I smell a skunk! No big deal, everyone gets a whiff of the ammonia like smell every once in a while. Up North, it’s a call to get outdoors especially when the weather is cool – maybe rainy – and your best bud (your bird dog) is twice as antsy as usual and wants to keep going when he’s out for his morning walk.
Seamus and I beat the expected rain this morning when we went for our morning constitutional but at the end of the road, well, suffice it to say, I was vigilant for the little black and white critter that left his calling card lingering in the air. Actually, I was more concerned about Seamus finding the source than anything else. I knew if he did, most of the day would be spent bathing him in a mixture of peroxide, baking soda, liquid Dawn soap and water ….again and again and again.
I was a little concerned when he went into his hunting mode – nose to the ground, tracking down what had been there before him – but he kept going in the direction I wanted him to go. It was almost as though he knew not to be too curious about the skunk scent, probably because he’d been skunked twice before and he likes the bath cure less than the odor.
Down the road are two chicken coops next to a cabin and once in a while, one of them gets left open and the chickens strut out onto the road and Seamus of course, gets interested. He doesn’t go on point (he knows the difference between a chicken and a grouse) but he sure likes to watch them scatter. Most ran back to the coop, but one took flight to the top of a 5th wheel trailer with Seamus looking up at her. I could almost hear him call her a chicken.
The rain started and the smell of the woods filled both our nostrils. This will be a fishing weekend, but soon, soon the bell will go on his collar, my brimmed fishing hat with the fleece fly band will be replaced with a hunter orange cap and the bamboo 5 weight will give way to the 20 gauge o/u.
If only I could live forever.
TD