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Show fFiiii M lop "Anyone who is interested in the highest degree of excellence ex-cellence that a foot-paced bird dog can attain should be cognizant cog-nizant of two significant events, which took place in the fall of 1975," writes Jerome B. Robinson, Gundogs Editor of "Sports Afield." "First, on October 4 through 5, at the Moosehorn Wildlife Refuge, the Maine Bird Dog Club held a wild-bird field trial in which woodcock and grouse were the only birds sought. SECOND, THE North American Woodcock Championship Cham-pionship Corporation of New Brunswick announced plans to hold a woodcock futurity field trial in conjunction with the Annual Woodcock Championship Cham-pionship which the same club inaugurated five years ago. " These two events are of unequaled importance to all gunners who hunt on foot in heavy cover, since it is from the winners of these trials that the best foot-shooting gundogs of the future are most likely to be bred. THAT IS a strong statement, sure to raise the ire of the average field-trial follower. But, the fact is that among field trials in the Northeastern States, only the woodcock trials held in New Brunswick, and now in Maine, seek to honor the type of dog which the ardent walking bird hunter would want as his personal gundog. The top woodcock dogs are not pottering, shoestring dogs, but neither are they typical, all-age field-trial winners which race from one birdy-looking birdy-looking objective to the next. IN WOODCOCK cover, the whole course is a solid birdy-looking birdy-looking objective, and the dog that wins a woodcock trial will have covered all of it with a fast, stylist pace, pointing and handling his birds with elegant sytle and manners, but his range will be suited to the type of cover which bird hunters commonly investigate, inves-tigate, and his pace will accommodate ac-commodate that of a man on foot slowly making his way through heavy cover. You will see no horses at woodcock trials; handlers, judges and gallery plunge into the alders and walk behind the dogs just as does a bird hunter. THE DOGS wear bells on their collars so that their ground pattern can be heard -when it can't be seen because of the heavy growth. The dogs that win will hunt to the limit of bell range and maybe a mite beyond- but if the bell is; out of earshot for more than a minute or two, that dog better be found on point with a bird solidly located or he will be faulted for lack of handling responsiveness. There is nothing artificial about a woodcock trial. The birds are wild native game birds being hunted in their natural na-tural habitat, and the dogs that do well in these trials epitomize epi-tomize what the bird hunter seeks in his own dogs. RUFFLED GROUSE are commonly found along the courses in a Woodstock trial, and a winning dog must be impeccable in his ability to handle these wily customers as well. |