Neal
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Everything posted by Neal
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Here's my old one. If I say so myself...probably the ugliest lurcher ever bred.?
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My first two lurchers were heavily coated beardy crosses. However, that was in Coniston and when I returned to Hampshire I moved to smooth coats. I must admit that I do really miss the beardy character...but not the smell of damp beardy. My main reason though was because I assumed they'd be too hot 'daan saaf' with all that coat but the chap who used to write in EDRD used his first cross in Australia with no problems.
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My wife told me yesterday that a preschool in Southsea in Portsmouth regularly get muntjac in their grounds. Apparently they've been swimming over the Solent. Not sure how much truth there is in that...I know they can swim but that's some distance.?
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Wow! I'd forgotten about Sporting Dog magazine. I think I bought a few of them but I can't remember when. I didn't realise it was absorbed into CW. I have a book by him, I think it's called "Highland Deer Forest." I've also got one by BB...but mine is "The Little Grey Men" so slightly different reading material.? My teacher started reading it to us in the third year of junior school but never finished it so I found a copy and finished it myself. I think there was a tv series about it too.
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It's called "Out Of Town A Life Relived On Television" it was published by Dovecote Press Paperbacks in 1987 and the price on the back cover is £5.95 (though I paid three quid for it in some charity shop or secondhand book shop).?
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True. I've had the book for several years but only recently got round to reading it. It's full of so much wisdom and common sense. My particular favourite so far is a chapter called 'A Shilling and a Pint' which looks at the reasons for the breeding of dogs. Here's one quote: "Personally, I believe it should be made illegal to breed and sell dogs commercially. Such an enactment would reduce the number of dogs in the country by half - the right half."? Edited to add: I'm very flattered by all the likes but it's not me that deserves them...I'm just quoting someone else.?
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Lots of roe near me too. Even some in the grounds of my daughter's school which borders my local wood. Fortunately, as there are so many of them, I get to break the kelpies to them as early as possible...but Maud still thinks that if I haven't actually said, "No!" then it's similar to saying, "yes."? She'll get there.
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Ahh: that'll be it then.?
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I always presumed longhorns were quite placid. My only reasoning being that there are quite a few of them near where I live being used on different sites as conservation grazers in places which the public have access to. I've usually found the "black and white ones" (friesian?) to be more likely to get rowdy.
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My eldest kelpie quickly learnt, from me doing target practice initially and sending him back behind me, that whenever I got my catapult out of my pocket he should come round to just behind me and lie down.
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Yes, the one in the book was back when he was a young lad in Yorkshire around a hundred years ago. I checked and it was a dog called Jim which was half "hunt terrier" half whippet. It was bred by a local chap called Luke and he sold then partly trained. The training involved whacking them with his cap if they did anything wrong so, whenever Jack Hargreaves doffed his cap at a passer by, Jim would race over to his heel for fear of being told off.?
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Was that the one which was mainly white but with a black mask on one half of the head? First dog I can remember growing up was my dad's wire fox terrier x sheltie. I named my first lurcher after her.
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I was reading in a Jack Hargreaves book last night about one of his dogs (I think it was a terrier x whippet but I'll have to check). He said the bloke who trained it only ever swiped at it with his flat cap as a reprimand, so as soon as he took his cap off the dog came straight to heel.?
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Thanks Socks.? Don't worry, I didn't mean of 'the incident,' just photos of him in general. He looks a good build. I'm always amazed at how agile they are considering that they don't look as though they would be. I've heard of one walking along the top of a wall, jumpimg in the air and landing safely, still atop the wall, but facing the opposite direction. Do you know anything else about him i.e. where he's from, were his parents workers etc?
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Any photos??
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I'd agree with the comments made above about moving away from the dog. I've always found that dogs are far more worried about losing us than we are of losing them. If ever I have a dog which doesn't come all the way in for either recall or a retrieve I simply start walking backwards. If that fails, try turning your back on them and jogging away!? One problem I often find is that, because dogs can be clever enough to know the minimum requirements, mine have cottoned on to the fact that. when I call their name, I don't actually mean "come here" I'm asking where they are. So they pop o
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Fred, I've only ever had two dogs with whippet blood and neither of them were my cup of tea. However, in defence of whippets, I'm fairly certain the part of them I didn't get on with was the type of collie used in one and the terrier in the other.? If I ever did go back to 'the dark side' and own another sighthound blooded dog it'd definitely be whippet rather than greyhound...I couldn't afford the extra food for a start.?
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Actually Fred, Fielder was the 3/4 whippet 1/4 bedlington. The first one (first cross) was called Mini and Fielder was her daughter. I only remember that because I was recently rereading loads of my old Shooting News articles after finding them in the loft.? I'd forgotten his name though...even though I've got a book by him.? Old Phil, I'm glad you've said that he and Les White were decent sorts as they were two of my favourite writers at the time. Another I liked was Stag Carter...you're going to tell me he was a complete arsehole now aren't you.? Actually, I've just realised that m
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I could be completely wrong about this (typical me, sitting on the fence before I've even written anything?) but I sometimes wonder why so many books about either dogs in general or pastoral breeds in particular, claim that all the old breeds/strains are extinct. The reason given is always the rise of the Border collie. Now it could be that every dog you see (like the one in your photos) is the direct result of mating two 100% pure/registered Border collies, and I know that, like most working breeds which are bred for what they do rather than how they look, they vary a lot in height, buil
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I believe Pester, who used to write for the Shooting News, either had one or was thinking of getting one too. If my memory serves me well, he started off with a beddie x whippet, then mated her to a whippet before trying a fell or lakeland x whippet. I think it was then that he said he was considering getting a border x whippet. No idea if it came to fruition or not. As breeze has said, Skycat has a lovely example and I think I've seen another one on here in the last ten years.
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I often think that too. Typical: Devon and Sussex...there must be a gap here in 'am'shire.?
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Mine was near Belstone. We were talking to the owners of the cottage we stay in one evening and they mentioned that nobody had seen any cuckoos yet this year, then I heard and saw one the following morning. It took me about ten minutes to spot it, even with the binoculars, as it was perched on a granite boulder amongst a slope covered in clitter. Like you, Dartmoor is the only place I see them now. The last time I saw one in Hampshire was about 2006ish.
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I saw and heard my first on about the 20th April on Dartmoor.?
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A long time ago now (80s or 90s I think) a friend of my dad (who's always used terriers for bushing) bought himself a cocker. He said it was far more driven than his terriers and I believe he eventually gave up terriers and moved completely to the cockers.
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My old kelpies got really pissed off if they tree a squirrel. Very different to rabbit. With rabbit they stood still, pointed and said, "where are the ferrets,"...well, apart from Scout who went to ground if possible...but with squirrel they'd shout at them. A bit different now as we very rarely see rabbit and Noggin and Maud tend to treat squirrel in the same way that Rusty and Amber treated rabbit. I wonder if that's because I never used to use a catapult.?
