Ellie earned her HR title Saturday. I gave a bad cast on the land blind, but recovered pretty quick, one whistled the water blind. Got a simo double when the bird boys got confused, judge said no bird, I said "naw" and Ellie picked 'em slap up on a string. If nothing else, the beast can mark. Ellie was in duck spitting mode, but we sort of worked through it with a lot of glaring at each other. Other than that, she worked like a champ. Travis somehow managed to get Sonya to willingly sit there for the bucket ceremony and get soaked. I don't think we have EVER been to a hunt test when at least one of us did not get wet.
I was really proud of my wife, she ran Ellie sunday in Seasoned again to get experiance as a handler, her first time to handle with the gun, and the dog was in hyperwired mode. Sonya struggled with the pump guns, since the stocks were way too long for her, and she was really nervous. She took the little black adreneline bomb and lined the land blind, picked up the marks, dog sat like a stone on the walk up. Ellie was bird spitting, Barlow says it was the gassed birds, and gave us a tip to deal with it, and Sonya handled that like a champ.
Went to water, and the dog was WIRED. Sonya had to wait halfway to the line while some fellow held court on the bucket 'bout why his dog should not have been dropped. I could see her little doggie brain simmering. When she got on the little point at the line Sonya had to wait again while the marshalls stopped someone from throwing training marks on the grounds that were visible from the line.

This took several minutes, and Ellie was 'bout to bust a gut to get to the marks they were tossing in the field. Sonya opted NOT to take a rerun, and actually got EM to lie down quietly while the marshal dealt with all that. This was most amazing, considering she had smoke coming out of her black floppy ears at this point. Ellie then smacked the marks, and then Sonya sent here on the blind, which was a short channel blind

. Ellie took the line, swam the whole channel, came out 2 feet from the bird, and Sonya thought she had it, and did NOT blow a stop whistle. OOOPS. Ellie headed straight up the draw towards Corinth with all four tires spinning. She slipped 3 straight whistles before Sonya got her stopped, took one angle in and snagged the duck, and came on back. The judges dropped her for the whistle refusals, which they should have.
The judges could NOT have been nicer to my wife, they knew she was nervous, and had a HANDFULL of dog on Sunday. Tina Soprano in particular gave Sonya a lot of encouragement during the test, and came and sought her out after the test to talk to her and encourage her some more. I cannot imagaine a set of nicer, fairer judges. I would be glad to run under them any time.
Through no ones fault, Sonya had some real tough luck with delays, and fought through it like a champ and kept the dog from going ballistic, and almost lined the blind of death that dropped so many dogs. She did not get the pass, but I was really proud of how she stepped up. Wasn't no one's fault but da trainers!
Old Hatchie put on a great test, good folks, good grounds, great food, and a lot of portolets. Barlow was everywhere, hiding behind every tree almost. Barlowmania!
Sorry for the long post. We going to work on stop whistles this AM.