Rock Dogs

[Bosun11 537]

As a youngster i used to be a member of the old Wigan club. Some of the old boys there travelled north for their sport a lot of the time. They worked their dogs in rock and knew the game well and had plenty of expierience in rescues.

They bred for that job too, leggy b&t's or sometimes red's. Lot of Cowan blood, drop of Tyson, drop of Park. Got my first digging dog off this stuff, leggy Lakey, with a narrow chest and Beddy top knot. Most agile dog i've seen never mind owned, climb like a cat, you'd think it wanted to spend all its life 'perched' high off the ground, it loved it. Hard as fecking nails too. The bloke who bred it said it was all you'd need in a rock dog but for a kid like me it was easier going south for my digging.

Great thred people.

[perthshire keeper 1,237]

As a youngster i used to be a member of the old Wigan club. Some of the old boys there travelled north for their sport a lot of the time. They worked their dogs in rock and knew the game well and had plenty of expierience in rescues.

They bred for that job too, leggy b&t's or sometimes red's. Lot of Cowan blood, drop of Tyson, drop of Park. Got my first digging dog off this stuff, leggy Lakey, with a narrow chest and Beddy top knot. Most agile dog i've seen never mind owned, climb like a cat, you'd think it wanted to spend all its life 'perched' high off the ground, it loved it. Hard as fecking nails too. The bloke who bred it said it was all you'd need in a rock dog but for a kid like me it was easier going south for my digging.

Great thred people.

all good names in the lakes them my dogs have a little cowan in them so i was told

[tank34 2,178]

You may think you no the rock piles you work but they do change with digs an movement of the ground,I no a wood with about 7 rock piles in it and the older boys always said they don't join up,but we had dog in one an 100yards or more away one bolts an hour or so later dog came out of the same pile the Fox bolted from.

[Rat face 1,655]

its rare you see that type around anymore up on some leg and a nice narrow chest with a good wire like coat on them. well you do but its only in the summer in the show ring lol

[Rat face 1,655]

 

As a youngster i used to be a member of the old Wigan club. Some of the old boys there travelled north for their sport a lot of the time. They worked their dogs in rock and knew the game well and had plenty of expierience in rescues.

They bred for that job too, leggy b&t's or sometimes red's. Lot of Cowan blood, drop of Tyson, drop of Park. Got my first digging dog off this stuff, leggy Lakey, with a narrow chest and Beddy top knot. Most agile dog i've seen never mind owned, climb like a cat, you'd think it wanted to spend all its life 'perched' high off the ground, it loved it. Hard as fecking nails too. The bloke who bred it said it was all you'd need in a rock dog but for a kid like me it was easier going south for my digging.

Great thred people.

all good names in the lakes them my dogs have a little cowan in them so i was told

 

be hard little things then with cowan blood in them, my father always said the cowan dogs was always hard as iron but would nail owt that moved

[perthshire keeper 1,237]

 

 

As a youngster i used to be a member of the old Wigan club. Some of the old boys there travelled north for their sport a lot of the time. They worked their dogs in rock and knew the game well and had plenty of expierience in rescues.

They bred for that job too, leggy b&t's or sometimes red's. Lot of Cowan blood, drop of Tyson, drop of Park. Got my first digging dog off this stuff, leggy Lakey, with a narrow chest and Beddy top knot. Most agile dog i've seen never mind owned, climb like a cat, you'd think it wanted to spend all its life 'perched' high off the ground, it loved it. Hard as fecking nails too. The bloke who bred it said it was all you'd need in a rock dog but for a kid like me it was easier going south for my digging.

Great thred people.

all good names in the lakes them my dogs have a little cowan in them so i was told

 

be hard little things then with cowan blood in them, my father always said the cowan dogs was always hard as iron but would nail owt that moved

 

nail on the head

[Bosun11 537]

My dogs dam was off John Cowan, her name was Lassie but the blokes who dug to her called her crazy horse. No good for digging in the deep Cheshire or Shropshire places, they just used her in rock or awkward (bad) places. Thing is she never really got into bother in the places she was entered and worked right into old age but boy did she take some hammer!

[craggers 36]

FIGHT ON A NARROW LEDGE

Followers of the Blencathra certainly have not before this winter beheld such a peculiar or stirring sight as was vouchsafed them on Saturday when a fox found in Yew Crag, in the Naddle Valley, declined to leave his fastness in the mountain side and climbed to a small ledge below an overhang of rock in the crag face. Hounds themselves, were unable to shift him and the fox paid little heed to the clamour they mad around him. A terrier, however, got so near that he was obliged to abandon his position, and he crept this time to a ledge where he appeared to be even safer than before.

What followed amazed onlookers long accustomed to extraordinary happenings in the fells. The terrier climbed almost after the manner of a cragsman to the bink, and there ensued two minutes desperate fighting on the narrow ledge the snarling fox crouching at bay while the terrier tried to reach past the lightning like strokes of flashing fangs for its own jaw hold. The fox hugged the wall of rock; the terrier was on the verge of a precipice. Even so the terrier was punishing severely the creature of the wild. The fox suddenly leapt out of the crag. The terrier followed, but lost its foothold and fell 30 or 40 feet on to the screes. Fortunately, the snow covering saved this gamest of tykes from severe injuries and she is now little the worse for her experience. Hounds viewing the fox away broke into a wild melody that made the valley ring, and continued to pitch their voices at the top of their gamut while they ran him to a notorious bield known as Birk Tree Borran. In the depths of this earth he offered a stout resistance to the terriers. Two he mauled so severely that follower were glad to withdraw them, and it was left to a tyke more famous for its valour than it’s discretion to account for a fighting fox of the true hill breed.

Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer 26^th January 1927

[neil cooney 10,415]

Craggers that story of the terrier surviving a fall like that reminds me of a time I was only exercising terriers in a quarry when two of them hunted a fox along the top of the quarry. I was standing the other side of the quarry and watched Spike come out of the covert and fall around 30 feet landing on his feet on a boulder that was at a slant.

Two minutes later I watched Dixie do the very same thing.

Both times watching my terriers sailing through the air I thought I'd be scrapping them up of the rocks. Both terriers kept going.

The Fell terrier is just designed for the job.

That was years ago and the same quarries are even more dangerous now as they were all re-opened for the boom times and cliffs that were 30 foot 20 years ago are now 100 foot and more.

But they still hold foxes. A couple of months ago I watched the Staghounds drawing the quarry I mentioned and I seen two brace sneak out.

Edited February 4, 2015 by neil cooney

[oohmydog 82]

Had the pleasure of meeting a lot of lads in the valleys round Rossendale who worked piles week in week out ,very good terrier men with some special dogs no fuss and plenty of results using gun or lurcher ,you get to know the places you work and when it comes to danger over all rescued a few dogs from earths because of cave inns and a few out of piles which can be heavy work none of its for the faint hearted but like anything else it gets easier if you have the right tools ,I would never turn a dog in without a collar known lads pull piles to bits and the dog as been out for a few days in the local kennels ? if the dog gets into trouble and things cant get any worse it makes it easier knowing were the dog is and like the deban collar and box the new one for piles it fits nice under the neck and don't forget to join the F,MWTC

[neil cooney 10,415]

 

I agree Rat Face and if I lived in the UK I'd definitely be a member.

I have a couple of their old Yearbooks and some of their rescues were massive.

Would I be correct in saying they had a rescue a few year back that cost £2000 and that bill was picked up by the club.

Remember the video ? Where the lads were just finished the rescue and it collapsed with the boys standing nearby.

 

Regarding bales ? it probably would be a good topic but not one that would feature monumental rescues.

But they sure do hold foxes. The round ones do anyway.

And not just between them either, foxes will lie on top of them.

I showed a fellow fox scat on a stack one time and he couldn't believe it. The stack was 4 bales high and the sign was on the top.

thats the one buddy that spot where they are is not very far from me, i have it on dvd it came with a book i got, the lad just gets the dog out and it all drops down was a close call that lol

 

Yes, it worth seeing and I still have the video. There's a few surprising comments on it by some of the big names in the hunting game.

I can't find the report of the rescue I mentioned that cost big money , I think it might have been in EDRD that I read it.

However, I did have a quick look in the 1999 - 2000 yearbook and the F. & M W T C expenditure on rescues that year was £2,224 (in '98 it was £1,344) and I think membership that year was £8.

Anyone who has a local branch would be mad not to join IMO.

[perthshire keeper 1,237]

 

 

I agree Rat Face and if I lived in the UK I'd definitely be a member.

I have a couple of their old Yearbooks and some of their rescues were massive.

Would I be correct in saying they had a rescue a few year back that cost £2000 and that bill was picked up by the club.

Remember the video ? Where the lads were just finished the rescue and it collapsed with the boys standing nearby.

 

Regarding bales ? it probably would be a good topic but not one that would feature monumental rescues.

But they sure do hold foxes. The round ones do anyway.

And not just between them either, foxes will lie on top of them.

I showed a fellow fox scat on a stack one time and he couldn't believe it. The stack was 4 bales high and the sign was on the top.

thats the one buddy that spot where they are is not very far from me, i have it on dvd it came with a book i got, the lad just gets the dog out and it all drops down was a close call that lol

 

Yes, it worth seeing and I still have the video. There's a few surprising comments on it by some of the big names in the hunting game.

I can't find the report of the rescue I mentioned that cost big money , I think it might have been in EDRD that I read it.

However, I did have a quick look in the 1999 - 2000 yearbook and the F. & M W T C expenditure on rescues that year was £2,224 (in '98 it was £1,344) and I think membership that year was £8.

Anyone who has a local branch would be mad not to join IMO.

 

where and who is the rep for the western lakes? and what and how do you go about getting help if the worst happens? is it like the RAC for terriers?

[tank34 2,178]

Think the f&m w.t.c have a website mate

[Rat face 1,655]

 

 

 

I agree Rat Face and if I lived in the UK I'd definitely be a member.

I have a couple of their old Yearbooks and some of their rescues were massive.

Would I be correct in saying they had a rescue a few year back that cost £2000 and that bill was picked up by the club.

Remember the video ? Where the lads were just finished the rescue and it collapsed with the boys standing nearby.

 

Regarding bales ? it probably would be a good topic but not one that would feature monumental rescues.

But they sure do hold foxes. The round ones do anyway.

And not just between them either, foxes will lie on top of them.

I showed a fellow fox scat on a stack one time and he couldn't believe it. The stack was 4 bales high and the sign was on the top.

thats the one buddy that spot where they are is not very far from me, i have it on dvd it came with a book i got, the lad just gets the dog out and it all drops down was a close call that lol

 

Yes, it worth seeing and I still have the video. There's a few surprising comments on it by some of the big names in the hunting game.

I can't find the report of the rescue I mentioned that cost big money , I think it might have been in EDRD that I read it.

However, I did have a quick look in the 1999 - 2000 yearbook and the F. & M W T C expenditure on rescues that year was £2,224 (in '98 it was £1,344) and I think membership that year was £8.

Anyone who has a local branch would be mad not to join IMO.

 

where and who is the rep for the western lakes? what and how do you go about getting help if the worst happens? is it like the RAC for terriers?

im not sure buddy the website is very out of date and a lot of people who its says are reps arr no longer im sure there is one at north yorks then there is the club im a member of the pennine area and there is the mid lancs who my mate is the new rep,

 

all you do mate is pay your subs 10 pound a year then if you ever get a dog stuck they will come with lads and plant if needed and try get your dog,well worth the money and there is also the social side which is always a good laugh. if you cant get sorted with a group up your way give my mate a ring and join the mid lancs or get a few lads together and re open the one in your area

[russell tuck 127]

It a great sight watching a fox skipping across the rock after a bolt what do you lads prefer in working style in a rock dog i seen a small bitch work a out and out bayer but as soon as her turn his back shes nipping away at him and as bolted no end of foxes from rock and earth iv also seen a couple of bedlington type work rock really well up on the leg narrow in the chest but very hard in work both dogs and bitches . As for working rock to thing i think are important you/pals have some sort nollage of the places and the second thing is a good bunch of lads on hand to help out if things dont go to plan . Great thread lads ATB RT