copyright © 2005-2008
Apsley Labs

Yellow Male
DOB:2-5-1999
- Pedigree
- Kennel Club Number:Z1968407Z02
- American Kennel Club Number:SR14786301
- British Hip Scheme 0/2
- British Eye Scheme
- OFA Hip Certification

I was yellow like my father but my favorite brother was black like our mother. He was the largest of all of us and was nick named Rolly because he was round and rolled whenever he lost his balance when learning to walk.

I was delighted when the family on the estate decided that they wanted Rolly to go and live with them which meant that he was nearby. In fact when we were young I used to see him every Sunday when he came to be trained by John, along with Edward his master.

My obedience training started when I was six weeks old and by the time I was four months old I could sit, stay, come, and walk to heel off the lead. However, it was not all work as I would play with the older dogs every evening before I went to bed and as I was so young I lived in the cottage. Apparently, this was necessary to house train me and to provide me socialization skills.

At six months I moved out to the kennels and my real training started in earnest. Digby, who was at that time the leader of the pack, explained to me that the quickest way to learn how to be a working retriever was to not only learn from John, but also to watch how the more experienced dogs worked in order to please him.

The Apsley estate incorporated an arable farm that was run and managed by Rolly’s owner. There were many fields of wheat and barley but along the edge of one ran a disused railway embankment that provided dozens of rabbits with sheltered warrens. In fact we were only a few miles from Watership Down which had become famous due to the success of a book and film about the rabbits that lived there.

The problem was that on summer evenings the rabbits would leave their warren and feed on the crops that were needed to provide an income for the estate. Some years they would eat into the first thirty feet and the entire length of the field.

John devised two methods to help the farmer address this menace. The first entailed sending Oscar down a row between the crops which would cause the rabbits to bolt back towards the railway embankment where they would be dispatched by John’s trusty 12 bore in the open ground. We would be worked on a rota so that each one of us would have a fair share of retrieves.

The other method was even more effective when Oscar and Digby were working the fields on both sides while we crept along inside the embankment where the railway tracks used to run. The rabbits, scared by the dogs, would appear over the banks and make a dash for their holes-some made it, others didn’t.

By the end of my first summer I was an effective rabbit hunter but I was looking forward to retrieving birds. However, unfortunately during my first shooting season I was lucky if I was given two retrieves in a day as John did not want me to start thinking that every bird that fell out of the sky was for me to retrieve.

The following spring the farmer asked us to help with another menace that was devouring his crops, the wood pigeons. Early each morning huge flocks, sometimes consisting of hundreds of pigeons, would descend upon the green shoots and leave bare patches throughout the fields.

John would drive around the estate looking for the pigeons’ flight lines. These would change depending on the direction of the wind, time of day, and what was on the menu! We would hide in the woods and hedgerows behind camouflage nets and wait to see if the decoys that were deployed under a flight line would attract these canny birds. It was amazing to see how far away the pigeons would spot the decoys before changing course to come down and join their friends at the farmer’s table.

Retrieving pigeon is not for puppies because the feathers have a tendency to fall out easily and get stuck in the mouth, but it is good training to sit quietly in the blind and watch the older dogs dash out to make the retrieves and return to the blind before the next flight of pigeons appear. However, by the end of that summer I was making regular pigeon retrieves making sure to leave no teeth marks, as I had been taught how important it is for a retriever to be soft mouthed. Oscar told me of a dog that he competed against in a Field Trial getting disqualified because the judge said that the bird’s rib cage had been crushed during the retrieve.

By the summer of 2000 I had learned all the skills required of a working gundog. I was steady to shot no matter how many birds fell around me, I obeyed the stop and recall whistle, I obeyed hand signals to go right, left, or further back, I would take a cast even if I had not seen the fall, and swim across any water or jump any obstacle. In fact I was the finished article!

My reward was to become my master’s ‘peg’ dog on his syndicate shoot days. This was indeed an honor, as only well behaved dogs were welcome on these formal occasions. I was told to lie down about three feet in front of John as soon as we arrived at the ‘peg’ and not to move until the shooting had stopped. I can’t tell you how tempting it was not to make a break and retrieve birds as they fell, especially if John shot a left and a right, which is when both barrels are aimed, fired, and succeed in hitting the target.

I was only allowed to pick up the birds that John had shot, as it was considered bad manners to retrieve another gun’s birds, especially if they had their own dog. Once all the birds had been loaded onto the game cart we would pile into the four wheel drive vehicles and move onto the next drive. I noticed that each drive had its own name which made it easier for the game keeper to control the beaters, the pickers up, and the guns. I also noticed that throughout the day whenever we arrived at a new drive the peg number had changed by three. Apparently there are pegs for each of the eight guns and to make sure that everybody has a fair share of the driven game throughout the day everybody moves up three spaces.

This knowledge really helped when I joined the team that winter picking up on the Laverstoke shoot. Apart from us there was a lady, Heather, who sometimes had seven dogs working for her, and Neville, who had two spaniels. In fact one of Heather’s dogs, a Field Trial Champion that had competed in front of Her Majesty the Queen, was the father of Kyta who had come to live with us the previous year.

Kyta became the love of my life and we had our first litter on the 3rd August 2002 which consisted of 4 yellows and 4 black puppies. I heard everybody keep remarking how good looking they were whenever people would come to see them.

In the spring of 2003 we moved from the English countryside to the Virginian countryside in America and things started to change. This was due to John wanting us to learn a whole new set of skills required to compete in North American Field Trials and Hunting Tests. For example in England we might have to swim across a river or lake to retrieve but firstly, they were rarely very large and secondly, ninety per cent of our work was on land.

Now we had to mark three duck falls at once, remember where they were, and retrieve them crossing islands on the way. Sometimes they would fall in the water and at other times on the far shore. The main thing we noticed was the huge distances we were expected to cover which was very different to England.

I don’t know what ammunition the Americans use in their guns but it certainly has a greater range than in England as the land blinds also doubled in distance! Every Saturday and Sunday morning during our first year in Virginia we would be trained and gradually my confidence improved to a point that I can now make these lengthy retrieves. In fact I have now become an AKC Senior Hunter.