What Characteristics Make A Fast Bear Dog?

[Mackdog]

So what makes a fast bear dog? Thanks

[live to hunt]

none they either are or they are not.

[Mackdog]

Yep, so what physical traits make a fast bear dog?

[box rocker]

Head up drifting a track.

[Mackdog]

Thanks for the post. I don't think I'm going to get the info I'm after. Not trying to offend anyone, but I see hunting ability as a learned trait, not a bred trait. Was hoping to get info from someone that breeds dogs more for body type.

[live to hunt]

I do not think that you will find anyone that likes to caught game breed for body type only. Don't get me wrong here but i do not know anyone that will breed two dogs because they are the best looking dogs if they lack the ablity to caught game. On the other hand they will breed two okay looking dogs that have all the ablity to put up the game. Great comformantion and speed is a bonus!

[wanapasaki]

My long legged, long bodied black and tans are great strike dogs, but my compact medium legged blue tick/walker crosses are alot quicker and have more stamina

[Mackdog]

Wana,
Thanks, thats more of what I was looking for.

Live to hunt,
I'm thinking body type not because of how they look, but how they cover ground. In my opinion, any hound can hunt well if trained right. Also not a fan of game bred lines, I've been successful with random (grade) dogs from the local area. My redbone (the one in my signature) is long legged and rather lean, I bred him to a friends stocky red tick bitch and a couple pups turned out looking like whippets. The runt we kept is about 35 lbs and can smoke bunnies around the yard. Unfortunatly, the bitch's spleen got twisted up after giving birth and she had to be spayed. I want to do a little research before I breed my stud to another bitch or find a stud for the whippet looking bitch.

[rhromm]

Look at the dogs with "cat feet." They walk very easy on their feet, and are not "heavy footed." My lighter footed dogs are generally faster.

[Catch]

Mackdog,

This is my opinion. Males 55-60 lbs, females 50-55 lbs. Big Deep chest, give the heart and lungs room to work. Long legs, the further a dog can reach forward with back legs the more ground it can cover per stride. Lean and stream line, muscle takes energy and oxygen, so unneeded muscle is a waste, and less lactic acid. Nice rounded muscled ass end, need those muscle to drive. Light boned, extra heavy bone is weight that is not needed. Tight feet, no reason to run a loose dog just to break its feet down. Good nose, a dog that can run a track with is head level to the shoulders is important. Chop mouth, a ball mouth dog is spending time barking and not running or smelling. Chop on track about every 5-10 seconds. A babbling dog is wasting time barking and not paying attention.

This is what I breed for in a dog. Big loose dogs or barrel chested squaty dogs don't work where I run.

This is my opinion only and may not be worth .02 for others.

[box rocker]

A little back bone and rib showing.

[Mackdog]

My dog doesn't gain nor loose weight, no matter how much he eats. His muscles bulk up when he gets in shape, that about it. Had an old hound dogger tell me to try to take off running while yelling as loud as I could and see how fast I could go. My redbone usually makes a ton of noise, bear or cats. The exception, I remember one bear race where it was just him and a 100 pound color phase. They covered some ground pretty quick, but when they eventually circled and got back into hearing I thought he was up to no good. I heard one bark, bout half mile off, a few minutes later heard another but a lot closer. I ran up the road on foot to cut em off, sure as shit, I could hear the bear coming so I cut it off and got to chase it about 20yds up the road myself. I need to pay more attention to his chop and bawl when hes striking, starting a track and while running the track. That and I need to get their asses in shape before season starts next time.

[cobalt]

I've seen many different styles of conformation in fast dogs. I do agree that conformation is important as far as the long term goes and dogs with poor conformation slow down earlier in life and flat out crappy conformation should be avoided, also, a dog should bark appropriately, not all the time. In my experience, it is the chop mouth dogs that bark with far more fequency than bawl mouth dogs, but there are bawl mouth dogs that definitely bark way too much. In either case, I don't think barking is much of a variable in the speed of a dog, but more of a preference to the listener.
There are 2 catagories of speed IMO. There is jump speed and endurance speed. I am not a fan of heavy drifting dogs as the shortest distance between 2 points is a straight line the only drifting that should be done is when a dog is running off to the side of a track because of wind drift, or when picking up a lose on a feed track. That being said, it is the nose that makes for good speed on either the short or the long run. The fastest dogs I've had, even the ones that were not "real" bear dogs, could run a track as fast as they could go without making a bobble, not even a brief lose and could keep that pace for long periods of time, especially uphill and through heavy cover.
Dogs that are out of shape and are not subjected to endurance situations constantly will struggle in the speed department.
I am also talking about single dogs, not a pack of dogs.
Genetics also has a lot to do with good speed.

[Mackdog]

When he was trailing pretty quiet was later in the season, he wasn't in great shape but had been on several races a weekend for most of the season. For some reason that dog always ends up running solo, it always starts with a pack, but it usually ends up just him. He was my first hound pup, I'd give anything to do it all over again. The first hound guy I hung out with was a stereotype poster child, I didn't know any better at the time. Anyways, for being 5 years old he still seems to be learning quite a bit. Just have to see how he does this spring, can't wait to get his daughter (the whippet) on some bear.

I remember hearing a speal about heavyweight UFC fighters. The guys with a lot of muscle (like panzy Brock Lesnar) use such a great amount of energy its near impossible to be able to maintain a fast paced fight for 5 rounds. I think slim built dogs would have better endurance, given that a short stalky pup and taller slim pup were raised by the same hunter and had the same experience.

[Catch]

For those that PMed. I will get some pics and post them.