Migration Series: The Gun Dogs | Hunter & Chip

The first book I ever read was about a boy and his dog called Old Yeller, I cried like a baby at the end, and I didn’t even have a dog at that time, but I wanted one so bad. Fast forward, now I own my own kennel and train dogs. But this isn’t about me, it’s about two gun dogs that impacted my journey immeasurably. 

Hunter was my first Labrador. I got him after returning home from serving in the Marine Corps. He was the first dog that I trained from a pup. He had the best nose I've seen to this day on a lab and had a knack for finding birds that most gun dogs would have given up on.

We were his family and he loved us. Hunter would always let our daughters use him for their veterinary care clinic or beauty shop. They helped often with his training by throwing bumpers, played or just laid in the sun during a warm summer afternoon. He loved the sun as much as they did and was outside with them every summer. Tent forts became one of his favorite places to just get away from the busy world a dog lives in.

My PTSD and addictions caused lots of pain and hurt, to the ones I loved the most. I silently fought deep feelings of being a lost cause and hopeless. However, despite Hunter’s lack of desire to cuddle with just about anyone, he always seemed to allow me to be the one to do so and that made me feel connection to him. I felt like he really knew my heart, almost as well as the Lord. It was so simple yet impacted me and put a smile on my face every time. 

Hunter joined me on my first trip to the Horicon Marsh Veterans Hunt and would become widely known at the event through the years. This event is special and is geared at taking military veterans out duck hunting for three days on the historic marsh. Hunter and I went every year and even started taking other vets out prior to and during the event. Hunter often would retrieve a veteran’s first bird and that was something very special in itself. 

For almost 13 years, he always there. By my side.

Saturday night of the Horicon Hunt of 2021, Hunter and I went to our boathouse with a handful of my best friends to sleep for the night and get ready for Sunday morning's hunt. Late that night Hunter started whining, so I carried him down the very steep boathouse steps that were difficult for him to traverse at his age. I took him over by a big oak tree that had a single street light next to it illuminating the night scene. Hunter and I both relieved ourselves between a pair of boathouses like a pair of buddies and went back by the oak tree where I sat up against it, Hunter decided he wasn’t ready to go back upstairs so he walked around with his nose on the ground for about 10 minutes right at my feet, no doubt sniffing all the birds and feathers and previous dogs that had been in that area over the last 24 hours. When he was ready to go back upstairs, he came over, sat next to me and looked at me. 

I carried Hunter back up the stairs, put him back into his bed and I climbed into mine which was right next to his. He woke me up a few more times after that just by some simple whimpering. I checked on him and tried to give him some water, but he was not hungry or thirsty. I realized the only thing that was calming him down was putting my hands on his head and gently rubbing behind his ears. I grabbed my pillow and my sleeping bag and laid on the floor at the end of his bed, putting him to sleep every time I would rub his head. I eventually fell asleep beside him. 

Later, he reached his head out and laid it on my pillow with his nose right to my forehead and we both fell asleep, I will never forget that feeling of calm that I had when he did that. I never knew that type of pain and heartbreak like when I woke up 45 minutes later to discover that my best friend passed away in his sleep right next to me, completely unexpectedly. 

All the years and honestly all the mistakes that I made as his best friend and teammate came flashing through my mind, wishing I could squeeze some time back in and tell him how sorry I was and how much I loved him. God never granted us the ability to turn back or stop time. Only lessons to make us better at embracing it and enjoying it while we have it. 

I was blessed to be surrounded by such close brothers in that boathouse. I woke everyone up with my outward expression of anguish and shock. They all rushed to my side and could not believe what had just happened. They all knew Hunter very well – some of them even had him retrieve a few of their first birds at the event for them. They stayed by my side with hugs and encouragement. We all agreed that of all the places a gun dog could pass, it was in his sleep with his best friend and teammate by his side, in a boathouse on the marsh doing what he loved to do. We would all be so blessed to have such a peaceful transition to the other side like that. 

That was the longest drive of my life, crying on the phone as I called home to explain what had happened and bracing ourselves for sharing the news with our two daughters. We all wept.

After he passed, I couldn’t hunt anymore. Hunter was always there waiting for me when I came home and on nights where I just needed someone to be with me as I struggled over some of life's hardest obstacles. I questioned why God would allow this to happen to me right now during this part of my life? Well, He was already working out the answer for that. A group of people from the Horicon Marsh Veterans Hunt had submitted my name to Southern Oaks Kennels as they were giving away a puppy to a deserving veteran. 

I found out that I had been chosen a few months after Hunter’s passing, so I drove down to Tulsa, Oklahoma to pick up my new puppy.

Chip came into my life when I needed him the most, and one day in particular was very special. I decided to go on a solo hunt during a blizzard to try and get some late-season geese with Chip. I didn’t know what to expect, however, I knew I needed to get back out hunting now that I was going to have another gun dog. I owed it to Chip, Hunter and maybe even myself. In case you missed it, Chip was helping me heal more than I knew just from that, a sense of facing my brokenness and hurt. 

That hunt resulted in three Canada Geese with a bonus leg band. The last time that I shot a banded goose for myself was on my first hunt with Hunter. When I saw the band, I was thrown back to that first hunt with Hunter many years ago when we both got our first band. I knelt in the frozen field in a mix of tears and joy. It was like a weight was lifted off my back. Like a fog had been cleared from my head and heart. 

Chip joined me on the Horicon Marsh Veterans Hunt this past year and was right by my side as I poured some of Hunter's ashes into the marsh that he loved for 10 plus years. Hunter and I only hunted out of state twice and now my goal is to take Chip to as many different states as I can and watch him retrieve birds and enjoy the adventure together.

No matter how old I get, I will always be “a boy and his dog". I will never forget my gun dogs, Hunter and Chip.