There's a lot of beet in beating!

Could do with a drink mum!

One of the things that makes bushbeating fun (yes! fun!) is the infinite variety of terrain human and hound are expected to work through - from gorgeous grassy pastures to the thickest most leg-grabbing bramble thickets and everything you can imagine - & a few things you never could - in between......
So, yesterday was Bugler's second day out this season and he spent the whole morning hunting through well grown soaking wet (lots of rain the night before) sugar beet. It's hard enough for human legs to walk (or stumble) through for hours on end but for dogs it involves endless bounding and diving through flapping wet near tropical greenery.... It exhausts them but they love the variety of smells..... the tantalising scent of the birds, rabbits, hares, deer, foxes who have passed this way before them. Imagine reading your favourite novel, the one you can't bear to put down even though you are almost too tired to take in another word. That's hunting through sugar beet........ the dogs just go on and on.... just another yard, just one more scent, OH! and another and OMG over there's another..... and finally the field and the drive comes to an end...... the soaking wet dogs emerge and hunt around in search of a much needed drink.... any old puddle, ditch or stream will do...
What makes the dog keep going? He can't be fit - it's the beginning of the season and we don't do this sort of thing between seasons.... 20 mins to an hour of exercise or training once or twice a day not 5 or 6 or 7 times.... Why does he keep going through sodden beetfields for hours even though he must be getting tired? 
Look at the face of the dog; the eyes say it all - he just loves what he is doing and will go on for as long as I ask him to..... he'll have sore feet at the end, he'll sleep like a log, he'll probably be a bit stiff first thing in the morning..... but, if I ask, he'll get up, go out and, beet or not, do it all again................. That's working dogs for you....