Training report

We beat the rain, but not by much, as Larsen and I ran the traps at Tim's.  I described last week's fiasco to Tim, including my notion that Larsen was ready to bust out just based on his behavior on Friday and Saturday when I tried to work him on dummies.  Tim elected to go train at the field just to get some different vibes going.  We brought Flick the ESS and Avery the flatcoat along and, of course, Carsen whose 6th birthday is tomorrow.

I quartered Larsen with no birds in the field.  Periodically, Tim shot and Larsen sat on the shot.  Tim had his training pistol as well as his field gun so he was able at times to shoot off a real volley: bang-bang - - - - bang, as occurs in a hunting situation often times (miss, miss, and then a hit by the other gunner).

Ultimately, Larsen flushed two pigeons.  Both times the birds flew back toward our home base which made for dog-Frank-bird situations that are ideal to enforce a sit.  While this situation is unlikely to occur in a hunt test (the gunner would not turn and shoot back from whence the group came because the gallery is sitting there), it provided the successes that are so very important to get.

I am going to work at being more relaxed and of good cheer and not anticipating a screwup.  These things will occur, of course, but now I will start expecting success.  Larsen can do this and I can put more trust in him and get the behavior that I want.

Larsen hunted quite close to me and it was difficult to get him to range out, in part, I believe, because we were rolling the birds.

Larsen did well on the hunt dead and the blind.  He is learning to trust my directions on the hunt dead (and the blind) and that obedience will lead to the reward, namely the bird.

Very heavy rain rolled in as we were leaving Bowman.

Clounds like these cover the sky from the Gulf to Canada as heavy rains move in.