Spring Fever at ATB

TOP COLLAGE:  Treasure & John     BOTTOM COLLAGE: True & John

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A GREAT weekend all the way around.  It included a wonderful birthday celebration for our grandson where our entire family was gathered and our neighbors as well.  I love seeing all 7 grandchildren playing together, it just blesses my heart.  I was also happy that my nieces could all be there with Hannah being home from college. Maryann cooked a lovely dinner and we all gathered around the table to sing Happy Birthday to Callum. Boomer, their Brittany, was a part of the early festivities as well. I had the added enjoyment of our son pointing out a beautiful pair of cardinals sitting in the appletree.  Couldn't believe the difference in the weather an hour away, there was no snow at all while back at home the snowpiles still tower about 9 feet high around our yard in places, and don't mention the mud.

Sunday began with a confirmation call from our friends Pam and Sam to see if we still wanted to do some more training with the dogs. The answer was yes indeed!  It was great because Gibson, True, and Treasure were all together - it was a family affair for sure.  And pretty Miss Paris of course was part of it all as well.  The dogs all had a good run before birds were involved, just enough to stretch their legs together. It was pretty cold and windy so Pam and I supervised from the truck while Sam and John worked the dogs one at a time on the birds.  This was the very first time Treasure has been out on birds since late summer 2010 and certainly the first real adventure to the fields since being bred and having her beautiful litter of 8 pups earlier this year.  Treasure deserved this outing - she was so excited and I enjoyed observing her as she realized birds were definitely part of this great adventure.  It was terribly windy and I know it was hard for all of the dogs but they really all had some nice bird work.  Each dog has their own style and they are at different levels but all of them know what they were born to do and do it well.  Pam was able to get out and take some nice shots of Gibson on point. All of the dogs established solid and stylish points and handled well for Sam and John.  Shots from the blank pistols were fired over them when birds flushed and with the way the wind was today they blew across the sky to land elsewhere.  We can always expect more of an older more experienced dog and Gibson is no exception to this - he was a pleasure to observe as was Treasure who was just so happy to be OUT OUT OUT!   Paris has just as much style in the field as she has in the ring and also had some nice finds.  It was very meaningful to me personally to see True working in the footsteps of his parents and the Brittanys behind him. He held my attention the entire time.  I love seeing the teamwork between John and True and it makes me know my decision last year to give him a summer in the field was the best one for True.  It was an amazing morning and afternoon of refresher gundog training.  True needs to earn 2 more sets of qualifying scores to finish and receive his AKC Junior Hunter title.  Paris needs just 1 more set to finish hers. Our day together wound down over a late lunch together in town with good food and good conversation.  I look forward to doing this again very soon!  I know the dogs do too and hopefully so do Pam and Sam!  Take care and God Bless, John, Ann and All Things Brittany