IT is over 35 years since we bought our first Irish Setter and since then I have never been without at least one Setter or Pointer about the place. The current head count is four – all Pointers – and I suspect that it may shortly rise to five since Herself is muttering about starting field trailing again.

Besides, with two of the present incumbents being more or less retired we really do need another set of legs to make up a working team suitable for a full day on the hill.

And coincidentally, just as I was sitting down to write this article Julie Organ phoned to tell me that she knew of a litter of Pointer pups from first class working parents that are for sale just a few miles down the road from here.

I say ‘coincidentally’ because I was just beginning to write a piece about a video that Julie had lent me. I can’t tell you what it was called because it was one that Julie and her husband Colin had brought back with them from a trip to Greece and the whole thing, titles and commentary, was quite literally all Greek to me.

There was no problem in understanding the pictures, though, because they showed something very familiar and very close to my heart. It was all about shooting partridges over bird dogs; something with which I am reasonably familiar; but it was a very, very different approach to partridge shooting to the way we do things over here.

The British version of partridge shooting over bird dogs involves autumn stubbles or the rough ground on the edge of the hill. In Greece - or in the part of Greece shown in the video – it meant a walk of several hours up into the hills, staying overnight in a shepherd’s hut and then running the dogs over some of the roughest and rockiest ground I have ever seen.

We put a lot of effort into getting our Pointers fit ready for the start of the shooting season, running them on the hill to harden their muscles and build up their stamina, plus plenty of roadwork to toughen their paws.

All I can say about those Greek Setters and Pointers is that they must have pads like steel to withstand the constant abrasion of the rocks and scree, and from the length of time they were working, they must be as fit as the proverbial butcher’s dog.

They had a team of mostly English Setters plus an odd Pointer and the two Guns ran them as a pack, pretty much letting the dogs get out and hunt under their own initiative.

On the steep slopes, with odd patches of vegetation and a few stands of trees among the bare rocks it would have been difficult as well as a waste of energy to try to get the dogs quartering as we expect our own dogs to do when hunting a flat stubble field.

Instead the dogs seemed to be taking themselves to the most likely spots and hunting them out rather than trying to cover every square foot of ground – and pretty effective they were too. There was very little handling as such; the dogs just got on with the job, sometimes spread out over the mountain and sometimes almost hunting as a pack.

The Guns just followed along and got themselves into position pretty smartly whenever there was a point.

The camera work was a bit special as well, since the cameraman must have had legs and lungs of iron to lug all his gear up and down those mountains under the hot sun and still be on hand to record the dogs coming on to point, the Guns coming up and sending them in to flush as, as often as not, a partridge or two being added to the bag.

It isn’t difficult to fake shooting sequences, especially with Pointers and Setters, but these looked to be absolutely genuine, with long sequences, uncut, of the point, the flush, the birds dropping and the retrieve to round things off.

And incidentally, there was a nice lesson to be learnt for anyone who repeats that old mantra: “Pointers can’t retrieve.” These Pointers and Setters did, and made a damn good job of it as far as I could tell.

The hunters ended the day with a barbecue over a wood fire back at the shepherd’s hut and I’ll bet those partridge tasted good. They certainly earned them the hard way.

It opened my eyes a bit as to the conditions in which partridge can thrive. There was very little cover on the mountain and not very much for them to eat as far as I could tell, but there were some good coveys and they were obviously wild birds, not reared ones.

If redlegs (or whatever subspecies of the redleg lives in Greece) can survive in those conditions they must feel positively pampered among the bracken and rushed of our hill shoot.

Incidentally, some of you may remember that Julie and Colin Organ produced their own video, A Working Life with Pointers and Setters, a few years ago and very popular it was, so popular that it has long since been sold out.

I understand that Julie has now had it reissued, on DVD this time, and I can thoroughly recommend it to anyone who is interested in the training and working of bird dogs, or who just likes watching a master of his craft at work.

Copies are available from Mrs Julie Organ, Rathmoss, Pennington, Ulverston, Cumbria, LA12 7SA, or by telephone on 01229 5825. The cost is £16.95 plus £1.50 postage and packaging.