Take A Kid Hunting--4 Generation's of Cooks

Austin Cook's first pheasant...

Take a kid Hunting.  It's said all the time and it's beautiful to see happen and or in this case, in word and picture form.

My youth afield with OMR was foundational in the way I view the world, my family and my father.  My guess is that if more sons and daughters got the experience of young Mr Cook recently had, we wouldnt have the volume of problem our society has

Enjoy this guest blog post from friend Gerald Cook as 4 generations of Cooks converge an epic moment in a father and son's lives.

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Family Tradition

If I’ve read it once I’ve heard it a thousand times: “Take a youth hunting… Share our tradition… Introduce a child to the outdoors.” Thanks, Field & Stream. I appreciate it, DU. That’s a good idea. It’s a great idea – admirable, even.

If my dad hadn’t taken me into an alfalfa field when I was 12 years old I wouldn’t be a Hunter today. I also wouldn’t have stood awe-struck with a 20-guage at my hip and my mouth gaped open as a Northern Illinois cock pheasant flushed at my feet and my dad laughed, either, but that’s a story for another time. With 27 years of hindsight and almost as many hunting seasons under my belt, I now think the sage advice “take a youth hunting” might rank up there with “just say no.” Outdoor companies may need to partner with Nike so they can legally follow “Take a youth hunting” with “Just Do It.” Now we’re getting the picture.

In 2011 I finally heeded the advice and took a youth hunting: my son. At 12 years old it was “time” to introduce The Boy to the fields. He had already shouldered a shotgun and fired on clays dozens of times. He was responsible, smart, excited, and above all, safe. He was also stepping into a priceless new tradition. His first hunt would take place in Kansas with me and my dad. For the first time, three generations of Cooks would be astride in the field chasing roosters and hoping for another first: The Boy’s first pheasant.

Did I say three generations? I’m sorry, I meant four. You see, my late grandfather’s Belgium-made Browning A5 20-guage shotgun was also in the field that day. Purchased through the mail in the 1950s, Grandpa finally got his dream gun. He carried it for years and was the only hunter in his family hunting group to consistently shoot doubles. Handed down to my father and now to me, that old A5 had dropped birds for three generations and I couldn’t help but think we were carrying a piece of Grandpa with us that day. We later learned that the gun was actually manufactured in 1930, so its unknown and untold stories of familial hunting may even predate our experiences.

Regardless of the gun’s age, one thing is sure: Grandpa’s gun rarely missed. Dad is money with the old humpback. I’m dangerous with the heirloom and have to pause writing this to remember if I’ve ever missed with it on my shoulder… maybe. You’ll never know. Like Grandpa, the gun is easy to carry with you, dependable, and willing to provide a memory. Anyway, back to The Boy’s introduction.

We walked the first field and I almost doubled over with laughter when The Boy stood in half-panic as his first rooster exploded before him. I caught myself though  and remembered my own experience as I caught Dad’s glance and suddenly understood: Yes, it’s funny, but it’s more than that. It’s why you take a youth hunting – instant addiction. The Boy didn’t even shoot during that first walk, but he was all in.

We walked the second field where Dad and I shot a few birds before magic struck. Late in the walk I heard the rooster flush. I watched The Boy fire. I saw the ringneck fall. Suddenly I was that 12-year-old boy in the alfalfa field again. I stood awestruck with a gun at my hip and my mouth gaped open. As I watched The Boy collect his first pheasant I saw my dad on the other side of him and the pride started to swell. He had done it. We had done it. In one beautiful frame on the Kansas prairie I saw my dad, my son with his first bird… and Grandpa’s A5 in his hand. Count it four generations who have bagged birds with Grandpa’s dream gun.

I’ll spare you my flush of emotion and the thousands of times I’ve replayed that scene in my mind. I’ll simply leave you with this, and I mean it: Take your youth hunting.

Pheasant Macros....

The beauty of the bird is in the small intricate detail in each feather and feather pattern.  Every pheasant is a little bit different in their coloration and each one gives off different hues of color.

So sit back and enjoy the detail and beauty of some recent shots afield.

Orange to red to pink all in one set.

Each fiber radiates color.

After years in the field, this old boy finally is outwitted by a dog that knows how to root them out. 

More to come!

Farmland Relics...

The stories these machines could tell.

Coming from a bygone era, they're left to rot in the spot they died.   Weeds hide the hard work and toil that families poured into the land in their fight to push forward with progress.  Some won, some lost, some got new equipment.

We're constantly finding these machines tucked away on our pheasant grounds that we walk each fall.  Bailers, combines, tillers and other assorted machinery dot the land and provide habitat for the quarry of our chase.  Ever flushed a rooster in the remnants of an old combine?  It's an experience to say the least.

If you think about it, the pheasants are relic's themselves.  Product of another era itself, they struggle to maintain their foothold in the face of farm practices that become more and more efficient each year.  

Thank goodness for the glacial floods that created the channeled scablands of of Eastern and Central Washington that created the nooks and crannies that the relics of farmlands past and future cannot touch.

They both make Fall so very, very interesting.

And Murph Dog Says, I GET IT!!

Season 4 of a bird dog's life can be a beautiful thing to witness.

Last Friday, I watched it all come together for Murph Dog.

Gone are the wild escapes of birds sent up by an overzealous pup with nostrils full of a running ditch parrot.  Gone are the continued sprint with head cocked to the sky waiting for that hen to drop out of the sky.  Almost gone is the constant trailing and mirroring of the other dogs in the effort to learn

Murph has graduated, she gets it.

After we hunted the first piece of cover d in the morning to alleviate the nervous energy, the dogs shifted into their hunting pace.  Back and forth their worked the ground in unison between gunners, and soon roosters were on the ground to showcase their hard work.

Murphy has shown great promise since her first season in the field.  Generally she stays tight and works hard, but most of the attention we gave to the dogs focused in on Dakota, OMR's veteran pheasant sniffer.  She's a machine that works at a methodical pace and you absolutely know when you better be ready because her birdy clues rairly, if ever fail to produce.  You can read her like a book

This particular day afield, halfway into the canyon stretch of property we have access on, I watched it all click as well for Murphy. 

Both dogs instantly got hot in the normal spot and birds rocked out of the cover.  More weight was added my bird vest and we continued on.    A few hundred yards later I separated from OMR and Kevin, taking Murphy up a draw ourselves.

From that moment, her nose alternately went from ground and into the light breeze and I knew she was on a bird.  The pace picked up and we swung back up to meet Kevin and OMR in the main path of the canyon.  At that very moment, Murphy dove into a patch of native grass and up rocked up a cackling rooster giving me the classic going away shot that all pheasant hunters dream of.

One report of the Ruger Red Label 12 gauge and Murphy was soon hovering over her prize.

50 yards later a rooster surprised Kevin and I with a wild flush.  Over the top of a basalt column chased by two quick shots the bird roared.  A possible hit sent Murphy and I up over the top to a piece of cover that might hold the wounded bird.

After a quick approximation to the landing zone, Murphy locked into the birds sent.  Following it for about 200 feet,  a quick shot and retrieve gave me my limit. 

The day continued with success.  Kevin got his first ever rooster and plenty of prime pheasant dinners were added to three families dinner table.

A beer at the end of the day at the truck and we all came to this conclusion;

It was a hell of a day.

Hey, What's Peaking Out of Your Bird Vest...

I believe they call it "Dinner"

The 2011 pheasant opener is in the books.  The dogs and their owners are tired, but very, very happy.

Tis The Night Before...

Murph dog about lost her gourd when I started assembling the gear.  I might or might not have washed my brush pants from last year's last trip and the scent blast of dried pheasant blood must have been a sensory overload for her. 

Tis the night before pheasant season, and all of us in this house are just slightly excited.  Fingers are crossed for a decent second hatch of wild roosters as the first hatch was basically lost in our spring rain barrage that just kept coming. 

Tomorrow is a day I haven't missed since I was 11 years old.  It is a part of me as much as any part of my life.  Some first days are over quickly, other are an excursion in perseverance.  Either way, it's a day that I look forward to all year. 

It's also a day that bring the fair weather hunters out to crowd the grounds.  Through time and developed relationships, we are afforded the opportunity to hunt territory that others do not.   Even that said, the season is long and with good numbers, we will enjoy the chase deep into winter when the fair weather gunners are sitting in front of a fire. 

So tomorrow, may the dogs work close, may the birds hold tight and good luck to the trigger fingers that culminate the activities of opening day of pheasant season.

The Anti Black Friday...

There wasnt a Target, Best Buy or Fred Meyer for 100 miles.

Thank God.

Deep Snow and tight holding roosters with miles hiked in between opportunities were the order of the day.

Following a longstanding tradition, OMR and I got the hell out of dodge to follow the noses of our bird dogs.

And what a day it was.

Watching our dogs work on a snow day defies the ability to describe accurately.  A good friend asked me the other day what the dogs did when they hunted.  I stumbled around for an answer for a while and finally landed on the non descriptive, you have to be there to see it answer of "they, they just are birdsy"

The twitchy tails, the lowering of their bodies to the ground the follow the scent, the laser intense staring at a bird that holds it's ground.

It's a thing of beauty.

Breaking away to the Channeled Scablands

The previous week has become a blur, and when I called my mother to say hello early yesterday morning to hear a loving and reassuring voice to tell me that we were doing things correctly with our new Bambino...

I had a feeling....

OMR had broken away.

"Tell Josh he knows where I am", were the words mom told me as to where he was.

Of course, I knew right away. 

The cataclysmic floods of eons ago shaped the land we have run our dogs through for 30 years or more.   Tell people who dont understand the state of Washington that we hunt upland birds here and they look at you like your head is screwed on backward. Isn't Washington the Evergreen State?

Oh, yes...our state is half desert and upland steppe....and there are birds to be chased that are wild and fly as soon as you close the door on your truck.  Challenging? why yes they are

This wide open country is strangely beautiful.  To imagine the volume of water it took to carve this land to shreds  is almost unfathomable.  The Willamette Valley in Oregon can thank us for the topsoil

We hunt the pockets around the rocks and run a circuit that we know so well that when my father and I hunt together, we know where each other are at all times. Our labs Murphy and Dakota know the drill as well as we do and quiver with excitement when we park the truck and load up.  They spring from their cages like a bottle rocket set to go off.

We know where the birds get up

We know their escape routes

We know the angles, the drives, the particular weird anomalies that produce birds.

And yet still, these wild roosters present a hell of a challenge.

Throw in a bit of Hungarian Partridge and Quail for spice and you can have yourself a hell of an upland adventure, just an hour or so from home.

At the end of the day, the phone rings and dad gives the anticipated report.  We always go through this routine when we aren't hunting together.  After all, why not live vicariously through another's actions afield?

I feel like I am right with him as he describes a 3 rooster day and I know exactly where he got the birds.

The cut to the right of the fence line on the "canyon"

Near the old farmhouse, and no...not to the right...the left

At Mike's place, just above the house...

And lastly,  with vivid imagery OMR tells me about the fantastic retrieve that Dakota had on a wounded rooster.  A broken wing brought it down at 40 yards and the lab nailed the bird on a full sprint.  Smiling, she brought it to the feet of my father.

As our baby stirred in my arms, I was right there with him

Soon I will able to join him again, as we continue our quest of wild roosters in the channeled scablands of Eastern Washington