Horse, My Preferred Way to Travel

I pulled a calf muscle several weeks ago so that pushed me into using my horses more. That means hunting areas that in most cases are larger and more open. I realize that I need to continue to hunt some on foot just for the exercise, but I'm enjoying the horseback hunting so much I can see that walking my become more the exception than the standard way to travel.

The main advantages, other than the obvious of less work, are these. The view of  the dogs is much improved by the extra few feet in elevation. I enjoy putting the horses to work. It's so good for their minds, and bodies. I get a great deal of satisfaction when dogs, horse, and I, all work well together.

I think today was my fourth hunt since my last entry. My shooting hasn't been too great, but we're finding pheasants.

On three of the four trips I got at least three good shots, but brought home only one rooster. On the remaining trip we saw only hens.

Other than my shooting, the only other problem I've run into happened today. Within ten minutes after we got started the dogs pointed two roosters. I got one while the second one left lots of feathers,but flew off. The problem was that I was only 25 feet from the horse when I shot. Usually I'm at least 60 to 100 feet from him. Much of the time I'm hundreds of feet away from him. Two shot that close made him very nervous the rest of the hunt. A one point when I dismounted, and drew the gun, he swung 180 degrees away from me, took three steps. I went back,turned him around, walked him back to where he started, and was very firm with him. He did OK from then on, but obviously wasn't enjoying himself.

 A heart warming incident was the retrieve of the one I got. To me it looked like it had fallen on the other side of a drain ditch. The dogs plunged over the bank on my side, but I was pretty sure that I was going to have to walk the 100 ft. or so back to the bridge we had just crossed so they could look for the bird. I took a few steps when I heard a dog coming up behind me through the tall dry grass. I turned around, and there was Lilly trying to catch up to me with the pheasant in her mouth. What would I ever do without her?

The two roosters were on the left of this ditch. You can see the bridge. This is our barn, shop, and house. The fog has been freezing on everything for a couple days now.