My involvement in Setters and Pointers began when I was about 11 and my father bought my mother an Irish Setter puppy for her birthday. I was totally entranced and have remained so to this day. I was eventually allowed to have my own Irish puppy when my mother took a litter from her bitch and initially became involved with the show side of the breed.

We had been very lucky with the first litter since we had made contact with Sheilagh Thomas whose dog Sh.Ch.Red Dominic of Tamarisk we used on my mother's bitch. It was Sheilagh who introduced us to Alec Dodman and his wife when we were looking for a dog for my bitch when we used their wonderful Sh. Ch. Barnsforde Winston. Through Alec and Sheilagh we got to know Sybil Lennox and her brother Stephen and the wonderful Hartsbourne and Brackenfield Irish Setters that they have campaigned so successfully for so many years.

I remained committed to showing Irish for many years but gradually developed a stronger interest in the working side of the breed. It was clearly apparent that in most cases the breed had developed along separate lines depending on whether the focus was on showing or working. Initially I had hoped to be able to work my show bred dogs but this wasn't a success partly because I hadn't begun with them as pups, partly because their breeding had not been focused on working characteristics but predominantly I suspect because I didn't really know what I was about.

During this time I attended a number of Joyce Damerell's training days down in Devon where there was the opportunity to observe the standard that was required of working dogs so beautifully demonstrated by the superb Sparkfield Pointers for which Joyce and more recently Terry Harris are so well known. I also attended a number of the training days organised by Peter Heard on Salisbury Plain and although I persevered with my show bred dogs I had to admit that they didn't have what was required in the field. In 1984 I attended my first Field Trial with my parents, which was held by the Southern Pointer Club at Bedingfield in Suffolk.

Although we were complete strangers to everyone a few people were kind enough to introduce themselves to us and explain a little about what was going, most memorable amongst these were Will Sloan and Declan O'Rourke and Colin and Julia Organ all of whom remain good friends to this day.

It was still to be many years before I got my first working Irish and even longer before I really began to understand what it was all about. In the meanwhile I used to read as much as I could about training setters and pointers and attend as many trials as possible. For many years I used to just follow on, watch how the dogs worked, how they were handled, and try to understand the conclusions the judges finally came to. I was always only too happy to hold dogs for anyone running more than one in the trial, not only did it make me feel a little bit involved it also provided a perfect opportunity to ask a few questions about what had been happening.

The dogs that we are campaigning at the moment include Will's English Setter F.T.Ch.Molly Iken (Molly) and my red dog International F.T.Ch. Lusca Finn (Finn)

Will also has a daughter of Ardoon Roisin by my red dog F.T.Ch. Lusca Finn called Ardoon Oonagh (Oonagh) who has done exceptionally well in her first trial season qualifying into Open during the summer circuit with two seconds. We are particularly pleased with the characteristics that Oonagh has inherited from both her sire and dam since she has her mother's stamina combined with Finn's athleticism. Finally we have a few pups from the Jess/Pat litter Lusca Fusion (Connor) Lusca Dreamweaver (Weaver) and Lusca Allytwo (Ally) all of whom are showing a great deal of promise for the Novice stakes in 2004.