Our Story
In 1994 I had retired as the head baseball and football coach at our high school and after 20 years of being too busy in the summer and fall to hunt or properly train a dog I found myself looking for a retriever to work with. My dad had brittanys when I was a kid and as he was paraplegic and in a wheelchair, I was the trainer and keeper of the dogs. I showed one of my brits, Rusty, once, but he was too big and that was the end of that.
I felt that a retriever would be the best choice for pheasant hunting in Wisconsin. A guy down the street had a curly when I was a kid and I remembered that years later when I began looking for a dog, but curlies were nowhere to be found.
While attending a dog show to research flatcoats I happened to see a curly called Yeager, CH Ranah's Bainbridge Meant To Be. I immediately called his breeder and it so happened she had a liver half-brother to Yeager called Magee, eventually CH Ranah's Mahogany Glide CD WC CGC ROM. He arrived at Nyehyrst in a snowstorm April 1, 1995. As I had been involved in dog shows as a kid I agreed to show this goofy looking dog. I figured we'd make a few trips to the ring and then leave that behind for the field.
Right.
Almost two years later we brought home Rally, CH Softmaple Natural Finish ROMX, from Cathy Lew's Softmaple Curlies. Rally went on to be one the top producers of her generation being bred to the first mutliple best-in-show curly in US history, Baron, CH Mayhem's Gentleman's Agreement ROMX--and Magee.
It's now twenty years later, and I've hunted over more than a dozen of my own curlies, finished close to another dozen, we're anticipating our 14th litter-- and Yeager's owner has just taken home a boy from the S litter twenty years after I first saw Yeager.
I was the president of the Great Lakes Curly-Coated Retriever Club for its first 10 years and proud to preside over the first ever Upland Hunt Test in 2008 and more curly field events at the time than any other curly club.
Magee turned out to be the best pheasant dog I've ever seen. His ability to produce birds where "there were no birds" was unmatched. He learned to cut off runners already as a pup. He was the perfect example of the curly's ability to teach himself to hunt. When Magee moved on, Ivy took over and proved to be nearly as good as Magee and a much more focused retriever. Rizzo followed her, his son Finn followed him. Then Rory, and now Lena.
EVERY Nyehyrst curly will have Magee and Ivy in their pedigree and most will have Jet (CH SoftMaple's O' Dark Thirty JH SH MH CD WC WCX WCQ CGC RN TT HOF ROM), one of the most accomplished field dogs in curly history and half-brother to the Nyehyrst foundation bitch, Rally (CH Softmaple Natural Finish ROMX).
John Heyn
Nyehyrst
In 1994 I had retired as the head baseball and football coach at our high school and after 20 years of being too busy in the summer and fall to hunt or properly train a dog I found myself looking for a retriever to work with. My dad had brittanys when I was a kid and as he was paraplegic and in a wheelchair, I was the trainer and keeper of the dogs. I showed one of my brits, Rusty, once, but he was too big and that was the end of that.
I felt that a retriever would be the best choice for pheasant hunting in Wisconsin. A guy down the street had a curly when I was a kid and I remembered that years later when I began looking for a dog, but curlies were nowhere to be found.
While attending a dog show to research flatcoats I happened to see a curly called Yeager, CH Ranah's Bainbridge Meant To Be. I immediately called his breeder and it so happened she had a liver half-brother to Yeager called Magee, eventually CH Ranah's Mahogany Glide CD WC CGC ROM. He arrived at Nyehyrst in a snowstorm April 1, 1995. As I had been involved in dog shows as a kid I agreed to show this goofy looking dog. I figured we'd make a few trips to the ring and then leave that behind for the field.
Right.
Almost two years later we brought home Rally, CH Softmaple Natural Finish ROMX, from Cathy Lew's Softmaple Curlies. Rally went on to be one the top producers of her generation being bred to the first mutliple best-in-show curly in US history, Baron, CH Mayhem's Gentleman's Agreement ROMX--and Magee.
It's now twenty years later, and I've hunted over more than a dozen of my own curlies, finished close to another dozen, we're anticipating our 14th litter-- and Yeager's owner has just taken home a boy from the S litter twenty years after I first saw Yeager.
I was the president of the Great Lakes Curly-Coated Retriever Club for its first 10 years and proud to preside over the first ever Upland Hunt Test in 2008 and more curly field events at the time than any other curly club.
Magee turned out to be the best pheasant dog I've ever seen. His ability to produce birds where "there were no birds" was unmatched. He learned to cut off runners already as a pup. He was the perfect example of the curly's ability to teach himself to hunt. When Magee moved on, Ivy took over and proved to be nearly as good as Magee and a much more focused retriever. Rizzo followed her, his son Finn followed him. Then Rory, and now Lena.
EVERY Nyehyrst curly will have Magee and Ivy in their pedigree and most will have Jet (CH SoftMaple's O' Dark Thirty JH SH MH CD WC WCX WCQ CGC RN TT HOF ROM), one of the most accomplished field dogs in curly history and half-brother to the Nyehyrst foundation bitch, Rally (CH Softmaple Natural Finish ROMX).
John Heyn
Nyehyrst