Wired for Wirehairs

As the conversation ebbs for a moment, Greg Dixon grabs a lead and walks Backwoods Buck Forty-Five ("Reggie II") out of a nearby kennel. "This is what I like about this line of dogs," Greg says, restarting the conversation as he reinforces "whoa" training with the 2-year-old German Wirehaired Pointer. "They must be predisposed to stand still with intensity on the whoa command." Indeed, the bearded dog stands like a statue atop a barrel as Greg continues talking about things he's learned to appreciate about German Wirehaired Pointers. Though unknown to many in the United States, this continental breed has won countless ribbons and trophies for Greg and his wife, Liz, and has helped them make a name in the field trial world. Since 2002, the Dixons have bred and trained dogs that claimed four German Wirehaired Pointer Club of America (GWPCA) National Field Trial Championships. The most recent champion is 2XNFC DC Backwoods Sure Shot Marley ("Marley"), an 8-year-old who won in October at the Branched Oak State Recreation Area in Lincoln, Neb., repeating his 2002 GWPCA National Championship win. The most decorated dog in their kennel, Marley, who is owned by Helen Shelley of Tucson, Ariz., was second at the 2007 National Championship, the same year he placed third at the AKC Gun Dog Championship. The Dixons' other GWPCA National Champions are NFC FC Backwoods Longshot ("Lewis"), who won in 2005, and NFC FC Backwoods Sure Shot Wilson ("Wilson"), the 2003 winner. Beyond professional success, the Dixons have been impacted personally by their German Wirehairs. After all, the breed helped Greg meet Liz. That introduction came 18 years ago when Greg saw an ad for German Wirehair puppies in Gun Dog magazine. "The breeder was local so I called her up, but she wouldn't sell me a puppy," Greg recalls fondly. "She didn't think I was the right home." Liz smiles at that story. Shortly after that first meeting the pair started training together through the Twin Cities German Wirehaired Pointer Club. Then they started attending field trials together. Before long they were married. Around that same time, Greg sold his asphalt business, his Browning Citori Lightning shotgun and MG convertible and shifted into full-time, professional dog training. Today the Dixons live on 200 acres in west-central Wisconsin, one hour east of Minneapolis-St. Paul. The farm is home to their Backwoods Kennels and has plenty of room for 25 Tennessee walking horses, numerous barn cats and even more dogs. During a recent visit the Dixons were joined inside their house by a litter of German Wirehair puppies and several older dogs who no longer compete in field trials. Dogs in training live in a heated kennel that features 20 indoor-outdoor runs, three dog yards and five outdoor runs. Most runs are occupied by German Wirehairs, the most popular hunting dog in Germany but a breed the Dixons say is less common in the United States. "Some people think they are the ugliest dog they've ever seen," Greg says. Liz nods, "Yeah, people either think they're ugly, or like us, they think they are beautiful." 'The Coolest Dog Ever' Liz fell in love with German Wirehairs after seeing a picture of DC AFC Walker's Blue Movie on the cover of Gun Dog magazine. "I just went wild. I thought that was the coolest dog I'd ever seen," she says. "She was standing there on point and was just awesome." Not long after, someone brought an injured German Wirehair to the veterinary clinic where Liz was working and gave her the dog. From there she started showing the dog and bred her first litter in 1987. That was the same year Greg had his first German Wirehair encounter. For years he had hunted pheasants behind Brittanys with one main regret: He wished the dogs would retrieve more consistently. "We hunted near a lot of sloughs and I always ended up having to wade in to get the birds," Greg says. One day while blacktopping a driveway in a Twin Cities suburb he watched as someone walked a German Wirehair near the job site. "The owner was throwing a big stick as far as he could into this swamp nearby. And that dog brought it back every time, even if it took five minutes," Greg recalls. "I just couldn't stop thinking about that. I felt like I had to get one of those dogs." What appeals to Greg is that in addition to retrieving, pointing is an even stronger trait of German Wirehaired Pointers. This versatile breed first appeared in the United States in the 1920s and was registered with American Field in 1953 under the German Drahthaar Club of America. The American Kennel Club recognized the breed in 1959 but requested the name be changed to German Wirehaired Pointer to designate which group of sporting dogs the breed would compete with. The GWPCA was then founded and held its first field trial in 1963 in Ingleside, Ill. A decision was made at that time to hold the National Specialty at the same time and location, a tradition that continues today. The Dixons have fared well in both conformation and field trials, having achieved five Dual Champ­ions they have either bred or owned. Liz handles the show side of the operation, which traces back to her early days working with German Wire­hairs. Her first Dual Champion came out of a 1990 litter that produced DC Soo Lines Allied Freighter. "When I got my first good dog I wanted to show her because I thought it would be fun," Liz says. "The co-breeder liked to show dogs and she got me hooked on that." After attending a field trial, Liz decided she liked that side of the game, too. "I already had the expensive part. I had the truck, the trailer and the horses," she says. "I loved the horses and the riding." What she needed was more competitive dogs, so she began to concentrate on dogs with proven field trial performance in her breeding efforts. "The more I stayed in the sport, the more I wanted a competitive field trial dog," says Liz. Once the Dixons paired up, they continued to refine their small but effective breeding program. Their foundation stock began with a male named "Archie" (Backwoods Flex­ible Flyer) and a female called "Zip" (FC Jay-Mar's Blake's Blue Angel), who is now 16 and one of the older housedogs. "Zip and Archie started it all," Liz says. "Archie was Greg's dog, and I was competing against Archie with a dog I bought. We ran Archie in so many trials when he was young that we learned not to run derbies so much." An Archie breeding to DC AFC Sure Shot's Justa Miss Marker produced an outstanding male, NFC FC Sure Shot's Slick Nickel, who in 2000 won both the GWPCA National Championship and Futurity. Owned by Mel Lee of Bend, Ore., "Nick" impressed Greg and Liz when they first saw him run as a 2-year-old. "Nick gave me chills the way he ran at Nationals," Liz recalls. "He ran as far as he could along the rim of the entire place, but you could still see him. He had great style on birds." When Zip came in season, the Dixons had fresh chilled semen from Nick shipped for a breeding that produced seven wirehair pups. They hoped to capitalize on Nick's range ability to balance their close-working early dogs that were well-suited to hunting situations but not as ready for field trials. Among the seven pups were Lewis, the 2005 GWPCA National Champion mentioned earlier, DC Backwoods Penny Lane ("Pepe") and FC AFC Backwoods Reflection ("Hank"). "These dogs had fantastic range," Greg says. "Our dogs now will range to the other side of a section and point birds and stand steady to wing and shot." Meanwhile, in 1999, the Dixons outcrossed their conformation CH Backwoods Mo Kick to a wirehair named "Rocky," who later became NFC DC AFC Sure Shot's Hot Rocks, MH, the 2001 GWPCA National Champion. The breeding, Rocky's first, produced Marley, the 2008 GWPCA National Champion. Because they breed as few as one litter of German Wirehairs per year, they try to be extremely careful when selecting pedigrees. "It's really not a numbers game for us. We just really try to do one first-class breeding per year," Greg says. "When we see a really great dog, as we did with Nick and Rocky, we try to breed to him to better our dogs," Liz says. "These crosses produced good looking, highly competitive field trial dogs." Temperament is crucial when they breed. "When I first heard about wirehairs, I always heard they were aggressive," Greg says. "We breed away from that. Almost all our male dogs get along well." Those that don't get along are neutered, including one finished show champion. "If fighting and dominating aren't in their makeup, they're just a better dog to work with and live with," Greg says. Other traits they seek include stamina, independence, nose, style, trainability, pointing ability, range, intelligence and gait. Rocky and Nick embody the best of these traits, and their pedigrees run throughout the Back­woods Kennels' line. The Dixons also like seeing liver-and-white coats in their dogs, a color that is frowned on in Germany. Looks matter, but only in relation to the total package. "We're just trying to produce a nice-looking, intelligent, competitive field dog," Liz says. "We'll always pick out the best-looking dog in a litter and hope they can prove themselves in the field. If they don't, they get sold as a started dog." Breeding for Field Performance Performance in the field is a major factor when it comes to any Backwoods Kennels breeding. "One of the keys to our whole breeding program is evaluating dogs on wild birds. Your better dogs will rise to the top. They'll find wild birds, and they won't get lost," Greg says. "It's a good evaluating tool for developing a breeding program. I think every dog we've bred has been exceptional on wild birds." The dogs get plenty of opportunity to prove themselves. Each January Greg leaves for Texas where he spends 10 weeks training on wild quail in the rolling plains at the base of the panhandle. Then he returns to Wisconsin, which serves as home base from March through early June during the busy spring field trial season. After a short summer break in Wisconsin, Greg and the dogs head North. The Dixons own land in south-central North Dakota, plus numerous friendly landowners allow Greg to train from early July through the end of August on wild sharptail grouse and occasional pheasants. Several weekend trials and National Championships take place in the fall, and then Greg gs back to Wisconsin for training and hunting in winter. Then the cycle starts over. Even in Wisconsin, Greg tries to train with as many "nearly wild birds" as possible. In a large johnny house he has about a thousand quail that are trained to return to the pen similar to homing pigeons. To train dogs, Greg simply chases a few birds out of the house and lets them flush wild into his 200 acres of timber and grassy fields. From there, the dogs go to work. Puppies are let loose on wild birds at 10 weeks. "It's pretty young, but it makes a better dog," Greg says. "You'd think that when you let out a group of 10-week-old puppies they'd be wrestling and rolling all over. But, no, they want to hunt." All that variety pays off in field trial situations, Greg says, since trials are often held in very different settings. "Among the three areas where we train, the dogs have really seen it all," he says. "That's what makes a well-rounded dog that can go into different areas of the country and succeed." Greg developed his training program over the past 14 years, ever since that summer he quit paving driveways and sold his MG convertible and fancy Browning shotgun to bankroll a trip to North Dakota. That year he took six dogs to the prairie. "Six led to 14, the next year I had 21, and the next year I had to send dogs home," Greg says. Wherever he gs, Greg is sure to haul along plenty of Purina® Pro Plan® brand Performance Formula, which he feeds year-round. Dogs are fed twice per day when not competing. During field trial season feedings are cut to once per day. "I like the way the dogs look and the owners are really happy with how the dogs look," Greg says. "They can generally go right from the kennel into the show ring. And anybody who cleans a kennel can appreciate Pro Plan Performance because it's easy to clean up." While Greg relies on one dog food, he's willing to train any and all pointing breeds. At any given time in his kennel you may find Vizslas, Irish Setters, Gordon Setters and German Shorthairs along with the ubiquitous German Wirehairs. That's due partly to the fact he specializes in a breed in which "there's just not a lot of demand," Greg says of German Wirehairs. In order to make it as a professional trainer, then, he trains other breeds. "I see myself as a pointing dog trainer, not a German Wirehaired Pointer trainer," he says. It would be hard to argue with his track record. Immediately after winning the German Wirehair National Championship in October, Greg packed up and drove 1,600 miles to the Gordon Setter Nationals. The amateur winner there was NAFC FC Cobb's Golden Kernel ("Kernel"), a flashy dog Greg trained and bred along with co-owner Linda Sanders of Las Vegas. Greg also trained Kernel's sire, 2XNAFC FC AFC Ice Hot Cobb, and bred him to raise one litter of Gordon Setters. One litter, one National Field Champion. Not a bad track record. Greg also trained NAFC FC AFC Triad's Keepsake of Oakleaf, MH, the 2000 Vizsla National Amateur Field Champion, owned by Linda Kelly of Dassel, Minn. He trained NFC FC Willow's on the Spot, the 2007 German Shorthair National Champ­ion, for three years for owner John Lunseth of Long Lake, Minn. "Spot" went on to win 15 one-hour championships under handler Eldon Hongo. But for all the time training other breeds, Greg still has a soft spot for the breed he's most commonly associated. "I train other dogs, sure, but I'll always have wirehairs," he says.