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I Gundogs By Tom Davis t says he's pointed 225 yards to the south." Rusty. The speaker, and the owner of both, was Nolan Huffman. The setting was the high plains near Lewistown, Montana, where Nolan – a professional trainer and Brittany breeder whose home is in North Carolina – spends his summers and falls. The time was a couple Septembers ago, when my friend Terry Barker and I hooked up with Nolan for a few days of bird hunting. Now, we're not the sharpest knives in the butcher's block, but we figured out right quick that Rusty and the Astro were a match made in heaven. Rusty's on the small side, even for a Brittany, and as you might guess from his name, he carries a lot of the breed's characteristic reddish- orange color. (His registered name, which I think is brilliant, is Beeline Bullet's Oxidation.) He's not what you'd call a close- worker, either, the upshot being that he's out-of-sight, literally, a lot more of the time than he's in it. And when he goes on point in any amount of cover, you have to look sharp to pick him out "It" was a Garmin Astro. "He" was a Brittany named The little Brittany has it all – the nose, tenacity, boldness, intelligence and independence – along with that special, indefinable element in a great bird-finder. from the surrounding vegetation, even the patchy, thinnish grass favored by Huns and sharptails. Oh, and one more thing: While Rusty's not the type that'd ever run off, Nolan pretty much gives him free rein to hunt at whatever range, and in whichever direction, he wants to. He'll either find birds – and Lord, does he find birds! – or he'll show up. Eventually. In other words, he's not one of those classic forward-patterning dogs who always pops out somewhere to the front after he's been gone for a while. Not coincidentally, some of the strongest bird- finders I've ever had the pleasure of hunting over – Mike Gaddis' Katy comes to mind along with several of Ben Williams' dogs and even my own Emmylou – operated in much the same fashion. N olan Huffman and Rusty, who seems to be smiling after pointing and retrieving this Montana sage grouse. the direction might be, well, just about anywhere (although generally not behind us). SPOR TIN G CL ASSICS 187 All of which makes a dog like Rusty an ideal fit for a GPS-enabled tracking collar like the Astro. Time and again Nolan would get a "page," pull the receiver from his pocket, and announce Rusty was on point. The range might be up to one-fourth of a mile,