IT’S 2 A.M., and I’m thinking that the best thing about puppies is that it’s not long before they’re dogs. That’s grouchy and uncharitable, but I want to be in bed at this hour, not waiting in the backyard for a German shorthair pup to pee.
At least I’m not standing in snow. Pick a puppy born between March and May, and those middle-of-the-night outings take place in late spring and summer, and the puppy is just old enough to hunt during his first fall. It’s a long journey compressed into a few months, and there’s a lot to do.
SPRING TRAINING
Zeke yowls in his crate the whole way home from the breeder. I remember now why I waited until my old dog, Jed, was 11 to start again. Getting a puppy is like having a baby in the house. At first Zeke spends several hours a day asleep in my lap as I work, and he is cute. But there are also the interrupted nights, the cleanup, the puppy proofing, the vigilance. The playpen I bought gives me a safe place to stash the pup, but only until he learns to climb out of it after a week and not before he eats his new dog bed. What Zeke likes best is lying under the couch, where he can tear at the upholstery while waiting in ambush for Jed.
Crate training is the first order of business, then basic obedience starts at home and ramps up with puppy kindergarten at 12 weeks. Everything a bird dog truly needs to know it can learn in kindergarten: his name; the commands sit, stay, and come; and how to play well with others. The rest is instinct, honed through contact with birds, but that comes later.
At the first class, we meet the instructors plus 10 other puppies and their owners. We all wear nail aprons full of dog treats. Zeke shines at obedience and flies through
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LIVING THE DREAM
After the author arrives in Maine’s fabled North Woods with a moose tag in his pocket, an adventure he’s been wanting to take his entire hunting life, reality sets in, and he learns a valuable lesson: Be careful what you wish for
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Is there any place better than a good hunting camp? It has everything: great food, games and pranks, and of course, hunting. Shoot, we don’t even mind going to camp for grueling work days in the summer. Here, our contributors share their favorite stories, traditions, and lessons learned from camps they’ve shared. So come on in and join us. The door’s open.
THE DEERSLAYERS
Before you even claim a bunk, you need to eyeball the hardware your buddies have brought. In the process, you’ll see that the guns at deer camp are changing. What was walnut and blued steel may now be Kevlar and carbon fiber. The 10 rifles featured here aren’t your father’s deer guns. They’re today’s new camp classics
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The Pentagon awarded Microsoft a $10 billion cloud computing contract, snubbing early frontrunner Amazon, whose competitive bid drew criticism from President Donald Trump and its business rivals.
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Arabia Saudita prohibi los deportes femeninos durante dcadas. Ejercitarse en pblico ha sido durante mucho tiempo un tab cultural. Pero a lo ancho del reino, grupos de corredores en tnicas han tomado los caminos y las calles, demostrando que se aproxima un cambio.