Preacher John Part III-A

Part Three: The Lessons

Preacher John rode with Trey Sutton, Buster’s new owner, as they traveled down out of Canada and back to the Dakota lease where Bobby Pickett, John, and Bobby’s scout, Mack, were spending the summer training dogs.  Trey was excited about becoming Buster’s new owner.  Buster didn’t seem all that aware of his change in status as he slept peacefully in the back seat of the dually. As Trey and John rode along they could see that many of the crops were already being harvested and they shared the highway with trucks loaded with the bounty of the prairies as they traveled from fields to elevators and processing plants.  Directly in front of them were Bobby and Mack with Bobby driving a steady 80 mph.  Even so, trucks were still passing them.  Time is money on the farm and the truck drivers are paid by the number of loads they haul.  The bucolic life of the American farmer is a myth that is long gone.  Today, it is always a race – against the weather, against a variety of ever evolving pest and pestilence, and against the banks. 

      Except for driving through the bustle of the harvest, John and Trey were oblivious to the plight of the farmers.  They talked dogs.  Trey asked questions about dogs his grandfather had owned and dogs John had seen over the years at the plantation trials in Georgia.  And they talked about Buster whose head would come up when his name was mentioned and then go back down when he realized the conversation was not directed at him but was just about him.  Trey wanted to know what John intended to do with Buster in training in the time before the next trial. 

      John thought about it for a few moments before he answered, “That will be up to the dog.”

      “How so?”

      “Well, Buster’s training was going forward on a known line and he was going real good.  Now, he got off on his own and spent some time chasing ducks and geese.  We won’t know how that’s affected his training until we run him tomorrow.”

      “What do you expect will happen?”

      John looked into the back seat and thought about the dog laying there, “Well, I expect we’ll have to do some training.”

      They talked for a long time about the difference between running dogs and training dogs.  Many handlers are great at running dogs in a trial and showing them well, but a much smaller number are really good at training dogs, especially if there is a problem.  The training regimen for the dogs on their string was like the proverbial box that they rarely were able to think outside of.  John had always been able to adapt his methods to the dog and the situation at the moment.  He had learned many tricks of the trade over the years, but he never knew which one he would use until he was confronted with a problem that had to be solved.  Buster’s experience chasing the water birds at the lake at the end of his brace during the derby stake might not have any negative affect on the dog, although John doubted that.  He didn’t know what to expect, but he knew he would deal with it.

      The sun set with another magnificent prairie light show and they traveled on south through the lingering summer twilight.  John offered to drive, but Trey was fine.  This was an adventure of the kind he hadn’t had since he was a boy traveling in the shadow of his grandfather.  He didn’t want to miss a minute of it.  John had been asleep for a couple hours when they finally pulled into the yard.  There was a flurry of activity as dogs and horses were unloaded and fed. Trey pitched in, and the four of them made short work of the chores.  When Buster had finished his meal and the men were ready to go in the house, John let Buster out of his kennel and he made his usual tour of the yard, doing his business where it would be out of the way of anyone walking about.  Then he followed John into the house.

      Trey was directed to the spare bed in John’s room.  As the two men settled in Buster raised his head from the rug between the two beds and looked at Trey, then at John, then back at Trey.  He stood up, stuck his head in the old man’s face and nuzzled him gently.  John rubbed him between the ears.  Then the dog turned, jumped up on Trey’s bed, made one circle down by his feet and laid  down for the night.

      John reached up to turn off the light and said, “I guess Buster knows where his bread is buttered.”  He chuckled and pulled the chain on the light.

      When he awoke in the morning Trey and Buster were still sharing the bed.  The dog raised his head when John got up and then put it back down.  John was usually the first one up.  Years of habit and a 75 year old bladder made sure of it.  He soon had the coffee brewing and a pound of bacon frying in a big iron skillet.  He heard Mack get up and had a cup of coffee waiting for him when he came into the kitchen.

      “What are we going to do with Buster today?” Mack asked as he added cream and sugar to his steaming cup of coffee.

      “That will depend on Buster.  But make sure we’ve got our heaviest cable on him this morning.”

      “That’s what I was figuring, too.  Do you think one will be enough?”

      “Should be, but it wouldn’t hurt to have an extra one on your saddle.”

      Bobby and Trey were soon in the kitchen as well and John had toast and eggs going for everyone.  Once they were out working dogs, they wouldn’t stop until it was too hot to run them.  If the weather cooperated, their next meal wouldn’t be until early afternoon – a long time from breakfast, which was why John made sure that everyone got plenty to eat each morning. The evening meal was always after dark.

      Mack went out first and started tacking up the horses.  Trey followed him out offering to help while Bobby and John cleaned up the kitchen.  As the sun began to lighten the sky, the four men led their horses and dogs out to the edge of the CRP field closest to the house.  John had Buster by the heavy welding cable he would drag and Bobby had one of the all-age dogs ready to go.  Mack had two more dogs in harnesses.  The first two would be worked on the way out from the house, the other two would be worked on the way back, and then they would grab four more dogs and make a different loop until it got too hot.  After they took a break for lunch, they worked the young dogs in the yard in the shade of the big cottonwoods.

      At first Buster ran like there was no cable attached to his harness, but it soon slowed him into a relatively close searching pattern as he checked all the spots where he had found birds during the summer.  He was soon rewarded and locked up high and tight.  Bobby’s dog came in and backed.  The two handlers got down from their horses and went to the dogs.  Bobby stood next to his and John started to walk in front of Buster.  He could see that Buster was moving his head slightly and thinking about all those birds he had made fly along the lake shore at the trial.  John stopped and waited.  Buster was caught in a dilemma.  He wanted to make the birds fly, but he knew that he shouldn’t even though he was unaware of the consequences.  He finally settled on point and John went in and flushed a whole brood of close to full grown sharptails.

      John came back and took Buster by the collar and led him away from the spot.  He looked at Trey and Mack on their horses and smiled, “He’s going next time.”

      Mack just nodded knowingly.  Trey wanted more, “How do you know?”

      “Ol’ Buster has got to this point based on his intelligence and his natural ability.  There were some little bumps along the road but he really hasn’t tested me yet.  I’m betting that test is coming on his next find or the one after that.”

      It was the next one.  When Buster pointed for the second time his feet began to move when John came up beside him.  This time John didn’t wait for the dog to settle and walked straight to the birds.  So did Buster. The birds busted and the dog stopped long enough for the old man to grab the cable.  Buster then started after them.  When he came to the end of the cable John held on tight and dumped him on his back.  Then he walked over to the dog, grabbed his collar and a handful of loose skin on his flank, and carried him back to the spot where he had first stopped.  Without saying a word he unsnapped a flushing whip from his belt loop and then started in on the dog.  He took full swings with the whip coming up into his chest with the leather straps on the end of the whip making a loud popping noise each time they hit the dog.  Buster never yelped or whimpered – he just stood higher on each stroke.  After 8 or 10 lashes, the dog was on his toes, his eyes were staring widely ahead, with his nostrils fluttering in and out.

      John noticed and stopped.  He walked out in front of the dog into the small bluff that the birds had flushed from and a sleeper blew out.  John fired his blank gun with a big smile on his face.  It couldn’t have been better if he had planned it.  Mack got down from his horse and looked to John.  John nodded and Mack replaced the cable with a rope and hooked it to John’s saddle.

      Trey looked at John with a puzzled look, “Don’t you want to see what’s going to happen on his next find?”

      John shook his head, “I might have if that sleeper hadn’t been in the bluff, but since he was, this is the perfect place to end the lesson for today.  Tomorrow or the next day we’ll see if the lesson took.  The key to getting your message across to a dog is to know when to stop the lesson.  Too much and it all becomes clouded in his mind, too little and he may not have got the message.  I’m pretty sure I got his attention.  Now, it’s time to let the lesson sink in.”

      Mack hooked one of the other dogs into John’s rope and let go of the other.  Bobby’s dog had another find and then was switched out as well as they made the turn back towards the house.  It was still cool when they got back to the house and four more dogs were brought out.  John roaded the spare dogs while Bobby and Mack handled the dogs that were running.  John and Trey watched the dogs, and Trey kept up a steady stream of questions which John was happy to answer.

      That night it was Bobby’s turn to cook dinner and Trey stayed in the kitchen with him.  John dozed in front of the TV only catching pieces of the conversation, but it sounded serious.  After dinner Bobby took his cell phone outside and walked about the yard as he talked to someone.  He came back into the house with a smile on his face and looked at Trey, “I guess you just bought yourself a ticket to Grand Junction in February.  And thanks to this economy, I only spent about half what you authorized.”

      There was only one dog on Bobby’s string that was already qualified for the National Championship and that was Rebel Yell, the dog who had just won the last championship and taken runner-up at the one before.  Jack, as they called him, was only five and had a long and promising career ahead of him.  He was a true prairie dog who could hopefully adjust to the tighter courses of the piney woods and the mid-South.  Bobby shook Trey’s hand and then John and Mack also congratulated him.

      With a twinkle in his eye, John said, “So, are you going to kick Buster out of your bed to make room for Jack?”

      Trey looked at him and realized he was being teased before he answered, “No, I’m afraid you’ve already spoiled that dog way too much to make him sleep in the kennel.”

      They all laughed and Bobby broke out a bottle of Woodford Reserve that one of his customers from Kentucky had given him.  He poured a couple of fingers of the amber liquid into four mismatched glasses and added a couple of ice cubes to each.  They toasted Rebel Yell and Buster and Trey becoming part of the team.  The relationship between owners and handlers in the field trial world is varied.  Some owners are happy to get a phone call after their dogs run and read about the outcome in The Field.  At the other end of the spectrum are owners who have their own breeding programs and often start their own young dogs before they put them with a handler.  Some ride the circuit and even run their dogs in amateur trials, while others don’t.  Bobby expected Trey would fall somewhere in between.  He had always believed in including owners as much as they wanted to be.  An involved owner always seemed willing to stay with a prospect a little longer while those looking for quicker gratification and their name in print often changed dogs with annoying frequency.  Over the years since John had introduced Bobby to the field trial game, Bobby had come to have a core of very loyal owners who respected his opinions and usually didn’t try to second guess him when it came to training the dogs.  Buster’s former owner was an exception and Bobby was glad to be rid of him.  He and Trey were already developing a clear working relationship and he would get him another dog or two when the right ones came along.