A pleasant morning arrived for Thursday' events It was partly cloudy, temperatures in the upper 40's and little breeze at 6 a.m. Judges had scheduled only one test dogt o be run at 7 a.m.

Once on site, a heavy haze hung over the series. The line faced the rising sun that added a glare also.  The only test team of Gary Zellner and D Seven ran at 7 a.m., but the visibility was too bad to resume the test. Judges decided to wait until the haze burned off and the light was better. By 7:45 the first running dog, #90 was called to line..

The test was much the same as the day before, however, dogs seemed to do a better job of marking the far right bird. Not as many ran up the far hill and winded the bird. More hunted their way to the area of the fall and recovered the bird with a hunt instead of winding it from a distance. As the last few dogs arrived, the wind switched and came in from left to right so that the dogs could wind the far bird on the right. A few handled, but most did workmaship-like jobs.

By 9:45 the fifth concluded when dog # 17 returned to line. Contestants were told to wait for the callbacks before moving to the next site a short distance away. Once again the callbacks were readily available. Forty Three dogs had survived with 9 lost. Those missing were: 20, 24, 28, 42, 55, 56, 63, 74, and 81. Dog 60 would begin the 6th - a land quad with 2 flyers, two retired guns and an honor.

Test 7 - Land Quad, 2 flyers, 2 retired guns and an honor

A quick move was then made to a hill overlooking a rolling  pasture with a small creek angling through. The line was on top the hill that dropped down to a road transversing below. Beyond it the land rolled up fairly sharply. The stream was lined with patches of cattails and angled from the far left to the near right.. Four sets of guns were positioned .at various depths in a 160 degree spread. To the near left, a flying duck was shot thrown to the left were it landed in sparse pasture grass 125 yards away. Deeper to the right a second set stood alongside some cattails. They threw a dead duck deep to the right that landed beyond a wet area 144 yards from line. Deeper to the right, well up the far hill, the third set shot a flying rooster thrown to the right. It fell in sparse pasture 262 yard deep. The right station was much closer in, also in the cattail lined shore.. They threw a dead hen pheasant to the left where it fell in a wet swale, 209 yards out. The order was : left middle dead, right middle flyer, right dead hen and left flyer duck. Handlers received the last bird on an honor mat to the right of line. It took about 10 + minutes per dog (?).

The first test team of Mike and Dixie demonstrated the test at 10:22 with Arnie and Rocky following about 10:35. . First running dog came to line at about 11 a.m.

The 2 shot flyers boggled the dog's minds and the configuration only added to the excitement. When sent for the first flyer, the two dead bird stations retired so that when he returned with the bird, only the pheasant flyer station was visible. Most took that mark second. The pheasant falls were varied and some hunted them before recovery.  Most took the left middle dead duck second. After running deep for the last flyer, some dogs blew through the shorter, retired mark and ran deep up the hill. Some recovered after a hunt but others had to be brought back with a handle. The same scenario applied to the right, retired mark. A few handlers took the two flyers, then the right retired third and the left retired last.

Although there was some hunting on the flyers, especially the long, left middle pheasant flyer, most of the problems occoured on the two retired marks. Both were well placed in tall  wet cattail cover . They were also down wind. Dogs were drawn past the cattail creek to the large expanse of pasture beyond. Many did not want to check down for the shorter, retired marks initially, and of those that blew threw them, only a few recovered without handling. When the test was suspended for the day, 31 dogs had been run and 15 handled on the marks, about 50%. If those, 4 handled on two fo the marks

The test was suspended at about 5 p.m. after dog 25 had run. 12 would run on Friday morning.
A test dog would be run at 6:30 and the first running dog shortly thereafter. There were no partial callbacks and the next test was rumored to be a blind(s?).

96 NFC AFC Storm's Riptide Star visits, recalling  memories	Handlers observing test 6 from the line

Sam Milton and Ford on line	Summit meeting (L to R) Gary Zellner, Ron Foley Gary Ahlgren and Rich Fenner.