Mark Lance Memorial Shoot

Mark Lance Memorial Shoot

When

08/26/2023    
10:00 am - 3:00 pm

Bookings

Bookings closed

Where

High Plains Shooting Club (HPSC)
38997 Co Rd 51, Eaton, CO, 80615

The Rocky Mountain Chapter of the North American Versatile Hunting Dog Association (RMC NAVHDA) is hosting the first annual Mark Lance Memorial Event on Saturday, August 26 at the High Plains Shooting Club.

Registration has been extended through August 25th, 8 p.m.

The event will honor our friend and fellow chapter member, Mark Lance, who passed away from cancer in 2022. The event will feature the gathering of friends, a sporting clays course, food, and a silent auction. All of the funds raised at the event will support the conservation-related activities of RMC NAVHDA, a local 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, notably Team Elevate, the youth development program.

Please come help us celebrate Mark’s life, passions, and what binds us together.

About Mark
Mark Lance loved people, wild places, dogs, fishing, and photography.

His passion for dogs and hunting started innocently enough when he was hired to take some professional photos at a hunting preserve in Colorado. He had no experience with bird hunting or hunting dogs. However, his amazing photography skills in the fishing world landed him at the preserve lodge for his first hunting photo shoot. The connection he witnesthsed in the field between the dog and its owner changed the course of his life forever, as well as his wife Sharon. The couple were already passionate about the outdoors, but the spark to get a hunting dog was lit that day! After some research and family negotiation, Mark’s journey with versatile hunting dogs began with the purchase of Zeke, a Wirehaired Pointing Griffon.

Mark first came with Zeke to the Rocky Mountain Chapter of NAVHDA for a training day to see what training a hunting dog was all about. This started his journey training and hunting a versatile dog of his own, like the one that he witnessed at that preserve lodge. Many people create lasting friendships through training their dogs with other NAVHDA members, and Mark was no exception. He quickly made friends, and by the next hunting season, he had a trained hunting dog and a group of friends to take Zeke into the field. That first hunt brought all his passions together – people, dogs, photography, wild places and adventure. He appeared to love every minute of it. Mark had found that special bond with a hunting dog, Zeke, who he had trained himself, with the help of his NAVHDA family.

Where does the money go? About RMC NAVHDA’s Team Elevate:
RMC NAVHDA is the local front range Colorado Chapter of NAVHDA, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization committed to the responsible hunting community, wildlife conservation, and well-trained versatile hunting dogs.

The Rocky Mountain Chapter includes over 100 members focused on the following goals:
 Support youth upland hunting through our youth program, Team Elevate.
 Promote upland hunting with versatile hunting dogs.
 Foster ethical hunter behavior and conservation practices through education programs.

The funds raised at the Mark Lance Memorial event will support the conservation-related activities of RMC NAVHDA, notably fostering the next generation of responsible, ethical, conservation-minded upland hunters through Team Elevate. The youth development program engages participants to learn dog training, hunting and outdoor skills through mentorship and volunteering. Participants also learn responsibility by caring for and training their dogs. Team Elevate youth participate in Aims & Rules Clinics, train and volunteer at training days and test dogs.

Bookings

Bookings are closed for this event.

Recent Posts

2024 Introduction to the RMC NAVHDA Training Program

Hello Rocky Mountain NAVHDA Chapter!

As the training committee has always done, we have asked for more people to come to the committee meeting, be a part of giving input, or become a committee member. We had our meeting and had over a dozen members attend. We feel we were very productive and have a great plan this year.

We had some positive feedback about the stations and drills. Some of the not so positive feedback was that people felt confused about which station was the next station. The answer to that question is…. the station(s) that you feel your dog needs to visit before going on to the next progression or out into the field.

The Committee also did some self-evaluation, and with the new folks in the room, it helped us confirm what we were feeling. We felt we failed people by not giving you a better foundation, progressions, and goals. Even worse, we felt we let you down by not doing what was best for your dog by letting you go on to your next progression or into the field to shoot over your dog when your dog wasn’t ready. I get it, everyone wants to see birds shot over their dogs. Is shooting the birds you bought the best use of those birds for your dog? Should you take them home and work live bird drills in the backyard? Should you run your dog in the dry fire field? Should you be using launchers, check cords, etc? Should you dispatch them, freeze them, and use them for the next 30 days? If this is currently your only venue for getting your dog on birds or shooting birds over your dog, consider reaching out to members/non-members w/ pigeons/chukar that may be training in the next 4 weeks. Join Facebook training groups and, most of all, work your dog for 15 min every day. Your dog will learn more from a little training 15 minutes a day than they will from a full day’s training 4 weeks apart. Andy Leslie showed me a great quote the other day “Beginning trainers want to work on intermediate drills, Intermediate trainers want to work on advanced drills, and advanced trainers work on the basics”. This is what we call foundation, and once you develop a good foundation, you can take this NAVHDA thing as far as you would like to progress or reach any goal you set outside of NAVHDA.

This year we are taking the training sessions to the next level, Checklists! What are checklists?

Checklist are to:

  • Help you evaluate your dog
  • Set goals and track them
  • Help you w/ your progressions
  • Show you what your dog needs to work on and what your next station should be…lol
  • Remind you where you left off w/ notes on what went well and not so well
  • Show whether your dog should go into the field or not
  • Will your dog work in a cooperative range?
  • Will your dog recall?
  • Will your dog stay steady to the shot?
  • Will your dog retrieve a shot bird? To hand?

I have to get checked off to shoot birds over my dog? Yes, to run your dog in the live-fire field, you will need to check off the green sections of the checklist. The reasons for this change is if your dog cannot do the above 4 things to a high level, you are

  • Putting your dog in an unsafe situation
  • Putting our gunners in an undesirable position if your dog can’t stay steady
  • Not setting your dog up to be successful and it can even set back your progression.
  • Taking up more than your fair share of field time when you should have really been working your dog on the drills

There will be mainly 2 sets of checklists: a Daily version for a training day, and a Full version for the season. The Daily will be simple so people can get the most out of a training day and get checked off for the field. The Full training checklist will be similar criteria to a judges card for you to judge his progression in most areas.

I also created two videos explaining the checklists — one for NA handlers, and one for UT handlers.

I hope you are excited about the upcoming training season and not apprehensive. See you at the end of the month!

Pete Corso

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