The junior judge announced at the first breakaway,
“If we see a scout riding in front, his dog will be disqualified.”
Ben Reach, the senior judge, thought, “Oh, Hell.” Read more
If We See a Scout
Blog
What if?
What if there were no more field trials?
Soon there would be only ankle warmers
For only competition’s testing leads to better breeding
It’s not a way-out theory
It’s the truth Read more
Days Remembered
I was twenty three to thirty
Care worn and sometimes depressed
But grouse season opened
So I put my setter in the plywood box I’d built Read more
Mountain Roads
I love to drive the byways Of the counties of my youth Where the Blue Ridge rises steeply And the hollers hold streams roiling in the spring Where white pines blend with rhododendrons And hickories caress poplars and ginseng grows below Where stone bridges span the bottoms and high vistas wait at tops Where Forty Fords hauled moonshine and peach brandy to West Virginia miners in my youth Yes I Read more
The Prairies
There is something about the prairies
That’s different from anywhere else Read more
You Know
You know your momma was deep south if
You ate okra
In Shrimp Gumbo or
Fried crisp or stewed and in soup
Or with rice Read more
Fall
When the hint of cool fills the dawn
And the summer heat starts to fade Read more
Scouts
The year is 1947. The War is finally over, in Europe and Japan. Veterans of the War, leaving home for it as boys, have returned as men, matured by a baptism of fire, some wounded physically, more wounded emotionally, but sharing joy it is over along with its scars.
They are at Broomhill, Manitoba, having trained bird dogs nearby since mid-July. It is the first week in September, time for the Canadian prairie trials, resuming after the War. Mose Blevins had been a scout all his adult life, and now he is fifty-five, not old, but his arthritis is taking its toll. His son Robert is home from the War in Europe. He is twenty-six, hoping to succeed his father as a dog man on Twin Oaks Plantation in Southwest Georgia. Read more
No Regrets
My life grows short
I somehow know
But I dread not death
Or where I’ll go Read more
Before and After DNA
Before DNA proof-of-parentage became possible, practical things were different in many ways, Ben Reach and Sam Nixon MD contemplated in their end-of-day musings over drams of The Macallan in Ben’s library-conference room. Nowadays, proof of “who’s your pappy?” was answerable conclusively by a Q-tip swab of saliva submitted to a lab test for humans or beasts, thanks to DNA science. This had revolutionized pointing dog breeding practices starting in summer Read more