French Friends

We had the good fortunate of having three good friends from France visit our home, kennels and hunting lodge this year. All three are trainers and handlers in France. Rene and Jean-Louis are professional trainers and field trial handlers and Dominique is an amateur field trial handler - and they are all exceptional at what they do! All of them also own Epagneul Bretons (French brittanys) and so we had many good hours of discussion regarding the breed, pedigrees, ancestors and all the things us dog fanatics like to talk about.  There was much laughing, joking (and interpreting!) going on as you can see from some of these pictures.  We truly enjoyed the eight days that they were our guests and they have promised to return. Please be patient with the loading of these pages as there are many pictures included. There is also a second page with additional photos you can view.

During the same time that our visitors from France were here, Steve and Jake Smith of Pointing Dog Journal and Mike Lardy, retriever trainer, also joined us for a few days of South Dakota wild pheasant hunting. The weather was excellent for December in South Dakota and the pheasant numbers were better than they've been in forty years so there was no shortage of game! Our French friends were amazed at how many birds they saw each day, as they said "more then they would see in a lifetime".