"Two classes of people on this forum have it knocked. A few guys here shoot guns that are exactly the opposite of what most of us want. They clean up when that style double comes along. Then there are the dog men, who know that the gun is almost unimportant... that watching the dogs run is all that matters."
I believe there are far many more categories of collectors and dog people. I run dogs at the highest level of competition and hunt them as well. I find it very satisfying to run my 2 labs and a mini-dachshund on a pheasant hunt while handling one of my more rare and exotic doubles. I also get great satisfaction in putting up the gun and running the dogs or putting up the dogs and handling a fine double. I do find I have developed an intolerance for poorly trained dogs and autos with synthetic stocks.
For my own part I collect the more and rare exotic doubles as individual guns and also on a theme or type for example I have an A, B, F Trap 1894 and 1889 hammer all Remingtons. At some point I will ad a C or D grade and an older external hammer with lifter. I buy and gather/accumulate many average ones for hunting and shooting and train my dogs almost every day. If time and money permitted I would have another 20 dogs of all different breeds for many styles of hunting and they would all be trained up. My dream is to have a herd of mini-dachshunds with an English cocker or two just for close range pheasants.
Now is that three categories?
Last edited by Tamid; 01/11/17 02:46 PM.
