10/09/2017
10/8
Today was a busy day. My wife, Geri, and I drove to Berne (near Albany) to take John and Jolanta Jeanneney up on their generous offer of loaning us 4 year old Kunox. We had a very nice 2 hour visit, then headed home to face the music with Luna. Kunox has had training on tracking deer, but has never been on an actual track. I told my wife how cool it would be to get a call tonight and have him find his first deer. Luna is a little puzzled about the intruder who keeps trying to hump her, but they'll figure it all out in the next few days.
At 8:00 the phone rang with a hunter asking for Luna by name. I told him Luna has the day off due to her injury, but I do have an inexperienced dog I'd love to bring over if he likes. He agreed and told me he was hunting from the ground and had made a good shot on a nice buck, had good blood, then lost it. They had looked around for about a 100 yards, then called. I told them to mark last blood and back out. It turned out the track was only 1 mile from my house...gotta love that.
We walked back to first blood since the hit site wasn't marked and started there. I told Kunox to "find it" and off he went. There was a substantial trail to follow and he mostly stayed on it. He missed some turns but corrected himself most times. When he didn't I took him back to last blood and restarted him.There were a few times where the blood dried up for 40 or 50 yards and Kunox methodically worked it out and found more. He was a very determined boy! We crossed two creeks and he dove in without hesitation. The track ended up being a mile long and I dispatched the gutshot buck at the end of it. The long drag out started then, with Kunox chewing the deer the whole time. He was not overly possessive as he showed no signs of aggression when I tested him several times by picking him up and walking away from the deer. He's a very good boy! It was an honor to handle him on his first track and first find!
