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All right. Welcome back to another episode. We've got an exciting one for you
today. My dear friend, M. G. Maderas, Marie, the ex employee. That's alliteration
everyone. Uncle Bob knows things. That's rhyming. Rhyming. Alliteration.
Alliteration is like Kevin's talking. He doesn't have a microphone. No, but that's
rhyming and that's pretty good. But alliteration would be like Leslie's, Louis
lefty, whatever, like all the same letter in a row. Okay. So get back.
Anyways, we're off to a good start. Everybody welcome back to another episode. Marie is
back. She is in town this week training with me and Oliver Burman, who shame on him
didn't stick around for the fun. But we're going to have fun. Let's clink cheers.
Silver Lions kennels is what do you think seven months in business? Since February.
We're not a big math guy, but four or five or five. All right. Well, it seems
longer, but how has it been going there? Bud, welcome back. Thank you. It's been good.
Yeah. We've got a based out of New Hampshire. And we're doing a mix of bird dogs and
retrievers and the versatile thing. You have the quintessential Schmorgas board.
Some would say that. Yes. There's a. Are they graphons? Are they? What are they?
So I've had some wire hairs, but right now I've got two of the wired-haired pointing
graphons. Yes. They're very eclectic and they're moustaches. Yeah. They got great
beards. It makes me jealous. So I saw them. You've got a couple of German short hairs.
You got your man, Colt. And then you've got a bunch of young lab puppies. So it's
a. And you got a nice show golden. Yes, I do. Yes, as may shout out as may. She did
pretty good today. She did good. Yeah. I'm proud of her. Little struggle on the first
watermark and then rocking and rolling. Yeah. Not bad. Bingo bingo sparkles. Inside
you. Okay, everyone had to be there. Show goldens live in the dream. All right. Let's kick
back because the last time you were on the show, we had Grayson on. Actually, your only
time on the show says you're a repeat, a founder, second timer. Grayson was here. You were
still working here, I think, or it was like your last week. It was like your Bon Voyage.
That was the Bon Voyage. We were hunting grouse for pretty much a week. And he came up
with his dogs and we just had a good time. Yeah, we did. So after that, you finally got
to have a honeymoon with your sweet boy, Hubby Steve. Yes, I did. But your honeymoon is
not like everyone else's that goes to Hawaii or, or, you know, the Maldives. No, we waited
till the beginning of December when it was cold and wintery and about to snow. And we
traveled out to Iowa. We got a hunt with my short hair's breeder, cold's breeder. It
topped on kennels. Love their dogs. Very practical. 100% if you're looking for a short
year pointer. 100% recommend them. I mean, my allergies killing me. But yeah, so we got
a guy with him. He got a guy with his father and grandfather back naturally, beautifully
to both those dogs and we were hunting a pheasant out there. We hit Iowa actually at the
beginning of deer season. So it wasn't ideal in public land, but we went to a private
property and that ended up being pretty fun. Sweet. And then from there, we went up to
Aberdeen, South Dakota. Slow down, bud. Oh, okay. All right, all right. I want to learn
more. What was it like? Hunting with the father and grandfather of your dog. What were
they like? What were their personalities like? Did you see them have characteristics that
cold as we're like, oh, snap, that's that's a cultism. Yeah. So very similar. Maybe shouldn't
say this on the air, but him and his grandfather shared a bird retrieve, maybe popped the head
off of the bird, but they did have a shared retrieve. So that was actually pretty funny
to see them coming back with that. But they both had a very similar style. They were
bold, but very cautious and sent. And then both the retrieve dives were just off the
chart. So sweet. Yeah. It was neat to see. Your dog is black, grown, right? We call him
a speckled Labrador here at Lundish at what were those were they both black? I know his
grandfather was liver. Let me think. His dad was liver and his mother was black and white.
Okay. Yeah. So we like generally in the industry, you try not to do the homozygous black and
black because then you can still have black and errone puppies. If you do a rone parent
with a black parent, or a liver parent with a black parent. So the black gene is still
dominant in them as well. Oh, okay. Yeah. All right. So slow it down because I think I picked
up on it. So if you have a so we're on for all you Labrador folks, Ron is like the heavy
ticking heavy heavy ticking word faint white, very faint white, but mostly speckled with
big patches of of the solid color, right? So it can be liver and white with some ticking
or liver and white or liver and rone, which would be very little white black and white, black
and white tick black and white, wrong. True. Okay. So now you said a big word homo sapien,
something like that. Homozygous. Yeah. Way above my pay grade. What does that mean?
Pretty much same same. So I mean, it is. It's the same. So black and black. Yeah.
Liver and liver. That's homozygous. Yeah. Okay. So now if you non homozygous to be black
and bred to a liver. Yeah. So it's almost like a Labrador. It's a black with like a yellow carrier.
Oh, you know, if you breed a black to a black, most likely you're going to get an all black
letter. And generally in the industry with the breed standards, it's not ideal to have an
all black letter. Just like it's not ideal to have an all black Labrador. If you're, you know,
all right, I got you. So grandfather and him shared a lot of similar characteristics.
Father, what was he like? Very similar to cold. Because cold is a small
for a male, especially. Like a brick shit house, like muscled up. Yeah. And both his parents,
actually, mother and father were both short and stature, but like when we saw him in the
kettle, we went to puppy pickup. It was like two little bull looking short hairs.
Nice looking at that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's what cold looks like. Every muscle has a
striation. Yeah. You can see his like lap muscles and like his back strap looking muscles. And
he just juiced up. Yeah. He's often gone. So his dad is the same. Yeah. Yeah. How did Colton prairie?
So he ranged a little bit closer to begin with just because we hunt them. Yeah, we hunt in the
woods up here. And you know, kind of figured out with the other dogs. Okay. What really surprised me
was how he backed because I really only ran him. I think of running with Ethan that one time with
thunder was the first time he really backed a dog at all. Cool. So seeing like three of them flank one
point and then him and another dog flank and hold steady till the flush was just super pretty
unreal. Yeah. That's awesome. How did the birds work on the private land? Were they pen raised
probably or was it wild birds just on pub private land? Well, it was a preserve. So they were
put out as far as so pen raised. But I think they do get some of the outlying birds in the area
obviously because they're making habitat for their birds. But it's pretty wild. So a lot of the
bird that don't get shot also just kind of stay in the area. So you never really know what you're
going to run into. Cool. So was it put in take? Meaning like we put out 20 birds this morning,
go hunt them or was it yes, you're nodding yes, or was it like throughout the season, they just
stock the field and you don't know. No, they plan it out. So you put in, I mean, you buy like
buying a lot of birds and you put them in. Okay. But that's not to say that you won't
find more. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's super cool. So all right. Colt had fun. Colt learned a ton.
How did you shoot? Well, with with them, I I didn't shoot. So I just got it with the dog.
Oh, no one ran the dog. Cool. Um, Steve, my husband and our friend who came with their lab,
did some flushing stuff. They shot a bunch of birds. Um, Steve got our one wild IOF
sweet. So that was cool. And that was pretty much it for Iowa. Okay. And then you went to south
the code and the next. Tell us about that.
Quote, quote, well, not quote, quote, quote, it was our first wild feson hunt. So
I don't know. The GSP and SIG freaking feson in my life. Really? Like, I mean, just left and right.
The problem with where we hunt. So we went to the CRP lands, which is like the, they can be
public, but they can be also privately owned that they're allowed to, you're allowed to go hunt.
And they have a South Dakota is pretty cool in like how you can find those privately as the hunt.
Um, so we went to a spot like just outside Aberdeen. It was like five minute drive. And
it was all uncut. It was like a massive island of uncut corn and then hayfield around it.
So we obviously were on the outside of the corn because the corn was above head.
And the dogs would go into the corn and be like 10 birds flushed out.
But yeah, but all the like a hundred yards away. So we're like, well, that doesn't work.
But so we kind of just like that day was just kind of figuring it out. And then the next day,
we actually traveled to our, our duck spot. We found another CRP grassland area.
And the grassland was really cool because we saw some grass. And then we saw some wild feson.
Sweet. And again, my husband is the sharp shooter. So he got the, he shot all the feson. But
I'm going to tell a funny Steve story right now. You know what I'm going to say.
So we're, we're training the bird dogs. And I don't remember if we were running cold
or a dog in training. Was it cold? Okay. So cold is technically Steve's dog.
And he loves this thing. He sends me pick obscene pictures of cold.
They sing together in the morning. They do a lot together. It's a true unspoken bond,
Steve and cold. And so we're going to put some pigeons out to shoot. And I'm like, Steve,
did you bring a gun? He's like, yeah, I got one. It is like a sawed off home defense gun.
I'm like, yeah, I guess we're doing this thing. So we're walking behind cold locks up on this
pigeon. Perfect. I'm like, all right, you get here. Everybody watch out. You know, make sure
we're safe. If the bird flies here, you know, we're doing the whole deal. And I'm like, all right,
I'm going to pop the pigeon. And I popped it. And if you've ever seen a pigeon come out of a
trap, it goes straight up 10, 15 feet in the air. And then it starts to fly. And usually you let
it fly a little bit and then bang, you shoot it. Well, this sucker came straight out of the air. Oh,
there was like nothing left of this pigeon. And I'm like, all right, Steve.
I'm not sure what choke if there is a choke or whatever. But we want to let that pigeon ride a
little bit on the next one. I mean, it was like, well, you told me to shoot it. Like, I had day
and you did. And then you did now cold has no retrieved because there's nothing left. So that
was a pretty, I'll never forget that on with him. But it was like a Remington 870 home defense
black, tactical red dot, whatever trick he has on those things, he's got him tricked out.
But it's a pigeon killer. He didn't miss. He didn't miss. So good for Steve shout out.
Big, big Steve. So South Dakota, was that, did you duck on it all in South Dakota? Was it all
1000? Yep. So after Aberdeen, we headed out west. We actually went to like the very western border
of the state. And we went to an outfit. So this was like the technical honeymoon phase was our
treat to ourselves. We actually had a couple traveling with us, which was really fun.
And they brought their little British Labrador that. That's sick. Yeah, that I kind of hooked them
up with and trained or helped train them a little bit. Really nice dog. And but this was his first
like big duck hunt too. And really for my dog's bracket, I mean, I have 100 little holes in
New Hampshire and the old jump shoot queen here. Yeah, jump shooting wood ducks are specialty.
So this was like her first thing. And it was like a mixed bag of like the first day, 5 a.m.
We roll up and set the scene. Yeah, okay. So we get to the outfit really early in the morning,
four o'clock or something. We get to the spot at like 4455. He's like, we're going to sit here,
see if the birds, like we see the birds come into this. It's like a farm bond. Okay. So
we're watching our watches. The sun's coming up. We don't see any birds coming in. There's no birds.
We get out of our truck. But before the birds. Yeah. He was like, right, you know what we're
going to do? We're just going to drive around to the pond and just see what's up. We drive around
to the pond. We get out of our trucks, slam our doors and like entire like black sky of geese
and ducks. Really? Like you couldn't have, I've never imagined that many geese and ducks.
How big was this pond if you had to like put words to it? Acre and a half. It's not huge. But
out there, I think when they, when you create water out there, because it's such a big like
by way from Canada, that if there's water, they'll come and stay for a little bit. So it was my
understanding at least. I'm no professional as far as that. But so yeah. So we set up our blind.
We did everything. Put the decoys out. Sun was like still kind of coming up. So it was like a
really cool scene. And then the ducks started coming in. And this was like sprockets real first.
Like let's see a bunch of ducks come in here. Like 10 12 shots go off and let's see what happens.
Lay out. And no, this was just a regular like sit down blind. So we're in like a.
A frame. It was just like a regular blind. Okay. What do you call that? What? Yeah, panel blind. Thank
you. Yes. A frame panel blind. Okay. Yeah. A frame. I'm thinking like a house. A frame.
True. Anyway. You're good. So the first group comes in. We stood shot. I think four birds
um crippled one. So the first one I sent her on was literally in the decoys.
Five yards off the shore. Okay. And
send her to go at the bird. She gets in the decoys, gets 20 yards out. It looks at me. It's like
what am I doing? Like there's no holding minds out in the field. There's no white bucket. What am I
doing? The struggle and fight for her to get into that five yard mark duck. That was still like
it wasn't alive really, but like it was still moving a little bit so she could see it. She got
that and then like a light bulb switched on. And it was like every bird from then on. She,
I mean, there was like so it was a artesian well. They call it. Okay. So like the part right in front
of us was still up in water, but the outskirts of it was thin ice to normalize. You can walk
on and she did blinds from the water to the ice and straight back. She did blinds. I walked
her out around the pond and did blinds on the ice. We had to go hunt them, hunt up a few ducks,
say got like like when we were doing a cleanup hunt for cripples, he like found a duck hidden
God knows where. No way. And got to get a live duck retrieve and cool. So one of the one of the
things that I want to check. I'm like you're in a second, but I think
that right there, extremely well trained like passing master tasks, passing finish tasks,
but hasn't had the real live thing yet. And it does take a duck or ten ducks for them to go,
hmm, it's the same, but different. And they figured out and you do see a light bulb moment
come on. And so I think whenever someone sends a dog to us to get trained, we're always like,
you know, the first few hunts, Leaver gun at home, the first few hunts, you're a dog handler,
not a shooter, you know, coach the dog on how to be successful, etc, etc. And then like,
you got to witness it really with sprocket. It's like, yeah, this is not a jump shoot hunt in our
beaver pond that she's known since she was a puppy. Like, it's a different pond, different place,
probably totally new. Like, you know, we don't train out of a frames or panel blinds. Like,
all of it was new to her and all of a sudden it's like, she heard her name. She's like,
hell yeah, I'm out of here and just runs. And it's like, she didn't mark shit. And there's birds
dumping everywhere. And it's like, she knows how to mark them, but she didn't. She's ran and was like,
now what? Help me out. And then that one bird, it just clicks, right? Yeah.
And I'm aside to heaven. We got to get more mics. It's way easier to just have my own mic and
cut you off. One of the things that I liked here and you say is that you got out of the water
or got out of the blind, excuse me, walked out to the open ice and then sent your dog on the
retrieve. I feel like a lot of times we are hunting with people and they just get all excited and
birds go down and you send the dog and just assume that they're going to go and do all these
different things. But if you train or excuse me, hunt like you train where the dog understands,
being lined up and understands, like getting to a point where they can see more, like, have a
better view point, things like that, like set them up for success in that kind of way.
It's a lot smarter way of hunting, especially when your dog is new to the scene, like,
sprockets. That's awesome to hear maybe just reiterate for people. Slide it back.
We got to get like a... All right, more back. I also would say that that another piece of advice
for folks is think about your backdrop. So if you're standing in an A-frame and they can see you
from your shoulders up and you're trying to handle your dog on a blind and all they can see is
shoulders and arms flailing, that's not really setting the dog up for success when you have to run
a blind. So step out of the A-frame exactly. So very cool. Tell us more. What species did you
nab on that duck hunt? Mostly mallards in Canada, Goose. Goose was Steve's favorite to hunt because
they're wildly harder to shoot than you would think. They fly fast. And then we got wiggins,
which were pretty cool. We were all pretty excited about that. But yeah, going back to like the first
hunt kind of thing too, like even with Colton and Wild Birds, a lot of the rules that we teach
him in training kind of went out the door because you don't want them to be unsure about stuff.
He definitely went to a wide open South Dakota field and was like,
like either let's run a mile straight and then hunt or let's heal for a little bit and figure out
what we're doing. But yeah, there's definitely a learning curve. I mean, especially like handler and
dog. It was on both our parts of like I just sent her the first time. I was like I didn't line her
up for success at all. But also like from that, I incorporated a lot like even when it does get cold
where we are like practicing safe ice handling. So she's not just sliding everywhere and kind of
knows how to grip herself before she's chasing after a crippled duck, you know, on cloud nine.
You're right. And then also the other thing was that was was remote blind. So like having her
she was in a down over here in our layout blind. She was in a down with a camel cover over her.
Like just her nose poking poking out. And when they came in and we shot, she would sit up,
which is fine because at that point, they're not really you're not flaring. Yeah.
But also like learning to handle her or even release her from that remote like away from
me position was huge. Yeah. One of the things that I've I've incorporated in our dogs training as
they've get ready to go home and hunt is running a blind from a dog stand or a ground blind
compared to your heel set good right there. No here good good right there. No here good back.
Right. Yeah. And basically you you find to them a lot less. You get them to look good back.
And they just jump off the stand and like run half hash really and like to boop boop boop boop and
they get back in the groove and it gets better with time. But if you try and find to them on the
dog stand or out of the ground blind, it's like ugly. So ugly. So you just kick them loose. Let
them get out and then start handling. But I've practiced that a lot because I would have people be like
he runs great blinds sitting next to me. But when we're in the dog stand in the marsh, he won't
jump off the dog stand on back. Like that's weird. Like the suckers never done that to me.
But I haven't done it where he like I would do it on land off a dog stand not in water where
you know what I'm saying? Like there's just little things that it's big to the dog but it's not
big to it. Like for our thinking is like he's done this before it should be fine. He's been a thousand
times before. Yeah. But that one little nuance of being in the water and getting kicked loose
from a dog stand. And it only takes two or three successful sands and then they're often running.
But if you never you know as a owner that didn't train it, that to them is like now I don't know what
to do. So yeah, we work on that a good bit now because it bit me in the butt a few times.
Like he definitely knows back. Yeah. I promise. Yeah. So cool. All right. So this is just outside
of Aberdeen. This one was on the western side of fruit. You don't have to name the name.
People. Yeah. One of the yeah. It was the western side of South Dakota. Very good. Yeah.
So where did you do is at the end of the hunt or did you have more in store? No, that was pretty
much the end. So we did. So we did I think three duck hunts and like two upland hunts there
on private land. They released some birds. But like a lot of it was to like keep the predator
population from eating the wild birds. Okay. So like there was some chakr mostly fesant.
But the chakr that was released was like the predator population control.
Give them some dees. So they leave the fesant alone. Yeah. Pretty much. All right. Most memorable
retrieve for sprocket. Oh, it was actually a blind retrieve. It was on our last duck hunt day
where it was like like beginning of December and it was like 60 degrees. We're hunting in like
shorts and t-shirts in our layup lines. But there was ice in the pond still. And she had just
come back from a goose and they a group of pigeons came in. We got those, came her back and center
on a blind retrieve through water up. She crawled up onto the ice, broke ice and then onto
regular ice and came like straight back to me with almost no handles. So that was pretty.
And then there was the guides dog broke and was running around and the other dog was just kind of
he went to get like a marker tree. So there was like three dogs out in the field and she just did
this perfectly. My eyes. No, it's just pretty stoked on it. Tell you our best sig retrieve.
His first goose. He got his first Canada goose. And he didn't know what to do with it. And we just
we just let him figure it out and let him have fun with it. And he brought this. I mean, he's a
little or dog for a male. He's definitely he's actually probably smaller than sprocket.
And he dragged this big honking goose back by the neck. That's awesome.
Pretty proud of him. Yeah. All right. Fast point or cold. Wait, can I add one to sprocket? Yeah,
you knew you. She had it. I think I got the goose actually. He was on ice on the other side
of the pond. She came back and it was biting her. Oh, really? And she held onto it till I grabbed
it and then it started biting me. Anyway, it's the best point for Colt. The one that's Steve
let get away. Oh, poor Steve. You didn't know it was tactical done. No tactical done.
Ten sessions. There was no no good sights on it. No red dot. I think it was the second
present field we went in and Colt pointed perfectly. Steve actually handled him because I was
away. And he stayed steady to flush and Steve yelled, Hen. And it was a chucker.
He just looked back at me and just shook his head disappointment. So sad. Yeah. So sad.
So that was the most memorable. All right. Most memorable. Most memorable for you shooting wise or
what you saw and experienced. When those widgets came in, I think we got five of them
and sprocket picked up all five. Really? Yeah. That's sick. Yeah. So I think she marked two of them
and then the rest were, I mean, there weren't hard lines, but still. They were all three blind
trees. Sweet. And then the guy complimented me on both our dogs. Good for you. Yeah. So were you
hunting both sprocket and say at the same time? So during like the five-widgen that got knocked
down, say it's just like killing? He was on a leash. So he's not quite as finished. So it was more
of an experience hunting for him. But he's very like calm, like as a general demeanor.
So he wasn't noisy. He wasn't great, like a down for the lab lines, which we didn't expect.
So we didn't really know, to train him for it. But if he held him, he would stay fine. And as soon
as he let him go, he'd go. So he's just like a gentlemanly style of like, all right, let's
sprocket get these. Yeah. That's sick. Yeah. Or I mean, I'd hold her back. And yeah. Yeah.
Exactly. Nice. Good for you. Yeah. All right. So you had your honey moon haunt
the hunting moon. Kevin says hunting moon. I like that. Hunting moon. Are you going to do another
one this year? We haven't got anything big like that planned. The South Dakota takes a little
planning because I get to pull duck tags. Right. But we have Grouse Camp booked for a Northern New
Hampshire right after opening week. Cool. So we've got a few days up there. And then I've got some
guiding on the books and actually be up in New York, probably a good bit to hunt through her up
land. And then probably just come here with you. Sorry. Hell yeah. I'm here.
Are you going to be down to master national? There are a lot of the early action. So that means
Marie, we going out hunting? Yes. I mean, Kevin are going to be hunting. Yeah. Master
nationals are ruining my hunting season. Shout out to master national club. All right. Where I
want to go somewhere next. Okay. Do you have a question? Yeah. Okay. Kevin's up.
Hey, how about that Kent cartridge, baby? They got that fast steel 2.0. If you're not in the market
for Bismuth, I get it. But fast steel 2.0 is a great option for you and your dog to get more ducks
in the bag. Strap them up. Strap them in Kent fast steel 2.0. Let's go. From the duck blind to the
holding blind bird. It's pure arena. Our young dogs are eating the puppy blend. Large breed puppy
formula should be fed to puppies from eight weeks. When you get that little bundle of joy home,
that little cuddly, wuddly, buddy, all the way to about a year old. We want that dog to develop
at a good consistent rate. We don't want them grow too fast too soon. And so that puppy formula
is going to help accomplish that goal to give them all the nutrients to develop their bones,
their joints, their ligaments, everything right? Feed that puppy formula till 12 months old
and then flippity, floppity to the 3020 pro plan. Hey, do me a solid. If you enjoy this show,
if you enjoy our Instagram, if we've helped you at all, join patreon.com forward slash
lone duck outfiters. If you do it before September of 2023, you're going to enter to win a hunt
with me and Kevin and a bunch of other Patreon members. Down in Missouri, we're going to smack
some ducks, have some fun. Do a seminar with our dogs and have a great time. But jump into patreon.com
forward slash lone duck outfiters, links in the description and join the community that helps me
help you help your dog. Force fetch. What is it? It's super intimidating to so many people.
Yet it's not that difficult. I built a step by step process that helps you understand it. You
and your dog can be successful in it and it takes the intimidation away of the process so that
you and your dog can get to your goals. That's what it's built for. Let me teach you how I do it so
that you and your dog can do it. Different breeds, different personalities, problem solving, and more.
Check it out, links in the description, the force fetch course. Bebe. Hey, lone duck outfiters.com
is another great way to support the show. If you want to get a hat, you want to get a little
swaggy swag. Check it out, lone duck outfiters.com. That's another place you can support the show and
show up to a hunt test. Rep in the gear. What is the latest with Tika? Tika, K9 Tika. She is doing
fantastic. My people who Tika is. Tika was the male and while I was raising. I got her when we got
back from down south last year, so last April, not this April, 22, 22. Raise her for a police department
down in Connecticut and for detection. She's in detection school right now and she's doing fantastic
with her new handler and she is. That's very dearly. Yeah, she was special. Yeah, she was a cool dog.
Yeah, she was really, really cool. She had crazy retrieve drive. She was a Labrador in a
mountain body, loved to swim, loved to get bumpers. You know, me and you would play tug and bite
stuff, but it wasn't her jam. That wasn't her jam. It wasn't like what made her tick. She loved
to retrieve, which probably will make her a phenomenal detection dog because of the reward of like a
Kong or whatever afterwards, but she was intense. Yeah, but but also less intense than a lot of the
other male and was I have now met. Oh, I would agree, but it was like she was on. When she was off,
she was cool and like hang out and she was a busy body and like doing stuff, but she wasn't
destructive or crazy. Like a lot of the stigma or stereotype would say, but she was like,
you just look at her and be like, she's thinking she's smart. She's outwitting us and every
every second, everything she could think of without winning it. She was super cool. So
cheers to her and her career. Yeah. Yeah. Will she be bomb or drug?
Um, the last I heard and I don't know if this changed course at all, but she was actually,
she was actually a gun dog. So she was going to be gun detection in the hospital setting.
Oh, that's right. You told me that. Yeah. And we've got about 220 acres to play with.
A seven acre beaver pond and a couple other ponds, a couple other ponds to come, hopefully.
And clearing a bunch land to hopefully have a big area to run on and you have a beaver problem.
We've got a beaver problem. There's the beaver problem at marise. Yeah. So if anyone likes to
deal with beaver problems, yeah. So a lot of it is wooded, right?
So you're clearing land, hopefully this summer and probably started. So you're going to have
even more field work. How are you thinking of designing it? Do you have this master plan of what
it's going to look like? Like with all the places you've gotten to train and be a part of and
see down south in Camden and here in New York and the contest we've gone to, like,
whatever, where some cool ideas. So we're a little limited because
clearing land is not easy. Even if we have someone come cut it, we stuff the stump and grade
and make it. So essentially what we have is like, it's a bigish. It'll end up being probably like a
3 acre by 10 acre long run. Smaller than my backfield. How big is your backfield? I don't know.
Good question. I always just round out saying 20 acres, but I don't know if it's true.
I think it'll probably be around like the 10 acre mark. Okay. Plus the pond. So really what I
would like to do is kind of smooth out some of the hills and valleys so that we have, like,
like, still have hills and valleys to run in, but like you won't lose sight of your dog.
So we're kind of moving a lot of things around. Push and dirt. Push and auditor.
And then we kind of got to figure out our waterways and make sure we're doing that right as far as
it's not just going to drain and we'll actually hold. But we'll probably build,
hopefully, one more like fairly big tech pond. Okay. Have the big beaver pond to run in. And then
we've got one little tech pond that we're kind of expanding right now. Okay. Cool.
As a new business owner, excuse me. And we get a lot of questions that come through Instagram
in the podcast saying, Bob, how did you get started? And how's it been? And not at all.
How has it been? Where do the struggles and triumphs and pros and cons of going out on your own
and like taking this risk and staying your life into this industry?
A lot of questions.
Well, it is literally invested in my life. So pretty much every penny I have saved in my life
has gone into this very thankful for my husband because he's put a lot into this as well.
A lot of struggles. We'll start with that. So it's stressful. You go weeks, maybe months without
phone calls or messages or anything. And it wears on you. It's not, I mean, you've been through
it too. Everyone who's been in this business, I guess has been through it. And any business.
Yeah. And it's, it's something you question yourself every day. But at the end of the day,
you, that dog leads to one more, which leads to two more. That's kind of where I've come around.
As far as being a business owner and understanding the whole process is,
you gotta be patient. It's like doctorating. Like you just have to be patient, put the work in
and do it right. And don't cut corners and be good to other people. So those have been the
struggles, I guess. But on the same hand, I joined a club up there which has been nothing but great to
me. They've referred a whole lot of people to me. And then the plus side to everything is one
obviously like working for you has been enormous in my education, but also your guy's support has been
you know, over the roof as far as referrals and stuff like that. But also at the same point,
like I'm pretty remote. So being able to come up here and train for a day or two is a huge relief
and fun and feels good. Yeah. Yeah. And like even my bird dogs have pushed me to get them into
doing more duck dog marks, even though they're not duck dogs. But it'll make them better. Yeah.
Yeah. Exactly. So that's kind of where I kind of had a switch in the past month or so. And
I think my dogs are looking better because of it. And feel good today. Thank you. I don't think
I grew good. Yeah. No, I'm proud. I'm proud of all of them. They're all really young too. And
that's another hard thing. Like when I go you train with you or other people, they usually have
a higher level dogs, which it's great. And I get to run sprocket and cold. But at the same time,
I remind myself that my dogs are young and they'll be there any year, maybe two years. And
right. And this it's been good. Yeah. It's uh,
uh, I feel like I'm in that boat right now because for two years, I
I don't know how to say this the right way. So it might come off wrong. But like I had the
luxury of you being here. And so the meaning luxury is like you are an asset here. You could
be trusted and kicked ass with the young crowd and the troubleshooters and the difficult ones.
And we would like how wow on this dog's a real gem. And I'm using gem lightly. Bob, can you
come watch and you know, we'll work this sucker out together and you know, you you have
opportunity to bounce ideas off of each other and say, well, did you try this?
And to run out of ideas like it's one of our grown, you know, okay, let's try this. And then
it works your dogs and where can we keep
or came together where by yourself. And I
wherever I feel like we're just like living remote, you know, in remote
that's probably not a word, but remote area. And there's not retriever
a dime a dozen like you drove five hours to come and
motivated. But yeah, like I could tell like I could tell
that I'm running big dogs and it takes four hours to do all the big dogs. And then it's like,
now we do the young dogs. The bug and now they want more. And you have more of those. And
it ebbs and flows. But you know, for me right now, I'm feeling very similar to probably how you
feel. It's like, man, I'm spending so much time. I've got nine dogs on four such nine.
How was me last year? Right. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And while you were doing four such those nine,
I was putting nine through T pattern and swim by and pattern lines. So I could go and focus two
and a half hours on those guys. Well, you focus two and a half hours on those guys. And then we
met up at nine thirty and went and had fun. Yeah. And we could blow off steam and tell how terrible
they all did. And you know, rock and roll for the rest of the day. Now it's noon. By the time
I'm done with all that stuff. And it's like, I don't have anyone to commiserate if you will on the
that kind of day to day. And I feel like even though my bigger dogs are doing well and I'm proud of
them, I miss focusing. I personally miss focusing on the big dog stuff.
And it's you're I mean, this like little mode of how do I juggle it all? Do I have a young dog day
and an older dog day and then a next day is a max and then an older dog day and a younger dog day
and a next day is max. And you put it at the end of the day, you just cried. And that I think if
everybody thinks that they want to be a dog trainer, you have no idea how much
effort and stress. That's like dead. This dog is not doing this and I've got to send it home
in a month. Like they're dead line stress. But it's not corporate stress. We put a lot of pressure
on ourselves. Would you agree? Yeah, it's a lot of self pressure. But I mean, at the same time,
the deadline stress, like I had to, you know, I started and my dogs looked good. I had to re-evaluate
my, some of my, yeah, it was mostly my bird dogs. You know, like I didn't want to push them
through as fast as I thought I could push them through and I, not how I want to train them.
And that wasn't the results I was seeing. Well, actually, I didn't think they looked good,
but it was, it was just too fast. Yeah. And I feel like it wasn't what I wanted. So I kind of had
to recheck myself and redo my expectations and relay that to the owners, which everyone's fine
with. Sure. Because they understand once I can, you know, once I stop putting pressure on myself
and I'm like, I'm not going to force your dog who doesn't like to retrieve, to retrieve
in two months. Right. As a bird dog, you know, yeah, yeah. Um, we're a lab for everyone else. Like,
yeah, they're not all cookie cutter. Yeah. And some of them will come around to it. And that's fine.
But like, let's let them do what they're good at. Let's make them good at that. And then let's go
from there. So there's been a lot of learning. And it's been a lot of, like I have to give you
props. Like it's been a lot of help from you as far as like just almost just stop, just stop
thinking, overthinking things like again, tree in the dog in front of you. Do I have to do and
make it the best you can? And I thought, I mean, that's all you can do at the end of the day.
Yeah. Yeah, I agree. Um, what is the biggest proud moment you've had as your own business owner
with it with anything, but then with a dog? Um,
getting my in a prize one, my little wire her pointer, Sadie. Yeah. Um, yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. And a prize one, perfect score. Ah, suck it in a second. I'll you name the people who
don't like the word score. Yeah. Um, no, I was that dog had a very nice turning point. And on her,
it wasn't even then it was the napkin prize one, but on the day before we did the take-home lesson
with her owner, um, who's local to this area. And she did phenomenal. Like she was, she found her
birds perfectly, pointed, stylish, held the flush, held the shot, and went on her name and retrieved
a bird for him. That was straight to hand. And I literally couldn't have been prouder. Good for you.
So, uh, that's kind of just like cubby. Mmm, I'm mostly proud of that one picture. I took a cubby.
Yeah. That's awesome. Uh, as a business owner, um, what's your proudest moment, not just being a
dog trainer, what was it? I'm still working on that one. We're still, we're still working through
the first year here, but well, what about your truck? What about the kennel? What about your first client?
I mean, those are all things to celebrate. Yeah. I think maybe it's not what I'm most proud of,
but what I'm most excited about, again, was kind of my turning point as far as
being smart and growing my business. Everything was, oh, going down to Connecticut to our property,
coming up, coming up here as a huge thing, and then like, I've got a few trips to me,
and to go work with my Nav2 group up there. I got a few retriever trainers up there,
I'm going to go work with, and I think, yeah, just be able to travel.
And do my business is
excluded, right? Like yourself working. You're literally by yourself all day. And
and everyone thinks, oh, you're just playing with dogs all day. And yeah, we enjoy dogs. We get it,
folks all day from the minute you wake up until the minute you go to bed.
5.30 AM, the 10.30 PM. Oh, you think about Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.
Sunday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Oh, it's Monday again, Tuesday. There's your,
you literally have dreams. I've got Carrie wakes up next to me and goes, hey, hey,
you're dreaming. Like, uh, it's like, you're saying knock it off.
Like, hell, yeah, knock it off. Quit barking. Right? That's what I'm dreaming about. It's all day.
And when you're by yourself, truthfully, it really does become almost like this monotonous thing
where you can get in a rut or do the same thing over and over again or feel like you're not
making progress. But then you go and train with other people and you see them kick ass and you're like,
we are making progress. It is fun to be with other people and listen to tunes and
do we do a beer blind challenge? We haven't done one yet. Tomorrow night,
and we got another podcast tomorrow night, but Thursday night, we'll do a beer blind challenge.
And basically, it's like, you pick a dog out of the hat that can run a blind and we,
we pick out a Mondo blind that's tough and you have to drink a beer while the dog is running a
blind. So you're like drinking and blowing a whistle and everyone's laughing at you and, you know,
busting your chops and you're trying to monkey with this dog and it's squaring beer out your nose
and having fun. And it's just like a moment like that, that five, three minutes you're running
that blind or whatever it is, it's not your job anymore for a second. So yeah, it's fun. It's fun.
Yeah. I'm proud of shit of you. And I think you'll continue to evolve.
All right, so we had a mini technical difficulty. We were just talking about Rambler and Bo and
Leroy, but basically, whatever you missed, it was a gem. So sucks to suck.
There you go, Marie cheers to you. Everyone, silver lion canals.
We don't do silver labs. No silver labs here.
Silver lions only. Marie, Maderas, a dear friend, badass. If you're in the northeast and you're
looking for bird dog work or retrievers or gondogs, whatever you want. Look her up on the old
Instagrams and the old websites. Give her a follow. And if you have any questions, you can hit
me up to and I'll put you in touch with her too, but take it away and tell everybody a little,
like finish it off. Website.
Yeah, silver lion kennels.com. At silver lion kennels for Instagram and Facebook.
And I do right now mostly bird dogs.
But
recruiters and gondogs and
campaign dogs.
A couple puppies that are being available for home soon.
Yeah, honey, see, I mean, really, like they some of them could go home now and like come back
and training, but others, you know, keep them through the summer.
I'm ready for duck season. Yeah.
Yeah, they're really nice too. You've done awesome job with them. So if anyone's looking for a
started dog,
um, hit her up.
Uh, I selfish plug for myself too. We've got one pot,
simply two that
mark and slide into either of our DMs and learn more about the dogs.
Yeah, available.
Uh, Maria, it's nice to have you back here in London showing us tonight.
And sure, everybody.