Sat 16th, round two

Our UPS Lady, (who has the supplements for the dogs) and her husband Dan, were coming today to see Jessie fly. I agreed to film a testimonial for their product, as it has helped Indy, our 16 year old Setter more than I can say. I had earlier thought that I was going to have to put her down because she was in so much pain. With the addition of the supplements, that time has not yet come. She was sleeping all the time, and in a lot of pain. While she isn't out working with the other dogs she is much more aware of her surroundings and has enough of a reduction in pain to enjoy life again. Dogs have few enough days in the sun as it is.

When I set this up, I had intended to fly at the ranch next door, but the gun hunters had been there for two days, and I was unsure what kind of an effect this would have on the duck populations, so I rolled Dart out of the hanger to see if there was anything left over there to hunt.

It has been a long time since I have been able to fly, and I would not have gone today due to the soft ground, if I did not need to know what we were going to find over there. The weather has been fairly dry for the last week so I had hopes that the ground had set up enough to not do much damage. I walked the runway with the dogs this morning and it seemed to be OK. The temps were in the mid 40's so I rolled it out about 11:30 and did my preflight, adding a half quart of oil, and fired it up. As you can see the clouds are low, and there was a slight cross wind.

Randy and I had hunted the place pretty hard, and rousted the ducks off the ditches pretty energetically.  We had no problem finding ducks and even having them come back into the spots that we had just flushed them out of. We didn't have guns though, and that seems to make a lot of difference.

You can see the creek and potholes in this picture that the ducks like to hang out in, but today they were empty. The Lake also only had four Coots on it. I did not see any Geese at all, so there would be no use to hunt  here today and quite likely for quite a while.  While I was disappointed, it was nothing compared to having put Jessie up over an empty pond.

Teri and Dan showed up and after a bit we loaded up to see what Arock would have to offer. The pond that was still frozen two days ago, had an open spot that was so crowded with Mallards that there was no open water at all. Jessie was a bit lower in weight than I prefer. Still well able to fly, but likely to be a bit more anxious than is good for success.

We parked and climbed over the fence to get into the right field to get into position. The Hay field has been grazed by lots of cows, and there are lots of apparently irresistible, at least to Curly, cow pies lying every where. Curly was running around like crazy with his nose to the ground, much like what you would expect if it was bird scent that was filling his nostrils, rather than bull shit.  It will be several days before I let him lick me again. At least he was particular, not just any cow pie would do, but some were definitely irresistible. I in turn was frustrated by the fact that while my shock collar call button would work, the red one that makes him pee down both legs was on the fritz.  Oh well, who am I to denigrate his pleasures.

Jess circled the pond a bit lower than I would have preferred, most likely due to the lower weight that I mentioned earlier. I was very pleased to find the little com radio lying on the ground that I had apparently lost the last time that Jessie attacked me. It had apparently fallen out of my vest and had been lying on the ground since Nov 18th exposed to the rain and snow. I turned it on the batteries were still up and it worked just fine.

We did our best rush up the side of the dam and I yelled for all I was worth. The ducks came up in a cloud and Jess slashed through them, and I lost sight of her in all the wings. Finally when the dust and feathers cleared, she was sitting on the bank and a Mallard was sitting in the water just off the edge. Apparently she had smashed him into the water.

We walked back to the truck, I called her to the fist, and fed her half of a Pigeon breast and put her into the truck. When we got back home, I fed her the rest of the pigeon. Season closes the 24th. Not sure at this time whether I will fly her again before the season closes.