i almost watched my dog drowned..

it was a rough out saturday morning.

not to many ducks flying, a few but kinda dead.
i had a group of 5 mallards come in, dropped 3 drakes and 1 hen went sailing off to the frozen pond that i absolutly wont hunt when it's frozen.

well after a couple outstanding retrieves we went to take a look for the sailed hen.---

now i will say my yellow lab , copper, might possibly be the best hand signal dog to ever walk this earth[ o.k. i'm a little biased......]

but we went to the pond and there was no duck. i start with the hand signals and send him probably , a total of 500 yrds AROUND the pond. when i figured he was in the general area i gave the "dead bird" command. [ we do this all the time, when i say "dead bird- the nose hits the ground!] well he sniffed out the hen but she got up and flew out to the middle of the frozen pond.

now i dont really know about this part, because on one hand my dog absolutly would not quit untill he was able to retieve that bird, on the other hand i know that that is no place to send him and i absolutly could not call him off that bird for nothing.

i put a shock coller on him, 90% of the time it's dead, but this time it wasn't and i was hitting him and trying to get him off the bird[ remember, i'm 200 yrds across a pond.

so i watch him fall through the ice and absolutly cannot get back out. i honestly dont know what was going to happen and really think that i'm going to watch my best hunting buddy drown right in front of me.

i ran around the pond as fast as i could, lost sight of copper and finally got to the edge of the pond. i wasn't wearing my waders that morning, but it didn't matter. i dropped my gun and was into the pond up to my chest and grabbed my buddy and pulled him to the bank.

i dont know what would would have happened. i'm talking about a dog who has well over 1500 duck retrieves to his name, been in the ice many times, but this one was different. i think had i not gone in, i would have watched him drown.

i hate to say it, and dont know if i should, but i left that hen on the ice.

i figured if i was going to get a ticket thats fine. i, know that it almost cost me my dogs life trying to get it. and there is no way i would let him try again. in fact i had to put a leash on him to take him away from the bird on the ice.

i'll tell you what, today i'm glad duck season is over and i will have copper for another year.........