Beloved pets, and my new dog

I was reading a republished article in a sporting magazine recently. The short article had originally been published something like 80 years ago, but the message was still pertinent today. The author was a well-known outdoor writer at the time, and he was addressing a question he had received from one of his readers.

The question was posed by an avid outdoors person who hunted frequently with and was almost always in the company of his beloved hunting dog. The dog had recently passed and the owner was grieving and wondering what to do. He asked where he should bury his beloved pet while showing respect for the dog and its years of devoted service. The writer began by questioning what type of hunting the owner and dog had engaged in.

The writer suggested that if most of the hunting was for upland game, then, perhaps, a burial site near a favorite grouse or woodcock habitat would be appropriate. If the hunting was for waterfowl, then a site near a favorite feeding pond might be fine. If the hunting was for racoons or squirrels, then a productive woodlot might be the place.

I can relate to this whole situation. My first, very own dog, was a Black Lab I had named Troubles. I was in grad school in Maine and Troubles was my constant companion. We basically taught each other about hunting. We started hunting grouse and woodcock. After I moved to Georgia, we continued hunting the upland birds in the north Georgia mountains. I introduced Troubles to duck hunting along some of the Georgia rivers.

After I moved back to Alaska, Troubles came into his own hunting ducks We did a little freshwater duck hunting, but the overwhelming majority was for saltwater birds. Troubles was fun. If we were hunting and I missed a shot, he could make a face that actually made me feel guilty. He lived to go duck hunting.

He started sleeping more as he got older, but all I had to do was put on a certain hunting coat and grab my shotgun and Troubles was bouncing like a rubber ball – ready to go duck hunting!

I could tell you stories all day long about his hunting antics. Once, he found, stalked, flushed, and grabbed a woodcock out of the air in Georgia. He laid the bird down and told me, with his look, that it was my turn to retrieve the woodcock. Another time, he retrieved two ducks for a friend, following hand signals from him in a white-capping surf, and brought them to hand without a feather out of place.

Since Troubles had a “hard mouth,” I was afraid he had ruined the birds for mounting, but he didn’t. The other hunter complemented me on how well Troubles followed hand signals and how gently he mouthed the birds. Interestingly, I had never trained Troubles to follow hand signals, yet he responded like he had been raised following them.

His last retrieve involved a triple I had made with a single shot. That was the last hunt we made that season. Troubles died the following March, just a few weeks short of his twelfth birthday. I cried that day!

I buried him on a rise behind the house where he had an unobstructed view of the bay where we hunted ducks. I had also, unknowingly, followed the advice of the writer of that earlier article I mentioned. The writer commented that where the body was buried was not as important as where the memories were kept. I buried Troubles in my heart, where he will remain for as long as I live.

On a lighter note, my Cadet model Martini rifle arrived and it’s even nicer in hand than the pictures displayed. I found some heavy-for-caliber bullets at a local gun shop and several potential reloads by perusing several reloading manuals. I had all the dies and other reloading necessities already and even had a selection of the recommended powders listed in the loading manuals.

I spent this past weekend loading ammunition in new cartridge cases I had in my reloading “inventory,” and now I’m ready to do some shooting. The rifle is in 357 Magnum caliber, and I got it to participate in some local metallic silhouette shoots held at the Birchwood range in Chugiak.

Getting this rifle and the 38-55 blackpowder rifle I’ve written about before has reenergized me to look forward to both shooting competitions and reloading the ammunition. Life is good again!