High Mountain Shorthairs

Week 6

2011-05-23T09:06:00.001-07:00

5 Weeks Old

2011-05-19T13:11:00.000-07:00

Ruby and Boone pups

2011-05-10T16:25:00.001-07:00

A month old.

Two days old.

A month old.

Kaylie Shot Two Toms!

2011-04-18T20:27:00.000-07:00

This was the sunset the day before we hunted. We could see turkeys roost near theses trees.

The next day we sat here and Kaylie shot her tom at 14 yards with her 20 gauge. There were two toms strutting at our decoys.

I carried all the gear and she carried her tom to our truck.

That afternoon we were at Dworshak Dam on the North Fork Clearwater. I was standing right here to fight this fish.

We hunted two more days and Kaylie shot her second tom.

With camo on and she fell asleep two hours you can see where she got sunburned. We were waiting for turkeys and I fell alseep as well.

We stayed at a home of two great friends, Halli and RJ. Kaylie was tagged out for turkeys so we fished two days with RJ.

Kaylie sat next to me. When the toms were gobbling and coming towards our decoys I tapped her with my shoulder as she was sound sleep. She saw the turkeys and watched me call them in and pull the trigger.

She carried the tom to the truck.

I carried all the gear.

We hunted and fished for a week. Kaylie did a great jog! Getting up at 4am wears us out. She carried two of her toms and my tom. She did a great job carrying 20 pound toms a mile for each walk back to the truck.

Hunting 2010

2011-02-25T14:50:00.000-08:00

Opening day.

Boone on point.

Kaylie shot two blues with Boone on point.

Kaylie shot a sage-grouse with Boone on point.

Ruby pointed this sage-grouse for me.

I did three different walks that day and hit 5 miles. A full prosthetic leg. I can only walk 1.5 miles and hour. I will not quit.

I hunted a few days by myself.

Kaylie got her fourth species, a sharpy. She had shot a ruff ealier.

By myself.

Rebecca got a sharpy.

Rebecca shot a wild rooster with Boone on point.

Christmas day.

Ruby two days after Christmas day.

Boone and Ruby together with me.

Another day that I took Lily, my daughter.

My New Life, I Will Never Quit

2011-02-23T12:31:00.001-08:00

In April 2009 my daughter Emily shot her first turkey. In June 2009 we had an accident. I have driven over 20 years and thousands of miles on a motorcycle. We were going 50mph on a straight road. A truck was coming on the opposite side of the road. He turned across the road to a gas station and hit me and Emily. I was knocked out instantly. People saw the accident and rushed to help. A man had to take his belt off and wrap my thigh in a tourniquet. The ambulance showed up 12 minutes later. I had lost 75% of my blood. My blood pressure was 40 over 20. My heart beat was 8-10 beats per minute. At the hospital they had to put enough blood in me for 2.5 people. My skull was cracked. My eye socket, nose, and jaw were broken. My collar bone, six ribs, pelvis, and both hands were broken. My right lung collapsed. My left leg broke in 6 places. In my right leg over 50 pieces of bone were broken. The right leg was amputated. I was in a coma for a month. After the coma I was in the hospital for another month. They rebuilt my left leg with 9 titanium screws. Six months later, my jaw was wired shut for 2 months. Emily's leg was broken. They put 10 screws in her broken bones. She was in the hospital for a week.

It took me several months to put a prosthetic leg on. During Christmas, Emily and I decided to hunt turkeys in April 2010. I spent weeks and months to walk several feet, then yards, then ½ mile, and a mile.

Spring of 2010. Getting up at 4am shows how Emily can snooze while she waits for a tom. She was lights out!

The fourth day she shot her tom at 12 yards on full strut. She gets pretty shaky when those toms gobble so close and loud.

I can walk! I carried her gear, decoys, and gun. She carried the 20lb tom by herself!

2009-06-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

Grandpa Thane spent a day on the boat with us. We had a real pretty day and caught some nice fish. We are very grateful for his generosity in allowing us to stay at his cabin. It has truly made fishing at Henrys Lake a springtime favorite.

2009-05-28T12:21:00.000-07:00

The 2009 season is here. Emily, Kaylie, and I spent the night on the boat to go after them on the opener. We had a great day as the above and below pictures show.

Lily did not get to go opening day so I took her out a couple days later. She was wanting to catch a big "pounder" as she calls them. Well she ended up catching the biggest fish of the long weekend. She was excited.

2009-05-28T12:04:00.000-07:00

We fished the lake 14 days in the spring of 2008. This was our last day and it ended with a bang!

36 pounds total.

Emily caught these two in 20 minutes!

2009-05-28T11:51:00.000-07:00

Kaylie caught this big one on opening day 2008.

The above and below pictures are from 2007.

This was from 2006.

2009-04-22T08:58:00.000-07:00

Emily is now old enough (10 years) to hunt turkeys in Idaho. So we headed to northern Idaho for a week to see if we could call one in for her. It took more than one!! The first morning she got buck fever real bad watching those big toms come strutting into the decoys. We could see them coming from a couple hundred yards and when they got within range she was a shaking, heavy breathing, mass of camo. She had a real bad case of buck fever. Three big longbeards came in and she missed at 25 yards. Later a single longbeard came in and he gobbled several times so close and violent you could feel it resonate in your chest. He also came in in full strut and you could hear him spittin-n-drummin. Her only prize of that bird is the feather she is holding. She missed again. It was an awesome morning. We saw five adult toms from that setup. Just abit too much for a first timer to handle! On the walk back to the truck we decided she was gonna have to get "mean".

Our second morning we found ourselves to breaking skies as it had rained all night. We got set up and waited. They flew down much earlier than expected and with some calling we could see four adult toms at the end of the field. They started gobbling, saw the decoys and came on a dead run! At 15 yards in front of us they were packed so tight bumping and shoving each other Emily had to wait abit to let them separate enough to make a shot. She got "mean" and the 20 gauges aim was true. Third time is a charm. Bird on the ground at 5:58am. Several others were gobbling in the area so we grabbed our stuff and moved off to take pictures at the truck. Wanted to come back in a couple days for another hunt.

Gotta love the purple boots! Gotta have dry feet!

2009-04-22T08:56:00.000-07:00

We were pretty excited and nothing beats a kiss from a cute turkey killer!

The 1 ounce load of 6's did the job. Kinda fun to shoot'em with home grown reloads.

Back at the truck, been driving ten minutes and she is out. She is not a morning person.

Halli and RJ let us stay at their home for the week. We spent Easter with them. Halli had a birthday midweek and Emily made her two cherry pies and we cooked a turkey dinner!

2009-04-22T08:47:00.000-07:00

This is the lucky cedar post. We went back to the same spot Emily shot her bird and I shot one from the same spot. In the following picture Emily is standing in the pile of feathers were her bird was shot and you can see the post and backpack behind her to the left. My bird lays were it fell. He came from a long ways off. We could see him at over 300 yards.

Emily helped carry the bird back to the truck.

2009-04-03T10:25:00.000-07:00

These pictures are from several years ago, but bring back good memories spent with the truest friends. They are a good backdrop for the poem below.

I have killed a lot of doves over the years but none compare with those killed this day.

These are my great uncles, Maynard and Bill. We are 5 miles from the nearest road and had a day that will be cherished.

The past year or so has really brought this poem to light. Love those that love you.

Mending

by Henry Hughes

To be at joy's instant------
the blue-wing olive
free drifting
under a shady bracken bank
just before
your fat heart leaps.

Or doesn't leap.
Fly following its leader, green line
bowing wide with current
and the cost of long connections-----a bad marriage,
a friend who won't call back-----
drowning dun in a blue ripple
where no one believes you're real.

Unless you throw a mend.
Keep the river off your back.
Glide your sweetest invitation
unhurried
over the ones
who really want you.

2009-03-25T11:02:00.000-07:00

The snow has melted and we have been out several afternoons the past week.

2009-03-25T10:58:00.000-07:00

CR Bruson and I ran dogs a few days ago. Here is his pup Copper.

2009-03-12T11:42:00.000-07:00

If you properly respect what you are after, and shoot it cleanly and on the animal's terrain, if you imprison in your mind all the wonder of the day from sky to smell to breeze to flowers--then you have not merely killed an animal. You have lent immortality to a beast you have killed because you loved him and wanted him forever so that you could always capture the day.

--- Robert Ruark, The Old Man and the Boy

I do not kill with my gun; he who kills with his gun has forgotten the face of his father. I kill with my heart.

--- Stephen King, The Wastelands

...pick your gunning companion with the same care and forethought you would employ in selecting a business partner, except that in the testing, I suggest the employment of a finer mesh screen and a stronger acid.

--- John G. MacKenty, Duck Hunting

Hunting is a path, a muddy, brushy, dank, and spoor-written path along which the seeker, if his spirit is right, can truly feel the earth. If he is fortunate, he travels with a true dog and a true friend.

--- Charles Fergus, A Rough-Shooting Dog

2009-03-05T15:05:00.000-08:00

2009-03-03T13:04:00.000-08:00

Photo: Doug Favor. We each shot a male on a beautiful evening walk with Boone and Bugsy.

Photo: Doug Favor. This is my first time hunting over pointers. They belong to Matt Tanner.
They have style.

Photo: Doug Favor

Photo: Doug Favor. Boone retrieves my last mearns and my last bird of the year.

2009-03-03T12:52:00.000-08:00

Photo: Doug Favor
Stitch is a legend. Here I am with my first bird shot over a "Stitchy" point.
I have now been inducted into the club of the elite. Its a great place to be.

Photo: Doug Favor
Dinner in the wall tent. Mearns make an incredible meal. No steak in town would match.

Photo: Doug Favor

Photo: Doug Favor

Photo: Doug Favor

This is the same meadowlark the sings in my pasture in Idaho. Glad to see he was enjoying his winter in AZ.

2009-02-19T14:52:00.000-08:00

Grandpa's OU

2009-02-12T13:37:00.000-08:00

2009-02-12T13:30:00.000-08:00

Above: The point by Boone. Below: A double. Boone had 4 covies in an hour.

Below: Stitch was given the comfort of the truck to travel back to Idaho. He laid down for hours and only occasionally peeked over the back seat. Here he is looking real innocent.....

However these kept him busy! Nothing like a $300 chew toy.
He also chewed through two leashes, ate a zipper of a fleece jacket, chewed off the handles and ate two holes in a duffel bag.

2009-02-12T13:18:00.000-08:00

2009-02-12T13:08:00.000-08:00

Above: A double over Ruby, and below: she cut her tongue!

2009-02-12T13:01:00.000-08:00

Above: Nine year old Stitch with Doug Favor. Ruby is out of Stitch.

2009-01-29T08:58:00.000-08:00

2009-01-29T08:55:00.000-08:00

2009-01-28T15:37:00.000-08:00

This is King. He is off of Boone and "Boondocks Annie Girl". Annie is owned by James Groth. My brother in law, Matt Burgess picked this pup and they hit the hills hard.

2009-01-28T15:21:00.000-08:00

2009-01-23T18:13:00.000-08:00

This is Copper. Brad Smoot bred his female; Silver Sages Eloway, "Elllie" to Boone. This pup was the pick of the litter and went to my friend CR Brunson. CR lives down the road from me. It has and will be fun to follow this pups progress. He is 8 months old and is really coming along very nicely.

2009-01-22T19:39:00.000-08:00

2009-01-22T19:08:00.000-08:00

2009-01-20T14:34:00.000-08:00

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2009-01-20T14:06:00.000-08:00

2009-01-20T14:02:00.000-08:00

2009-01-20T13:58:00.000-08:00

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2009-01-20T13:24:00.000-08:00

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2009-01-20T13:08:00.000-08:00

Photos by: Myron Rick

Photo by: Myron Rick

Photo by: Myron Rick

Photo by: Travis Wall

2009-01-20T12:59:00.000-08:00

Myron Rick took the next three photos.

2009-01-20T12:52:00.000-08:00

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2009-01-20T12:45:00.000-08:00

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2009-01-20T11:29:00.000-08:00

My grandfather.