WELCOME to the Official Blog of the 2015 Master National Hunting Test, October 15-25, 2015, brought to you by the Retriever News and written by Tina Styan, Gwen Jones and Kelley Hall. We hope you enjoy these daily updates on the 2015 Master National, held this year in and around Cheraw, South Carolina.
Day 4 – Flight E – Test 2 – Mallard Pond-Water – Tuesday, October 20
Flight E: Kay Scott and John Kinnard
Mallard Pond-Water – Water Triple, Water Blind,
Diversion Shot
Flight E moved to their second test – they lost 66 dogs from their first series.
Test two for Flight E is Mallard Pond, a Water Triple with a water blind and a diversion shot. The handler stood on the line looking across a narrow stick pond. Bird number one is directly across the pond, thrown to the right, up the hill, landing 91 yards from the line. The second bird is across the pond right of bird number one. This bird is thrown to the left, down a hill, landing close to the shore at 54 yards. Bird three is on the same side of the pond as the line. This bird is thrown to the right in the water landing at 30 yards. The water blind is under the arc of bird number three located 85 yards from the line. The dogs have a 40 yard entry, then must be kept parallel to the shore for the next 45 yards. When the handler comes to the line, he must blow a duck call to start the test. Dogs retrieved bird number three, the water bird, first. On the way back with the waterbird, a diversion is shot. The handler must then retrieve the water blind. When that is complete, he is free to pick-up the next two birds in any order he chooses. When visiting this test, we watched seven dogs. We saw one very nice job, three handles and three pick-ups. Judge's instructions indicated that if the water blind was unsatisfactory, the contestant would be tapped on the shoulder and not allowed to pick-up the last two birds.
Day 3 – Flight C – Test 2 – Byrd's Campground-Land/Water – Monday, October 19
Flight C: Carol Hynes and Tellus Calhoun
Byrd’s Campground-Land/Water – Land/Water Triple,
Double Blind and Walk-up
Flight C moved to their second test having only lost 26 dogs from the first series.
This test is a Land/Water Triple with a double blind and a walk-up. Bird one is to the handler's right, thrown to the right at 40 yards. Bird number two is a flyer shot to the right, landing 150 yards in front of the line at a point of cover. Bird number three is thrown to the left from the shoreline, landing in the water 40 yards to the left of the line. The line to the land blind is between the flyer and bird one at 130 yards from the line. The water blind is under the arc of bird three, 35 yards in front of the line. The handler comes to the line, with bird one a walk-up. The go-bird is water bird number three. The handler must then pick-up the land blind. The handler proceeds to complete picking up birds one and two and finishes with the land blind.
We watched six dogs complete this test. We saw two very nice jobs, two handles and two pick-ups. We heard that there had been at least one break on the short, left-hand bird. Also, many dogs were pausing sat the decoys in front of the line and checking out the bushes near where they were placed.
Official MNRC Photographer, Mark Atwater of www.upclosephoto.com
Day 3 – Flight B – Test 2 – Wood Duck Pond-Water – Monday, October 19
Flight B: Dale Langhorne and Ed Sullivan
Wood Duck Pond-Water – Water Triple, Water Blind, Diversion Shot
Flight B moved to their second test, Wood Duck Pond-Water. When the callbacks were given, 42 dogs had been dropped from the first series. This is a Water Triple with a water blind and a diversion shot. The mat faces the left end of a lake. Bird number one landed 21 yards directly to the handler's right along the edge of the water. Bird number two lands directly in front of the mat. It has been thrown to the left from a well-brushed blind, landing in heavy cover 55 yards in front of the line. Bird number three is thrown from the far shore on the handler's left, landing 45 yards from the mat in the cove at the end of the pond. The blind is located on the far shore between birds two and three. It is placed on top of a fallen log 53 yards from the line. The instructions are to pick-up the go bird – on the return from this bid is a diversion shot. When the dog returns to the line, he must then retrieve the blind. He then picks up the remaining two birds. We watched seven dogs run this test. There were three, passing jobs, two handles, one pick-up and no bird. The bird that seemed to pose the most problems was memory bird number two.
Day 3 – Flight A – Test 2 – Bruce's Farm-Land/Water – Monday, October 19
Flight A: Judges Robert Rascoe and Tom McMorrow
Bruce's Farm-Land/Water – Land/Water Triple, Double Blind and Walk-up
Flight A moved to their second test after finishing the last few dogs to run at Palmetto East. When the callbacks were given, 50 dogs had been dropped from the first series. We arrived at this site as the test was being tweaked by the Judges and Marshal.
Bruce's Farm is a Land/Water Triple with a land blind and a water blind. The first bird is a walk-up. The Judge's instructions to the handlers said that they should pick up one bird and then run the land blind. They were then instructed to pick up the remaining two birds and run the waster blind last. The line was located on the far left end of an oblong cattle pond. Bird number one, the walk-up, came from right to left, thrown towards the edge of the pond at 31 yards from the line. Bird number two was a flyer with the gunners situated behind two hay bales. They shot the flyer and it lander 150 yards straight in front of the line. The correct line to this bird had the dog swimming the far left side of the pond, going up a hill and into a large pasture with plenty of room to get lost. Bird number three was across the pond to the right at 110 yards. These gunners were also hidden behind two hay bales and threw their bird to the left. This bird was in the hip pocket of the flyer gun station. The land blind was located directly to the handler's right under the arc of the walk-up bird. It was placed 32 yards from the line in a hole at the base of tree. The water blind was across the pond in an alcove behind a brush pile at the water's edge.
Test Dog #1 came to the line at 10:40 am. He did a nice job on the walk-up bird, picking it up first. On the land blind he got into the holding blind area, but found his bird. Next he went for the long, right-hand bird #3. He had an extensive hunt in the field right of the gun station, but hunted till he found the bird. He had to be handled on the long flyer. Test Dog #2 came to the line at 11:01 am. He picked up the long right-hand bird first. Next, in running the land blind, he went to the poison walk-up bird, but he was reheeled and ran the blind. He had to be handled on both the walk-up bird and the flyer, finishing with a very nice job on the water blind.
The first running dog came to the line at 11:18 am and did a nice job. As the next dog ran, it became apparent that the barbed wire fence that had been previously pointed out to the handlers was going to become an obstacle in this test. This running dog will be given a rerun at the end of this series. The committee went into the field and made this test safer. Of the first five running dogs, we had one nice job, one rerun and three handles. This test averaged 7-8 minutes per dog.
Please check out the callbacks on the Master National website … they are updated as each flight finishes, refresh the page … as new flights are added, they will appear – Copy and paste the link below to go to them: http://www.masternational.com/Websites/mnrc/images/2015_MN_Docs/2015callbacks.pdf
