May-June 2003 NEWSLETTER SNAKE RIVER SPORTSMAN And GUNDOG ASSOCIATION

Upcoming events:

Saturday, June 28, 2003 – POKER SHOOT – High hand wins the pot! ANTE UP!

Lewiston Gun Club – 10:00a.m.

To get into this contest, each shooter must possess a $15.00 stake to cover lunch and prizes. Current SRSGDA membership is required to play. (Membership may be paid on site.) There will be a variety of “games” offered. For each game played, each shooter will obtain a playing card. There are additional random wins possible including: Annual membership in SRSGDA, Two (2) braces at a club sponsored fun trial, and the much coveted celebrity Filson hat.

Shooters should bring 75 shells. The “house” recommends the use of target loads, max size #7-1/2 shot. The club will provide the main course, drinks, and paper products for all contestants, but requests that everyone bring a potluck side dish or dessert to share.

So, even after all those details, you simply still need to know more? The chairman, Jay “Maverick” Roach

(208-285-1636, troach@moscow.com) and your SRSGDA Club President, Bart “the pit boss” Dearborn

(509-334-3774, bartd@pullman.com) are happy to fill you in on all the details!

Calendar of Upcoming events

June10 – 6 p.m. SRSGDA executive committee meeting, El Mercado, Moscow, ID

July 26 – 3 p.m. Family Picnic, Ceccarelli and McCawley, Moscow ID

This is a family potluck event – main dishes will be provided, some beverages, and some sides. Salads, desserts, and appe”teasers” are most welcome! We would like to organize some “youth” activities in addition to access to volleyball, basketball, croquet, hiking, eating, drinking, conversing, etc. Please let us know if you have children and their ages so we can plan appropriately.

Aug Sporting Clays, Outback Sporting Clays, Palouse, WA, date and time TBA

Sep Fun Trial and Training Day, date and location TBD – possibly Snow Farms

Jack Flack, Ed Westbrook, Zac Sexton and Nance Ceccarelli will chair this event. There will be two fields run with bobwhite quail used in one field and pheasants in the other field. Entrants will have a choice of field and brace selection.

If you have not had a moment to send in your membership ($25 per family) dues, please consider doing so at this time. We’d love to see all of you participating in the next club event!

DID YOU KNOW?

The May Fun Trial was a wonderful success – thanks to the great show Abe, "Stumpy" and all the volunteers. Good company, light warm rain, food, great flying birds, few "moses" and no ticks, yet. Ian McKinney and friend found salamanders much to the delight of John “Doc” Kramer. How about those flowers? Just for us. Most dogs found birds – many handlers shot successfully! The clean-up crew found the few “lucky” quail outside the field in the trees. If you missed this one, you’ll have to wait until Fall for the next one – we hope to see you there!

	A-Field						B-Field
Place	Name		Dog	Score		Place.	Name	Dog	Score
1^st	Ceccarelli-McCawley		Pirate (ES)			1st	Ed Westbrook	Abbie(EP)
	Jack Flack		Lizzie (GSP)		715		Zack Sexton	Mojo (ES)	640
2nd	Mike Bundy		(Brit)			2nd	Jack Flack	Micki(GSP)
	Jim McKinney		Rowdy (EP)		540		Jim McKinney	Rowdy(EP)	620
3rd	Bart Dearborn		Echo (W)			3rd	Ceccarelli-McCawley	Pirate (ES)
	Jeff Pollilo		Molly (EP)		345		Abe Smith	Kit (EP)	475
*Derby		Skip Gabriel	Bell (GSP)		12 mon.	*Derby	Skip Gabriel	Bell (GSP)	12 mon

Norman and the Badger (Basically the Truth)

Upon reflection, it just wasn’t the sort of situation you get into every day. I was beached on the sofa making a valiant effort to digest my wife’s “Tuna Surprise” when the phone rang. The caller dropped the small talk and simply stated, “Norman is down a hole after a badger.” Thus, began the chain of events, which will henceforth be known to sportsmen everywhere as “Norman and the Badger.”

I suppose some explanation is necessary at this point. Norman is a young female German Shorthair. The caller, and owner of Norman, is Jack Flack. The time is 8:15 p.m. on a Thursday. The date is March, 1992. And I think we all have a handle on what a badger is.

Anyway, Jack explained that Norman had been missing since midday. After nightfall, he had heard eerie howls near a badger hole high up on an eyebrow behind his house. Jack said he needed some help. As I hung up the phone, I quickly analyzed my options. First, maybe this was some sort of sick joke played upon the feeble-minded. But would Jack Flack do that? No way! Second, maybe I had been napping and this was the kind of thing you dreamed about after a lethal dose of my wifey’s “Tuna Surprise.” Sure, that formless lump of noodles and grease had been nauseating, but hey, I live on this stuff. No, that wasn’t it. It suddenly dawned on me I really had only one option – call Doyle McLam.

The logic of this choice may not be readily apparent to the uninformed, but Doyle has the reputation of once killing a badger. Better yet, if the need arose Doyle would be able to compare the badger in size, color, and demeanor to badgers that existed in the area, say, prior to World War II. That could come in handy. Besides, when you get down to it, Doyle is the only person I know who is just crazy enough to shovel out a badger hole in the middle of the night.

Doyle and I soon drove south. We met Suzie Flack and a very nervous Jack in their driveway, whereupon, a consensus quickly agreed upon a division of labor for the task ahead:

Suzie Flack ………………… Supervisor (The brains of the outfit)

Jack Flack ………………… Photographer and traumatized victim

Doyle McLam ………………… Badger Consultant/ Historian

Cam Hershaw ………………… “The Digger”

After loading into Jack’s Bronco, we headed west across freshly plowed fields. A strange silence overcame our party when Jack finally stopped the vehicle and we stepped into the brisk night air. To this day, I don’t know whether it was fear, determination, or a desperate sense of fatalism that seized the group. The silence was soon shattered, however, by a long, guttural moan that stood my hair on end. I gasped, but then realized the moan was just Doyle who had fallen on the ground getting out of the Bronco. Anyway, after we hoisted Doyle to his feet, my thoughts turned to “The Hound of Baskervilles” and the dark Scottish moors as we stumbled through the Palouse mist towards Norman, the badger, and what was to be…

Episode Two (And, Somewhat Less True)

Through the black night, an evil wind buffeted our small group as we turned east and descended ever-so- slowly into the tangled lair of the badger. Not 40 feet from the Bronco, we were again greeted by a low, ghastly howl that froze us in our tracks. “Did Doyle fall down again?” Suzie asked impatiently. “Wasn’t me,” remarked Doyle as we crowded together. “What in the HELL is that?” squealed Jack in a tone at least an octave higher than what most of us would consider a manly voice. “Jack, you get a grip!” Suzie snapped in obvious disgust.

Under the dim glare of a feeble flashlight, we collectively peered through the mist in the direction of the awful sound. Nothing greeted out eyes but a dank tangle of limbs and vines. After an impassioned discussion, we again proceeded with our leader, Suzie, in the fore. But another twenty feet had passed under our feet when again that dreadful siren wailed.

We stopped in terror and I wish I could tell you what happened next but events just happened too fast. Dirt, equipment, and assorted screams filled the night air as our light failed. I instinctively rolled to the ground; my mind racing to process the sounds falling on my ears. After what seemed an eternity, a single, feeble beam appeared and focused on a babbling Doyle who was standing waist deep in the middle of our meager path. I noticed Doyle’s right leg was on the trail, but his left leg was down a substantial hole. It was then that Doyle screamed but one word, and that word was “Badger!” As Doyle paused to draw a ragged breath, our leader sympathetically asked, “Did you actually see a badger, Doyle?” “Not really, Suzie,” Doyle barked sarcastically, “But something in this hole definitely has the MUNCHIES!!” Jack was the first to respond, “This is great, Doyle – don’t move!” as he unlimbered his Nikon. Too little, too late. Doyle exploded from the hole with the intensity of a Polaris missile breaking the surface of the Atlantic.

Suzie, Jack, and I gathered to stare down the hole as Doyle crashed aimlessly out to sea. We had found the origin of the ghostly siren. Norman looked up from her place of confinement – just an abandoned hole. A dozen strokes with the shovel and we backtracked to the Bronco with a tired Shorthair in tow. Standing beside the vehicle, we heard quickening footsteps racing towards our location. It was Doyle, chased by the badger of his imagination. As he passed, Suzie thoughtfully stuck out her foot and the three of us fell on our noble Historian as he kipped into the soft dirt. After a fashion, Doyle was loaded into the back seat of the Bronco and we shortly arrived where we had begun: the Flack residence. With Norman safely bedded into her kennel, the team nervously made small talk over cookies and milk at the kitchen table.

As it turned out there had been no badger. But alas, I knew none of us would ever be the same. Our lives had been forever changed, and only now do you now the reason why.

(Our editor’s thanks to Cam Hershaw for his literary contributions! Thank you, too, to the Flacks and Doyle McLam for permission to share this wonderful story.)

As I begin my second term as your club President, I look forward to another fun-filled and exciting year…fun trials, shooting activities, dog training, and camaraderie. There is much satisfaction working with

such a strong group of volunteers. Thank you all for your contributions of time and energy.

The SRSGDA executive committee meets on the second Tuesday of every month. If you have an issue to discuss, please contact one of the officers so we can include you on the agenda. If you simply want to join us for a lively discussion, please let us know as we move our location from month to month.

GSP’s

Tedi and Jay Roach are happily expecting the late June arrival of a litter of pups out of “Willy” (Star Kissed Willow Von Greif, Lehmschlog’s Hershey Kiss x Starbuck V Greif). Willy is three years old and an “awesome hunter,” holds very well, pointed at an early age, is not high strung, but has just the “right amount of energy to get the job done!” She is solid liver with a flash of white on her chest. The sire of this litter is “Butch” (Flacks Butch Two, Franks Chucka Tolla Jr x Tanenbaums Lady Perkins). He is owned by Jack Flack and hunts nicely. Butch is LVR/RN. Pups should be ready to go around Labor Day. Please contact 208-285-1636 or troach@moscow.com for further information.

EP’s

Upcoming litter of ENGLISH POINTER pups…this is a repeat of the same great breeder that produced:

Jerry Thiessen’s TANNER, John Kramer’s TIPPIE, and Dick Chapman’s WACKO. Litter will be whelped in mid-July. Reserve EARLY! Call Dick Chapman 208-743-5548.