Well today Lochan excelled herself. The walk started as normal with a short drive to the farm, then straight out of the car off lead for a couple of hours training and general fun exercise. Both girls were remarkably lively from the off, with much dashing about hunting and scenting but recall and stop all fine. After about half an hour we were on a field surrounded by birch woods and bracken just below a viaduct where a ranger-led nature walk for the over-60's was on the go - all looking for our Red Kites I think. At this point Lochan started hunting in the bracken, and decided that the stop and recall whistle were completely optional. A sudden flurry of activity and she flushed a pheasant swiftly followed by a leap and grab and she caught it about three feet in the air above the bracken. She then triumphantly returned to me to deliver with evident pride her trophy. I could feel rather than see the binoculars from the over-60's group all swing round to focus on us.....what to do? The pheasant was delivered to me and looked OK but was pretty stunned from its experience, and now I have two insanely excited labradors just desperate to retrieve the pheasant again if I placed it on the ground. Believe me, all their practice with heeling away from dummies came to nothing at this point, they clearly thought I had gone mad as I didn't want the pheasant - they were trained to bring pheasants back to me, and just because it was in public view of a bunch of bird watchers, not dead and not shot didn't matter one jot to them. Both girls by this time were on slip leads, and horror of horrors over the hill appeared a lady with three terriers off lead. Clearly if I placed the stunned pheasant in the bracken and walked off with my two, it likely would not survive the attentions of the terriers. So in a moment of madness I stuffed the stunned pheasant in my rucksack and planned to walk off in a large circle, returning in 20 minutes or so to release the pheasant. A big mistake. A live and frightened pheasant in a rucksack produces an unbelievable amount of poo I was to discover....also by the time I returned to the bracken some 20 minutes later it was now an unstunned and fairly angry pheasant in my rucksack, liberally coated in pheasant poo. Believe me when I say it was much harder to get it back out of the rucksack than it had been to put it in, especially with two excited labs on slips leads, the handles of which were round my ankle at this point as I needed both hands to disentangle the pheasant from the other contents of my rucksack.....she managed to inflict some fairly painful pecks to my hands and arms as I whirled around partially disabled by the leads around my ankle desperately trying to release her whilst the dogs equally desperately tried to retrieve her for me.....anyway, after what felt like an incredibly long time she was released and flew off much to the horror of the dogs and I began the long trek home covered in pheasant poo and smelling like a hatchery.......
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... I may actually be crying ;D Your pheasant did better than one my friends dog managed to snatch. It clearly wasn't going to recover so it was swiftly dispatched and stuffed in a pocket!! This young female lab also looked mightily pleased with herself for bringing such a fine prize back to her owner who was mortified this had happened in front of me as her dog had always been so well behaved and held up as a paragon of virtue (by me not her) Your rucksack may never be the same again...oh oh more tears ;D ;D
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... I may have to apologise for laughing but you tell it so well .................
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... Oh Lordy! Gosh...I bet bits of that weren't funny at the time but - ROFL! ;D
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... I would have loved to have heard what the birdwatchers were saying about you
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... [quote author=editor link=topic=2503.msg24939#msg24939 date=1378739623] I would have loved to have heard what the birdwatchers were saying about you [/quote] Sadly as the ranger with them is my next-door neighbour I will undoubtedly be treated to a word-for-word account in the near future....
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... Oh my GOODNESS!!!!!! ;D ;D ;D Sorry, I am sure it was awful at the time, but it does make a great story... 8)
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... I'm sure you could dine out on this story for years. Funny in retrospect but at the time! I think I'd be tempted to ditch the rucksack. Alice
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... [quote author=Alice link=topic=2503.msg24947#msg24947 date=1378746915] I'm sure you could dine out on this story for years. Funny in retrospect but at the time! I think I'd be tempted to ditch the rucksack. Alice [/quote] Well, she COULD have dined out on the pheasant but she let it go..... ;D Too funny....
Re: Today's walk retrieves.... That is a total cartoon comedy sketch.....the only thing missing was you shouting hysterically 'Its Ok,I'm a vet!!!!' Which are the words that would have been coming out of my mouth.......together with all the expletives that I'm sure you uttered!!!hilairious x
