Spring Hill Farm

12/23/2024

Merry Christmas to all from the Spring Hill Farm crew, Ed & Sue, Sally, Mags, Del & Rose.
The painting below, by Lou Pasqua, is of DC/AFC Spring Hill’s Hemi Magnum “Nash”, part of our proud history of dual quality dogs.

11/09/2024

DC Spring Hill’s Fancy Wheels
Mags is enjoying her retirement from competition being the #1 hunting companion of her favorite person, John Bell, and the spoiled house dog of JoAnne Bell, Ed & I.
Thank you John for this great photo of Mags taken while they were hunting today.

09/06/2024

Are you still calling this breed by *that* name?

The Brittany was referred to as the Brittany Spaniel for many years, but because Brittanies acted more like pointers than spaniels in the field (often freezing, or pointing out game), it often lead to a confusing debate over its classification. The breed carried the markings of a spaniel, but its field behavior belied its “spaniel-ness.” In 1982, the AKC dropped the word, “spaniel” from the breed name at the behest of the national breed club for the aforementioned reasons.

When all is said and done, the Brittany is a pointing breed so versatile as a gun dog that it’s been called the “canine over-achiever” because it can point and retrieve (a more accurate descriptive than the Brittany being the only spaniel that pointed to game). Brittanies are suited to work in different types of terrain, be it densely covered or open, are extremely biddable, and, if made a member of the family, are easy to train.

Image: “Her First Point” by Kimberly Santini
www.paintingadogaday.com
www.facebook.com/KimberlyKellySantini
http://paintingadogaday.blogspot.com

07/12/2024

Working in ER this past week: We had four heat injuries each day for two days straight. Four of these were French Bulldogs, which happens to be the most common US breed these days. The others were three Rottweilers (brachycephalic by exam) and one Pit X.

Only ONE survived. NOT a Frenchie. Not a brachycepahlix breed. The Pit X.

Why? He happened to be playing in a pond. He ran and played with kids on land and then in the shallow pond water in 95 F 85% humidity weather until he collapsed. The humidity at his breathing level was probably a lot more, since it was approx 12 inches above water level.

They recognized a problem and brought him in… from one hour away.

On arrival
he was HYPOTHERMIC. Low body temp. Typical of heat injury. We warmed him up, treated his other abnormalities and within a
few hours he waa normal. Like NORMAL. No kidney failure. No coagulopahty. NO PROBLEMS.

Why is this? Probably because this dog reached critical heat injury when he happened to be in the best environement for treatment… IMMEDIATE cooling in water that was colder than him.

RAPID cooling with the coldest source available is what saves dogs with heat injury.

It’s time ro let go of the old wive’s tales of how ice water causes vasoconstriction or that rapid cooling is bad. HEAT is what causes death in heat inrjury, not the coolong method.

05/05/2024

Just one of those days I’ll never forget that always brings tears to my eyes.

Something very special happened at the PA Brittany Club on Sunday, April 28. This little, 9 year old Brittany put down one of the best performances of her life for her newly acquired handler and scout and became a dual champion (pending AKC confirmation) for her owners, the late Les & Donna Casselberry and the 7th dual champion from Spring Hill Farm. I can never thank Steve Tubach and Sandy Sargent enough for taking on the challenge of handling this little dog who had only known one handler/trainer in her life and building her trust and confidence so this could come about. They were also responsible for finishing the dual championships on Chica's sisters Rikki and Sally. When Les & I talked about this breeding 10 years ago, of his DC/AFC Cisco Kid Del Prado and our CH Spring Hill's Midnight Fame, we could only dream that it would produce three dual champions and then one of them (Sally) would produce a national field champion. I am so glad he was still with us to hear about Red's national championship but the tears flow every time I realize I won't be able to celebrate Chica's win with him. I know you're smiling form above, dear friend. As Chica was running Sandy & I heard you singing "Chi-ca"....

04/17/2024

We have a new Field Champion at the farm (pending AKC confirmation), Spring Hill’s Spirit Del Prado! Del was sired by NAC/DC/AFC ANJ’s Ohio Hellion out of our DC Spring Hill’s Salida Del Prado. She finished by winning a 23 dog OLGD stake at the Kentucky Brittany Club field trial handled by Al Cropek. Thank you to judges Brian Riggle & Domenic Serago for rewarding our girl and to the Kentucky Brittany Club for a good trial.
We are so fortunate to have Al and Cindy Cropek to care for and guide our Del now that we’ve retired from trialing! Thank you so much for taking that nice started dog, trained by Nick Mellon, and creating a polished competitor!

02/12/2024

Happy third birthday to this great bunch of pups! It took plenty of patience to set up this photo but it was worth the effort. It always brings a smile to my face!

12/25/2023

Merry Christmas to all our “dog family” from Ed & I, Sally, Mags, Del & Rose!