Tex is nine months old today. He is right at 80 pounds and a super-sweet guy. Next weekend he will be freezing his pecker off in North Dakota, his first big-time hunt. We will be hunting four days, he has no idea of the fun just ahead!
Category Archives: Bird Dogs
Big Tex
This was to be a post on a Sage Grouse and Ptarmigan hunt but we did not see a bird. What is that recipe to remove the stench of skunk?
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Tex on Birds
Yesterday was a big day for Tex. Not quite 6 months old we put him on live birds for the first time. By nature Tex is a very sweet, mellow dog and we love him in the house but you wonder what will happen when he has feathers in his face. Will he have interest, not to mention intensity and an enthusiasm to hunt? Is he going to get it and fulfill his bird dog destiny, or is he going to lay in the shade under the truck and lick his balls?
Not to worry, Tex gets it. Within 45 minutes he went from mildly curious to a bird dog with fire in his eyes. With guidance from our trainer, John Augustine of Nickel Creek Gun Dogs, we had a tremendously successful day. Tex learned what a game bird is, what they smell like and how they taste. To see the light come on, to see the instinct kick in, to see your puppy perform is an incredible experience. I think I am tearing up.
Tex worked the field well, he picked up scent and worked it to the bird. He pointed and held point well and we were able to shoot over him with no ill effect. You always worry about gun shyness, but happily there was none of that. He did pretty good on the retrieve as well. Being his first time, none of this was flawless or executed consistently but the skills are certainly there. Most importantly he was into it and we have the opportunity to develop a terrific gun dog and also have a wonderful pal back at the ranch.
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Cajun-German Shorthaired Pointer Pups Available
My friend Grant from Melville, LA has an awesome litter of GSPs on the ground.
Here is what he says:
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Tex at 5 Months
Tomorrow Tex is 5 months old. He still is a puppy but at 48 pounds sometimes it doesn’t seem like it.
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First Point
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Moretex
Here is more Tex! He is 81 days old and, in the 4 weeks since he arrived, he has more than doubled in size. These wonderful puppy days are moving by too fast!
More Puppy Pics
Tex has been with us for two weeks and is 40% bigger than when he arrived. At 9 weeks he is learning the key commands well and though I hesitate to say this, we think he is house broken. (I am sure he took a crap in my wife’s new shoes as I wrote this.)
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Ahhhhh . . .
Tex is 2 months old today and has been with us for 1 week.
Better the deck than the carpet!
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Tex Comes Home
Tex left his littermates at Valhalla and came home on
Saturday morning. It was a perfect weekend of puppy fun that started with a quiet, reserved pooch trying to understand a new world and ended with a marauding alpha dog full of vinegar and armed with needles for teeth. Tex is confident, fearless and a very happy dog. We could not be more pleased with him.
Handsome boy!
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Tex
We have come full circle now. Last November we lost our beloved Rio, not even 7 then. It took a while to recover but now we are ready to roll with our next GSP. We feel very fortunate to have found the wonderful dogs at Valhalla Hunt Club near Bennett, Colorado and have secured a fine boy. . . .Thank You Gary Thompson! We are looking forward to picking him up next weekend and for the adventure to begin!
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More GSP Puppies
These sweet pups are 24 days old. The litter has 4 females and 2 males and we will pick between these two males. One is about the largest dog in the litter and the other is the smallest. Other than the female in pink, which one would you choose?
Moose? This little fellow turns out to be our Tex!
German Shorthaired Pointer Puppies
Who doesn’t love a puppy! Here is a litter of irresistible black and white GSPs. Beautiful pups at 5 weeks.
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Colorado GSP
We lost bird dog Rio last November and now the search is on for a new puppy. This morning we shot at some Chukars with Rio’s half-sister, Matrix. You sure can tell they are related, the resemblance is amazing. The hope is to have a pup by the beginning of summer.
We love those white & liver pointers.
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Splenic Mass Hemangiosarcoma (HSA)
I was happily ignorant of this term a week and a half ago. I hope you never have reason to look it up.
A couple of weeks ago bird dog Rio was running at the dog park with her usual tail-wagging enthusiasm. I remember thinking how lean and athletic she looked, at the top of her game and ready for the next hunt of the season. Over the next few days her weight continued to drop and at some terrible point of sad demarcation she lost that ounce that took her from healthy-lean to skinny-sick. It took the vet about 10 seconds to find the mass around her spleen. The odds he gave us were not good – 2/3 chance of this being HSA which would take her life, 1/3 chance it being benign in which case removing her spleen and the mass would save her.
The 4 days until the surgery were a tough mix of fear, anxiety and love. I wouldn’t trade those days but don’t want to relive them either. Rio was extraordinarily affectionate, wanting to be in your lap, to be petted, to be near. I don’t think she was in pain but you could tell she was uncomfortable and had some trouble breathing. All this time she had that sweet spark in her eyes, her tail wagging as she chased our Chihuahua Jack and at times not appearing sick at all. We were optimistic for a positive outcome the morning I took her in, working hard to suppress thoughts of this ending badly. But the call was quick and clinical. The mass had spread to the lymph nodes and intestines. It was HSA, the odds had not been beat and Rio was “euthanized on the table”, as they put it.
I have never in my life felt such deep, exhausting grief and sadness (sorry Grandma & Grandpa). Common words like “gone”, “never again”, and “I’ll miss her” take on a terrible weight for a while. This is the time that the grace of God sees you though and I want to look forward to another puppy, to other hunts and happy days afield . . . but not yet. In due time.
Good bye, Sweet Rio. 6 years, 8 months and 9 days was just not enough time with you.
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The Dog Park
Summer in Colorado is a wonderful time . . . fly fishing the Rockies, baseball in LoDo, sporting clays, BBQ on the deck, no bugs, no humidity. It is a great time to own a convertible! Summer is also the time to get the dogs in shape for the coming bird season. If you are partners with a bird dog, then you know that a walk around the block won’t cut it. These dogs need to run and run and run. I wish I had a section of land out my back door, as I am sure some of you do, but I don’t. Living on 1/4 acre allows me to keep my farming and ranching costs in check but I need a place to let the dog have at it.
Living in Denver we are fortunate to have a 69 acre off-lease dog park at the Chatfield State Park. There is a massive amount of public land in Colorado. If you live in town, little of it is convenient to visit with the frequency needed to keep your dog happy and in shape. This park provides a wonderful in-town alternative to let the dogs run to their heart’s content and is minutes from the house. Here are some pictures from our visits starting with a Meadowlark that sat still just long enough . . .
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6 Years of Bird Dog Joy.
Today is bird dog Rio’s birthday. It has been a wonderful 6 years. We miss her puppy days, as destructive as they were at times, but now she is at her bird hunting peak and sweet as pie.
Whoever said “Money can’t buy happiness” never bought a puppy!
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Texas Bird Dogs
We love West Texas quail hunting for a lot of reasons but mostly because we get to hunt behind these beautiful pointers. I can’t imagine hunting without them. Below are some of the superb animals at First Shot Outfitters. These are hardworking dogs, tools of the trade who spend their lives doing exactly what they were put on earth to do. I can’t think of a place I would rather be than walking up on one of these puppies pointing the way to old Bob.
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Dog points bird . . .
Capturing the intensity of a covey nailed is a tough assignment. Most attempts fall short but not this piece that I read in Sporting Classics some years ago. It is by far the best I have found. It was written by Tom Davis, the Senior Editor and Gundogs columnist for Sporting Classics and author of “The Tattered Autumn Sky: Bird Hunting in the Heartland.”
“You turn the dogs loose and let them roll, and as they sift the wind – miners panning for gold – you feel yourself pulled along in the slipstream of their intense, unfettered joy.
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And when they strike point, transformed in a blazing instant from pure kinetic energy to living statuary, it’s as if the earth stops spinning, There is no past or future; there is only this moment, and what hangs in the balance, awaiting resolution, is nothing less than everything.”
– Tom Davis
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Birdhunter 
