Sugar Creek English Setters

January Litter update. Chica's litter was born Sunday, December 29th, a couple days later than the earliest I thought they would arrive. 7 males and 4 females, 11 very vigorous pups all together, were born by the end of the day. Most were born with some manner of black head patch(s) but some were all white. Colors and ticking will be more apparent in the next few days but it looks like tri's, orange beltons and blue belton/black and whites in the mix. Chica is out of a Pinecoble female and an October Setters male. The sire is from Jason Gooding's Goodgoing Kennel and has Pinecoble, October and some West Virginia Ryman lines in his pedigree. Contact us if you are interested.

Kansas 2020.... With tremendous help and dedication on Gail's part at home, I was able to travel out to Kansas for a week in early January. Ordinarily this sounds like a bird hunting trip. Kansas offers wild populations of bobwhite quail, pheasants and prairie chickens. So I did that, but in the context of an annual gathering of breeders of Ryman type English Setters. During the day we get to see each others dogs afield. At breakfast and in the evenings, we discuss, deconstruct and even argue (constructively!) about, well, pretty much everything important to us as English Setter people. Lacking correct battery power, I was unable to collect some photos of my own on this trip. Thanks to my friends Copper John Nagle and Fran Thompson for sharing some photos to help make this post more interesting.

Wow, this is a fun item to follow. Allow yourself 5 minutes to watch the whole video. We feed their food, not bashing other companies, but they do have excellent products.

Hello friends, we have a litter coming along to let you know about, due to whelp a couple days after Christmas. The dam of this litter is our Chica. The sire, named Trooper, is a great young male in Wisconsin from Goodgoing Kennel's line of Ryman type dogs. Chica is a strong performer, working at a modest range with great flair. She has retrieved nearly every bird shot over her these past two seasons. Trooper is hunted extensively on ruffed grouse at home, and handles pheasants, quail, huns and sharptails out on the prairies. We have plenty of information to share if you contact us and are interested in this litter.

This year I am back to carrying a 16 gauge sxs. I had an LC Smith 16 in Ideal grade many years ago. It was nostalgic but I took too long to acknowledge I shot it poorly. Last spring I acquired an old British gun, J. Blanch of London, in a very classic British configuration. This gun fits, and the chokes are just right (so far!). Chica put the icing on the cake, retrieving the first grouse I shot over a point with it. Looks like this is my good weather firearm going forward and the B. Rizzini, with its modern steels and finish, is for wet days now.