VC Engelhardt Ben v Sieger Boss passed away earlier this month at the age of 12.  Ben was Bob Engelhardt's "personal gun-dog" and the father of both Colt and Winnie.  I'm sure Ben meant more to Bob, but he meant a lot to me.

Ben was the first real-live GSP that I ever laid eyes on.  I was up for a visit with a deposit check for the pup that would eventually become Colt.  I'd been apprised of Ben's accomplishments and pedigree and he did not disappoint.  Ben was and remains one of the best looking GSP's I have ever seen.  He was "Mr. October"; a genuine hunting machine.

I grew up with pet dogs and Ben was no pet dog.  He was a dog with a job and seemed more alive than any I'd ever seen.  I was even amazed at the amount of concentration he'd put into finding a place to relieve himself.  If Ben was canine royalty, I was watching the prince take a dump.

Over the years, my opinion never changed about Ben, but my understanding of dogs did.  Ben was very instrumental in that.  I got to hunt over him a bit and it was mostly fantastic.  I shot my first pointed upland bird over Ben (sorry Molly, I missed the myriad of birds you pointed for me).  I saw Ben do amazing things, including a retrieve of a woodcock in a rushing, flood-swollen stream.  I also saw Ben when he was just OK and learned it was OK for my dogs to be OK.  I can't tell you how liberating that was for me.

I learned from Ben that he was just a dog.  He was a great dog, but a dog nonetheless.  Ben went on to earn his VC title, and he was still Ben to me.  He couldn't read his scores, had no idea that some of the decorations on the wall had something to do with him (even after 12 years, he never learned to read).  Ben had a great work ethic, but would still drink Scotch out of your glass if you let him (and I did).

I learned that great dogs were real dogs and that real people get to own them.  In addition to giving me Colt and Winnie, that is the gift that I will forever be grateful for.  If I had maintained my original expectations about GSP's, dog training, NAVHDA and myself, I'd have been out of this sport long ago.  I expected perfection in every instance.  I learned from Ben that in many ways, that mechanical perfection wasn't reasonable, but more beautiful perfection was obtainable.

There is the "head on boot" relationship you can have with your dog.  Total respect and admiration that goes both ways, and exemplified by the dog sleeping with his head on your foot.  To this day, I am totally blown away every time I look down and find one of my dogs resting with his or head touching me.  Often there are more comfortable places to sleep very near by, but to the dog, my foot is often the most comfortable pillow in the house.

Then there's the rare, but very real, wild partridge pointed, shot and retrieved to hand.  It's a humbling and exhilarating moment.  You expect it in a NAVHDA test, but those are stinky pen-raised birds planted repeatedly in the same spot, and dizzied then planted.  A wild bird doesn't live in it's own stench (much less the stench of dozens of others) and doesn't sit still.  They fly in the woods and are much harder to shoot than their lazy cousins.  Once shot, they are hard to find.  When you put together perfection in the grouse woods, it's really more perfect than you can imagine, and Ben taught me that.

Ben taught me to appreciate these moments, rather than to expect them.  It may seem odd to say that the greatest gift I got from Ben was learning that a great dog was still just a dog.  But without that lesson, I'd have never come to appreciate my dogs as completely as I do.  Thank you, Prince Ben.