Labrador Retrievers: Hunters, Companions, and Friends
I do a lot of writing. Is it any good? The writer is the last person to whom that question should be addressed. All I can say is that someone seems to think so. Nonetheless, I am getting older and can no longer engage in many of the rigorous physical activities I formerly enjoyed. I recognize that my ability to produce coherent prose may be suffering the same fate. If so, I will not resent being told so.
Publication of my early books were joyous occasions. There followed a period of workmanship during which I still enjoyed the craft of writing, but without that initial sense of euphoria. When I finished Language of Wings, I told myself that would be my last book. Then I wrote Have Bow, Will Travel and made myself the same promise. Then came On the Wing, followed by another hopeless vow. Now I’m back again, as if by magic…
The reason I talked myself out of another self-imposed retirement was my affection for this book’s subject matter. I grew up with hunting dogs and they have been a constant presence and source of joy throughout my life. Concurring with the English poet William Cowper that variety is the spice of life, I trained and hunted with a number of breeds including English pointers and setters, Brittany spaniels, German shorthairs and wirehairs, beagles, blueticks, and treeing Walkers. I also spent time in the field with two other celebrated waterfowl breeds, Golden and Chesapeake Bay retrievers. When I was facing early stages of burnout as a physician, I promised myself that I would find something to like about every patient I saw. I brought the same attitude to bear on that riotous smorgasbord of dogs. Sometimes that was easy, but all those breeds produced a dog or two that was a hard to like, with one exception…
By now readers should have no trouble identifying the dog in question. For that matter, the fact that you are reading this book suggests that you share my opinion. Greetings, brothers and sisters.
Some of us enjoy Labs primarily as hunting dogs, while others equally devoted to the breed don’t hunt at all. I have intended this book for both parties. The first two sections are basically hunting stories highlighted by Labs, while the third focuses on the dogs independent of their roles as hunters. If you’re reading this book because of your enthusiasm for Labs but do not hunt, I suggest that you begin with the third section, Life with Labs, before reading the preceding material with an open mind. That’s my favorite section anyway.
I frequently describe my dogs in ways suggesting they have feelings and insights they almost certainly don’t have—the definition of anthropomorphism. I’m too much a scientist to believe in those descriptions literally but too much a romantic to deny them. I apologize for any confusion.
The photos that accompany the text are weighted toward those dogs that accompanied us over the last 30 just because we didn’t do much photography before then. Apologies to Sky, Sonny, and Rocky. I’ll have to let words paint most of those pictures.