My buddy Lee Kjos and I used to laugh about it. He had the perfect term of endearment for that kind of dog. He called them “Old World Dogs”. The description came after spending his first few hours around Larry McMurry’s Pepper. Lee has no issues warming up to someone fairly quickly.
Lee was always enamored with Pepper. She amazed Lee and us because of her make-up, mentally, and physically. Pepper was a huge female, in her prime fighting weight she was a 90 lb. gal. I teased Larry regularly about her weight, saying that he should due a commercial for Purina Cat Chow……due to Pepper’s midnight raids of the family cat food dish. I could always see the inside front cover of a HRC magazine……Larry smiling ear to ear…Pepper sitting beside him with the 400 plus ribbons she had earned laying all around him. The caption would read “Purina Cat Chow….It’s not just for cats!”
She had the gift…..very relaxed, almost lazy. I cannot tell you the number of times we would have a set-up going, I’d get through running Yella, and look behind me and Pepper would be sound asleep on her back behind the line. I mean on her back with legs straight up in the air. McMurry would say “Here Pep” she’d stand, shake, then stretch, and trot over and smoke the set-up. Without a doubt the greatest lining dog I have ever seen, and maybe the best marking dog I have ever seen. I can hear it in my head……the cadence went just like this….”dead…dead….dead bird…………LINE……………Back”. 350 yards later through whatever cover, whatever water, she’d be there. She understood concepts as well as any human. Get on a point, swim by a point…..you could not find a concept she did not understand completely, and fully.
A hunting dog of magnificent proportions. Although Larry was a converted deer hunter, in time he became a 50 day a year duck hunter with Pepper. She hunted Arkansas’ White River green timber, rice fields, Texas goose fields, and chased pheasants and ducks all over South Dakota. She was easy to manage in the blind….she knew her job doing things that only a few ever figure out. She almost always picked up the long bird first….no matter the order they fell. She self selected off short dead birds to long sailing cripples. She was automatic.
But, maybe what made her so great was her personality. She was perfectly obedient, loved everyone. Strange dogs, strange people, even cats had nothing to fear from good ol’ Pep. “She was just impressive. So big, strong, and beautiful, impressive, she was just awesome. I hunted with her last year, although her hearing was gone, she still picked everything up like a machine. Said Alex Washburn.
In typical Akin flair Chris Akin said “I’m not saying this because she’s dead…everybody’s says nice things about dogs once their gone…..that dog could mark, handle, hell she was perfect. I judged her, competed against her, and trained with her…she always made everything look easy. The bird that no one could dig out, was never an issue for her, she always knew exactly where it was. I’ve been saying this for 10 years, and I’ll say it again she was the best all around dog I have ever seen…..bar-none.”
Missy’s Cajun Dakota was dropped out of the same mold as Pepper. Big, long and very relaxed. Cody was handsome, and maybe the most proud looking dog I have ever seen. He was regal. A bad man, and he knew it.
I distinctly remember the first time I really watched Cody. It was 2000 and Cody was running head to head with FC-AFC-CFC-CAFC Jazztime’s Frequent Flyer. In those days we ran dogs in braces. Trip ran first and posted a great score. Very few if any gave the HRC dog much of a chance. Cody and Bill strolled to the line with incredible confidence in front of thousands. Cody sent Trip home early that day.
I never had the opportunity to train with Cody, but I did have the honor of watching him run at many events. He had a strange way in competition. He seemed to always begin slowly, almost always barely getting through the first couple series. But, once he got a head of steam he was literally unstoppable. He would blow through series at Grands, and SRS events like the whipped topping. Just kill them.
I want to tell you about the greatest cast I ever saw. It was the finals of the 2003 Minnesota SRS in Northfield. For your recollection Stella’s Derek Randle won it. The set-up was brutal. The prefect hybrid. Another Dave Mealman masterpiece. Here is how it shook out.
Mark 1 came
from a hidden gun about 175 yards to the left. You then ran a blind about 275 yards down a steep hill, cutting the corner of one pond, then threading the needle through brush, and a huge wall of timber into another pond, through 500 plus floating duck decoys into a 20 yard long channel, maybe 12 ft. wide. After you pick up the blind….you re-set and see an in-line double at 100, and 150 respectively.
Cody took a poor initial line to the blind. Bill stopped him and gave him an over. Cody dug another 25 yards deep. Bill stopped him, and gave him the “come on pard listen to me, we really need this one look”. It was telepathy. It took about 10 seconds before he gave him the cast. Before we go any further let me paint the picture. There was a wall of timber between Cody and the line to the blind 50 yards wide. Not to mention the decoys, water, poison bird, and everything else. 99% of the handlers would have given 25 yds. worth of come in whistle, and an over to even have a prayer. But, with the scores that were already posted there was no way that would work, the points incurred would have thrown him out of the top 3 for sure.
I thought he was crazy, and he was. Bill gave Cody a huge angle back. Cody took a 45 degree angle through timber 50 yards wide into the water swam another 150 yds and smashed the blind. The greatest example of control I have ever seen, and probably will ever see. Feats like this can only happen when there is a total understanding between the handler, and the dog.
HRC owes much of their success to Omar Driscoll, but a huge part of HRC’s success has been because of these 2 dogs, and the two men that owned them. Cody passed the Grand 13 times, and Pepper passed the Grand 10 times. On a national stage these dogs have shown that an HRC dog deserves respect regardless of who they line up against.
Not unlike what Larry Bird, and Magic Johnson did for the NBA, 5XGRHRCH Mac’s Southern Belle Pepper MH and 6XGRHRCH Missy’s Cajun Dakota MH have done the same thing for HRC and sporting dogs. Although they will never receive the accolades that past National Champions do, these dogs may have been the finest the breed has ever produced. Maybe?
Special thanks to Larry McMurry, and Bill Autrey for giving us all something to shoot for.
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