New guy needs help

[JDJP]

Hey everybody,
I just found this forum, and had to join, I really like it so far.

I plan on doing a bunch of research here, but I wanted to see what yo guys had to say first.
so i have been hunting since i was little, Im 21 now. I have been hunting with dogs here and there with friends for the past 4 or 5 years, but I have never owned one. I breed pitbulls , but I know almost nothing about hunting breeds. And I need to change this because I plan to get 2 dogs pretty soon.

I live in south florida, and we are all over the place here, we hunt in orange groves, swampy areas, heavy palmetto, sugarcane ect....
We have a good catch dog, and a young hound dog(not sure what breed he is, hes black and white with black spots on his skin long ears long nose and and seems to be getting pretty tall.
anyway I want to get my own pack going so I don't have to rely on my friends all the time. I want to get 2 new trail dogs, but have no Idea where to start, can you guys give some advice and or point me in the right direction?


Thanks
JD

[Pops]

your bay dogs need to be rough enough to stop the hog. hopefully growing up w/ bulls will make him rough.
the easy route would be to buy a good dog in the woods that all by himself strikes and stops a hog. then use it to bring the other dogs along.
or the hard way (be more satisfying in the long run). start trying to train the pits to trail since you're already going to be training the hound. if the hound is any good breed him to you best finding pitty bitch. then most of what comes out will be money on finding and stopping hogs.

[btpp]

what you need will depend on the land you hunt and the type of dogs that you perfer you don't have to have gritty dogs to catch pigs i have been doing it for 14 years and personally i will not own a dog that is gritty but when you start this discussion the are going to open a big can of worms i am not saying that you will not catch pigs with gritty dogs i am saying that this is not what if perfer. if you are hunting smaller places like under 500 acres then you will need a dog that will not push the pigs and can stop them but if you are hunting larger places and don't care how far they run you can hunt open hounds i personally like listening to the race and listening to the bay so i run hounds open mouth mostly but this is not for everyone. i hunt with a guy that hunts curs that are gritty and they are good dogs also. the real difference that i see in the two dogs over the past 14 years is if you want to go catch as many pigs as you can in the shortest amount of time i have noticed that the curs usually do this more often not always. but if you enjoy listening to the dogs work and you have enough land i like the hounds. i have caught up to 14 pigs in one day with my hounds but it usually don't happen i can usually catch about 5-8 pigs in about 6-8 hours but my buddy can usually catch them and shut them down alot quicker than me. i am not trying to get an arguement going on about open and shut mouth dogs i am just letting you now what i have seen i know that someone will get on here and argue with me and i am not here to do that just to try to help you out. you will be better off trying to buy a dog that is going good already and then trying to train other dogs to hunt with him. i personally do not try to hunt with my pits loose to find the pigs because there will not be any baying just catching and if you can not hear the pig squeel then you will not even know they have a pig and if it is a big boar then you could be in some trouble i just use my pit to catch and that is all if you have 1/2 or more pit in a dog they will usually catch only not bay
good luck

[longshot]

I am also against running pits loose.

Most people that hunt hogs day in and day out around here want a dog that will STOP a hog and then be smart enough to bay a standing hog. While the person walks in the pit and let the more expendable catch dog do the heavey hitting.

MOST 1\2 pits are what I call "baybusters" they are always trying to catch and busting the bays. 1\2pits are not always this wat but that is the most common outcome of the cross. That being said I have a pit out of a long range cur that wont hardly catch so there is always exceptions to the rule.

I would advise since you have been hunting before to talk with your buddies and see if they know someone that will sell a experienced dog or older puppy trainer type dog. You can normally pick up a old dog that is past his prime for a decent price and use him to start some hogs for 1 or 2 young dogs to get them going. Then you can use your pits for catchdogs.

Good Luck and let us know how you are doing
Longshot

[JDJP]

"Most people that hunt hogs day in and day out around here want a dog that will STOP a hog and then be smart enough to bay a standing hog. While the person walks in the pit and let the more expendable catch dog do the heavey hitting. "

exactly, except i wouldn't call my pits expendable, they all wear good vests and collars, and cutter usually catches a ham, or balls so he keeps out of harms way, and they stay on the leash untill we need them

As for the hounds or curs thing, we already have one hound, my friend says hes a leapord dog, only black one out of the litter, brown dam and sire.I've got high hopes for him. Also I think the dogs we usually hunt with are catahoulas. So I am kinda set on trying to find a good catahoula, and one other dog. what are some good choices for a smart dog that'll stop a hog and keep good bay untill i get in there? should I even pair a catahoula and a cur, or just get two of one kind?

also as for the open hounds, Id think id prefer a quiet dog. I have never hunted hogs with a dog that was constantly barking during chase, only here and there, and then rapid barks when they stopped the pig. also we will have a gps tracking unit in a couple months, so i don't think they will need to do alot of talking.

keep the advice coming, how would you do it in my position?

[WestTexasCurs]

If my Pit kept catching on the nuts,and the hams,I wouldnt call him call him expendable either.I'd be wondering what I was gonna call my next catch dog!Lets see.....hum Spike or Brutus?

[Arkansas Frog]

go to TEXASBOARS.COM all hog hunters including longshot.

[txmaverick]

Wow whated a loaded question........what do yall think?
This should be interesting.
I would put in my 2 cents but then I would be broke..........longshot will give you some good advice, I can say that since I know him personally and we live in the same town.

I will tell you what I tell all that ask me about starting.........take advantage of friends, not in the sense of useing them but if you have friends that have dogs and places to hunt, keep those friends close, watch and learn and watch and watch and watch then think about getting dogs. The best thing is not a good dog but experiance, the more you know the more you can do with and for a good dog.

[1hogwild]

Good luck and welcome aboard.

[JDJP]

I picked up a catahoula yesterday. I really like him. 6 months old, good personality, I gess he is blue mirl with a little rust color here and there, half tail,and hes got two glass eyes, beautiful dog.
he was a little shy at first but hes warming up. Im going to let him get settled then show him a pig and see what he thinks.
any suggestions?

[longshot]

[DWD58]

Lead the pit in to 3 or 4 next few bays and try to take him by the collar and almost place him right on the ear. Do this on the next few bays and maybe if you havent already ruined him, he will go to catching the ear or jaw permanately. The first few catches a catchdog makes, you need to make sure he always gets the ear, even if you got to lead him up to it. Most of the time, where a catchdog catches the first few times, he will catch there for the rest of its life. if it is on the ear, he will live much longer.

[longshot]

That is very sound advice that DWD just posted.

What I have done when training a catchdog when they catch other than the desired spot is QUICKLY leg the hog, break the catch dog off and place him back on the spot I prefer such as the ear. Then release the hog and let him hold it alone for another min and praise him .

Normally they will quickly learn they can control the hog by that spot and choose to go there the next time. ON the next hog if they dont catch the prefered spot repeat the process.

Good Luck
Longshot

[JDJP]

UPDATE

Got 2 new started dogs from a buddy who had to get rid of all his dogs. they are a 11 month old catahoulaXbmc "cable", and a 1.5 yr old blue pitXbule catahoula leopard "spaz". I also have the louisiana cat. i mentioned in earlier post, and the young black pup "mo" i think is catahoulaXsome kind of hound, and the atch dog "cutter".

We took mo and cutter out with a friends BMC the other day and caught one good 100lb boar before daylight in the woods. I think cutter and the bmc just ran over top of him and caught him real quick, got mo to catch a little with the other dogs. then we moved to some orange groves and walked right up on a couple groups of hogs, but the hogs ran deep and kept burning the dogs. found out that mo is open on a hot trail.

sunday night we took spaz, and cable out for the first time with some buddies and their 4 dogs. We had to walk pretty deep in this area to find some hogs. spaz and cable stayed really close untill we heard the other dogs baying up real close, they bayed for about 10 seconds and the pig was caught, when I got in therespaz was catching good on the ear, and cutter had his death grip on the sows snout. I didn't notice where cable was in the excitement, but I didn't see him for a god 15 minutes after that.

then one of the other guy's dogs got away and took off on trail again maybe after that same sow, we let her go. And we didn't see her( the dog) again untill around 4:30 am, after we took the wrong way back out and ran into some nasty palmetto sitting in 2-3 feet of water for a few hundred yards. It was a long, wet walk back. Everyone agrees the sow was no less than 200lbs, so all in all I think it was a good hunt.

Im sure most would be unhappy with the very close range of the dogs, but Im guessing they need some time to adjust, and have very high hopes the all the dogs

[JDJP]

Well I got rid of the one dog cable bmc/cat he was just too skiddish for me.

took mo and spaz over to a friends place and put them on a couple 100lb boar hogs, one at a time. pulled the first pig out of the pin and let mo go. I have to say I haven't seen to many hog dogs yet, but I am very impressed with mo. He is only around 10 months old and he'll get right in a 100lb pigs face, I mean within a foot. He has a good loud bark and as soon as he sees an opportunity he catches pretty hard.
so we went out tonight with Mo all by himself, had a shotgun too, but wanted to run moo a little. We see a good boar around 200lbs about 100yds away. Mo is close to us goofing around, so we duck down in the tall grass and try to get mo's attention on the hog. finally mo sees the pig, the boar is facing away from us now and mo bolt over to it. He gets within 10 feet and the pig sees mo and bolts. Mo never barked, he chased the boar about 30 yds into some tall grass, and must have nipped the boar, because he stopped. He backed into the grass and mo had him bayed right in his face. The boar was chompin his teeth and foaming real bad. we walked in close and tried to get mo to catch, but I GUESS HE THOUGHT BETTER OF grabbing that one. my buddy walked around back of the boar, was going to try and leg him, but the boar heard him and bolted right at mo. Mo got tossed out of the way with a yelp, but was hot on trail barking up a storm. We didn't see or hear from mo for about 45 minutes. when he finally came back it was pitch black outside, so we headed for the truck.

all in all I think it was a good hunt, mo's first solo solid bay in the woods, can't ask much fore than that from the pup.

I havn't taken the pure catahoula out in the woods yet, we showed him some pigs being caught, and plan to see what he does with a shoat soon. Hes getting huge, and his attitude it getting better every day.

jdjp

Sorry for the single paragraph, but Im tired and Im in a hurry to go to bed to go back with spaz, the pit/cat, in the morning.