At Least The Dog Gets The Point

Lately, I’ve been sympathizing with hunters who have really good dogs.

My Brittany, Radar, will never be considered perfect, except in the way he licks his food bowl clean.

But during a few moments of brilliance on recent hunts, Radar’s pointing prowess caused me nothing but grief and sore muscles.

One of my hunting partners has eliminated such grief by getting a dog that won’t leave his heels. The only muscle strain my friend suffers is from shoving the dog off his lap.

Radar, on the other hand, is a young, lean, bird-finding machine who occasionally hunts in my proximity.

His breeding and penchant for running at full throttle has not been a major problem in the past. Generally, Radar gives me a chance to catch up.

For reasons not understood by humans, a pointing dog freezes at the moment its predatory nature tells it to pounce.

Through some genetic hocus-pocus, the pointing breeds were convinced to abandon hunting instincts for a life of poise and denial.

This is the canine equivalent of Hugh Hefner becoming a Trappist monk.

The pointing virtue requires sacrifice on the part of the dog and the hunter.

In chukar country, a pointer’s nose may force you to go uphill when you’re too tired to take another step.

In sage country, the nose might take you through several counties when you intended to hunt a single patch of cattails.

On Tuesday, my partner, Walt Balek, was waltzing around bagging his limit of pheasants while I spent most of the day hunting for Radar.

This is no fault of the dog. Radar was doing everything he’s bred to do. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see the work.

Radar stands less than 2 feet tall. The grass on the slopes I was hunting in Whitman County was 3- to 6-feet tall.

A hunter must be judicious in calling a pointer that has slipped out of sight. Call too often at the wrong time, and you might convince the dog that he’s not supposed to point.

Five times, I saw roosters flush a hundred yards out of range only to see a head bob up, indicating that Radar had pinned each bird temporarily.

But I wasn’t there to shoot.

This is like John Stockton making the pass only to have the Mailman miss the slam dunk.

Pheasants in the late season are notorious for running rather than flying. The wet grass dulled the ring from the bell on his collar, but occasionally I could see the grass part as Radar worked furiously to track down a ringneck. Sometimes the chase would go on for minutes. You can’t call off a pointer that’s making game, even though some roosters might pack their bags and run into the next state.

While walking high on a canyon ridge near the Snake River, I got a glimpse of Radar getting birdy 50 yards ahead. I hustled to where I thought he’d gone on point, but couldn’t find any sign of him. For 15 minutes, I made bigger and bigger circles in grass and weeds that sometimes were six feet tall. Still nothing.

Balek was wisely working the other side of the canyon, where the cover wasn’t so thick. His Weimaraner and English setter were in clear view working ahead of him even though they were mere dots from my distant vantage. Walt dropped two roosters in a flush at the end of a small draw.

After the retrieves, he turned his attention to my predicament. He was looking across into my hillside, but could not see Radar.

I had just hiked to the top of a knob on the ridge for the widest possible view, when I could hear Balek shout, “He’s in the bottom.”

I looked into the bowels of the canyon and winced at the thought of losing a thousand feet of hard-earned altitude. I still couldn’t see anything that looked like a dog.

Then Balek yelled, “He’s on point!”

Balek later said he timed my sliding descent through the grass, brush and mud at eight minutes.

“Go left,” Balek yelled from above.

I plunged into a thicket of brush. “Go left some more,” the directions echoed through the cold and drizzle.

Indeed. Radar was twisted in a contortion that left his nose and stubby tail pointing in nearly the same direction.

He had caught the scent in mid-stride. His nose had stopped immediately, but momentum had carried his body another step. The dog looked like a train wreck.

Radar’s eyes darted to me before sighting back down his nose toward the scent, as if to say, “It’s about time, Buster.”

My thumb pressed on the 12-gauge safety. I took another step, and the quiet erupted in a flurry of wings as though a bomb had exploded and birds were blasting out like shrapnel.

I did my job this time, dropping one quail sizzling to my left and other rocketing to the right.

Radar broke for the retrieve, sluggish at first until his muscles loosened from the long, cold hitch as a statue.

He handed up the birds and went hunting again. I didn’t see him for an hour.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Rich Landers The Spokesman-Review