Recently my dogs and I were featured on a CBC television program called ZigZag. Journalist Denis Chamberlain followed us in the forest as we hunted ruffed grouse on a fine autumn day.

Souris-Manon, my weim bitch and Quell Zum Laubwald, a longhaired weimaraner owned by my friend Sal were the stars of the show. It is always very difficult to get good video footage of bird dogs doing their thing, especially in actual hunting situations with wild birds, but Denis did a great job! There are some really nice scenes in the piece that will hopefully give you an idea of the kind of terrain we hunt in. You will notice that at one point in the video, a woodcock is flushed. There are not many of them in Manitoba, but we do come across one or two each season. They are not a listed as a game bird so we only "shoot" them with a camera.

In the scene, Souris is on point and it looks like Quell is backing her (both dogs are natural backers and a real pleasure to hunt together). Souris is actually pointing a ruffed grouse but Quell was not really backing her, he was pointing another bird..a woodcock! When the grouse flushed, my friend Ross fired and missed. Then, to our surprise, a woodcock flushed. I called out "Bécasse!" (that's French for woodcock) and Denis managed to "shoot" it with the video camera as it flew out of the woods.

You can view the video by clicking HERE (it may take a while to load, just let the download do its thing then view it when it is completely loaded).
Oh, one more thing...it's all in French. But don't worry, the action is pretty easy to understand for non-French speakers.
Enjoy!

As we made or way across the field, Lisa heard the sound of something running behind her. At first she thought it was one of the dogs that had somehow doubled back and was now trying to catch up.

When she turned to see which dog it was she was stunned to see a MASSIVE BUCK, running full speed across the plain, between her and the tree line to the south. Her first reaction was to let out a blood curdling scream which stopped everyone in their tracks....everyone except the buck that is. He turned on the afterburners when he heard the deafening squeal. Luckily, Lisa's second reaction was to point the camera at the running beast and squeeze off a burst of shots with the 200mm lens. The buck was running so fast that she only got one good shot before it disappeared into the cattails.


And what an AWESOME shot it was!!
That was back in November. Since then, Lisa has reminded me every day that the most AWESOME photo of the entire season, was her shot of the buck.

Reluctantly, I have to agree.

Please feel free to comment on Lisa's AWESOME photo to let her know just how AWESOME it is.