Glad Dodger is on the mend, it can be so worrying when you don't know what is causing the problem, from the photos he certainly looks a picture of health.
Funny how they lie in the most awkward places, thanks for the comment about Dee Dee I was very lucky to actually catch her sat still long enough to take the photo, good job we have digital now as I get lots of photos of a tail or one back leg as she disappears out of shot.

Nice to have you back with us Ali, my Newsletter came this morning, I had a quick leaf through it and there were some lovely photos, and looks very interesting, I will sit down with it tonight and look forward to a good read.

With regard to training the recall, I did also initially use a squeaky toy with Narla, I found it got her attention as she was just ignoring the whistle sometimes when she was going through adolescence, But if you are planning on working your dog I think squeaky toys are probably frowned upon, she was never allowed to play with them other than with me, or rip them up, but it was the one thing that would get her to lift her head and look back at me, and then I could call or whistle her in.
I don't need to use one now, as she very often just naturally looks back at me if she a bit ahead, sort of saying can I go on Mum or not.
For me I just found keeping my eye on her and watching for the look back helped, sometimes it is so quick that you can miss it, and also stopping them from getting things wrong, the more they get it right the easier it gets.
But my background is mainly Obedience and agility so different probably to how they train working gundogs, I think a lot of breeds especially the working and hunting breeds have strong scenting instincts, and most dogs go through some sort of adolescent period, but hopefully if you get the basic training in a a youngster, you can build on it and then they can do whatever type of activity you want after that.