The Irish Pointer Club held it’s Spring Open Stake in the Dublin Mountains at Killakee on Saturday 18th March 2005. The judges for the day were Jim Crotty, Charlie Neilson and Con Dunne. I traveled 132 of the 135 miles to the meet in thick fog. As I started to climb the mountain the sun broke through, the temperature doubled to 12C and we spent the day in strong sunshine, the thermometer peaking in my car at 21C around 14:00. The breeze was just about perfect and remained constant. I came home with the solar panel glowing and the red triangle emblazoned on my chest.The first 12 brace were over at 12:00 and there was only one clean find in the books. There were a lot of snipe not made use of and by the end of the second round there was only one other grouse find and one snipe find in the books.
The awards were:-
1st Sugarloaf Wolfe Joe Sullivan’s P.B. Excellent
2nd Lagopus Yorkie Jimmy Dalton’s P.D. Excellent
3rd Craigrua Kent Ned Flannelley’s I.R&W S D Very Good.
This was The One that Got Away. Jump had a good first round but we were pulled up a couple of minutes short of our 15 because the English Setter Bitch we were running against couldn’t stick pace due to the heat. Little did the judges know that Jump might not have made it to the end either but I took him to the car, gave him a drink and 100gms of Kronch bar and he was fine for the second round.The second round was one fine piece of ground and we were running along a small ridge. The net result of this was that one side of the beat, the left, appeared to be a bit back down wind, but it was just the dogs working the wind and not the ground. Jump was going really well. Nice and flat, wide, head up and going at a real belt. Then for what ever reason turning at about 200 yards instead of coming straight back he drew forward, the net result of this being that he was now coming across me about 30 yards forward instead of five. I turned to look to the right and Jimmy Dalton’s dog was on point, about five yards to the right of me and level with me. I dropped Jump and called him back and as he returned he flushed Jimmy’s birds. Jump was eliminated for ” Leaving birds behind “
For once I am blaming to dog. If he had come across flat he would at least have had a chance of the birds and would have been in contention for first, and would have at least been a better second place than Jimmy’s dog , as his pace and ground work was much the superior (IMO) up to that point. But it ain’t over till the fat lady sings.
The winner Sugarloaf Wolfe, is out of the now deceased Black Adder, the American Import. His second round was very classy, fast, turned well and did his ground nicely. His find was in the first round and was what I shall call a typical Irish Find. Having said that he did more than enough to win any open stake.
