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Spaniels | |
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A good hunting breed for close cover or the snipe marshes (yeah I know, but seriously there is a snipe and you can hunt them is some areas). Unlike the pointer and setter they do not hunt mute nor stand on point, whence their English name of Springer in contradiction to Setter came from.
Spaniels range close to his master, in gunshot all the time, and gives notice when he is on birds by a system of whines and barks. He rarely halts but for a moment to mark, and then flushes, his master having meanwhile shouldered his gun.
In cover where birds lie very close and require flushing such the spaniel is more useful than a pointer or setter, both of which often pass right over a single out of a bevy of quail, while the spaniel nearer the ground, rarely over looks a hidden bird. Due to the spaniels’ short legs, they are however at a disadvantage where they are required to range far and wide to find birds as in much of the quail country in the U.S..
In working over grouse country, where the sportsman goes from one likely cover to another, with his spaniel at his heels or ranging just in from of him at command, he is useful in finding and marking grouse which would otherwise spring up unawares. So used the spaniel has his own limited sphere of usefulness in our country.
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