I‘ve been lucky enough over the years to have worked my spaniels in all sorts of different cover, ranging from thick laid bracken to the spaniel handler’s nightmare: standing maize. On more than one occasion, I have been asked what I consider to be the hardest cover for a spaniel to deal with. The obvious answer is thick brambles, which as anyone who spends time in the beating line or out rough shooting will tell you is even more challenging on a frosty day when there is little give in the thorn-encrusted fronds.
Yet a hard-going spaniel that has been properly introduced to cover during its training seems to revel in the thick stuff . One of my cockers seems to be almost sadistic in the way
