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Saturday, Sep. 05, 2009

Carol Reiter: Hunters need a good dog

Dove season started Tuesday. I was awakened by my dog Jan, who sleeps at the foot of my bed, as soon as there was any light at all in the sky.

Jan hates gunshots, even though she is totally used to hearing the propane guns that go off at the dairy down the street. I don't know how she tells the difference, but she does.

Now let me say, right off the bat, I have nothing against hunters. I love to watch hunting dogs who love their job, and if someone wants to hunt doves, no problem. Let them.

But when I was going home Tuesday, I passed a big field that had recently been harvested for silage. I'm sure it was a haven for doves, but by that time of the day, it had turned into a haven for vultures.

There were at least 20 vultures out in that field, and I slowed down to try to figure out what they were after. One was close enough to the road to see it, and I saw that the big scavenger had a dove.

OK, guys. Go hunting if you want. But don't leave those doves to die out there.

I know, they're hard to find. So my solution? Get a dog.

Yep, there are a ton of breeds out there that would love to be your gun dog. Even at the animal shelter are purebred Labrador retrievers that wouldn't take too much training to fetch a dead bird.

Training a bird dog takes some time, and you have to have some knowledge of how to do it. But there are trainers out there to help, and as I said, if you have a dog that wants to retrieve, you are more than halfway there.

I've watched field trial dogs compete in various trials, from just fetching a dead bird that they can see to doing blind retrieves on more than one bird.

The dogs are awesome to watch, and I know they have a lot of training. But I can guarantee you, if we had wanted to, we could have taken Ty hunting, and he would have brought back every dead bird we shot.

Hunters who shoot, and hit, 20 birds but come home with only eight or nine aren't doing anyone a favor. They end up without their limit, the birds suffer and somewhere there's a dog that would love to have a job finding those dead or hurt birds.

I guess the only ones who like hunters without bird dogs are the vultures. And, unfortunately, they're having a field day.

Reporter Carol Reiter can be reached at (209) 385-2486 or creiter@mercedsun-star.com.