Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Test Five Is Off And Running

And began with #66 at 2:43 p.m. Here's how this test works: Water blind with shot flyer up the hill on the left, run the water blind first. The line to the water blind is more or less paralleling the left shore with kinks to it, but we'll get to that in a minute. There are two mats, one on the paved lane coming through Kammerer's property with the ponds on the right and a barbed wire fence on the left separating another field. One mat is situated on the lane and the other is down about seven steps from it near the fence. Dog and handler come to the line on the higher mat and call for the guns. The flyer is shot "out in left field" figuratively and literally and is shot right to left at 119 yards. The handler is given a number and then he/she retreats to the lower mat to run the blind from there. It is sort of a hidden entry, then up over the lane and into a cove of water and cattails, up out onto a gradual point that has an overturned boat on it about even with the flyer guns; the line at that portion of the blind is left of the boat and right of the guns. Then the dog re-enters the water and swims to and then crosses a second and more defined point. Once he/she re-enters again, this is a parallel the shore only from that moment until the dog reaches the bird out 228 yards on the pond dam at the end of the pond.
When the dog returns with this bird, he/she is then sent for the flyer from the upper mat.