Setbacks training Ben and Sam with Jim & Martin and so I cancelled the next day's Novice Field Trial entrance and then drove home to Paxton to rest and relax
I had struggled to communicate with Jim at his house in Sutton the day before due to the noisiness of first his kids and then his dogs. I do not know how they can think clearly with all this clamour going on!
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Therefore today, Jim was not really prepared for what I wanted to do with him which led to a bit of confusion. I got there early but he was not ready, and it was some time before we got underway.
We had a little time quartering his farmer's sugar beet fields, but he had the first large section to do with Ben and we had to cover much of the same land again and did not have any points or retrieves for Sam.
Then the journey on to meet Martin at Burnham Market and a coffee and scone at the high street pub before we went off for training. It was the common again that we covered and sometime struggling to point snipe when the pheasants upwind in the marsh were giving by far the stronger scent.
Things were not going very well but they got even worse when we tried retrieves on the dead pheasants. Sam just mucked about with them and mouthed them, refusing to hold them gently and so I soon had to give up.
Jim had more luck with Ben and, although he still has a fairly untrained dog, he has been making more progress than of late. We soon gave up the endeavour and went back to Martin's caravan where Mrs Sullivan was kind enough to get us some ham sandwiches and tea before we left.
Time therefore to chat about our experiences and the seemingly insuperable problems of training the GSP to high levels of achievement. The journey directly home to arrive at Paxton in time for a late tea with the family before resting and watching televised Rugby League in the lounge.
I cancelled the next day's Novice Field Trial entrance by reason of the problems I have been having with him and Jean Botterman, Field Trial Secretary of the GSP Club was disappointed as the last of the reserves had already been put in and the numbers would be short as a result.