puppy walker
The Puppy Walker
No members of your hunting community are loved by Masters and huntsman as dearly as the puppy walkers. Each year these intrepid folk accept the arrival of a couple of playful pups to their country home in early summer to teach them their names, walking on lead, a semblance of civilized behavior, and a taste of life outside the kennel.
In a couple of months, after the cuddly innocents have grown into marauding, thieving, hunting fanatics, the puppy walkers cry, “Uncle!” and the huntsman returns to reclaim them. The huntsman will be back the following summer, however, and these generous puppy walkers will smilingly welcome yet another couple of wide-eyed puppies to their property.
So, when your Masters praise the puppy walkers at the annual puppy show and bestow a small trophy upon those who walked the winning hounds, recall this poem by Will H. Ogilvie and give the puppy walkers their due!
Will You Walk a Puppy?
‘Will you walk a puppy?’ the Hunt enquired.
Being sportsmen, we did as the Hunt desired.
And early in June there arrived a man
With an innocent bundle of white and tan.
A fat little Foxhound, bred to the game,
With a rollicking eye and a league-long name,
And he played with a cork at the end of a string;
And walking a puppy was ‘just the thing.’
On Puppy Walking
Foxhound whelps—tiny creatures that in a few short years will be the very ones we rely on for our sport—are making their entrance into our world as we slide into the tailing end of the season. Hunt members and hunt supporters—"puppy walkers"—will be taking the lucky ones from the kennels to their own homes and farms to start the puppies' education in a free and pleasant environment.
Puppy walker Heather Kuenzi wants to do her best for her huntsman and her puppies. She writes:
"I was recently asked by our huntsman to bring two puppies (Penn-Marydel bloodlines) to our farm for the winter and walk them out! Any words of wisdom, or training tips for when I'm out walking the fields with them? I'm curious to know if hounds are simply born "biddable" or if there are things I can do to work on developing those traits. I'd like to continue to walk puppies for our hunt with future pups and am working hard on returning them as honest members of the pack! I also have a half-foxhound house dog who is also enjoying "helping" me with raising them!
