Green broke dog with a green handler

This is the green I like 

Being a green handler with a green broke dog.

green 

–adjective

1. not fully developed or perfected in growth or condition; unripe; not properly aged: This peach is still green.


2. unseasoned; not dried or cured: green lumber.


3. immature in age or judgment; untrained; inexperienced: a green worker.


4. simple; unsophisticated; gullible; easily fooled.  (Well, maybe I don't like this one, but it could apply.)


5. fresh, recent, or new: an insult still green in his mind.


Two "green" handlers with their "green broke" dogs starting a Gun Dog brace

 6. full of life and vigor; young: a man ripe in years but green in heart.

E-mail to Randy Berry (Bailey and my trainer this summer) after the weekend:

"Randy,

Looks like you had some good runs.  We did too even though we didn't get around in any of the three braces.

Just got back from the South Coast Vizsla field trial last night. 1,089 miles Friday morning to Monday night.

Bailey ran in ALGD, OGD and AGD.

He had a great point on the first bird in OGD but took steps on the shot towards the downed bird.  I couldn't woop him as I had to duck or get shot by Ellis. The bird ran before it flew and then went right over my head and then Bailey's. Bailey did stop and looked back at me when I yelled.  He knew he had blown it.  I put him back in place and held him there while I went and picked up the bird and put it in my vest pocket. Then we walked back to camp.

He had a great honor on the first bird in ALGD. The judge though he was on his own bird but looking at Bailey's eyes I knew he was honoring the other dog.  This was from 35 feet away.  He held great through the flush.  A chucker was running down the road a few minutes later and crossed Bailey's path.  He was running it down according to the judge.  I didn't see it.  We were done and walked back to camp.

Sunday in AGD Bailey held point beautifully through two shots.  Ellis didn't get to shoot the first bird because it flew right over the judge's head, but got the second bird we came across about 5 minutes later.  Right to hand  Bailey came with the bird from 50 yards away.  Bailey was running big for the judge who had stated he wanted to see "some big running."  The judge, D'Alasandro, was following me after the gunners and other judge followed our birdless bracemate.   The three of us crossed some wide open space to the far ridge at about 20 minutes out.  Bailey went behind a huge rock and the judge said Bailey pushed up a bird.  Bailey had run around the rock so fast he must have just spooked it up, according to the judge, but he did chase.  I didn't see that one either.

D'Alasandro let me finish the round even though we were out. The other handler was far to the rear with the gunners and other judge with his GSP.   Bailey pointed one more bird with great style and I blanked it off.

The judge told me without the bump Bailey, in his opinion, would have won AGD.  He was the best looking dog he had seen over the weekend and he liked how he was "put together."

The things you worked with me and Bailey on are slowly coming together.  We are still green but we are getting better each time out."

Posted by the senior member of "The Green Team."

It's just Bailey

Just returned from four days and 1,089 miles on the road going to and back from the South Coast Vizsla trial.  Have some good shots and good stories but I'm too tired right now.  These pictures are for a friend who wanted recent pictures of Bailey at 2 1/2 years old. Here are just a few.

 Some local photographers were at the field trial and I am sure they got some good shots also. 

At the entrance to the South Coast Vizsla Trial

 I asked them to e-mail me.



Santa Barbara dog friendly beach December 2010



More stories and pictures to come during he week.  Stay tuned.

I walk - therefore I am

A walk last year in the Cascades of Oregon

During a rain soaked and cold field trial last weekend I sat at the keyboard of my laptop while in our RV and wrote the below "poem" to walking.

On a bright day after Thanksgiving, Bailey, Chloe and I took a walk in the hills above the suburban town of Walnut Creek that we call home.


There is a poetic essence to a walk on “Black Friday” where for two hours you see no one except for a few others off in the distance walking their dogs. “Happy Black Friday” the young man at the drive through espresso shop told me as I was heading to the “hills” at 7am. “Thanks, I’ll be enjoying the non-crowds.”


Walking in the hills has always been my passion. Give me a dirt trail and good weather and I am in heaven. This has been the case since I was 5.


A meadow north of Crater Lake Oregon



I started my morning on a two lane road out of my driveway and then on to a larger road to an even larger expressway that took me to smaller artery road that crossed the one lane road that went up the hill to where we park. All in all about a half hour drive. Once the Jeep was parked and the dogs were unloaded we started out on our two-hour walk.


Spring time in the Cascades



As Bailey and Chloe ran ahead and enjoyed the scents and textures of nature on a late November morning, I relished the enjoyment of the weather and surroundings. The well-worn East Bay Park District trail opened up to a huge bowl of brush and natural vegetation after about a mile.

 Bailey and Chloe enjoyed the warmth of the sun as they ran off the normal beaten path used by hundreds of local hikers. The temperature was under freezing (29 degrees) but the sun felt good on the skin and the winds were light out of the south.
Both dog’s tails were up at the extreme happy attitude angle.

My life's good and is missing nothing up here in the hills.


The established trail became an open field.  Out of the field a small cow trail headed up a valley.  At the head of the small valley the trail became just the side of a hill with no visible trial at all.

Both the dogs and I found this wild and undeveloped hilly terrain heaven on earth. We don’t need holiday store sales or specials. The warm sun bathing me and my happily running dogs out in nature is as close to heaven as I need to experience until I actually make that transition.


Poems and fancy worded prose can not describe a walk with free running hunting dogs in the open spaces that are scattered through the urban landscape of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Go out every day for a walk with your dogs.  Get addicted to walking.  You will feel a great longing if your feet miss walking across the earth for more than a day.  This happens once the true addiction takes hold.

Faith-based Vizsla training

The weather up in the hills was cold and damp.  Visibility 50 feet.

This morning's training for Bailey was based on a Cesar Milan show I watched last night.  Cesar talked about how dog's senses should be emphasized and sight is the least important.

Dogs, like our Vizsla, use their senses much differently than we humans.  In ranking of importance is:

1. audio
2. smell
3. sight

Humans are more like:

1. sight
2. audio
3. smell





Sometimes you can see your dog, but today you just had to believe in your dog.



 So this morning at the crack of dawn, I took Bailey and Chloe out for some field training based on audio and smell.

We went up to the top of Briones Road and started our walk in the clouds on a moist and cold December morning.  Bailey had his training collar on and I had the transmitter and my whistle around my neck.

One of the field trial traits that I need to break Bailey of is "yo-yoing" back to me.  Judges are looking for hunting dogs that are hunting in a pattern most effective to find game (upland birds.)  A dog running back to the hunter is wasting time and energy.

Bailey had learned, since he was young, as we walked off-leash to stay in touch with me.  He would come back to me when he felt "nervous" that he had been gone too long.

I wanted him to check in regularly because their are dangers for a young dog in the "woods."

In a field trial, this is wasted energy in the eyes of the judges.

  An adult upland bird dog needs to have confidence.  It is expected that the dog is out hunting ahead of his master and that the dog "knows" his master is behind him.





A bright sunny day.  Today you wouldn't see the people on the ridge.





So in fog that was so thick the most you could see was 50 feet ahead Bailey and Chloe ran through the open spaces.  If Bailey chose to come back toward me unasked, two short toots on the whistle followed by a momentary tap on the training collar turned Bailey back "forward."

Over the 90-minute period that we walked up in the open hills, 80 percent of the time Bailey and Chloe were out of my "sight."  I had to "trust" that Bailey and Chloe could use their other stronger senses to keep in touch with me, even if I couldn't see them.

it worked great!  I keep calm as I "knew" they were around.  We have walked hundreds, if not thousands of miles of hill trials over the last two years.  I would never recommend this unless you have an extreme "bond" with your dogs and then they still might get lost.



I will continue to work all winter with Bailey to comfortably hunt ahead of me and he will know that I will be there behind him. 

It is my responsibility to give three short toots on the whistle if I change directions so he can adjust his run to stay "in front."

Great times working with wonderful dogs.  Have faith in your dogs.  It isn't easy to trust their senses to know where we are.