a thread i wrote a year ago about my old dog jess

[washwildfowler]

i wrote this thread on another forum a year ago today when i was out of action with a broken foot , i thought some of the pigeon watch members would enjoy reading it ....i hope you enjoy ...

 

 

 

 

well with me being out of action for a good while and nothing much to do but sit about and think, i asked the wife to get some of my old photo's out this afternoon and came across a few of my old dog jess ,so with me being out of acton and not being able to write about any fowling that i would have been doing , i thought i would tell you about my old fowling dog jess ....so here goes ..

 

well when i first saw jess he was 10 weeks old and belonged to my best mate chris , now chris has taught me all i know about wildfowling on the foreshore and we were out all the time together wildfowling, pigeon shooting, and lamping , we helped train each others dogs , so jess knew me really from the start, if chris was not going fowling then i would go pick jess up and take him with me , he worked just as good for me as he did for chris.At the time i had a young bitch called jan she was only 4 months old, so she was too young to work that season, now i must say jan was a decent bitch and never reached her full potential which was down to me really ...

 

 

well 2 years passed ,and for reasons i will not go into chris had to pack up shooting and gave jess to me , jess was just turning into a great wildfowling dog , all the ground work had been done , he was learning from me and i was learning from him. well after a few months jess had settled in with me and my family , at the time all i wanted to do in the winter was just go wildfowling , through the summer i would work hard save like mad then come september , i would slow down a bit on work and go wildfowling but come october that was it , i packed up work and i just went fowling, beating ,and lamping and every where i went jess came with me ...

 

dont get me wrong i would do the odd days work here and there , i had the best of both worlds really because my dad was a farm manager on a brassica farm and i worked on the farm too , so i could either go down for a morning flight first then go to work do what i had to do, then go home for a bath then down for either night flight of tide flight , or i would be down for morning flight then to work , or go to work at 2am then morning flight what ever it took to get us down the marsh ... but all the time i was doing my work jess was with me even if i went to the shop he was with me ...

 

 

I never had to tell jess to do anything when fowling, he just knew what i was thinking and i knew what he was thinking , now the first time i knew jess was special we were on the front of the marsh on the flood water , there was loads of ducks flighting that morning and a pack of wigeon came into the decoys, i dropped 2 with my first shot and took another 2 while flaring. jess just jumped out of the creek and just stood watching the pack of wigeon flying away , i shouted get on boy but he just stood staring at the pack of wigeon then 1 just peeled out of the pack and he took off like a greyhound after it , i thought to myself how the **** did you know that boy ...

 

we use to take jess lamping with me on the farm , he would just watch the lamp and wait for the thud and he would be gone to fetch what i had shot , no sooner had he gone he was back and he would jump straight in the back of the pick up truck and put them in a pile in the back he never use to try to eat them just dropped them in his pile and watched for his next chance ...

 

 

i have seen the dog do things that was unbelievable . if there was a diver he would go under the water to get the duck and i mean right under so he could not be seen , i use to call him bolly eyes because on last light at flight time he would just stare into the the sky, eyes wide open looking and listening for wing beats from the ducks ....i remember one hard winter there was ice flows coming down the river , one day it was snowing real hard and bitterly cold and jess was in and out the river retrieving ducks , i just happen to look down at him and there was icicles all over him and his coat was frozen hard but it never bothered him , i just packed up and walked off .....

 

he would go down the marsh with me and the kids in the summer swimming with the boys in the creeks or just sat watching us swim , i would take him to work in the summer with me he would either lay on the end field or walk at the side of me when cutting brassica from the fields ...

 

jess would never come into the house for a start you could leave the door open and as long as he could see me that was fine , if he could not see me from there , he would go round to the patio doors and lay there and if i got up to go into the kitchen , he would then come round to the back door and lay there ..if it was real cold i would bring him into the house and sit him near the gas fire but for a start he would not have it as soon as you moved he was gone and run to the back door and wanted outside , so i use to get one of the kids to sit with him , then he got use to it and was fine after that but he would never come in the house unless he was told to ...

 

he made some outstanding retrieves but the best one that sticks in my mind was the last day of the season and i was on the front where the 2 rivers meet tabs head its called , i had shot a couple of mallard and was just about to pack up when i could see some pinks coming from way back as they were getting closer , i could here them calling and they were heading straight at me a bit tall i thought but a it was the last day of the season so what the **** i thought , well i could say to jess get your head down ane he would tuck his head right in until i was up and shooting then he would be up at the side of me looking in the direction i was shooting .. well i hit a pink hard with my 3rd shot and it set its wings and turned back on itself and glided out over the flood water and over the river out onto the mud jess was out the creek and watched it glide out over the mud and then he was off swam the flood water out onto the rocks had a shake into the the river swam the river out the river had a shake and set off over the mud picked his pink and was back to me doing the same again that retrieve will stay with me for the rest of my days ....

 

if i ever went to scotland then the lads always asked if i would take jess with me , he made another good retrieve on the tay one morning all i will say he was like a dot when he got to the pink .

 

well as they all do jess got old , he was 14 when i had to have him put to sleep , he had gone off his food for a few days , i came home from work one day and he was laid at the front of his kennel , he could not lift his head and he could not move , i opened the door and i could see a big lump on his front left leg , i lifted him up and took him into the kitchen, i knew what i had to do but i had to build myself up for it and let the kids and the wife say there goodbyes, , i sat outside the vets for a hour before i took him in ...i had him cremated and i spread his ashes over our favourite spot on the marsh , i have 2 regrets 1.. i never got a pup from jess . 2 ..taking him to the vets to be put to sleep ...if you remember at the begining i said that jan never reached her full potential because of me, well now you know why because i chose jess over her every time and she never had the chance to prove her full potential and i ended up giveing her to a friend ...

 

here is a few pics

 

 

 

 

jes after a morning flight

 

 

 

 

jess after another hard morning with a mixed bag of ducks on the 1st of september a few years back

 

 

 

jess after a hard morning with murphy as a pup

 

 

 

 

jes& jan

 

[mpk]

Nice story

[ayano3]

Lovely story, we all have special recollections of our shooting companions, some funny ones too. It's tough when we lose our closest friend after many trips out together. When I lost my black Labrador I said no more dogs, 3 weeks later I got Rhia !! They sure are man's best friend.

[Devon Fox]

I dislike these stories - Because You know they will end up sad

 

He sounds like He really was a special chap