Brock, Mason and friends.

[brock ratcliff]

Today we loaf. Tomorrow we work.

 

[Jamie]

I’ve been pretty well laid up since late November. Spent a week in the hospital and have had a lingering infection that they just found and starting treating over the last three or four days. That issue has been a problem. I’ve been weak as a kitten and unable to do much of anything. Within a day of treating that particular infection I started to feel better. So that puts us up to yesterday or the day before…
Mason’s pal, Caleb has been around my house since he was six or seven years old. He’s spent a lot of time with us and introduced me to his future FIL yesterday as his “second dad”. Caleb had purchased 24 pheasants at my buddy’s preserve for yesterday. He insisted I come and bring Peanut. He really had no idea how sick I’ve been and honestly I didn’t think I’d be able to handle the walking. But I decided I was gonna try even though I wasn’t having a good morning yesterday and really just wanted to stay in bed.
I met up with the boys, Mason couldn’t go due to holiday plans w his girls family. Headed out and much to my surprise, I just kept feeling better with every step and folded bird.
Now for the good stuff…
I told Matt when we started out that I didn’t know if I’d be able to hang with it for the day. So he took out two of his GSP, which hunt these pen birds every day of their season. They are really good dogs. Peanut hasn’t stepped foot in pheasant cover since late March. I figured he’d be rusty. I was wrong.

Keep in mind once I start this bragging bit, I take ZERO credit for this dog’s ability. I’m not a dog trainer like JB, Jesse or some of you other fellas. I literally just took Peanut hunting with my old GSP when he was a pup until he learned the ropes.
So peanut rolls into the fields with the two GSP pros. He locks up on point a solid 50 feet from the first bird with the two GSP running around trying to find it. He holds. They eventually get in winding range of the bird (10 feet or so) and lock up. Peanut holds until I tell him to move up. The boys kill the bird and everyone comments on Peanut picking off the bird from long distance.
That continued for the duration of the entire hunt. Of the 24 birds the kids killed, I think that scenario played out exactly the same on 21!
We had pretty much concluded the hunt and we’re heading back to the lodge, walking along a pond edge when Peanut locked up on point at a cedar tree. I couldn’t see a bird but P said it was there was one in there so the boys gathered around, flushed the bird and shot it. It splashed into the pond still very much alive and swimming like a duck. Peanut jumped in, swam the length of the pond and retrieved the bird while the GSPs tried to stay dry. lol.
Obviously, I posted all this to brag on Peanut. I’ve loved this lil guy since the day we brought him home but each day I learn to appreciate just a little more how lucky we are to have him. A good dog enriches a man’s life in ways that can’t be measured! If he never hunted a bird he’d still be about the nicest little pet we’ve ever had. View attachment 203571

You just made my day.

 

[brock ratcliff]

Mason and Josh made a quick hunt between downpours this afternoon.

 

[OO2]

Goodluck on the wild birds tomorrow!

 

[Fletch]

Brock... Sorry to hear you were laid up, here's wishing you a speedy recovery... Lingering infection??? KEEP ON TOP OF THAT AND IF YOU RUN A FEVER GET YOUR ASS TO THE ER... COULD TURN TO SEPSIS... IT WILL KILL YOU.. Take that from someone that had it... Doctor told me I was very lucky they caught it when they did...

 

[brock ratcliff]

Goodluck on the wild birds tomorrow!

Thanks Cole! We don’t need to kill a thing but sure have high hopes for a few solid points!

 

[brock ratcliff]

Brock... Sorry to hear you were laid up, here's wishing you a speedy recovery... Lingering infection??? KEEP ON TOP OF THAT AND IF YOU RUN A FEVER GET YOUR ASS TO THE ER... COULD TURN TO SEPSIS... IT WILL KILL YOU.. Take that from someone that had it... Doctor told me I was very lucky they caught it when they did...

Two separate infections along with colitis. Never ran a fever. They had a little trouble sorting it all out but for now I think I’m on the mend.

 

[Fletch]

Ok... But sepsis kills a ton of people... I went in the hospital Thanksgiving and they said I had sepsis... Put me on strong antibiotics and stayed there for a week... They discharged me and I felt pretty good... Christmas Eve I'm running like a fever of 104, back to ER... Infectious disease doctor ( same one as first time ) comes in and asks me: WHAT THE HELL IS KEEPING YOU ALIVE??? You've had sepsis for over a month... This time I was there for close to 2 weeks... Sent me home with a port in my arm... Had to go back to hospital daily for an antibiotic drip... Finally got cleared up... So be carefully...

 

[brock ratcliff]

Ok... But sepsis kills a ton of people... I went in the hospital Thanksgiving and they said I had sepsis... Put me on strong antibiotics and stayed there for a week... They discharged me and I felt pretty good... Christmas Eve I'm running like a fever of 104, back to ER... Infectious disease doctor ( same one as first time ) comes in and asks me: WHAT THE HELL IS KEEPING YOU ALIVE??? You've had sepsis for over a month... This time I was there for close to 2 weeks... Sent me home with a port in my arm... Had to go back to hospital daily for an antibiotic drip... Finally got cleared up... So be carefully...

Sounds miserable!
Everything I have going on is a result of the treatments I’m taking for cancer. I’m not on chemo, but immunotherapy. It has serious side effects for a portion of patients, and apparently I’m one. I feel like I’ve received good care. It felt like when I went into the hospital I was wasting my breath continuously telling doctors that I was certain I was having a reaction to my latest treatment. It was a pretty severe reaction and it seems to me all of the doctors felt like the situation I was in was caused by something else —— so they looked at everything else. Finally a GI doc I’ve seen before walked in, looked at me and said “I am sure you have colitis”. Then he drugged me up and went looking from both ends. Soon after he came around and said, yep, that’s it. They diagnosed the first infection pretty quick and started treating that, but the second went undiagnosed and untreated for weeks. Once they got the results and started me on meds, I’ve started to feel substantially better soon. Sure, I wish it had been quicker, but overall I feel like they have done a great job. I mean everyone… every nurse I had except one was great, doctors, even the ladies that cleaned my room at the hospital. All great. Now, whomever runs the kitchen needs shot. Honest to God, I ate nothing but fruit while in the hospital. The other stuff was not edible. And that is coming from a guy who literally did not eat more than a crumb for weeks. . Towards the end of my stay when I got to where I could eat, Krista made or purchased food to bring me. How do you make steamed broccoli horrible? It’s literally water and broccoli.

 

[Fletch]

WOW.... I feel for ya buddy... My infection came from when they took a cancerous mass out of my bladder.. I kept complaining to the urologist that I had a constant discharge of black gooy blood coming out of my pecker... His response was it will clear up.. Yeh ok.. That was 4 years ago... But.... My food in the hospital was very good... Sounds like your on the mend.... But keep an eye on it...

 

[brock ratcliff]

WOW.... I feel for ya buddy... My infection came from when they took a cancerous mass out of my bladder.. I kept complaining to the urologist that I had a constant discharge of black gooy blood coming out of my pecker... His response was it will clear up.. Yeh ok.. That was 4 years ago... But.... My food in the hospital was very good... Sounds like your on the mend.... But keep an eye on it...

Ewww. You win.

 

[brock ratcliff]

Peanut did peanut things this morning. This is my pal, Jason with his very first wild Ohio bird. Fun morning in the field. Saw some good deer, moved about ten pheasants. We only killed one but certainly could have shot a few more. When you realize there is simply less habitat for wild birds it seems a lot less important to shoot them.

 

[Fletch]

Great pic Brock... Love those wild birds with big tails... We used to hunt them in Eastern Pa. back in the early 70's and flush 10 birds at a clip... My brittany would be in 7th. heaven... Now you can't find a single wild bird... This year on the farm in Illinois I flushed a whole covey of wild quail...

 

[Outdoorsfellar]

Epic reads Brock, good job !

 

[brock ratcliff]

Great pic Brock... Love those wild birds with big tails... We used to hunt them in Eastern Pa. back in the early 70's and flush 10 birds at a clip... My brittany would be in 7th. heaven... Now you can't find a single wild bird... This year on the farm in Illinois I flushed a whole covey of wild quail...

We still have quail here. Seems to me if you can find a piece of ground that hasn’t been raped by herbicide, bushogs, and bulldozers there are birds around. The issue is most farmers now find it trendy to spend their down time running big equipment to keep their land looking like a golf course. It drives me nuts and I do my very best to explain that “waste ground” is beautiful and the monoculture they want to create is hideous. These people are my friends and neighbors but the majority certainly seem to view things differently than I do. . A habitat-aware landowner is a rare thing in today’s world.

 

[Fletch]

I hear ya Brock... They try to squeeze an extra row or two of corn out of every ditch...

 

[brock ratcliff]

I hear ya Brock... They try to squeeze an extra row or two of corn out of every ditch...

Oh no, the newest trend is clearing waterways of anything but well mowed grass. There is no monetary gain, not an extra row of beans to be gained, just bald scorched earth because it “looks good”. @LonewolfNopack can attest… they have equipment and time to kill right now. It’s sickening. Their goal seems to be to insure there isn’t enough cover to support a field mouse.

 

[brock ratcliff]

I didn’t take any pics of the landscape intentionally today. But in this pic you can see a little better what this farm consists of… habitat. The place is around 400 acres. It is packed full of wildlife. Aside from birds, we saw rabbits and deer all over and we only walked a very small portion of the place within a few hundred yards of the truck. Two bucks most anyone would be happy to shoot, several small ones and a lot of does. It’s just heaven for anyone that likes to see wildlife. To my warped mind, the entire world should look this way. Practical? No. But some middle ground seems reasonable.

 

[Fletch]

WOW that's insane... No greed involved, just F... with Mother Nature...

 

[brock ratcliff]

WOW that's insane... No greed involved, just F... with Mother Nature...

Pretty much.