Rabbits do not like the rain either

Tonight they should feed in the early part of the night, so that when the bad weather hits, they have filled up with food and can stay underground or in cover. Rabbits don’t like serious rain any more than we do.

Moisture trickles and drops heavily off the trees, and the early-fallen leaves squelch underfoot.

We have at last had sufficient rain to make the ground soft enough to run the dog: she is as fit as I can get her with exercise, and now she will have to hone her fitness with work.

This may be her last lamping season, or she may have one more in her; it seems only yesterday she was just a pup with her life all before her.

When she is past lamping, she can still go ferreting, and when long winter days are too much for her, she will I hope have some time as a fireside companion. But retirement is in the future: tonight she will work, and she is trembling with excitement, for she loves her job. So do I.

We make our way quietly and economically to our first call. The walk warms up her muscles, ready to run, and when I sweep the first beam of light across the field, she leans into her slip-lead, following its progress with her predator eyes.

There are quite a few bunched-up humps that are feeding rabbits, and one that sits up uneasily, ruby eyes glowing back at us.

Instantly the lamp is switched off, and we start to stalk a suitable quarry. We need to get between the feeding rabbits and where they will run to. Up the treeline then, trying to keep quiet, avoiding fallen branchlets which will snap underfoot, and trying not to splash where water has gathered in tractor furrows.

Light on: light off. We are nearly there. The nervous rabbit is still uneasy: we are targeting another one which is more intent on filling its belly than saving its life. Now we are right!

On with the broad white beam of light, and the dog pelts off into the shadows, for such is her way. She comes out of the dark into the light and picks up a rabbit that never knew she was there.

She runs straight back to me like the experienced worker she is, and I take the rabbit. With one finger on her ribs to check her heartbeat, I find she has taken little out of herself, so we line up for the next run if there is one, because most of the other rabbits will have run in to safety now.

Two long sweeps of the light finds another rabbit a long way out, and this one is nervous. It starts to run as soon as it is lit up in the beam, and the dog has a long gallop to reach it.

She does not waste her approach by ducking out of the light but powers straight down the beam, a black shadow in a silver river of brightness.

This rabbit makes her work hard: it turns sharply again and again, trying to throw her off, and all the time it is working its way towards the shelter of the hedge.

But the dog is experienced in these matters, and ‘goalkeeps’ the rabbit away from its refuge, driving it back into the open field where she can master it. Two out of two: that’s good.

She is panting hard now, and takes ten minutes or so to return to a suitable state for running, though she is very keen.

Part of keeping a dog in working fettle for as long as possible is in allowing enough time between runs for recovery, and also in ending the night’s work while the dog still has energy left. One must never mistake keenness for energy.

This field is now empty except for us, so we take a walk down the track to another, which we hope will have some more rabbits in it. The rain is already on the increase, a little earlier than expected, though it never feels as wet in the dark when you cannot see it.

The dog leans against me, looks up at me and grins a long crocodile grin. A couple more runs will about do us this time: there will be plenty more such nights before us, when she is fitter.

Foxglove