At the top of the field, a farmer was baling his final cut of hay for the season. The sweet smell of cut and drying hay filled the hot, humid air, and when the setter’s bell clanged through the alder run I couldn’t help but smile. The cover had been trimmed down about 10 years ago, but now it was so thick the sun’s rays couldn’t penetrate the foliage. The dense canopy kept the soil moist, and I picked through what was now one of my best early season woodcock spots. The vegetation was so thick that after a point my friend Brett and I would have to drop to a knee and shoot quickly. If we swung properly with the gun and shot, the birds would fall, even though we couldn’t see ’em.

My setter Ocracoke cast around and locked up. Her nose pointed to a place just beyond the thick understory, but before I could get into shooting position she broke point and rushed in. Early season jitters, I thought, but a bird didn’t fly away. Then I saw her thrashing in the understory, smacking her face with her paw so much that she fell to the ground. I crashed through the brush to catch up to her and when I did there was blood everywhere. She had a mouth, chest, and forelegs full of porcupine quills.