Cold Duck: My Pint-Sized English Cocker’s Ten-Gallon Life

Gordie and I were in a woodcock honey hole that I hunted a bunch with my American Water Spaniel “Bean” 15 years earlier. The dogwood had more than doubled in size over the passing seasons, growing up to 20’ tall and branching out to choke the tiny gaps I formerly wedged myself through. Gordie presently flushed a woodcock, and I snapped off a shot as it crested the dense green canopy. I’m nearly 6 feet tall, and I immediately lost sight of that bird. Gordie, knee high at best, couldn’t have seen that little woodcock at all after it flushed.

While I was slowly clawing my way out of this emerging jungle, Gordie appeared with the woodcock in his mouth, his tail wagging happily. I still have trouble believing he completed that mission impossible. But that was Gordie’s gift: he made it all look so easy.

A year before 10-year-old Bean died in his sleep in 2005, we had the chance to acquire an English Cocker pup from our friend Harold Bixby’s WindWhistle Kennel. We jumped at it, taking in Gordie just before Thanksgiving. He delighted us by mastering overnight the ins and outs of the pet door to his fenced-in backyard comfort station. Not just smart, he was a highly cooperative puppy as well, and soon was sitting on command alongside Bean earning attaboys and treats.

Young Gordie with old Bean

Gordie was much too young to hunt that fall — Bean still managed a short hunt in easy cover on nice days — but the three of us enjoyed a long walk daily in the winter woods and fields behind our house. After sundown Gordie and I would do retrieving drills in the basement.

The weeks flew pleasantly by until a star-crossed day in March. We’d gone out the back door for our afternoon walk and were on our way to the back gate. Halfway there, old Bean just stopped and stared at me. “C’mon, Beanie,” I encouraged him. At this he turned on his doggie heels and filed his retirement papers by retreating into the comforts of a warm house. Bean and I had had a great run. If he wanted to start relaxing in his rocking chair, then I wasn’t going to second guess his decision.

Gordie was the beneficiary of this unexpected wrinkle. Now I got to concentrate totally on him during our daily outdoor adventures. He was a bold and happy pup. He’d chase a tweetie bird, or jump into an early spring puddle for a swim, and then return unbidden to his self-assigned station several paces in front of me. Here’s a photo taken after we returned home from one of our spring walks.

Gordie was a handsome boy

As spring gave way to summer, Gordie’s training heated up through sessions with more experienced handlers in our local spaniel club. Gordie swiftly revealed an exceptional talent for locating and retrieving downed game. On a training day at Harold’s, Gordie’s gunner dropped a pigeon well out and beyond dense brush scattered with pines. “Bix” howled with appreciation when Gordie appeared way out there with the bird in his mouth, and again when Gordie delivered it to me. I’ll never forget Harold’s words: “That was a world class retrieve!” I don’t know about that, but it foreshadowed many “how’d he do that?!” recoveries to come.

Successes like that one made me consider entering Gordie in spaniel competitions. Contests like that just aren’t my thing. But adding some entry level alphabet soup to Gordie’s pedigree didn’t seem too titanic an undertaking. And so Gordie and I started working toward the title Junior Hunter.

We got off to a bumpy start. He bombed out of his first test because of owner-operator error. I’d let him run far too far, fast, and loose. On the testing’s second day I did a better job handling him and by day’s end he had his first ribbon. Shortly thereafter he earned ribbon #2 at a test in Pennsylvania. Two down, two to go.

Having trained hard together all summer, we looked forward with confidence to our club’s September tests. On Saturday his gunner wing-tipped Gordie’s bird which then glided into thick brush 100 yards away. The judge suggested I recall my dog so that a second bird might be killed at a distance more appropriate for a junior. Knowing Gordie’s retrieving abilities, I said no, we’re good, he’ll make the pickup. The judge may have had his doubts, but I didn’t. I sure was proud when I handed that judge the bird that Gordie delivered to my hand.

Following his water retrieve Saturday, we had ribbon #3. Sunday went by well if not remarkably, and at closing time Gordie was now Flash Gordon of WindWhistle JH.

We were delighted to walk away from spaniel games and to concentrate on bird hunting, our real love. Old Bean died soon after Gordie’s last test, so the youngster, ready or not, was pressed into service for the October 1 opening day of grouse and woodcock seasons. Gordie needed a little time to adjust to hunting scarce, randomly occurring game birds instead of the pigeons reliably planted at regular intervals for him in testing. But his “cocker-y” nature soon burst into full bloom as he followed his nose to wherever bird scent took him. We had a sweet deal going: I let him do the hunting; he let me do the shooting; and we shared my sandwich on the drive home.

Gordie retrieved lots of woodcock,

and a goose,

many pheasants,

“partridge”

a few snipe, a beautiful wood duck, and just once, when we were targeting woodcock, a turkey.

Gordie ran to the fallen bird and puzzled over just how to grab it. He was clearly thinking “Hey, Boss, that’s one bad-ass woodcock!” He didn’t protest when I shouldered the bird and carried it from the field.

Gordie’s constant mindfulness of my whereabouts made him a boon companion in the field. He habitually worked about 10 yards in front of me and about as far from side to side as scent dictated. If I angled off a bit right or left, so did he. This made him silly simple to walk behind. Our hunts were always relaxed and joyous. Every day was Christmas, with Gordie playing Rudolf to my Santa.

Gordie’s habit of working close to and with the gun made him a sure fire hit with newbies. Kids in particular loved to work behind Gordie. I always instructed them to watch his tail, and when it started wagging at double time, to get ready for a bird in the air. Here’s a few of his satisfied customers.

On and on we went, our bond growing stronger every year. I never felt out-classed or under-dogged when I evaluated my beautiful, friendly, and productive hunting partner. For a long and glorious time, we two felt invincible together.

* ° * ° * ° * ° * ° * ° * ° * °

By the 2015 bird seasons, Gordie began to show his age. He’d have trouble with an easy retrieve of a woodcock downed close, or get slightly disoriented returning with a rooster. Unfortunately, this was only the start of a long, slow and inexorable decline in his health. After supper on one cool day late in August, 2018, I took Gordie to an old honey hole to scout for woodcock. Everything went fine until he disappeared into a likely thicket 30 minutes before sunset. I whistled him in so we could head back to the car before dark. But Gordie, partially deaf and occasionally disoriented, couldn’t find his way back to me. With nightfall approaching fast, I reluctantly returned to the car alone.

My anxieties disappeared an hour later when a phone caller told me Gordie was safe and ready to be picked up. But after this experience, even though we returned to our old familiar spots that fall, Gordie was never the same hunter. He’d literally not let me out of his sight.

By the following spring, Gordie was suffering badly from four geriatric issues. He slept 22 hours a day. Gone was the merry tail wagging of his glory days. After discussing Gordie’s swiftly eroding health, my wife and I agreed not to unduly delay his inevitable last ride with me. Gordie peacefully passed from a life well lived into a life enshrined in memory late in May, 2019.

I trust Gordie is already somewhere over the rainbow, patiently watching for me.