“Happiness Is a Warm Puppy” is a book written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz. It was first published in 1962 and has since been re-published several times.
Anyone who has ever bought a puppy will agree with this simplest, but truest, of notions.
Photo courtesy of Ruffed Grouse Society
“He was watching a ruffed grouse that was poking along the forest floor, as grouse will do, foraging for seeds or fallen berries, perhaps some remaining leaves of clover.”
So Sam Cook wrote in the opening paragraphs of his piece in the November 30 edition of the Duluth News Tribune. Cook related a story about a friend of his who was deer hunting in the north woods.
“Most deer hunters would agree that it’s pleasant to have a grouse come mooching along during a morning on the stand. Grouse are enjoyable to watch—the way they seem to step carefully over the landscape or hop up to cross a deadfall. They cock their heads to the side often, presumably to get a better look above them, where most potential danger is likely to come from.
“Suddenly, he (the deer hunter) said, he caught the movement of a hawk on the wing. A goshawk, he said. A goshawk on a mission. A goshawk whose eyes were trained on the grouse feeding on the forest floor.
“Goshawks are among the primary predators of ruffed grouse. These raptors are designed to dart and weave through dense aspen forests where ruffed grouse live.
“But, in this scenario, the grouse my friend was watching had caught a glimpse of the goshawk at the last second. The grouse burst into flight and made its escape to heavier cover, just evading the predator’s dive.
Photo courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology
“The goshawk, foiled this time, winged away to continue its hunt for a less wary grouse.”
On that day, there was a happy outcome for the grouse. But as Jerry and I frequently discuss and acknowledge, the natural world is at once beautiful and ruthless.
Sam Cook had been the outdoor writer for the Duluth News Tribune for 38 years. He retired in 2018 and now freelances for the paper. I first knew of Sam Cook in 1977 when we both lived in Ely, Minn. I worked for the original town newspaper, The Ely Miner, and he worked for the rival paper, The Ely Echo.
Greg Johnson, on left, with RU-CH Northwoods Atlas (Northwoods Grits x Northwoods Nickel, 2017) and Ken Moss with CH Moss Meadow Seeker. Back row: Tucker Johnson, Judges Ben McKean and Ryan Hough.
Most people involved in wild bird field trial competition acknowledge that it is a game.
Not only must handlers navigate uncontrollable vagaries like running order, weather conditions, bracemate and the often unpredictable behavior of grouse and woodcock but they also must handle their dogs flawlessly around a one-hour course and abide by the rules of the game. Among those rules are that the dogs should: run a strong, forward race; never lose focus; point with style and intensity; be steady to wing and shot; have no unproductive points; honor the bracemate; finish strong. No mistakes are allowed or the dog is “picked up,” i.e., leashed and walked out of the woods by the handler.
To persevere and win trials—especially big championships—competitors must keep paying the entry fees, showing up and running their dogs.
So it is especially sweet and satisfying when everything aligns and the handler and dog win an important stake—especially a big championship.
The Chippewa Valley Grouse Dog Association held its Wisconsin Cover Dog Championship last week in the Eau Claire County Forest, near Augusta, Wisc. A large entry of 52 dogs was under consideration by judges Ben McKean and Ryan Hough.
After five days of running, Moss Meadow Seeker, owned and handled by Ken Moss, was named champion. With three finds and a strong race that often strained the bell’s limit but always stayed within range, Northwoods Atlas, owned and handled by Greg Johnson, was named runner-up champion.
Five-year-old Atlas, call name Jet, is no stranger to the winner’s circle. Throughout his young career, he has consistently placed in 11 field trials. This is his first championship placement.
Jet was whelped in 2017 out of Northwoods Nickel by Northwoods Grits. Grits was infamous for his bird finding and never-give-up attitude while Nickel added an uncommonly strong yet graceful gait.
And that sweet and satisfying part? After it was all over, Greg commented, “I am walking on air right now.”
“A 15,000-year bond has yielded a much deeper understanding and affection between humans and dogs than between humans and any other animal.”
~ Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens
No wonder Jerry, me and all our clients form such strong bonds with our dogs. It’s in our DNA.
Sapiens, by Yuval Noah Harari, is not, as the subtitle suggests “a brief history of humankind.” Rather it is a sweeping history of the genus Sapiens and its impact on our planet. Harari is well qualified to write a book of this magnitude. He holds a PhD in History from Oxford University and teaches History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
One aspect that makes this such a good book is the clear, direct writing style of Harari. Another is simply the compelling subject. Where did we come from and how did we get where we are today?
About 50 pages into the book, this passage leapt off the page. From perhaps “15,000 years ago” to perhaps “thousands of years earlier,” dogs and humans began living together.
“The dog was the first animal domesticated by Homo sapiens, and this occurred before the Agricultural Revolution. Experts disagree about the exact date, but we have incontrovertible evidence of domesticated dogs from about 15,000 years ago. They may have joined the human pack thousands of years earlier.
“Dogs were used for hunting and fighting, and as an alarm system against wild beasts and human intruders. With the passing of generations, the two species co-evolved to communicate well with each other. Dogs that were most attentive to the needs and feelings of their human companions got extra care and food, and were more likely to survive. Simultaneously, dogs learned to manipulate people for their own needs. A 15,000-year bond has yielded a much deeper understanding and affection between humans and dogs than between humans and any other animal.”
* Readers of this post shouldn’t need visual proof of the deep bond, affection and love between dogs and people…but just in case, scroll through the photos in our posts and on our sidebar.
Northwoods Big Sky, our T’s puppy, at 18 weeks of age is a hefty 30 pounds and a handsome, bold, spirited, fun puppy.
First, a little history…
When Jerry and I started Northwoods Bird Dogs in 2003, training was our primary service and primary source of income. Breeding setters and pointers was definitely secondary and more a means to personally keep us in good bird dogs. Field trial competition and guiding were a distant third and fourth.
But, as businesses usually do, ours gradually morphed into primarily a breeding facility as more and more clients—especially returning clients—want our puppies and dogs. While we’re extremely proud of our line breeding program that consistently produces our high quality puppies, we’ve known for some time that we’ve needed to find good outside sires and dams, too. But where to find those dogs?
Fast forward to this April…
Jerry and I drove to T’s Doghouse in Farr West, Utah, to pick up an eight-week-old male setter puppy. Jerry had contacted Talmadge Smedley, owner of T’s, and not only did he find excellent bloodlines and dogs but, in Talmadge, he discovered a kindred spirit. Over several conversations last winter, those two discussed training methods, puppy rearing and breeding and all manner of industry issues.
Unfortunately, we were on a very tight schedule when we were in Utah which left little time for face-to-face conversation. But early one morning, Talmadge and his son, Tanner, filmed a session featuring Jerry for their YouTube channel, titled “Training and Breeding Bird Dogs with Jerry Kolter of Northwoods Bird Dogs.”
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Our current group of puppies love the snow. From left, Rose (Rufus Del Fuego x Northwoods Valencia, 2021) and littermates Mac and Van (Northwoods Sir Gordon x Houston’s Nelly Bly, 2021) soak up the sun on top of a dog house in the exercise pen.
This winter of 2021/2022 is the first Jerry and I have spent at our home base in Minnesota in 15 years. Stints in Texas, Oklahoma and Tennessee preceded Thomasville, Georgia, a place we called home for nine winters.
It’s been “interesting,” as we say in Minnesota. Seemingly endless shoveling of kennel runs and clearing of driveways and sidewalks is losing its charm. The adult dogs seem bored. Playing in a fenced-in area—no matter how big—doesn’t compare to hunting wild bobwhites.
But our three puppies from late fall litters are tigers in the cold weather…and 15” of snow doesn’t faze them at all. They run around on paths Jerry has cleared, climb up on snowbanks and play tug-of-war with ropes.
It’s now March and we can sense the downhill slide of winter. The angle of the sun—much higher in the sky—is starting to generate real warmth. Too, we’ve gained more than two hours of daylight since the winter solstice.
On sunny days now, snow drips off roofs and driveways reappear. In the woods, chickadees begin their spring “fee bee” song. And for dogs and humans alike, enticing scents arise from the previously frozen landscape.
The dog houses in the exercise pens look like igloos.
Mac (Northwoods Sir Gordon x Houston’s Nelly Bly, 2021) aces his training of the Up command. Other commands Jerry is teaching our three puppies include Place, Sit, Kennel and Down.
Native Americans named the full moons to help track the passing of time. Different tribes had different names but one for February seems especially suitable: The Snow Moon.
In the evenings, we stoke up the wood stove, pour an adult beverage or two and hang around with bird dogs.
“Good Dog” by Alex Gregory. Originally published in The New Yorker.
The month of January can be brutal in Minnesota, especially for residents who like to be outside with their dogs.
Although not the coldest state in the country (Alaska and North Dakota are #1 and #2), the winter weather here is formidable. Single-digit days, sub-zero nights and a biting wind from the north are bad enough but most troublesome are seemingly endless systems called “clippers” that drop enough snow to force Jerry and me outside with snow blowers and shovels and brooms to keep the driveway open and the kennel runs clean.
The dogs are snug inside the kennel due to in-floor electric heat and comfy Kuranda beds. In the evenings, Jerry and I hunker down. The NFL playoff games have been spectacular; and we can totally escape by bingeing on Yellowstone episodes.
As always, though, it’s good to keep things in perspective…and to laugh. We spotted this New Yorker cartoon by Alex Gregory while at Dr. Wayne Scanlan’s Otter Lake Animal Care Center last week.
This is a framed greeting card by very clever cartoonist Sandra Boynton. I bought the card at least 30 years ago in The Bibelot Shops, a favorite St. Paul store, sadly now closed.
“The three great elemental sounds in nature are the sound of rain, the sound of wind in a primeval wood, and the sound of outer ocean on a beach.”
~ Henry Beston, The Outermost House, 1928
For one year, Henry Beston lived in a small—but not austere—cottage on Cape Cod. His original intent was a two-week visit but he was totally enraptured by all that surrounded him and so he stayed.
Comparisons to Henry David Thoreau’s year at Walden Pond have been made but, in my opinion, Beston out-Thoreau’s Thoreau. There is no ego, condescension or New England ascetism evident in Beston. More importantly, Beston is a superior writer; his prose is eloquent and strong. The ocean, beach, wind, storms, birds and animals of the Cape all inspire him.
In a passage that leapt off the page, Beston wrote poignantly about mankind’s relationship to animals.
All dog lovers will understand.
“We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals. Remote from universal nature, and living by complicated artifice, man in civilization surveys the creature through the glass of his knowledge and sees thereby a feather magnified and the whole image in distortion. We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth.”