Seeing little puppies on point is definitely exciting but that cute stance is just the beginning. Developing puppies into a top-notch hunting dogs or finished field trial performers will take years. The paramount time for that development is during the first few months of life.
Our goal is to raise happy, healthy, well-balanced puppies. Over the years, Jerry and I have developed a program that works. At a minimum, we feel puppies need:
• mental and physical stimulation
• exercises and introductory training to develop their natural instincts
• exposure to different situations, people and dogs
We also provide structure, stability and consistent rules. Equally important, though, we want them to enjoy life and have fun.
Detailed below are some of our puppy development and training ideas.
Time in the exercise pens
Ample time in our exercise pens allows the puppies to play and to rest at their choosing. We believe this freedom develops a physically sound dog with a calm, well-adjusted mental disposition. They also learn the invaluable lesson of how to interact with other dogs.
Barrel work
We put our puppies on a barrel where they learn to stand still with confidence. They love this exercise because they have our full attention and receive lots of praise through touching.
Retrieving
We encourage puppies to retrieve because they’re at a stage when they really want to please. Starting with a retrieving dummy we progress to freshly killed birds. A few retrieves two or three times a week is plenty and we always praise them lavishly when they bring the dummy or bird back.
Time on a stakeout chain
Especially when puppies are young and getting used to wearing a collar, we clip them to stakeout chain. They learn to give in and to be comfortable with restraint. They all struggle at first—some more than others—but all eventually do relent and relax.
Gang run
We gang run puppies from foot at eight weeks and later introduce them to group runs from four-wheeler as the next level in physical exercise. During these runs we also teach them to turn on a whistle, run to the front and handle to our voice.
Swimming and finding water
On our gang runs we swing by ponds. Not only do the puppies learn to swim (they follow May, our Labrador retriever) but they learn to cool off and drink. This method teaches them independence to find water on their own.
Some Simple Commands
We introduce preliminary commands such as HERE, KENNEL, and call their NAME using pieces of wieners as rewards. This encourages puppies to obey simple commands and create a positive association with people.
When Jerry and I sell a started or trained dog, two questions are always asked.
• How do they adapt to living in a family environment?
• How well do they bond with new owners?
The answer: very easily. Judge for yourself.
Northwoods Led Zeppelin, call name Gus
Gus is a setter male by Blue Shaquille and Houston’s Belle’s Choice whelped June 18, 2011. He was one of several from last year’s breedings that we kept to start and train. Gus was taken for group walks in pastures and in the grouse woods. He was worked on bobwhite quail in Minnesota and Tennessee as well as local grouse and woodcock. He had birds shot over his points. We introduced him to all kinds of other experiences such as being in a dog crate, being on a stake-out chain, riding in dog trailers and pickups and interacting with other dogs and people.
David and Pam recently bought Gus and have sent two messages—one after Gus’s first night and, about 10 days later, the next message.
We made it home with no problems. He didn’t make a sound the whole way home and no fuss during the night. We are spending most of our time letting him explore and adjust to the house. The picture was after getting back from a thirty minute run.
Thanks for all the time you spent with us. It was sincerely appreciated.
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Gus is doing very well. He is adjusting to the sights and sounds of the house, he sleeps through the night, he has learned to ask to go outside, we have not had an accident in the house, and we did not hear him bark until this weekend. I am very pleased with the way he is responding to his name in the field and his rapid response to “here”.
Thank you again for our opportunity to purchase Gus. We could not be happier.
Win-win-win
Jerry and I say we couldn’t be happier.
This is a win-win-win situation. David and Pam bought an older puppy whose size, personality and strengths are readily apparent. Gus will have a wonderful life in a loving family situation and will have ample hunting opportunities. Jerry and I are able to breed good dogs, train them and move them on to good homes.
Northwoods Classy Kate, setter female owned by Barry Frieler of Pequot Lakes, Minnesota, put together a string of impressive placements this spring to win the 2012 Minnesota/Wisconsin Derby of the Year.
Consistency is the the essence of Kate’s performances. Trial after trial, she put down competitive races. Her drive to find birds, classy way of going, intensity and style on point combined with a strong desire to please were her trademarks.
Kate placed three times in four starts and had finished bird work in two of them.
2nd Chippewa Valley Grouse Dog Association Open Derby
1st Minnesota Grouse Dog Association Open Derby
2nd Minnesota Grouse Dog Association Open Derby
What’s even more impressive was that Kate wasn’t trialed at all last fall. Barry is a very serious grouse hunter and he preferred to be in the woods with Kate, working her along with his other two English setters. Barry sent Kate to Tennessee with us for training on quail for the past two winters which, along with her experience on wild birds, proved too much for the competition.
Kate was sired by Northwoods Blue Ox out of Houston’s Belle’s Choice. It appears to be all in the family as she is the second winner of this award produced by Choice. Last year, Northwoods Chardonnay, out of Choice by Blue Shaquille, won. Too, both of Kate’s grandmothers, CH Houston’s Belle and Blue Silk, won this award previously.
Steve Hurdle handles 2012 National Champion Connor’s E Z Button.
A fun aspect of living for a time in another part of the country is to take advantage of what that area offers. Here in western Tennessee, Jerry and I are close to Grand Junction, which is home to the Ames Plantation and the site of the National Championship.
This year marked the 113th running of this celebrated competition, which is one of few in the country with three-hour braces. Thirty-four dogs competed in 17 braces over nine days. Last year’s champion, Touch’s Whiteout, scratched.
Randy Downs steadies Gamemaker at the morning breakaway while Fred Corder waits on his horse.
It was thrilling to be around big-name handlers like Sean Derrig, Luke Eisenhart, Colvin Davis, Robin Gates, Randy Downs, Steve Hurdle and Gary Lester. Another big draw was to see—firsthand—famous dogs like Gamemaker, In The Shadow, the setter Shadow Oak Bo and all the Erin pointers. Plus it was cool to see all the gear and the big horse trailers necessary for competition at this level.
Jerry and I chose to go on the first Friday so we could watch Gamemaker (Rock Acre Buckwheat x Therapy’s Little Bess), a handsome liver-and-white pointer owned and handled by Fred Corder, scouted by Randy Downs.
Gamemaker was braced with Connor’s E Z Button, owned by David O’Connor and handled by Steve Hurdle.
Gamemaker, Fred Corder, Steve Hurdle and Button pause at a crossing.
What an exciting brace. Button had six finds; Gamemaker had five. In the waning minutes of the brace, Gamemaker was hit by a truck when he ran across a road. But he got up, shook himself off and finished with just a slight limp.
The three judges (in orange) and the gallery cross a road on the Ames Plantation.
And, several days later on the white front porch of the Ames Plantation, Connor’s E Z Button was named this year’s National Champion.
Chris Mathan of The Sportsman’s Cabinet and Strideaway was with us. Jerry and Ben McKean, a friend from Minnesota, rode the following Tuesday to see In The Shadow and Erin’s Whiskey River.
The world is a book, and those who do not travel, read only one page.
–St. Augustine
Earlier this winter, Jerry and I took some time off and traveled to Georgia. The warm climate was one draw, as was the opportunity to see historic quail plantations set in piney woods. Several days in a cottage on an island off the coast near Savannah was also on the itinerary.
Here are the highlights of our trip.
Best puppy/exercise pens
Dog trainers in Georgia are serious about their puppy raising. At most of the plantations and training facilities, it was clear that much time, money and energy is spent on giving puppies a good start in life.
What struck us most were the really big, really nice puppy pens. There was ample space for a dozen or more puppies to exercise, play, rest and find shade. One plantation had fenced an area about the size of a football field.
For the record, all the litters we saw were pointers.
Chance to see old friends
Jim Tande and Chuck Wingard have been friends of ours for a long time—going back to the late 1980s/early 1990s when we were all field trialing in the grouse woods. We’ve gotten puppies from their litters and they’ve bought from us. We’ve bred dams to their sires and vice-verse. An auspicious start to our pointer line was when Jim’s extraordinary CH Northern Dancer (call name War) was bred to a 6X grouse champion from Maine, Vanidestine’s Rail Lady, and produced our CH Dance Smartly.
Jim and Chuck have moved on to horseback shooting dog and all age competition and, since both are now retired from careers with the U.S. Forest Service, they spend winters near Arlington, Georgia.
Jerry and I spent a fun day with Jim and his wife, Kathy. They gave us a fabulous tour of southwestern Georgia and many of its plantations.
Venerable quail plantations
The main quail plantation area stretches from Americus in the north, through Albany and south to Tallahassee, Florida. The heart is Thomasville, Georgia.
We saw fancy gates, long driveways lined with live oaks, beautiful plantation homes complete with tall columns and wrap-around porches. We saw original dog wagons, vast stretches of piney woods and even a dog cemetery.
We toured the famous Pinebloom, a 20,000-acre plantation that was the setting for Tom Wolfe’s excellent book, A Man in Full.
The history of quail plantations is equally fascinating. As far back as the 1880s, newly rich, northern business owners discovered the area.
Finding plentiful game birds–particularly turkey, dove, and quail–they first leased then began purchasing small parcels of farm land and forests, consolidating them into thousands of acres of hunting plantations–larger than any of the antebellum cotton plantations…
Because the area remained somewhat isolated after the Civil War, it retained many vestiges of antebellum plantation life, a life that the new plantation owners sought to emulate and the old ones wished to preserve. The region today contains more than a hundred working quail hunting plantations, proving more durable than the cotton kingdom they replaced.
~ Susan Hamburger, Ph.D., from a paper presented at the North American Society for Sport History Annual Conference, May 27, 1996
Tybee Island and Savannah
We squeezed in some days at the beginning of our trip to spend time on Tybee Island and tour the area.
Tybee Island is a small island connected to Savannah and the mainland by 18 miles of bridges over marshes, the Intracoastal Waterway and various channels and rivers.
Savannah is the oldest city in Georgia. It was founded in 1733 by a group of English colonists who traveled under the auspices of King George II, after whom the state is named. The city plan was agreed upon before the ship left England and was based on London’s squares. Twenty-two of the original 24 squares remain.
Savannah had block after block of beautifully maintained townhomes. I could live in any one of them, although preferably one with a curving staircase and plenty of intricate wrought iron.
Cotton was special from the beginning. She was whelped on Easter Day in 2006 out of Blue Silk bred to the talented I’m Houston’s Image, call name Jake, owned by Paul Hauge. Jerry and I were renting a pole shed that housed both our living quarters and the dog kennels while our own buildings were being constructed.
The facilities were perfect and we loved living there but something strange happened in the kennel area when the litter was about four weeks old. A slight gas leak was ignited by a spark from the water pump and caused a ball of fire to roar down the kennel aisle, past the astonished adult dogs and the temporary kennel we’d created for Silk and her puppies, before it finally died.
Luckily Jerry and I were in the kennel when it happened. We quickly threw dog water buckets on the remaining flames and then calmed all the dogs. Everything turned out fine with the exception of Silk’s eyebrows and whiskers. They were singed.
The litter was auspicious in other ways. Among Silk’s puppies were two future grouse champions—I’m Blue Gert owned by Dave and Rochelle Moore and Satin From Silk owned by Greg and Diane Gress. Jerry and I kept three outstanding puppies: two females and a male. The male we named Boomer (in honor of the explosion) and the females became Moxie and Cotton. Moxie was a black-and-white spitfire—aptly named—and the other was Cotton. She was orange and white with almost no ticking and beautiful dark eyes and nose.
We had such fun with Moxie, Cotton and Boomer throughout that summer and fall. We took them for long walks with our Labrador, May. We played with them on the soft green grass of our rental place and we developed them on pigeons and quail. Eventually, all three ended up with great families.
With Cotton, though, Jerry and I wanted rights to one breeding. We valued her talent and temperament and felt she carried characteristics that we wanted passed on. In 2010, Cotton was bred to Blue Riptide, a big, handsome male (Blue Chief x Blue Blossom) owned by Rodney Klimek from Alexandria.
Among that amazing litter were three females that were bought by three friends who spend their autumns and at a hunting camp in north central Wisconsin. Cotton’s bird-finding ability and sweet disposition are clearly evident in Piper, Sage and Rosie.
Cotton’s family let us know that she died in December.
Jerry was recently featured in a podcast interview on the Strideaway website. Chris Mathan, of both Strideaway and The Sportsman’s Cabinet, conducted the interview when she was here in October. The topic is the importance of females in a breeding program.
A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down.
~ Robert Benchley
Bucky spent the first nine years of his life hunting the woods of east central Minnesota as an esteemed member of one of our client’s string of bird dogs. In 2004, he even made the cover of Shooting Sportsman magazine.
During late winter of 2010 Bucky suffered a brain trauma and became ill. He is tough, though, and pulled through but never regained the physical stamina to be hunted.
Enter Paul Diggan, age 12. Paul is the son of Mark and Martha Diggan of Sandstone. Mark is a good friend of Dan Stadin, the guy who works with us, and through Mark, Paul also is a friend of Dan’s. In fact, Paul often accompanies Dan to work and has spent hours with us either in the kennel doing chores or out in the field working dogs.
Somehow, someone concocted the idea that maybe Paul could adopt Bucky. How to convince Paul’s parents? What would Paul’s sister, Kelly, think? What about the other two dogs in the Diggan household? Would our client agree?
Several negotiations followed and many conversations and telephone calls later, all was arranged.
Paul and Bucky are now great pals. And Bucky upgraded his kennel bed to the comforts of either Kelly’s or Paul’s bed.
It began with the first pointer litter out of our dam, Dancer, in 1997. Jerry and I kept a male and named him Dasher. Makes sense, right?
Of all the pro sports, the only one we have followed with any regularity or interest is the NBA. My allegiance to the LA Lakers began in the late 70s when Magic Johnson came into the league from Michigan State University, my alma mater. Johnson encountered his nemesis from collegiate games, Larry Bird, who had been drafted by the Boston Celtics. For the next decade or so, Johnson and Bird and their respective teams played the best basketball games I’ve ever seen.
In the spring of 2004, the LA Lakers were on a tear with a new generation of players, Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. Even though the Detroit Pistons eventually won the championship series, my loyalty to the Lakers remained strong. We kept two males out of Paul Hauge’s Houston x Blue Silk breeding; the big, strong one became Shaq and the good-looking, smaller male we named Kobe.
Other themed litters we’ve dreamed up:
• Beer and Wine: Porter, Lager, Chardonnay, Chablis
• Cheese: Brie, Camembert, Roquefort, Parmigiano
• Minnesota Legends: Blue Ox, Babe
• Minnesota Wildflowers: Tiger Lily, Black-eyed Susan
• Ancient Egypt/Rome: Cleopatra, Tut, Zeus
• Planets: Mars, Venus
• Rock Stars: Kiss, Heart, Aerosmith, Led Zepellin
Of course, ensuing generations of pointers carried on the reindeer theme. Out of Dasher, we have Prancer and now her daughter, Vixen.
But, back to Grits, Biscuit and Sweet Tea, the title of this post.
One morning last winter when Jerry and I were staying in eastern Tennessee, we treated ourselves to breakfast out. We passed Perkins and IHOPs and chose instead a roadside diner. On the smudged, plastic-coated menus were offerings generally not found in Minnesota. Our excellent meal included traditional southern dishes like grits, biscuits and gravy and sweet tea.
Voila! Our two-month-old litter at home had their theme.
P.S. We sold Sweet Tea earlier this summer to the very nice Balfanz family from Stillwater. Biscuit was sold to good clients Ryan and Monica Gould, who had a special collar and name tag made for her.
Dennis Anderson, outdoor columnist for the StarTribune of the Twin Cities, recently wrote a piece, “Dog Gone.”
Four tales of hunting companions that were cherished and lost reveal a lingering truth—the love that binds best friends never ends.
~ Dennis Anderson
The vignettes are recounted in first person. Normally, articles like this are difficult to read but these stories are uplifting. They are tributes to great dogs.
Paul Hauge and his outstanding female English setter, Houston’s Belle, were featured. Paul’s opening words are so true. Jerry and I laughed out loud when we read them.
I own a log of dogs. It’s sort of an addiction. Every year I tell my wife I’ll cut back. But I don’t.
~Paul Hauge
Anyone familiar with the bloodlines of our English setters knows about Belle. She is the source of all our English setter dams—whether as daughters or granddaughters.
Cotton was special from the beginning. She was whelped on Easter Day in 2006 out of Blue Silk bred to the talented I’m Houston’s Image, call name Jake, owned by Paul Hauge. Jerry and I were renting a pole shed that housed both our living quarters and the dog kennels while our own buildings were being constructed. 
Enter Paul Diggan, age 12. Paul is the son of Mark and Martha Diggan of Sandstone. Mark is a good friend of Dan Stadin, the guy who works with us, and through Mark, Paul also is a friend of Dan’s. In fact, Paul often accompanies Dan to work and has spent hours with us either in the kennel doing chores or out in the field working dogs. 