Ten Thousand Hours

Farley is locked up on a staunch point, frozen in place with his head turned back over his shoulder, his nostrils flaring, his eyes shining in the cold.  I line up his point by following the direction of his nose and eyes to the base of a scraggly brush; there, where the roots form an abstracted cage against the earth, I see a pheasant dressed in drab greys and browns.  I relax and step forward through the snow, shotgun idle in my right hand now turning numb with cold, I kick the bottom of the bush with my boot and call out to Robbie, “Hen!”  So he’ll know to not shoot.

The hen rises up out of the snow, twigs and grey of winter on broad, thumping wings.  I feel the wind of her flight on my face.  We watch her as she goes deeper into the night where it grows in the East.

Farley looks at me like I’ve betrayed him.  I tell him, “That’s a hen, big boy.  No bird.  Get on.”  He blinks at me once, turns on his heels, and heads off into the brush and thicket at a gentle but determined jog — a gait he has spent ten years developing, a pace he can hold for hours on end.  He heads out into a blaze of winter white blended with hay stubble that buzzes in an adamant breeze.  He heads out into the exotic scent of rooster on the wind, into the dream that every bird dog dreams; to run, to sniff, to catch scent, to point, to wait for the shot, to retrieve, to give the game to the master, to be thumped on the arse by the palm of a gloved hand and told, “Good boy.  Good work.

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We are on a ranch that belongs to our friends; every curve of the earth here speaks of legacy.  The land rises up in good natured swoops and is strung together by wisps of brush that serve to fortify the drainages cut into stone by mountain water.  Bunches of thorns and brambles give way to scrub aspen and sagebrush and it is in the broadness of these places that the pheasant can be found.  This is a thriving and wild population of birds, an even mixture of hen and rooster, tail feathers here grow long and graceful, and the birds are fat on wild forage.

It is snowy.  We track pheasant through the snow, their footprints are are easy to spot and almost Jurassic in nature compared to the other upland birds we hut.  We monitor the dogs as they work, breathe out our cold smoke into the warm gleam of the sunset and trudge, step by step, upwards, paying attention to the body language of the pups as they quarter the space before us.

Pheasant are runners, they will run to eternity and beyond; flying is a last resort.  The dogs catch scent, move cautiously, wait tentatively with their noses pointed into the wind, creep forward, relocate, and then break into an easy trot again.  We walk quickly, keeping up is vital, no working dog should work in vain.

IMG_6663 IMG_6713I can feel the wind gusts brushing my face rosy, I shift my gun back and forth in my hands as I try to keep feeling in my fingers.  It is a cold night to hunt, the sun has slipped away and the air is fading to blue, chilling itself further as it passes over snow and ice.  We have been walking for a while, my body feels warm but there is an insidious tingling in my toes no matter how fast I move or how much I stomp my feet.  I tuck my chin down into my coat layers, as I always do, squint, try to wet my stony eyeballs with warmth by blinking too many times, and feel my exhalation turn to fine crystal on the curves of my cheekbones.

I am working closely with Farley while Robert keeps tabs on Tater Tot.  I always feel lucky to be partnered with our white dog; Farley is an expert.  When I say expert, I mean a master hunter.  His bird repertoire is as extensive as the interior West allows and includes some waterfowl; he is a true utility gun dog and the envy of many of our friends.  He knows how to respectively work every species bird he hunts, how hard he can push them, what to expect of them behaviorally and what their preferred cover looks like.  Some people say pheasant cannot be properly hunted by a pointer but if they had the great pleasure of hunting behind Farley, they would be forced to adopt a different opinion on the mater.  Farley doesn’t believe in wasting time.  He is efficient, right down to the speed at which he carefully covers ground.  He is a patient teacher, I learn from him every time we work together.

Tater Tot, on the other hand, is a young dog.  Pheasant are hard on him.  He has been raised on chukar and Hungarian partridge in big, wide open country which is perfect for a dog that runs huge.  Any bird we hunt in thick brush results in him making some mistakes.  He’ll learn, he’ll get better, it’s a matter of him working on his ten thousand hours and perfecting his craft.  With that in mind, Tater Tot teaches me, too, every single time we go out.  I learn from his mistakes and his successes.

I watch our dogs develop their craft and I learn to be patient with myself when it comes to developing my own craft, when it comes to building my gifts and honing my talents.  I remember that developing a voice within the realm of creative work can take a lifetime of evolution.  I realize that learning about myself enough to be proficient at expressing myself is honest work I can afford to be tenacious about; it is work that is worth the work.

Having an incredible bird dog isn’t just about bloodlines (though, those do help), it’s about exposure and development of natural instinct, it’s about taking my pup out and getting him into big country where he can work his heart out, rise to his full potential and develop a sturdy foundation for his skill set.  From time to time, Tater is going to bust coveys, run over singles, approach birds from the wrong direction and suffer moments of impatience and occasionally he might lose all all self-control and gallop around like a buckaroo.

He will lock up on exquisite, unexpected points on tight holding birds and will look as majestic as anything; he will have moments wherein he is god of all the dogs.  He will have good luck.  He will have bad luck.  There will be days when he rules the world on his four fleet feet and his humans will fail to get him his bird.  But in all of that success and failure and learning, he’ll be working steadily on his craft until one day, we’ll cast him off into the sagebrush and rim rock to do his work and realize that he, too, has become a master of his craft.

I hope I can say the same of myself someday.  Until then, there are those wily old pheasants running fast through the snow, tails streaming behind them like comets, and our little brown pup going forth earnestly and courageously into the winter white.

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Comments

  1. Oh my heart. This piece…
    Though, in my humble opinion….you don’t give yourself enough credit! You’ve been a master of your craft(s) for YEARS, and it’s only growing!! I wish that I had just a glimmer of what you exude.
    Love ya oodles.

  2. “learning about myself enough to be proficient at expressing myself is honest work I can afford to be tenacious about; it is work that is worth the work” — Yes. THIS. Thank you for expressing so simply something I have been trying to articulate for a while. So, yes, it is worth the work 🙂

  3. I have just found your blog thanks to my cousin and am really enjoying it, checking it regularly for updates. We live in southeastern Washington and I have taken up pheasant hunting in the last year on our farm. It gives me such pleasure to read your experiences watching your dogs work, this is something I wouldn’t have understood until we got our own bird dog. Any tips for cooking pheasant?

    • We love SE Washington! I’m glad to read you’ve taken up pheasant hunting. Not only is it a wonderful pastime but it’s such a blessing to be partnered with a hard working dog. I know you KNOW what I mean. To boot, pheasant are great eating.

      We love to roast ours whole if the body isn’t too shot up. Rob swears by searing the entire bird in oil at 500F for 15 minutes before dropping the oven temperature for roasting — it really locks the moisture in beautifully. We stuff ours with onions and apples and herbs when we roast whole.

      We just made pheasant Pad Thai for dinner last night. We tend to pre-roast the pheasant breasts for that in oils and herbs in our toaster oven and then cut it into thin strips and add it to the wok at the last minute.

      Do you have any recipes to share with me?

      • No recipes to share at this point, the one I have learned quickly is it is easily overcooked and becomes tough so I need to perfect my skills. Only recently have we been bringing home the pheasants, before it was primarily quail. I love the idea of cooking the entire bird.

        • Try the searing and roasting whole. I think you’ll really love it.

          OR, tortilla soup…throw the whole bird in the pot with all the ingredients and once it is cooked through, strip the meat from the bones, shred it and add it back into the soup. The meat stays moist and you’ll even get some bone broth benefits by having the entire bird in the pot — this is also the BEST way to get almost 100% of the meat off a bird. We use all upland birds in soups this way.

  4. I learn so much from you, dear Plume, and from Dogs. How amazing are Tater and Farley!!!

    • They’re really amazing boys. I cannot actually imagine my life without a working dog in it. Even once hunting season is over, I try to find jobs for Tater Tot — he THRIVES most when he is working for me in some capacity and learning new skills.

      I cherish being in partnership with dogs so much. I’ve already told Robert, if we ever fulfill our dream of owning a ranch I would want to get a cow dog for working livestock in the fields.

      • My dog, Thai, is the first dog I’ve ever had – and he’s a big, mellow 8 1/2 year old chocolate lab. I know most chocolates aren’t mellow, but he calmed down by the time he was 2! He was bred for hunting, and I have “spoiled him” according to the breeder. But I got him as a family pet, not a hunting dog, as a present for my then-12 year old daughter. Within 3 days, he was my dog. He is protective and sweet and loves nothing more than a swim and a bone. I love all your posts and photos about your dogs and their work. Truly amazing.

  5. Loved this. I’ve always liked the 10,000 hours idea. It’s exciting to think about how deep into a craft you can go but it also allows some grace for where you’re at. (which for me, currently, is thinking/reading about things but not doing them).

    I would love to witness bird hunting. All parts of it sound satisfying.

    • Exactly!

      And I think it’s also good for our society to remember that good things take time and hard work…and you simply treasure where you end up in life, and in your craft, when you clearly know the degree of blood, sweat and tears you put into the journey. Everyone wants instant success these days. I think it’s bad for our souls and bad for our relationships — someone almost always gets used and abused in the process.

      I think reading and thinking about things is fine and dandy. You’re preparing for something…something good.

      Let us know when you want to go out with us. You’d love it. The walking. The weather. The dogs in action. The birds on the wing. And dinner afterward, too. You’d love that.

      X

  6. The frugal ecologist says

    Beautiful. I also have a shorthair and you’ve so exquisitely captured their spirit. Both the joy of watching a master at work and the exuberance of a young dog.

    I was out this weekend with my dog in central Texas and she found and pointed a group of wild turkeys. She paused for a beat before busting through. She’s still young too.

    • It’s all such a pleasure, isn’t it? Working with a master and working with a young gun. I’ll take it both ways and happily learn all I can.

      I laughed out loud at your story of your pup busting those turkeys! I had the exact same thing happen with Tater once, as we were driving the long, steep road into our cabin in Washington, except he jumped out the open window of our Dodge as it was moving and nearly scared me to death. It was a turkey tornado like I’ve never seen before. You’ve got to give them those moments of reckless joy, you know? It feeds their passion.

      Thank you so much for being here and taking a moment to write. Appreciate you.

  7. Catherine Chandler says

    You are exquisite, as is your writing. I love your details and how you compare and contrast the dogs. I had to laugh when Farley looked at you like you’d betrayed him 🙂 Incredible work, darling.

    • Thank you, friend.
      I still hope to take you out with us someday. I know you would be SO thrilled to witness the dogs in action, and that you would appreciate, so much, the meal at the end of the day.

      Knowing you continues to mean the world to me on a regular basis.

      All love,
      X

  8. I really appreciate this writing, Jillian. I especially needed this part:

    ‘I remember that developing a voice within the realm of creative work can take a lifetime of evolution. I realize that learning about myself enough to be proficient at expressing myself is honest work I can afford to be tenacious about; it is work that is worth the work.’

    I needed to read this.
    I need to keep this close and tell myself in those moments when I am frustrated with myself and my work.
    So thank you for reminding me!
    xo

  9. Wonderful to have such skilled creatures to work alongside, both the master and the one-day-master. Ty must have some lab or pointer in him somewhere as he does point on occasion (at raccoons, squirrels…), but for many reasons he would make a terrible bird dog.

    • You know, lots of dogs will point every now and again. Pointing is basically stalking instinct. Bird dogs just have an incredibly strong version of this stalking instinct coursing through their veins…and a MUCH stronger hunting drive than most other dog breeds.

      Thanks for being here, toots!

      • Elizabeth Waggoner says

        I have a little fluffy foo-foo dog (Maltese) and even SHE will lift her little leg up and go to point when she sees birds outside the door. Hard to call her majestic though – mostly just cute! HA

  10. Great story telling. I love words and you really know how to put them together pretty and interesting. Our little Jack Russell Terriers love to hunt though they are strictly amateur, hobby hunters. Our little dude has impaired vision….but our girl is great at letting us know where the squirrels are up in the tree. I totally relate….sharing experiences and interactions with my dogs is so terrific. So thankful for these wonderful creatures that become a part of us. Oh….and I’d say you are quite quite the Jedi master of metal already!

    • Well, dogs DO come from wolves!!! The instinct to hunt comes naturally to them, even if it’s been watered down by breeding bloodlines. Even the breeds that don’t remotely look like wolves have a little bit of hunter in them still!

      So thankful to have you here.
      X

  11. Elizabeth Waggoner says

    Lovely post – and so absolutely true. The effort to slow everything down is SO worth it. Not only the fast pace of life itself, but the expectations we have for everything to happen yesterday. It’s a first and continuous step, this learning patience, because without it, there is no truly learning anything else. The dogs are a marvel. Hope you and Robert had a joyous and blessed Thanksgiving.

    • Preach it, sister!

      We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. It was 82F in San Diego and we cooked together and then ate outside, as a big family, on a huge patio table in an exotic back yard. 🙂

      X

  12. WHERE did you get that gun case? I need a new one and it is A-amazing.

    • It’s vintage and it came with my shotgun! I put that photo up in my Instagram feed and a few folks said that they had sleeping bags with the same lining when they were growing up! There must be more out there.

      Good hunting to you! X

      • Such awesome fabric. Will maybe have to try to find something similar and make my own. Continued luck to you too!

  13. Sharon Williams says

    Just what I needed to read today!!
    Thank you!