FULL NAVHDA TEST – ALL SPINONI!!
Ted Wentink
Ah, springtime in Colorado! A place where you can get 10 inches of snow on Tuesday, there’s nary a trace by Thursday, and on Friday, May 8th, under sunny skies warming to shirtsleeve temps, SCOA sponsored an annual NAVHDA hunt test, held in conjunction with the SCOA National Specialty.
This event is unique to SCOA, with SCOA being the only AKC parent club requiring a NAVHDA (North American Versatile Hunting Dog Association) test included as part of the annual Specialty. This stresses the importance of our dogs working as versatile hunters with the ability to search, point, track, and retrieve, working on both land and in water.
NAVHDA offers 3 levels of testing: Natural Ability, for pups under 16 months of age; the Gundog test, for a working, practical gundog; and the Utility Test, of a more finished dog and handler team. A dog who achieves a qualifying Prize 1 score at a Utility test will receive an invitation to run at the annual NAVHDA Invitational. This year’s National Specialty test is the only one I recall where every entry was a Spinone! At this year’s test, there was one Utility and four Gundog entries, every one of them a big, lovable Spinone.
Overall, the dogs and handlers performed well, impressing the judging team in both their field and water work in hunting scenarios. In the field, the dogs are expected to search, find, and point birds. Flushed and downed birds are expected to be recovered by the dog, retrieved to the handler. At the water, a dog is expected to walk calmly at heel with the handler to a blind by the water’s edge. After an already dead duck is launched into the air, the dog is sent by the handler to swim out and retrieve the duck to the handler. The Utility dog is also sent to search for a duck in cover, enacting a scenario where a dog is expected to intelligently search potential cover without direction from the handler.
The one hang-up that became the downfall of several dogs was the “drag” sequence, where dead game (a duck) is dragged (50 yards for Gundogs, 100+ yards for Utility) to a location out of sight of the handler. The handler is then shown a small feather pile where the drag begins and then sends the dog with a single command to retrieve the unseen duck. Unfortunately, only one of the dogs completed this task (is there something about Colorado ducks?!). Consequently, only one dog received a qualifying score for the day – the rest were so close! Ah well – back to the training field. There’s always something to work on, right?
Big thank you to test secretary Frank Leatherbury for doing the paperwork and putting the moving parts together, Bobbi Benson and the Illowa NAVHDA chapter for sponsoring the test, and the Rocky Mountain chapter for the grounds’ logistics, use of their equipment, gunners, and general assistance. Our judging team hailed from Illinois, Minnesota, and Colorado. Plus, many thanks to a whole lot of SCOA member volunteers who showed up to help, planting birds and keeping the test rolling. Nothing happens without the volunteers!
