Hunting Articles

Article

The Smith Setter Celebration

It’s tough to beat the warm days and cool nights of Georgia in the Spring. The high heat and humidity, the kind that drives field trailers in droves to the Dakotas, the Rockies, or Canada, hasn’t yet hit. The sounds of songbirds float o.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: July 6, 2025

Article

A Dread Problem and a Solution

Sam Teel and Booty Blevins had been partners ten years, never had a fight. They argued some about how to fix a problem, but each knew that was healthy. They didn't make much money, but loved what they did for a living, training and handling.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: August 26, 2024

Article

The Hunt Goes On

In the early 70s bird hunting was at its peak in Eastern North Carolina. I was a youngster still and loved to tag along on hunts with family and longed to have my own dogs. It was about this time that I attended my first bird dog field tria.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: April 21, 2024

Article

My Life As A Field Trial Reporter

From 1995 until 2022 I had two professions, lawyer and pointing dog field trial reporter. The first to earn money to pay creditors and afford to indulge in the second, pursued for the pleasure it brought me.
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By: gundogcentral
Posted: April 15, 2024

Article

The Poop Scoop

My brace of setter drifted in and out of view. Their range was typical for their shooting dog genetics, and when I couldn’t see them my focus turned to the long skeins of Spanish moss that dripped from every cypress branch. Wind gusts pul.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: March 17, 2024

Article

What Billy Morton Taught me

By the early 70's wild birds were getting harder and harder to come by. Subdivisions and trailer parks grew up right where our old covey haunts were. Ever the optimists, we started a little walking shooting dog club. 'Shoot to kill', it was.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: July 12, 2023

Article

A Lost Dog

It was July 15, 2003 and Billy Culp was fixin’ to turn loose for a workout his first green derby of the season. He was training this year on a new place just east of Lignite and south of Route 5. There were twenty pointing dog trainers wo.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: February 1, 2023

Article

The Last Hour Dog

Ben and Sam were alone in Ben's library-conference room on a cold and cloudy year-end Friday afternoon. The week had been brutal for both curmudgeons. Sam had had to tell a favorite patient her cancer had returned. Ben had had to tell a gra.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: July 17, 2022

Article

Last Hunt

John Cole had been hunt master on Old Pine Plantation thirty years. Before that he had worked on other plantations in the quail belt, that land between Albany and Tallahassee where quail still thrived, thanks to Yankee old money, fire, and .. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: May 15, 2022

Article

One Who Gave For Us-And Paid A Price

"Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
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By: gundogcentral
Posted: September 24, 2021

Article

Field Trials Matter

Most scouts yawn when linemen run 40's, but not at the 2020 combine. Mekhi Becton, a 6-foot-7-inch, 364 pound offensive lineman out of Louisville ran a blistering 5.1. Heads didn't turn so much as they spun off of heads, for what current li.. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: March 18, 2021

Article

Shadow Oak Bo Remembered by Tom Word

I treasure many memories of Shadow Oak Bo, the first and clearest (I can watch it like a movie in mind's eye today) at Coney Lake in the Lee County All-Age when Bo was a first year. I was riding with Luke Weaver in his pickup, following in .. more ..

By: gundogcentral
Posted: January 1, 2020

Article

Two Heroes - by Tom Word

They are two heroes , both Pennsylvanians, both Vietnam combat veterans. Both are pointing dog professionals. One is a Marine, one is Army. They both saw much combat, and that has had its inevitable consequences, physical and mental.
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By: gundogcentral
Posted: November 11, 2019