dog Blog so that's great news! But believe it or not lots of you get here because you wanted to know what that awful smell emitting from your GSP's butt is....haha...now we all know those are anal glands and they probably need to be squeezed. Allot of you wanted to know if you could hunt a GSP while its in heat....and the answer is of course you can. Some of you got here by looking up dog biscuit recipes, the NAVHDA Utility Test, GSP's gone bad, GSP heat cycles, info on AKC hunt tests, how to get your GSP to stop eating your shoes, and the list goes on and on.    

But regardless of how you got here, I'm glad your here. I hope you got something out of this blog and if you haven't yet keep coming back because hopefully you will. I have some great ideas for 2012, and Jim and I will have a busy year finishing Cleo's AKC Senior Hunt Title, starting her on Master Hunter and running her in a NAVHDA Utility Test and we are of course getting a new puppy in April. We will have our hands full. I hope your here for the roller coaster ride.

That first hat was just for the pre-party

I love when I get feedback and emails from readers so feel free to comment and or email me at byrdgirl50@aol.com. But thanks for sticking around, 2011 was great and I know 2012 will be better.  Be sure to stop back tomorrow and hear how our hunt went. And most importantly, please have a safe New Years Eve. Enjoy yourself tonight and when you wake up hungover tomorrow be sure to look forward to another year of experiences and all the opportunity it will hopefully bring. Happy New Year from Jim and I and of course Cleo.

The future of Upland Hunting

Cleo and Dakota's bounty 

The picture above is of 13 year old Dakota Capwell. Dakota is an amazing young man. He is a talented black belt who trains at my boyfriends Mixed Martial Arts School in the Pennsylvania, Lehigh Valley. Dakota's father Bill has always encouraged him to hunt and has worked hard at fostering an environment where Dakota can get exposed to various kinds of game including upland hunting. This morning Jim and our GSP Cleo guided a preserve hunt for Bill and Dakota.

It was a chilly 20 degrees when they set out but they had a good morning with Cleo finding and pointing 8 birds, 4 of which Dakota shot and Bill as the second gunner brought in 2. Jim raved about how well Dakota did. But Dakota is no stranger to hunting. Last year at the age of 12 Dakota won a hunting contest, receiving the grand prize of a trip to Africa.

Dakota at the age of 12 with his Zebra

Dakota and Bill spent 2 weeks hunting in Africa. While there Dakota took a Zebra, two Blesbok's, a Springbok, an Impala, a Wildebeest, an Orux and a Kudu.  The picture that won Dakota the Africa trip is also listed below, its a monster Elk he bagged at the age of 11! Someday when Dakota is much older I have no doubts that he will look back fondly at the time spent with his Dad hunting. And hopefully he will one day work as hard as his father to expose his children to the same joys he had in the fields and woods.

Dakota and his Springbok

Dakota and his father Bill Capwell and his first Blesbok

Dakota and his Wildebeest

Keeping hunting traditions alive in this country start with educating and awakening the spirit in our children. It is essential to the survival of upland hunting and hunting in general to get kids interested at a young age. Most large preservation organizations in this country like Pheasants Forever and Quails Forever realize this all too well and work tirelessly to engage kids in upland hunting by sponsoring youth hunts. And it's up to us to come and bring the dogs to work with them and make the time to expose our kids to these experiences.

Dakota and Bill with his Oryx

Dakota and Bill with his White Blesbok

Dakota and his Dad Bill with his Impala

By starting children out hunting young it instills in them the proper care and safe habits of guns, the responsibility of preserving the great outdoors, it gets them off the couch and away from video games into the fields and woods, it allows them to see and be apart of the process of gathering your own food which is an experience most Americans today never have, it allows them to take pride in accomplishing something that takes skill and patience and it allots them sacred and valuable time with the big people in their lives.

Dakota and his Kudo

Dakota's monster elk taken at age 11 in New Mexico

Taking time to expose youth, both boys and girls to the joys of hunting is ensuring that there will be a future for this great sport. It's also what builds traditions and fond memories. I know that Jim got a great sense of satisfaction today watching Dakota hunt. He recanted for me how nicely he responded to a double wild flush, quickly having to choose which pheasant to take. And although Jim won't be upland hunting on Monday, Jim will be venturing off into the woods to deer hunt with his 21 year old daughter Samantha who is home from college. I'm pretty sure nothing means more to him then getting to spend that time in the woods with her.

Another bull elk taken earlier this year by Dakota with a muzzleloader in 

New Mexico at the age of 13

Dakota has been very lucky and most kids won't get the chance to hunt some of the things that he has, but exposing kids to even the simplest joys of the outdoors will be fruitful to the next generation.

And then there was one....

Gunny and Cleo

A short while ago I dropped Gunny Boo off with Momma Secan. I have to say the closer we got to the drop off point the sadder I got. Gunny was a good house guest the last 5 days. We've all gotten pretty attached to him. However, I am excited to not share my half of the bed with him tonight. Sticking with true GSP form he is an all encompassing bed hog. But I'm sure Jackie will be ecstatic to have him back and hogging up her bed. He is a very good snuggler.

I do believe he had a good time while he was here. He got to sniff butts and play at daycare with Cleo and her buds. Everyday he got to waste himself running through fields and woods. He slept every night in our bed under the covers with his head on my chest. We loved him like he was ours. Cleo I think is sad he isn't here either. She looked for him when I came back solo.  Below are some pics of them running their hearts out yesterday. 

Gunny's idea of exiting the woods and entering the field

At least Cleo will get a pick me up tomorrow. Jim and her are guiding a hunt for a friend and his 11 year old son tomorrow at Powderbourne Pheasant Preserve. I know Jim is looking forward to getting to work her. I'm jealous I have to work and can't go. Hopefully he'll take some pics of their bounty so check back for updates!