My wife and I own 2 German Shorthairs, and several months ago I jokingly asked if we could get another one. She said "Sure!". We had several discussions, because we both weren't sure if we wanted to go through the puppy thing again and we decided to look for dogs on GSP Rescue. We got Molly on October 3rd and she proved to be one of the most obedient, loving and gentle dogs I have ever had. The one thing that I wasn't sure about was whether or not she would hunt. The little we knew about her background was that she had been found abandoned twice and she is somewhere between 3-4 years old.
The pheasant season has been tough around here (Eastern ND) because we have had an extremely wet fall and most of the corn is still standing, consequently, that is where the birds have been hiding. I took Molly out 2-3 times a week all of October, but all we found were hens. The first time I had her out, I shot the gun when she was a ways away and determined that she was not gunshy. She seemed to use her nose a lot and covered lots of ground and the hens we found she pointed and held very well, but I still didn't know if she was the "real deal" or not. The deer gun season has been going on the last few weeks, so we have not been hunting since around Halloween. Today we decided to go out and it was obvious that the farmers had been doing their harvesting as lots of the corn has been taken off and the birds were back to places we could hunt them. I gave my other 2 dogs the first crack this morning and we saw several roosters but I never had a decent shot so we were still empty handed. I did a little driving and found an area that had lots of grass and cattails and was surrounded by picked cornfields. We were into the birds right away as Molly found several hens and then pointed a rooster right at my feet that I missed. Cussed myself for about 40 minutes after that. As we swung around to head back to the truck there was one more slough to hit before we were done. Molly got two steps into the cattails and went on point. I walked in beside her and a rooster exploded out ahead of me. I dropped him about 20 yards out on the ice in another cattail patch. (Quick note: when we got Molly we had no idea how much actual hunting training she had. The foster family only said that they thought she hunted. I took it easy with her and kept everything short and fun. That said, she likes to fetch puppy toys and tennis balls, etc. in the house, but I had no way of knowing what she would do with a bird.) So now I had a problem, I finally shot a bird over her, but it had landed in an area that I wasn't sure I could get to because I didn't know if the ice was thick enough to support my weight. I worked my way about 5 yards out onto the ice and lost what little nerve I had left. Molly shot past me and started running through the cattails near where the bird had fallen. All I could do was yell "Fetch!" a few times, but I wasn't even sure that she knew what that meant. After about 30 seconds of searching Molly got downwind of the bird and I could tell immediately that she had found it. She went into the cattails, rumaged around and came running back with the bird and dropped it into my hand. I couldn't have been happier if I had won the lottery! I took the bird and praised her and made a big fuss, but she would have none of it. Her attitude seemed to be "Big deal Dad, that ones dead, lets go get another one!" Well, we were pretty much out of daylight by that time, bit I grinned all the way home!
I cannot promise the same results to any of you, but if you are thinking of getting another dog consider a rescue dog in the breed of your choice, you may be surprised at what you find!

P.Jelik,

Your story is heartwarming to be sure!

Very glad Molly has found you and a home for life Even better, of course, that you share a hobby!!!

Good Show.