Another Season gone by

We started our fifth season of bush-beating in the middle of October 2012. It's fair to say we were a little bit anxious about how much work we'd be getting involved in. Our 'main' shoot in the local village (which folded at the end of last season) left us with a gap of some 30 days to fill. Throughout the past four seasons we'd been able to count on going there at least 2 days a week from late September/early October onwards. With 'our' other shoots only staging 6 or so events a season we were going to have difficulty matching, never mind exceeding, the 46 days we notched up last season.

Through putting the word about a bit during the summer we picked up two other regular fortnightly shoots and, as the season wore on, were invited to work on a further two. That gave us a total of 7 different locations - each with its peculiar 'culture' and terrain. In addition we were invited to beat for a shoot that holds just one event a year! 
Bush-beaters are a pretty whacky lot. Mostly men (on most of the above shoots I am the only female!) with an average age of 60 we turn out for 9 am every shoot morning regardless of weather and proceed to spend the next 6 to 7 hours trudging up hill and down dale, through plough, bracken, kale, bramble, bog and wood, over stubble and grassland  with our sticks & flags (usually half a plastic animal feed sack nailed to a hazel or blackthorn stick)  "tap, tap tapping" on wood "beat,beat bashing" on bush and "flagging up"  all with the purpose of pushing game forwards and upwards for the waiting guns. Most shoots will cover 5-7 drives each day, between which there is much banter, joviality, storytelling and, often, colourful language. Nor is it a day out for the fashion conscious: the main requirements of clothing are that they be water, wind and briar proof! Those of us with dogs (75% spaniels, 25% labradors) tend to be a little more reserved than those without - working a dog effectively demands 100% attention on that dog - any lapse and the wily chap will be off doing his or her own thing. Nothing spoils a shooting day as effectively as an uncontrolled or unruly dog in the beating line and most such creatures are tolerated for their connections rather than their contribution to a successful day.

However, I digress...
This season was going swimmingly: the Bestest Gundog and I were quickly into the swing of things on our regular shoots and settled seamlessly into the 'new' ones..... He was a little keen to get on with the job and obviously (!) knew a lot more than his handler concerning the whereabouts of birds. In a perfect world I'd have wished for him to stay a little closer but past experience is a hard lesson to disregard! His occasional transgressions were overlooked in light of his overall work standard. The greatest compliment was being invited to work on a shoot which, until this season, has refused our help because they "don't have dogs in the line"!

Then the dog limped to a halt. Our 15th day was memorable for a number of reasons: it was the Keeper's Day; he forgot his radios so had little, if any, control; several 'new' beaters joined the line and a number of them were extremely rowdy ('red indians' someone, who heard them in a nearby village, called them); a number of wrong instructions were given by and to various people on a number of occasions so birds were flushed all over the place and not nececessarily over the Guns; yours truly picked up the prevailing tummy bug and the Dog picked up a nail-bed infection. At the end of that day he was just a bit lame; the next day he was seriously limping and the following day, having stayed away from 'work', he was unable to put the foot on the ground. A course of anitbiotics and anti-inflammatories helped and 10 days later he seemed OK, although the nail was glaringly red, so I made the mistake of taking him to work. He enthusiatically set off in the morning but winced when he jumped out of the car after lunch break: there was no way he was going to work that afternoon with only three good paws. The next day he was fine so, reluctant to let him be thought a 'wimp', we set off a couple of days later to the Shoot I mentioned which till now has not wanted dogs in the line - and that was his last day. His nail came off completely leaving the quick exposed. Another longer course of antibiotics, anti-inflammatories and lead-only exercise followed with the toe bleeding every time it was stubbed on the slighted thing.

 It was most distressing. The Dog took to howling when I went off to "work" without him and I was doing the job with 50% normal enthusiasm. "Bet you're missing your dog?" or "Not the same without the dog is it?" colleagues kept saying. Quite!
I shall add "the least enjoyable season" to the list of other headlines for 2012 ("wettest", "dullest" etc). Our stats for our five seasons so far are:
Season 1   Total: 34 days  Dog 26.5 (several weeks lost owing to having tail amputated)
Season 2   Total: 39 days  Dog 39 days
Season 3   Total: 36 days  Dog 33 days
Season 4   Total: 47 days  Dog 46 days
Season 5   Total: 31 days  Dog 16.5 days
To end on a positive note: two of our 'new' shoots this season have invited us to join their team on a regular basis next season - and one of them is the one that "doesn't have dogs in the line". Well done that Dog - he won them over in just one day!