A walk on the wildside

My thanks to the many who responded to the story we had some time ago and who also remembered the friendly dog who was everyone’s friend. Ben was special, he belonged to a family who live near the Waterworks. but another dog of which we have very happy memories was Cal, a cocker spaniel who lived with a family on the Duntaheen Road. Cal was a lovely friendly dog who loved to walk along the river-bank and in the woods with my son, Tom.

Every morning he would wait outside our door for Tom and walk to school with him, everyone knew Cal as a friendly dog. Then one day we got the news, Cal had disappeared from his home, we all went to search for him but in vain, the family who owned him were heart-broken, we all were. About a month later we got word that Cal had been found, I remember going out Duntaheen to see him, what a shock I got, no longer was Cal the friendly dog we all remembered.

He growled at me and slunk off with his tail between his legs, we heard later that our friend had been mistreated and beaten by whoever had stolen him, and he was never again the same friendly dog that he had been.

Paddy too was a wonderful dog, a Springer that was trained by Jim Roche, and during the fishing season when Jim was out every Sunday on the bank of the river, I would take Paddy for long walks. At that time there were no houses in The Sandpit we used to have great fun playing hide and seek in the sand dunes, but I remember a very special day within the Lords Wood at Knockananig. Paddy put up a pheasant which flew into the topmost branches of a very tall fir tree, Paddy stood at the foot of the tree in typical gundog pose, head up, pointing at the bird, Jim and his friend Ted stood with guns at the ready.

It was ten minutes before the tension was broken. The Pheasant finally broke cover, there was only one shot from Ted’s very special 16 bore shotgun and the bird tumbled down and Paddy recovered him, laying him at Jim’s feet. He knew who his master and friend was. Very special memories of walks on the wildside in the best of company.