The Irish Gundog Field & Show Society held it’s Open Stake for Pointers & A/v Setter on grouse on Sunday 4th September 2005. Judges for the day were Neil Ryan, Tim Fox and Ned Flannelly. The weather was great until about the end of the first round at approx. 16:00 when mist, rain and then fog blanketed the ground.
Result :-
1st Creg Finn Fr. Seamus O’Neill’s Irish Setter Dog. Graded Excellent.
Jump :- Jump had his moments and the first round of this trial was one of them. We did get one of the best bits of the hill to do , but I have to say that ably abetted by our brace mate, Joe McGill’s English Setter, we had a tremendous run. The beat was about a quarter of a mile and it was done from one edge to the other at great pace, with tidy lines and a whole lot of style. I only ever had to use the whistle to set his pattern and after that he was on auto pilot, more or less.
The second round was a great disappointment as we only got about four casts in the gathering gloom, as did all the competitors, but more of that anon.
Judy :- Wee dog didn’t get quite as good a piece of ground to do as Jump but still had a magnificent run, again against a very good going English Setter, Gerald Devine’s bitch Gortenreigh Abbie. They both made best use of a rough piece of ground and where they got the opportunity to go, they went, both of them, like the clappers. What sort of a day it was going to be soon made itself apparrent. Gerald’s dog had a find on the right of the beat. The judge didn’t see it !!!!!!!(the bird). Right!! Then at the end of the run the judge beside me said ” On the way back” meaning I was to pick up the dog when it reached the middle of the beat comming towards me. Right in the middle of the beat she pointed. Like a statue, steady as a rock. The judges wouldn’t go to her!!!!x*!!”"f!. There was talk of the ” Other dog was on the lead ” and some other nonsense but they wouldn’t budge so I picked her up. Her second round was another insult of four casts in the gathering gloom. There was an element of consistency in that at least.
Usually when competitors are venting their spleen it is about argueable decissions. Was that a flush? and the like. I think the judges totally mishandled the whole day. The factual decissions that I saw were all correct but the whole conduct of the trial was a shambles. We ended up with a second round of twenty dogs, yes ten brace, starting at four o’clock.What chance have you of improving your situation with a run lasting maybe three minutes? Not much. On a more positive note I saw plenty of good running dogs and some good work around game. The first placed dog was a worthy winner and the fact that Seamus is such a nice guy compounds the pleasure.
That is me basically finished south of the border for this year. If I can find a pheasant stake in beat that falls on a Sunday I will give Judy a run, sort of fact finding, and maybe Axl too, if he’s still here. Would have been nice to go out with a bang.( We were lost in the fog for a good ninety minutes It might be more correct to state that it was really the person that was most insistent that he knew where we were all along that was lost but the effect was the same. Nine of us rebelled and walked down hill almost straight to the road )
