Sept 1st (early morning) "roaded" Gunny two miles & Taffey, Kooly & Daisy five miles
note: "temp" in the upper sixties when finished & plenty of dew on the grass,
91º this afternoon = not going dove hunting
Sept 2nd (early morning) repeated yesterday's "roading" routine, didn't skip a day in order to
to catch up with weather issues
note: a little warmer, higher humidity and no dew on the grass, no problems
92º for a high today, much cooler tomorrow
Interceptor
Sept 3rd (late afternoon) rain in the morning.......and very cool and cloudy all day
Gunny ran five Dokken doubles at the Square Pond (lots of surface weeds)
Taffey, Kooly & Daisy ran the "longest" pattern blind at BT's hay field (nice stretching
run for a little exercise) 450 yards with rooster pheasants
Gunny ran six walking "poorman" singles with a rooster pheasant and primer pistol
(used a place board and stickman at the line as per the other day......he is getting
very solid with this routine)
note: the marks increased from 60 yards to about 150 yards
note: more marks seems to be having a positive effect, since I am the
gunner, he always gets the help I would expect at the right time &
this has resulted in him defining a much tighter AOF & smarter hunts
Sept 4th Gustav supplied us with almost 24 hours of rain = day off
note: continued to practice goose calling with three new calls
Sept 5th (morning) picked up 20 chukars at $6.45 apiece (after gas and tax = $8 each)
(evening) "road" - Sq. Pond DTA....Gunny 2 miles, Taffey 4 miles, Daisy & Kooly 5 miles
Sept 6th (early morning) teal season opener on Mississippi - took Taffey
note: nice day, no teal.....not even a shot (for us) with very few getting anything
rest of dogs day off
Sept 7th (morning) "roaded".....Gunny two miles & Taffey, Kooly & Daisy five miles
Sept 8th (early morning) trained at BT's - Gunny ran nine singles with a heavy cover change in
terrain......rooster pheasant, primer pistol & remote line.......followed by a cold blind
Daisy, Taffey & Kooly ran three similar singles and each finished with a cold blind
note: everyone did a good job & just beat the rain
Sept 9th (early morning) teal hunting Mississippi - took Taffey (to hunt) & Gunny (for the ride)
note: Mississippi Teal Hunts (Link)
Sept 10th (morning) "roaded".....Gunny two miles & Taffey, Kooly & Daisy five miles
Sept 11th (early morning) teal hunting Mississippi - take Daisy (to hunt) & Gunny (for the ride)
This morning Daisy and I had three chances. The first was a single that was just barely
nicked. Daisy made a long blind retrieve in open, lunging water. While I was handling
her about a dozen "buzzed" the spread and disappeared. The next two chances were
doubles, but I only got the first one each time. That was it....not a whole lot of action.
Then, the wind really kicked up from the south making where I was at kind of "useless".
Three "bluewings" seemed enough. Luckily, the landing was north and my Carsten
Bluebill "surfed" back.
(left click on thumbnails)
 "The Blind" |
 "ready to go" |
 "another sniff" |
Sept 12th day off with rain, but the teal were delicious - the fillets
were "butterflied" lengthwise,
bacon was cooked until it was opaque and each slice was halved, the
fillets were
rolled around a piece of pepper jack cheese and a slice of jalapeno, a
strip of bacon
was "toothpicked" around each roll, "teal wraps" were dropped on a sheet
of aluminum
foil and placed under the oven broiler, at 465º the top side got 4
minutes and the bottom
5 minutes producing a medium rare, choice teal wrap, before the melted
puddles of
pepper jack could harden, they were scooped off the foil and placed on
top each
teal morsel............mmmmmmm good!
(left click
on thumbnails)
 "ready to broil" |
 "medium rare" |
 "time to serve" |
Sept 13th Wow! the rain will not let up = another day off (at least we
are not in Texas)
note: the new grass seed in the south airing yard has sprouted mightily
and
buried the straw cover & the tomato plants are full of fresh pickins',
geese flew over the house this morning = scouting is in order because
there are three days left in early goose season
Sept 14th MORE RAIN as
Ike moved through (evening)
Taffey, Daisy, Kooly & Gunny each did
a nice session of walking baseball = very responsive and worked slowly
note: Gunny is taking very good casts & did
three concept doubles at the end
Sept 15th (very
early morning) Kooly went teal
hunting on the Mississippi & Gunny rode
along
note: very slow, but Kooly was totally enthralled with all the different
kinds of
birds in the air = he got two teal
note: Mississippi
Teal Hunts (Link)
Sept 16th (evening)
Taffey, Daisy & Kooly "roaded" four miles and
Gunny two miles at BT's
note: filled up water and feed tower in the Johnny House (third time)
Sept 17th (afternoon)
Taffey, Daisy, Kooly & Gunny "roaded" one mile &
Taffey, Daisy & Gunny
were given an opportunity to work on chukars
note: Gunny flushed two with no sign of
pointing, but do a nice job of dechasing
note: Daisy had two very nice points with a
short dechasing lesson on the first &
stood and watched the second one fly off after a nice point = I got up
near
and stroked her some without affecting the point
note: Taffey had a nice point, in fact it
was a surprise to her to suddenly find an
upland bird to point.......huge change in body language & the best part
was
she let me flush it.......something new
note: the birds were good flyers......which makes a big difference
Frontline Plus Taffey, Daisy & Gunny
Preventic
new collar for Kooly
Sept 18th (morning)
Taffey, Daisy, Kooly & Gunny did extended
sessions of walking baseball
Sept 19th (early
morning) day off for Taffey, Daisy &
Kooly............Gunny goes teal hunting
note:
Gunny's
1st Duck Hunt (Link)
Sept 20th day off for all - decided to
pass on Iowa duck opener.....not enough time to scout
and out of state license license expenses
Sept 21st (morning)
"roaded" at BT's...Taffey, Daisy & Kooly
went 5 miles & Gunny 2 miles
Sept 22nd (morning) repeated yesterday's "roading"
routine
note: redesigned the van "floor plan" for five crates & dogs = need for
the Oct
trip to south Dakota, much more efficient use of space
Sept 23rd (morning) repeated same "roading"
routine
Sept 24th (early
morning) trained at BT's hay field = setup a 125 yard Box Drill
(four marks) with
a remote line, Taffey, Kooly, Daisy & Gunny
ran their four singles with a flagged 3"
Avery flasher and primer report
note: everyone marked well except Daisy (either checked up short or blew
past)
drove to the swim-by pond to help Anne W. do swim-by with Katie and
ended up
running Gunny on a swim-by (he did fine)
note: design platform to use Avery Power Hunter layout blind in the boat
for
lower profile when duck hunting
note: fresh water and check food level for chukars
(afternoon) Daisy
worked three chukars......Gunny worked two
chukars
note: three points for Daisy.......zero points for Gunny
note: nine chukars left
(left click
on thumbnails)
"Daisy" - point one |
 "Daisy" - point three |
 "up close" |
Sept 25th (mid-morning)
Taffey, Kooly & Daisy "roaded" five
miles....Gunny did three miles
note: waited until temperature was in upper 60's
Sept 26th (morning)
Taffey, Kooly & Daisy "roaded" five
miles....Gunny did 2½
miles &
(evening) Gunny intro'd to Avery Ruff
Stand, no issues = jumped up on it after a little
coaxing with the "place" command
(left click
on thumbnails)
 "Gunny" |
 "place" |
"Avery Ruff Stand" |
note: charge all wingers
note: build small boxes for layout blind support in boat
Sept 27th (morning)
Taffey, Kooly & Daisy "roaded" five
miles....Gunny did 3 miles
note: worked at the Square Pond DTA & dogs could take a quick dip in the
pond on every loop around the bean field
(dusk)
Taffey, Kooly & Daisy were introduced to
the Avery Ruff Stand in the front
yard by doing a few simple retrieves off it. Gunny
did a few, too
Sept 28th (late morning) Gunny ran a 15
bumper, five slot lining drill with incrementally
increases in length and greater distances to the next "slot", slots were
formed by
3" Avery Flashers ten short steps apart
note: struggled with this "slot " at first = improved to nice efforts at
the end,
still not getting a bold, forward "lean & lock" look on straight
out, need to
use birds consistently with lots of short cold blinds in mild cover
(often)
Sept 29th van at mechanic
proactive replacement of fuel pump & help Ann W. Katie's swim-by
note: trained swim-by in the rain|
note: van will not be finished until tomorrow
note: worked on layout blind setup in the boat
(left click
on thumbnails)
 "gas tank box" |
 "gas tank cover" |
"blind support" |
"layout seat" |
 "Power Hunter" |
 "blind open" |
 "blind closed" |
"Bluebill blind" |
|
Sept 30th day off for all