New Lyme Vaccine, test results

Rock of Ages

Spy seems to have come down w/ anaplasmosis. Thought he was going to die last Mon./Tues -- shivers, couldn't stand, cried out in pain a couple times, could barely raise his head. But put him on doxicycline Thursday and he was ready to hunt again Friday -- 4 wc and 1 grouse point, 2 wc killed, 1 hr. He's his old self again.















I've gotten Brody out a few times since getting back from WI. It's always been maybe half an hour for exercise if nothing else. Tuesday afternoon (10/27) I had 15 minutes to run Brody before I had to pick up the kids. I put him down in a wet aldery area. Lots of white wash (day old?). Brody went on point.... but started flagging. He wouldn't take a step so I walked in and put up a low, weak-flying woodcock, which he chased out of sight. He came back around and continued hunting, and pretty soon went on point. Again tail flagging but wouldn't take a step . This time when I walked in a wc sprang up strongly. Easy shot. Bang. I missed. This time Brody just watched it fly away. I still haven't shot a bird over a long-held, statuesque point by Brody.

Wednesday afternoon. This time I had an hour. I brought Brody back to the same covert as yesterday. Ten minutes into it I bumped a woodcock that Brody didn't see. We continued hunting in the direction the bird flew. Brody was ahead, down slope among fir, cedar, and alders in a fairly soppy area, just about the right distance for land fall of the bumped bird. The bell went silent. I waited a bit for him to start moving again, and when he didn't, I moved ahead to find him. It took me a good minute, but there he was statue still in the thick wet stuff. A dark dog is hard to see in the dark woods. I moved ahead of the dog, approaching from the side. I was startled by a rustling of vegetation and a brown blur of hare hair hopped away. One jingle of the bell told me Brody saw or heard the bunny, but stayed put. I took two more steps and up twittered a timberdoodle flying right at me until it was about 5 yards away, at which time it turned away but quickly dipped low around a fir thicket and it was gone. Arghh! Brody had turned to rock, but my hands had turned to stone. Stoned by the woodcock. I really want to kill every bird pointed like that, to reward the good behavior.

So Thursday, a potential buyer of our house was visiting with a house inspector. I got them started, then got out of their hair for awhile. This gave me an hour and a half to try to get Brody into birds. Most of the first 60 minutes where uneventful. Then we worked along an old road lined by a stand of jack pine sloping down either side of the ridge into aspen and alder. I heard a grouse flush, so whistled Brody in to hunt the vicinity. He went on point about 30 yards into the pines. I walked in to flush, and a grouse busted out of the tree over my head, and my one shot did no harm. We followed, and again Brody pointed, this time looking up into the canopy to a spot from which a grouse burst forth. This time my load of steel 6s knocked it down -- Brody's first grouse on a solid point that lasted more than a few seconds.

Further down the ridge Brody's bell indicated he was moving slowly and pausing. In a little while the bell went silent. As I crept to his point from higher ground a bird flushed from about 30 feet up an aspen, and my shot broke a wing, at least. At the shot, the bird Brody had been pointing flushed.... toward me. I turned and took a going-away shot as it banked and flew down slope. The grouse went out of sight as I shot, but I did see a small cloud of feather dander hanging in the air in its wake. Shooting birds over Brody's solid points was just what I wanted. However a potential downside to this happy story is that both these last two birds were live on the ground so Brody then caught them (notice one bob-tailed bird in the photo). Time will tell whether he still wants to point, or if he thinks he can just run 'em down.

Last day for woodcock is Saturday, so I'll be out tomorrow trying to add a couple more birds to the larder for Thanksgiving appetizers.

Grouse Camp Snippets

First, thanks to all the spouses and kids for your understanding/tolerance/encouragement about the grousers going off to camp in the Maine North Woods for a week. It was great to spend time with these characters and to recreate ourselves. I think it's safe to say that we all really needed this. Thanks a bunch.









Stella showed great intestinal fortitude by getting aggressive on bird scent and putting up a couple grouse before her camp experience was cut short by a trip to the operating room for sockectomy. I think that bird scent will be locked in her noggin for good, and Josh will be enjoying the autumn woods and bringing home many more birds with the help of Stella.





Pete's pup Lilly is full of hunt -- she didn't want to stop to pose for a photo atop this old log. She was fun to watch in the woods, stalking anything and everything, but especially grouse. I'm really looking forward to hunting over her a year from now.






Lilly was so birdy that you'd be on pins and needles, ready at all times for a bird encounter -- we had to remind ourselves that this was training. The hunting will come next year.






Camp was loaded with pups and 11-year-old dogs -- 4 of each, with Artemis in the middle. Baxter, one of the elders, didn't hunt but helped to entertain the ever energetic Conley (aka Meatloaf, white buffalo, and twenty other names). The pup appears larger than life in this photo due to the fact that he is larger than life.






Conley executing a stylish retrieve.... or a quick getaway.







Cody, one of the elders, put this grouse right over Path Walker. Bang Bang.....................Bang.
And that was that.







You could spend all day in the coverts above Drowned Road. Great views and hunting.





It was good to have a gunner like Richie Fella along to honor the dog's points. (it's not every Grouse Camp that one can say that about Richie Fella, so enjoy it Rico!)






A nice bird taken by a good shot over a pretty point.







Spy had this woodcock (bottom center) pinned. On this trip I recall seeing 4 of Spy's pointed birds (1 woodcock and 3 grouse) on the ground, which usually makes the bird bullet-proof. But we were 4 for 4 on these birds. Spy and Katie are littermates, 11 years old, spawn of Butch.





This, plus one more grouse (pictured above in Conley's grip), was the take for Rich, Pete, and Andy the last day of the hunt. When I got home and showed the kids this picture they wanted to see the birds... which of course by then were cleaned, wrapped, and frozen.

..... So I had to go out and get a fresh one....




Nearly had a woodcock tug-o-war a couple times, so I'd better bring home two (or multiples thereof) next time.

Katie update

Well gang, Katie is officially on the disabled list for the foreseeable future. Bad timing for sure.

She spent the day at the vet's, and the good news is that nothing is broken. The bad news is that they suspect she has strained or torn a muscle in her shoulder. Although she's putting weight on the leg now, they caution against running her in the next few weeks so as not to re-tear or re-injure the muscle.

So that sucks. But at least she doesn't need $2000 worth of surgery, I suppose. So she's got that going for her, which is nice. . . .

Katie update

They did the surgery yesterday, the vet said it was a clean tear, and "fresh"... apparently they don't tend to see these injuries this fresh because most people let their injured dogs walk around limping for weeks on end. The doctor did say that Katie's other knee has a fair amount of slop in it too, so they're already bracing us for the likelihood of going through this again in a couple of months on the other knee. The good news is that during the initial exam the vet thought Katie's hips were bad, but after anesthesia and x-rays, she said the hips look okay. basically just age-relative degeneration in all the joints, and the Lyme disease probably doesn't help with that.

We went through this about 12-13 years ago with one of our Boston terriers, and at that time it was an 800 dollar procedure. Needless to say this is basically breaking the bank in an unexpected way, so I've actually gone to our friendly credit union so that we can still pay our regular bills. Going through this again on the other knee? not sure that makes economic sense, but what the heck can you do otherwise . . . let the dog limp around for the next five years? oh well. it's only money.


Prognosis is actually pretty good that she'll hunt again, and this year--no reason not to expect a total and full recovery. As PW said, good thing it happened this time of the year, since I'll be spending all summer rehabbing her: leashed walks, eventually swimming, etc. I'm just hoping the other knee doesn't blow out the night before grouse season.

Other than that, she's at the vet's for two nights, so we'll pick her up Thursday.

that's about that. I do really appreciate everyone asking about her. Other than the money part of it, I feel okay about it. We got her in quickly, she didn't tear it and re-tear it by running on it for a long time, so I'm hopeful we'll be back in business come August or so. we'll see. Keeping our fingers crossed.

The pics are from a pretty decent web site at http://www.thepetcenter.com/sur/ACL.html.