Good morning all,


I just wanted to let everyone know of something that happened over the weekend that I'm sure we can all learn from. I know me and everyone present have taken a big lesson from the events.

On Saturday we had the last day of our syndicate shoot for this season. It was a great success finishing up on a fabulous duck drive in a really strong wind. We ended up with about 45 head on the ground at the end of the drive, at which point the picking up started.

Our Keeper Bill called m over with Fern to pick some of the dozen to fifteen or so birds that were on the pond. We knocked out the cripples first and started retreiving. Fern worked absolutely fabulously, even though water has never really been her thing. She picked about 8-9 birds, some of which were quite an effort. With one left to go that all other dogs had failed on she stood by the pond and just looked at me. I asked her to get round the bankside vegetation to pick the bird and she duly obliged as always. As she brought the bird to me she got out of the water and suddenly hunched up, literaly just falling on her side.

Her leggs were bunched up underneath her and her head full back with the jaws wide open. I immediately picked her up and carried her out. My initial reaction was that she was having a heart attack, and I had no doubt that I was losing her. The eyes were showing some kind of life but she was stiff as a board in complete spasm with no signs of breathing.

I put her on the floor and a friend "Trapper" Dave noticed she wasn't breathing. While I checked she hadnt swallowed her tongue, he gave her 5 chest compressions at which she started breathing again. I tried to ease her legs out of the cramp which was almost impossible, and I didn't want to tear her muscles so we wrapped her up in my fleece and shirt and bills jacket and carried her back to the shoot room.

She was still unable to lift her head after an hour and I had spoken to a cousin (a vet) and he said it was urgent she got some glucose. If she didn't walk within an hour he said to get her into the vets for a saline/glucose drip. He pulse was at 200 when we had arrived at the shoot room and he said at 220 they generally give up. The warmth brought it backdown within minutes.

In the car on the way home I got a bottle of lucozade sport with a sports nozzle. I held her head up and squirted some into her mouth to see if she could drink. She lapped it up and I managed to get about 100cc into her then the head went down again.

By the time I got home her head was up and she wanted to walk, even though I could see it was painful for her. She took on board a bowl of food soaked in salty gravy that I had asked the missus to prepare for our arrival.

It was a long night as she stayed in with us. She could only be upright for a few minutes before she went to lay down. Over night she recovered massively. She still looked tired but the movement was better, and it was some relief tthat she was back being the cheeky mare we know her as.

Overall an entirely avoidable incident had I have done a couple of small things differently. I always carry a mars bar with me for her through the day but didn't have one that day. She usually gets a couple of bits of cake from the elevensies but it had all got eaten by the time we caught up with the guns after checking/organising the next drive. I could have opened another packet but didn't...

In the future I wil put a bag together that will stay ready and go in the car as a matter of course. Mini mars bars and a couple of bottles of Isotonic drinks for midway through the day and the end of the day. She'll also be sure to get a decent breakfast each morning before shooting, (she gets this anyway).

Overall everyone present took a lesson from it. I would have been devastaed to have lost her. The vet is sure Daves quick thinking in getting her breathing saved he life and for that I can't thank him enough.

These little dogs often are the reason our sport is possible and they give their all for our (and their own) enjoment of what we do.

Best regards,
FB

FB,

Very interesting. Please post in the "Dogs" section - I'd like to hear what more experienced Dog Handlers/Owners have to say......

Lab, Spaniel, Shorthair?

English Springer.

I'm going to give Tony Price a call this afternon and get his verdict too. I don't think there is anyone with more experience of working spaniels than him to be honest.

I'm also going to ask him to look out for a lab for me too, to try and take the retreiving load off of Fern a bit.... She won't be at all happy!!

Rgds,
FB

FB,

I had a similar experience with my GSP when he was about 1 year old. Since that time, I have watched him much more closely, but every now and then he will edge into those symptoms when in the field so you may have to watch more closely from now on out. I now carry some sort of energy bar and water pretty much wherever we go. Keeping him hydrated and blood-sugar levels up seem to help and it sounds like you are on the same track.

Best of luck and I hope the pup makes a full recovery. It is a seriously scary few hours when you are helpless to get them back to normal.

K

I trust she eventually managed to get to sleep with you fussing over her FB.

That post really got me concerned - having picked one of my cock birds the Fern Dog is my hero!

Give her a good scrutch from us lot down here in the SW!

Rgds Ian

Hi FB

Glad to hear you dog pulled through. When a young dogs hunting instinct kicks in they can literally run themselves to death. My
bloodhound has risked heat stroke a couple of times in Scotland hunting roedeer in the summer bracken. Young dogs have more enthusiasm than body fat and too much running around in the cold or even an infection can soon sap there reserves. I double my dogs food rations a couple of days before I take them out working in Scotland.

regards

Mark

regards

Ian, she's in major tummy scratching credits!! In fact elaine even had to tell me to leave her in peace which gives you an idea of to point we got to!!

I spoke to Tony Price yesterday who said that it is quite common. apparently it has to do with the way they regulate body temperature, which in itself accounts for 40% of a dogs daily energy expenditure at rest. He saisd that "enthusiastic" dogs gan get quite warm hunting then when they get into cold water the whole system has to change from cooling down to warming up, and if there isn't enough energy available they can sort of overload.

The madness is back to her usual self now,although she is still quite clingy. I'm sure that anytime she wants to be fussed over now, she'll just throw herself to the floor and play dead!!

Rgds,
FB

I had to smile at Ians' contribution.
Sounds like you had a near run thing, hope it's not going to be a recurring "fitting."
I should of thought the lesson to learn was the necessity to have more canine workers present....too many shooters are content to rely on another mans' dog. "Don't shoot it if you can't retrieve it."

Fallow Buck, I'm very pleased you saved your dog. The same thing happened to a friend of mine the other day, his spaniel bitch went into a fit, thankfully she survived and is well on the road to recovery.

Thanks guys,

I had her out again on saturday and she was fine albeit a bit easily tired. She was a bit subdued yesterday and I am taking her to the vet tomorrow for a check and her boosters.

Trans,

I have to say that you are spot on with the expectations of some guns. We all have a responsibility to collect our game or at the very least mark it well enough that it can be easily recovered by a dog handler. I'll often get told that a bird (hen or cock?????) is down in the ditch... the ditch maybe 300yds long. For the guns that make the effort to mark a bird and hang on to watch the dog work it is a joy to help them. For those that turn and leave with a wave of the hand it is not quite so myuch fun!!! We have a handfull of dogs on the shoot, a couple of which may as well not be there in all honesty. The result is that my dog and my freinds lab end up doing half the work when there are 7-8 dogs available.

I've already started making noises about a second dog. The idea would be to work one in the morning and one in the afternoon, or alternate them through the day. I can't ask Fern to continue working like that.

Rgds,
FB