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Subject: [working-gundog] Grouse down, roe-deer up.

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rospigan

MH
Posts:372

08/08/2009 2:35 PM
The yearly inventory of the grouse population in the Swedish mountains has shown that at least in the southern and middle parts of the mountain chain between Norway and Sweden the population is low, very low. The reason seems to be cold weather during incubation and hence no insects for the chickens to eat. It would be no surprise if they closed the grouse hunting on state land this year. We have not heard of anything from the far north but then again it does not matter, we have never been there. I had been thinking, for the first time after my by-pass surgery, to go with Maud but not with a gun but with my new video camera. It is a lot heavier than carrying a light 20 gauge gun. Well, as the grouse inventorers with dogs had to walk 30 kms, about 20 miles, for each covey, I guess I will do something else ) Our local roe-deer seems to have increased in number, or they have moved in from some other area. We see them every day here and there, often kids also. We have a lot of rowanberry, very much indeed, and according to the old the Farmer's Almanac that would indicate that we get a cold and long winter. We will see when the Waxwing (Bombycilla garrulus) will come into our village from the forest, this autumn. If it comes very early, then for sure we will get a cold and long winter..... )) It would be about time, its been ages since we had a real winter in our part of the country. Otherwise I am finished with all practical preparations for the autumn, of course the rifles are not sighted in yet, they never seem to be before the night before they are needed (but we have practiced really a lot with shotgun clay-shooting) . I have to tell a rather "amusing" experience. I had my old pick-up for 20 years and "customized" it to my needs during the years. There were small changes to both this and that, now and then. As I mentioned earlier this year I bought a 15 years younger version of the same pick-up (NIssan King Cab Navara 4WD) in April I believe it was. Quite soon I realised that my old, customized truck was much handier and I started to make changes to the new one. For example the old one had an analogue clock that kept ticking even when the ignition was of, and I only had to look in through the side window to see it. The new one has a digital clock that goes black when the engine is turned of. So I had to take an old wrist-watch and modify if with an angle grinder until it was perfectly round and neat, and the I taped it to the dashboard with double sided tape, fully visible from the outside. On the new I car had to make a special water bottle holder for my special water bottle for me and Briz, in the old one it fitted perfectly between the front seats. In the new one I have no good, handy place to keep my shooting glasses and hearing protectors and the cup holders are too small for my big coffee jug. And so on and so on with new tires, new reinforced chock absorbers, exchange of the motordriven radio antenna that was bound to break any day in contact with bushes or branches, to a simple, flexible one that can take any beating imagined, exchange of the axle and gearbox oils to synthetic oils and exchange of the synthetic engine oil for a mineral based heavy duty diesel lube oil. The engine is much quieter and smoother now and once the oil was drained I checked the crank case through the oil sump and everything was perfectly OK, no trace of any oil sludge indicating worn bearings or other trouble. I am still not finished with the car in order to get it checked to my full satisfaction but what is left are only minor things like cleaning the rear axle brakes and blowing the ventilation pipes from the gearboxes and front and rear axles clean with compressed air, just to be sure that they are clean from a mixture of condensated moist and oil mist before the winter comes. If clogged and frozen pressure might build up in the gearboxes during longer trips when they really warm up, but the air pipes remain frozen in the cold draught, and press oil from the power distribution box to the main box, as happened to my old truck. I must say that I am pretty suppressed to realize how much you do to, and learn about a car during 20 years! However, to me and the dog/dogs it is not just a mean of transportation but also an important and powerful tool for many different tasks and also a weather shelter and a secure house for the dogs. ...... Well, you may have noticed that I am an engineer by profession)) Tomorrow night I will got to work for a two week period, then I have 4 weeks of leave and by then many species are free to be hunted. I hope the temperature has dropped some until then. They promised rain and such for some days to come from Monday on, but that is most likely not a permanent chance to autumn climate. Torsti Borta Med Vindens Kennel www.rospigan.net "If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you; that is the principal difference between a dog and a man." /Mark Twain

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