Hounds and Bounds
Off with the dogs to Lyme Park, first dropping Patrick to his childmind friend Thomas's party. I forget Hooch's lead so he is running loose with the others. There is no great reaction from his knee visible during the run, but I do worry that it might flare up later.
We have descended through the wooded path from the second car park. We have climbed back up to the clough. We have contoured round the narrow path with wall to left and deep gully to right. Through another wooded section. Across open moors steeply to the radio relay. Up to the trig point and round and down to a lowered section of the wall, specially designed for dog or stock crossing. Through this past the real Folly and out again to the field which often has rare cattle breeds lurking.
Count the dogs. One-Two-Three. Jim has done one for a while and I try both Jim and Tig to get him back. We retrace our steps and find him looking like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. Next as we head towards what most people call The Folly but is actually The Cage - a moortop prison - Hooch finds himself in a stand off with a herd of young stags.
He's very nearly 30 inches at the shoulder. Very few greyhounds or lurchers, that's any 'sighthound' crossed with a variety of working breeds for different purposes, even 'longdogs' which are lurchers bred completely from sighthound breeds, are that big. Sighthounds - greyhounds, saluki, deerhound (the three ingredients in mine), wolfhound, afghan, whippet and a few local varieties.
My view is that their DNA is 99.9% the same across this whole range. They're all basically "greathounds" or "gazehounds" and the kennel club are clowns.
When we were at Cofton Park a few weeks ago for the National Cross Country we met a deerhound who was two or three inches bigger still. But that's unusual. Cofton Park is an important connection at the moment with the story SNWDWVF is telling as it backs onto the MG Rover Longbridge Plant. Back to that maybe in s day or two.
Hooch is a giant. Jim to is big, around 28 inches. Ottey a mere 25 inches. But despite having the physical credentials to chase these magnificent deer Hooch is getting pretty mature and walks away immediately he's called.
You get moments sometimes on runs like this. Keeping all the dogs on leads all the time would be ridiculous. But the terrain means surprise encounters are possible if rare. I praise him highly and whisper to him "but don't tell the others". Sister Ottey would scatter this lot as soon as look at them.
I've no proof but I believe that Ottey is a more instinctive and eager hunter because as the runt she got the most input from her mum. Hooch in contrast was taken away from mum too young. But none of them really know what they're doing. They would need a lot of training up to make hard working dogs.
Back to base picking up Patrick on the way.
Now I can set our Lib Dem blogger's mind to rest. Andrew Stunnell has dozens of posters up in the Hazel Grove vicinity. He may have seen the "Baby On Board" comparison himself as those "Whining Here" diamonds are out and it's orange rectangles stating he is "the local choice". Doesn't pay to pre-empt the result in such a tight marginal.
Never been sure about tree posters and the like myself. Mauldeth Rd near where I live used to be dubbed Tory Canyon (reference to famous oil tanker disaster of 60s) and to be honest it didn't do them any good. They went down with all hands. Not a council seat left in Manchester and excepting the now un-gerrymandered blip of Trafford precious few really in Greater Manchester.
In fact I went down the traditional canyon and saw no posters at all today. Though Labour has a good show in the same road - the Old Moat other side of Princess Road.
Do tree and garden and house posters work? Do they make supporters feel over confident if they are dominant in an area? Do they make opponents increase turn out?
We have descended through the wooded path from the second car park. We have climbed back up to the clough. We have contoured round the narrow path with wall to left and deep gully to right. Through another wooded section. Across open moors steeply to the radio relay. Up to the trig point and round and down to a lowered section of the wall, specially designed for dog or stock crossing. Through this past the real Folly and out again to the field which often has rare cattle breeds lurking.
Count the dogs. One-Two-Three. Jim has done one for a while and I try both Jim and Tig to get him back. We retrace our steps and find him looking like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. Next as we head towards what most people call The Folly but is actually The Cage - a moortop prison - Hooch finds himself in a stand off with a herd of young stags.
He's very nearly 30 inches at the shoulder. Very few greyhounds or lurchers, that's any 'sighthound' crossed with a variety of working breeds for different purposes, even 'longdogs' which are lurchers bred completely from sighthound breeds, are that big. Sighthounds - greyhounds, saluki, deerhound (the three ingredients in mine), wolfhound, afghan, whippet and a few local varieties.
My view is that their DNA is 99.9% the same across this whole range. They're all basically "greathounds" or "gazehounds" and the kennel club are clowns.
When we were at Cofton Park a few weeks ago for the National Cross Country we met a deerhound who was two or three inches bigger still. But that's unusual. Cofton Park is an important connection at the moment with the story SNWDWVF is telling as it backs onto the MG Rover Longbridge Plant. Back to that maybe in s day or two.
Hooch is a giant. Jim to is big, around 28 inches. Ottey a mere 25 inches. But despite having the physical credentials to chase these magnificent deer Hooch is getting pretty mature and walks away immediately he's called.
You get moments sometimes on runs like this. Keeping all the dogs on leads all the time would be ridiculous. But the terrain means surprise encounters are possible if rare. I praise him highly and whisper to him "but don't tell the others". Sister Ottey would scatter this lot as soon as look at them.
I've no proof but I believe that Ottey is a more instinctive and eager hunter because as the runt she got the most input from her mum. Hooch in contrast was taken away from mum too young. But none of them really know what they're doing. They would need a lot of training up to make hard working dogs.
Back to base picking up Patrick on the way.
Now I can set our Lib Dem blogger's mind to rest. Andrew Stunnell has dozens of posters up in the Hazel Grove vicinity. He may have seen the "Baby On Board" comparison himself as those "Whining Here" diamonds are out and it's orange rectangles stating he is "the local choice". Doesn't pay to pre-empt the result in such a tight marginal.
Never been sure about tree posters and the like myself. Mauldeth Rd near where I live used to be dubbed Tory Canyon (reference to famous oil tanker disaster of 60s) and to be honest it didn't do them any good. They went down with all hands. Not a council seat left in Manchester and excepting the now un-gerrymandered blip of Trafford precious few really in Greater Manchester.
In fact I went down the traditional canyon and saw no posters at all today. Though Labour has a good show in the same road - the Old Moat other side of Princess Road.
Do tree and garden and house posters work? Do they make supporters feel over confident if they are dominant in an area? Do they make opponents increase turn out?
posted by Chris Paul at 6:39 PM
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