Cove Mountain Kennels

Here’s a suggestion, remember to bring your dog in the house or garage Friday night, the fourth of July. Even if your dog doesn’t seem to be gun-shy, it is still a good idea to get them away from the sound of fireworks. If your dog shows some noise sensitivity, this is doubly important. Prevention of gun-shyness is 100 times easier than trying to cure it. When hunting there’s the reward of the bird at the sound of the shot. With fireworks, there’s no reward, just a loud noise. It’s easy to bring the dog inside on the fourth. If you’re going to be out of town, it’s worth the time to ask a neighbor to do it.

 

Ok, one of my pet peeves is a dog loose in the back of a truck. How many times have I heard, “he’ll learn not to jump out the hard way,” or some variant? This kind of red neck thinking really irks me. I have seen lots of dead dogs along the highway, and even come across one that wasn’t yet dead, but his back end was so busted up it was a tragic sight. Just put them in a dog box. If you can’t afford that, at least get an eye bolt and 2′ of chain and clip up the dog’s collar so that he can’t get his front shoulders over the edge of the truck.

I’m sure this guy was wondering what I was doing taking pictures. I was ticked. The dog was back and forth and all over the back of the truck. Several times he wobbled and regained his footing.

 

Photo: www.geo-outdoors.info

Rattlesnakes and dogs scares me, especially gun dogs. Snakes seem to hold a special interest for them; they must smell like a game bird. I know when I did a lot of hunting in the Nebraska Sandhills my dogs would commonly point box turtles. They would point them with almost as much intensity as a prairie chicken. So a reptile must smell somewhat like a bird. When a dog is curious, or wants to investigate a rattlesnake, only bad can come of it. This is what scares me.

The other day I went fly fishing up a small stream not far from my house. I thought about taking a dog or two, I seldomly go anywhere without a dog. At the last minute I decided not to since it was going to be fairly hot out. Man, was I ever grateful. I had one of the snake-iest days of my life. I ran into 5 rattlesnakes while fishing. By the end of the trip I was so jumpy I could hardly fish. Rattlesnakes arn’t agressive and like to give plenty of warning, but sometimes their buzz is covered up by the sound of the creek. I was so glad I didn’t have the dogs.

 

Back in October 07 (link) and again in January 08 (link) I wrote about a huge curl leaf mahogany tree we found while grouse hunting. We went back with the official state big tree scorer today from the Division of Forestry and re-measured the tree. We were excited to see that it was not only the state record, but also the world record largest curl leaf mahogany (Cercocarpus ledifolius) tree. Keep in mind that these are typically more like a tall shrub than a tree. A good sized mahogany is  as big around as your thigh and about twice your height, so this tree was huge. It was a fun field trip with folks from the State Division of Forestry, Division of Wildlife, BLM and Forest Service. We are now entered in the record book for the world’s record mahogany tree. We stole the record from California.

Oh yeah, another funny thing was when we went back, there were grouse feathers at the base of the tree. The day we found the tree, we were hunting dusky grouse and were skunked.

 

If you live in Utah and didn’t draw a deer or elk tag, today is the day to get online and purchase remaining permits. There are still spike elk and any-bull elk tags, as well as archery deer permits. Last year I my hunting buddy waited to purchase his archery deer tag and didn’t get a tag, because they were sold out.

If you are interested, it is also time to put in for the antlerless big game drawing. Go to the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources web site and click on the on-line licence sales.

 

I came across this indoor dog crate on-line today. Other than on their website, I have never seen this product, but thought it looked nice. They are made by Wooden Creek in Dunedin, FL. They are listing them at $185 and have a sale price of $149. I think it is a great idea, if you have your dog inside, and occasionally use the crate when you have guests, or for the dog to sleep in at night, but don’t like the look of the plastic dog crate in the house, this is a great solution. This looks like a nice piece of furniture and would be a nice addition to most rooms. Of course, you wouldn’t want to put a puppy in it, or any dog that has a habit of chewing on their dog box.

Looking at Wooden Creek’s other items on their website, they have a raised wooden dog feeding dish holder, a dog gate/holder, plus a large selection of beautiful Grandfather clocks and other furniture. It might be worth a look.

 

For the Memorial Day holiday we got out and scouted for ruffed grouse. It’s a beautiful time of year to be out, things are greening up and the early spring flowers are coming out. We saw elk everywhere we went. This time of year the ruffed grouse are drumming and a little easier to find. The thumping of their wings against their puffed out chest carries amazingly far. The other thing about it is that it can be deceptively hard to pinpoint. If you are able to locate them, they are sometimes easy to sneak up on to within 20 or 30 yards so you can get a great show as they strut their stuff on a log. They are really awesome birds to watch. I was able to locate six or eight of them in a morning. This fall they won’t be on the exact log, but there is a good chance that there will be some in the area.

 

 

If you are interested in really learning about training pointing dogs, Dave Walker, author of “The Bird Dog Training Manual,” is presenting a pointing dog seminar this Saturday and Sunday in Salt Lake City, UT. I am really excited about this event. I use a lot of Dave’s techniques in my training. Dave has been very helpful with my training and some specific issues with certain dogs I have been working with, so I am looking forward to meeting him in person and seeing him apply some of his techniques.

I believe they still have some room for additional participants, so if you are interested, look up Dave’s website at www.davewalkerdogs.com on the Seminars link on the Training dropdown menu for the contact information. The seminar is being sponsored by the Wasatch Front Brittany Club. The seminar is at the Lee Kay Center and starts at 9:00 each day.