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Monday, June 15, 2009

Portable tracking dachshunds

Today I received a nice e-mail from Sally M. from Vermont. Sally says:

I've been meaning to send you this picture for a long time - it's of Petey in his 4-wheeler box. In the spring, I make maple syrup but I only boil about half of my sap. The rest I bring to a farm down the road with my 4-wheeler. This year I made a box for Petey so he could come with me. He took to it immediately - he would sit down and lean against the side of the box with his nose in the air, thoroughly enjoying the ride. While I unloaded the sap, he got to run around a big hayfield full of gopher holes. He wore a harness and was hooked to the box so he couldn't jump out, plus the sap was really heavy so we had to go slowly. I felt pretty comfortable that he was safe.

Petey's doing just great. He had a good winter, only one trip to the vet for porcupine quills. He's matured beautifully, physically and mentally. I don't know the first thing about proper dachshund conformation, but I can at least see that he's strong and straight, athletic and moves well. He has a great personality too - he's calm and quiet, well-behaved, friendly and confident. Though he still tries to hump the cats, eat their poop and will roll in really disgusting things.

I am planning on bringing Petey to
the UBT workshop in NH and am looking forward to it. Hopefully you'll be there and will get to see him in person. Sally

Thank you Sally, as always, it is great to hear from you. We both will be at the workshop, and I am really looking forward to seeing you and Petey.

One of the advantages of dachshunds as tracking dogs, is their size and portability. These days a lot of hunters use ATVs, and dachshunds can be transported this way with ease. Below there is a picture of John and Billy taken in 2006 on one of the local deer calls. It was quite a haul up the steep mountain and getting there on a four wheeler really saved time and our energy.



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