On the preserve JR Clingan

JR has seen his ups and downs but he is unstoppable here he is with his two boys Gunner and Bodie with little Jaxx on the way.
Hello Bart,

You probably get tired of hearing more Gunner stories – sorry I just can’t help myself, he’s turned into “super dog”. A friend of mine asked me to help out on an afternoon hunt Saturday at a local preserve. He had hunted his 3 year old Brittany in the morning and had hunted for 4 straight days before that. There were 40 quail, 8 chukars and 8 pheasants. My buddy ran his dog for the first two hours. We the got Gunner out of the kennel and hunted him for 1.5 hours on his own. Gunner pointed and held 15 quail, 3 chukars and 2 pheasants. He retrieved most of the birds to hand!!! To finish up the hunt we turned out both dogs at the same time. Gunner found a few more birds on his own and he backed both times that the female Brittany pointed. Other than teaching him to point birds standing on his head, I don’t know what more that he could possibly do!!! It’s friggin unbelievable!!!!



Yesterday I ran him in a local chukar challenge. In the morning we participated in the “puppy division” in a 15 minute hunt against 11 other dogs. All the other dogs were 14-18 months old. We took second only because I “feathered” the first bird (losing points). Three points on three chukars with two kills and retrieved to hand.



In the afternoon we participated for the hell of it in the Amateur Division against 28 dogs of all ages. We had 15 minutes. He pointed and held four birds, I killed three of them and they were all retrieved to hand. We finished 6th out of 28 against dogs from NY, PA, WV, VA and MD. The judge that accompanied me in the field was a professional trainer. He couldn’t believe that Gunner is only 9 months old. He commented that he believed that I had one of those “once in a lifetime dogs”. He wanted to purchase him on the spot. Told him, “not interested” that he was my hunting buddy. I told him that the only reason I was there was just to get my pup some additional work and could care less about competing. It was just a good day to get his nose into more birds.



He is absolutely the dog of my dreams. He’s my constant companion, my shadow!!!! One of these days out in the future a few years from now I see another Ryman in my future. I’m spoiled with this one and am doing my best to spoil him with love and affection.



Thanks for listening to me brag!!!

J.R.