Excelling In A Plum Role

The Plummer terrier is adept at flushing game and vermin to the gun, as John Glover discovers during a day out on a farm to test the dogs’ versatility.

By their very name, terriers are dogs of the earth. In the past, before certain legislation was implemented, this varied and extremely valiant family of dogs did exactly that, going to ground in pursuit of their prey. Everything from badgers to otters was pursued by the smooth, the rough, the white, the coloured, the English, the Scottish, the Welsh and the Irish that collectively we name in one courageous group: the terriers.

Nowadays, the only earthwork a terrier can legally carry out is on foxes and even then such an activity must meet certain criteria as defined by the Hunting Act 2004. However, above ground one is still at liberty to flush game and pests to the gun using up to two terriers. It was this very thing that I set out to do with working Plummer terrier aficionado Mike Newitt and his two dogs, Billy, a pure Plummer, and Ruby, an outcrossed Plummer/ bull/Fell terrier mix.

Mike has kept Plummer terriers for several years, after working other breeds, and is lucky enough to work them on an almost daily basis. He ranks the breed highly in terms of prey drive and nose and also finds them extremely loyal.