"So did it leave you from the brambles while you were looking for it? " Riccardo is clearly chewing when on the phone he tries to be explained how things went. It is time for dinner, and I am walking up the field panting towards the parking space while I am on the phone with my recovery friends to ask for their intervention the next day. I do not prefer to hunt in the evening, I much prefer the appearance in the morning, when the light is increasing rather than decreasing, the search for any injured animals is more timely and the management of the desirable bare is simpler and less painful than in the evening. Unfortunately, the opportunities to go out are always so few, and today I did not give up and went to look for the roe deer assigned to me, a female or a class 0. I had seen female and young after about an hour but soon they were hidden from my eyes and the little one did not appear to me until after a long time, on the edge of the last glow. The distance of less than 100 meters had comforted me in the shot and the high jump reaction had ensured its effectiveness. The little one had made a leap and then disappeared into a hollow in the ground below him, and I was sure to find him there.
After 5 minutes (because, given the incipient darkness, 15 would have been really too many!) I started on the anschuss and, as soon as I jumped the narrow bramble hedge that delimits the two portions of the field, from a bush he had jumped in front of me and with a few leaps had vanished into the woods. I tried to follow him cautiously by pinning my eyes to where I had seen him and looking for confirmation in the bloodstains. When the forest has thickened and the darkness has given up anyway. I tied a bitterness-soaked handkerchief to the last blood mark and went to my car looking for my cell phone in my pocket. "Tomorrow morning we come with Erika, we bring Argo. Rest assured we find it… or at least we will find what the predators and wild boars leave tonight!”Concludes Riccardo, taking leave of me and giving me an appointment for the next morning.
Retrievers are a truly special category, they offer a commendable service free of charge to hunters but above all to animals, whose fate after a shot with a doubtful outcome can be the most disparate: from the missed shot to a slight injury up to the shot not immediately. mortal that exposes him to long and painful sufferings and makes their death vain and cruel. The recovery intervention took place very early in the morning, with a view to reconciling the work commitments of Erika and Riccardo. It cost me to give up a morning hunting trip but it wouldn't have made sense to go looking for another roe deer and leave one injured from the night before.
When I get out of the car, Erika makes Argo stretch her paws and calls him back to put on the satellite collar. "Really! Do you really think it is necessary? You will see that we don't have to go too far to find the roe deer”I affirm hopefully. "Vincenzo, each recovery is a story in itself, and it never ends as you imagine… better be careful!”Erica replies, as she caresses her handsome Bavarian. I accompany my friends on the anschuss. The spray blood confirms the shot in the ribcage, but the dog does not immediately take the track here. We proceed for a few meters in the direction of the ditch following copious bloodstains. Near the ditch Argo crosses it, leads Erika for a few tens of meters to the other bank and then returns to the other side, where the roe deer jumped from the brambles. Argo has hooked the track! It continues in the direction of the handkerchief where I marked the last visible passage. Along the way I show the recoverers a piece of lung that I had put under a stone to protect it from the throat of some fox.
Riccardo is admired by these precautions, which cost very little but are of great help in the reconstruction of the hunting action "If all hunters had this care in favoring recovery it would be a blessing for us!". Entering the wood, a large stain of blood on a trunk tells us about an animal caught in the chest that leaned against the tree before leaving. The exhibit encourages us and we proceed confidently, certain of stumbling upon the roe deer after a few meters. The walk, however, is not so obvious and the tracks are no longer so close together. Argo decided proceeds and Erika behind him. At a certain point the traces of blood become more sparse until they disappear from our eyes. Erika precedes us a long time with Argo so much that we don't see them anymore and we don't know if the dog is still on track.
After traveling more than 350 meters, the slope begins to rise a little and the hopes of finding the roe deer easily begin to waver. "But are you still on track? We don't see you anymore, and there isn't even any more blood ... are you sure you don't have to go back? The climb is getting a little too steep for such a stoned animal!”Riccardo comments on the radio. Erika's reply does not come from the headset, but a "Bravooooo Argooooo!”Which can be heard from afar tells us about the unexpected (and fortunately positive) outcome of a recovery that, like all recoveries, did not go as we expected.