The Perilous Poison Bird

Posted on April 01, 2004 by Steve Bowman 

STUTTGART, Ark. _ Super Retriever Series events are supposed to be judged on which retriever/handler team is the best at picking up a sequence of birds.

It didn't exactly work that way during the opening round of the Super Retriever Series presented by the Natural Life Pet Products in Stuttgart, Ark.

In this round, the competition basically boiled down to one bird. And it was a tough enough bird that only 33 of the 75 teams were able to pick it up and move into the quarterfinal round. Of course there were more than just one bird thrown in the contest, but for the most part it was the first one that killed the field and totally shook up the standings in the SportDog Team of the Year race.

"That was one of the toughest opening rounds I've ever seen in an SRS event," said Stacey West, a veteran of Super Retriever Series events.

Even those handlers running in the competition for the first time would have to agree. Many of them didn't get past the first retrieve.

Leading the way is Richard McDonald and Spur who scored an amazingly low score of 20 points. Donnie Colvard and Joe follow him in second with 23 points. Veteran Jerry Day and Nike (winners of the Super Retriever Series event in New Orleans are third with 26 points.

While those dogs all posted low scores, they by no means are an accurate sample of the field as a whole. And even with their low scores, even they narrowly escaped being part of the also rans. Day, for example, came perilously close to washing out of the event when Nike came within 10 yards of picking up a poison bird on the initial cast.

Day was able to stop her, but not before showing everyone else how easy it was to drop out of this competition, even for the top dogs of the sport.

"You guys really know how to make an old guy sweat," Day told the judges.

That was markedly more tame than the remarks some of the other handlers had for the judges.

For instance, there were Frank Bush's joking remarks, following his disqualification for picking up a poison bird. "You had a good test, I enjoyed every minute of it," Bush told each of the judges. "But I'd like to run it again and beat your ass."

All of that for one bird!

The test, billed as a control test, was set in the high ground country on the west bank of the famed White River. Instead of the flat, levee ridden rice fields noted for the country around Stuttgart, these were more reminiscent of the grounds of Virginia, with a little slope and wood lines to add to the mix.

In that backdrop, the test took place on an hour-glass shaped 80-acre field. It included three retrieves that started with a blind retrieve sitting 300 yards straight away from the handler's line. Before the blind was picked up, the first mark was thrown at 200 yards and landing just 30 yards off the line to the blind. It was the poison bird or denoted as the bird to be picked up last.

Once the bird was thrown, the handlers had to line their dogs to the blind, running the retrievers extremely close to the poison bird. To add to the mix, the right side of the field parallel with the poison bird was a point of woods, offering no opportunity to run around the poison bird and forcing the handlers to cast their dogs close to mark.

To add a little "razzle, dazzle" to the test, a diversion shot was fired once the dog left the line.

"That just served to really scramble their brains," said Justin Tackett, organizer of the Super Retriever Series. "The handlers had to really keep control or they lost it really fast."

To make matters worse, a cross wind sucked the dogs toward the poison bird and if a handler over compensated the wood line was so close the dogs would be lost. At times, the handlers played their dogs so close they looked like pinballs caught between the two bumpers of the poison bird and point of woods. And those that actually pushed past it, were met with the fat half of the hour-glass shaped field that sucked dogs away and out of sight from the line to the blind.

"I don't think any of the handlers figured out a way to get their dogs back on track," Tackett said.

As a matter of fact, 42 of the dogs either picked up the poison bird, earning a disqualification, or racked up so many points they were pulled from the competition. And it didn't discriminate between veteran dogs or rookies.

Some of the top contenders in past Super Retriever Series events fell victim to the test, including Alex Washburn and Honda and Keith Allison and Abby, just two top handlers who were in a position to win the SportDog Team of the Year.

The remaining 33 dogs will compete on Friday for a chance to advance to the semifinal 12 positions that will be featured on ESPN2.