Chux,
Thanks. It just popped into my head. I guess it can be attributed to my first Springer. She hunted like hell for 12 years and then went deaf. if she saw me in my hunting clothes or a gun in my hand she turned herself inside out trying to go. i couldnt not take her. No matter how slow we had to hun or how long I had to wait for her since she wouldnt recall anymore, it didnt matter. The last bird she killed, she was half blind and stone deaf but boy did that nose still work. Had a Pheasant in the field behind the house that cam eout. I saw it. an and got my gun and her. got her on him and her tail went from 0-60 in about .5 seconds. She flushed it, I shot it (luckily I actually hit him) and dropped it. She was on it and brought it back. That retrieve is etched in my brain, never to be forgotten. i can see the bird in her mouth, her steps slow and careful, that gleam in her eye and the wag of her tail. She of course did what she did the last few years and that was to stop about 6 feet away and make me come to her. How the hell do you not do that? I know, make them complete the retrieve, but the heck with it. she found it, fetched it up and okay, I ended up the one to move. she layed there, panting, stretched out, tail going, happy as can be. that was the last bird and last hunt. I had to put her down a couple of months after that due to cancer. but, that last bird..........