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I had one of my seasoned hounds run a back track today. It is terriably dry we were hunting a depradation bear. We saw more bear tracks than I have seen in a long time the dogs would not strike we would put them on the track and they would not do anything run right past the tracks.

Like I said earlier these are the driest conditions I have ever ran in. but I watched the bear cross in fort of the truck dumped the box and watched all but one pup run the track backwards. Why did this happen, the game warden said they had another hunter out a few days earlier and his dogs did could not take a track either. Was a bit embrassing the warden said he had heard alot of good things about my dogs and they did that right in front of him.

Just a little background on the day i got the call about 10:30am by the time I got up the mountain it was dang near one thirty we hunted hard until about six. We stopped to have a snack we had been there about 10 minutes and there he was just walking down the road. He turned and walked off the road. I got out opened the box and they were off and running backward. It was about 80 degrees and we have not had any moisture for about to three months I guess i do not have dry ground bear dogs. But I am pretty pround of the pup that did trail the right direction we did not catch the bear. We will be after it again tomorrow.

Any advice would be great.

I have run a lot of bear tracks backward & every houndman I have ever hunted bear with we have had back track races. Though I have never run a bear backwards that I saw because I made sure they went the right direction. One thing I have learned when stricking a bear and the strike isn't a red hot wind strike is turn only 1 or 2 dogs out to start it, dogs that have a history of being able to figure out which is the right direction. Let the start dog take a several hundred yard lead before turning more in. A good bear start dog if left alone will figure out in a couple hundred yards if he is going the right direction, if you dump the box to quick they are more likely not to turn it around. One problem is it takes a lot of backtrack races to figure out which are your best start dogs. Sometimes your best strike dog isn't your best start dog.

Excellent advice you just gave there .$$ for $$ I will take a Good Start Hound over a Good Strike Hound any day