how do you hunt your dogs ?

[mike martell]

this is for all you horse and mule hunters out there. do you free cast all of your dogs while lion hunting? the reason being i ask is when i talked to george pavey in idaho, he stated the lee bros. cast one start dog ahead of the horse or mule while the rest of the pack stayed behind the stock until a track was struck. then on command the rest were allowed to join in. i found this fascinating to me the control a person would have to display would be enormous.i never hunted this style ever.but never the less always interested in knowledge. i thought this would be impossible to perfect. when my dog strikes the flood gates open and dogs swarm the track. if i don't want to over load it, i better have mine on a lead. on my end it is not a problem because i have a dog box within a vehicle. currosity has got the best of me here, i'm not doubting it.i know those guys were dog handlers that hunted every day. thanks for weighing in on the subject! mike

[horshur]

[Machias]

[mike martell]

thanks guys, sounds like a good read. any takers on how you hunt your dogs from a horse or mule? like to see how guys of today freecast a hound. on my end it would be with broke dogs. the one that gets the first strike is who gets the credit. then all would fall in. to me this is how i would hunt, just like roading dogs in front of a pickup only slower.unless i trained a dog otherwise. not sure of my ability to have a hound stay behind the stock than fall in? thanks

[Tom White]

Wheather walking or riding I always let up to 8 dogs hunt at will. They stay close, within 50 yards usually.I keep a close eye on them and can tell if one gets a scent and gets interested enough to start that tail whipping. The other dogs often will see the actions of a dog that has found a scent and will get over there and check it out even before a dog opens. I believe that the more dogs hunting for a lion track , the better the chance of finding it. I suspect if my dogs were broke it would even work better

[sonofabeach]

When i hunt off my horse i just let them hunt and cricle around me.If one finds something that is hot all dogs will go to it. if the old blue dog takes it the race is on.
(this is on dry ground) but like tom says let them hunt the more noses on the ground the better.

[Big Mike]

All my dogs are free casted. I hunt with 6-8 dogs at a time, when i hunt with friends we will have as many as 15 dogs at times. First thing my dogs learn is to follow and stay semi close to my mules. I let the dogs I trust have a lot of range and try to keep the dogs I dont with in 50-100 yards so I can check them. With todays shocking collars not that hard to keep them straight but I do have a few trash chases from time to time. I know a couple of lion hunters here in NM that regularly hunt with 10-20 dogs free casted at a time. Better yet they dont use shocking collars and they are both about as good of dry ground lion hunters out there(way better than me). Key to this is they will have 8-10 of those dogs will be solid trust worthy dogs. When they young dogs trash they just ride off and leave them, after a while the young dogs will quit a trail up there horse. Eventually these dogs trash break themselves and the ones that don't well you know! The biggest key to this is out of a 180 day lion season these guys will be in saddle hunting 160-170 of them. Its amazing what a hound learns when worked with enough, thats how the Lee brother would have so much handle on there dogs all Dale did was hunt.

[Mike Leonard]

The Lees only hunted that way at certain times. They handled and trained so many (I mean hundreds) of young dogs they had to use a system.Some don't know it but the Lees never ranched until later in life when Clell and Margaret set up a place on the Blue. So how did they make a living. From the eldest Ernest to the youngest living Dale they hunted for bounty, they outfitted, they work for US Biological Survey later US Dept. of Interior and they SOLD TONS OF DOGS. So they multi tasked as we would call it today.
Scenario:
Lions been killing calves on Willow Creek. Ok Dale says I will take Scout, Rat and Screamer all broke dogs and about a dozen pups up there and see what's going on and get in some hound training. Soon as I find a big tom I will call Ernest and he will get word to Clell and he will grab that dentist from Silver City who wants alion trophy and we will fill him out. So Dale takes one maybe two broke dogs a day and then necks the bronc pups up. ( Necking dogs is using a double coupler to attach the collars of two together.) This was a common practice befor eshock collars but many dogs have been drug to death chocked down or strangled with the method, and I do not recommend novices trying this. Remember this is before Dale and Ben Green (not Bill) invented the shock collar, which later became Tri-Tronics of Tuscon. Dale contended you can't have them pups running off after everything before I get lions on their mind.So he starts riding circles maybe catches a lion or two and saves them for bounty with the State, Fed. or Cattleman's Assn:who ever was paying. Ok cuts a big tom track get to a place where there is a phone or has somebody call home and tell them to bring the client. Well then when he got there they got serious about it and they had another batch of fresh broke dogs they leave thye pups or maybe go get them after they tree, and they go catch that lion. So they got bounty, client fees, and hounds trained up to sell. Multi-tasking.

Once you get the fresh off hound by hunting them regular they will take up their position in the pack. Some are natural strike dogs and these are the ones we all want to own. They are constantly casting back and forth checking out those spots that a lion travels. They soon recognize you as the pack leader so they keep in contact and don't range too far for you may wish to change directions.Other dogs hang closer to the horse or mule and usually wait till a strike is made and then they go to work. I know some guys say they want all their dogs to be strike dogs but I don't. I need to focus my attention on the ground and then check the strikers as I go. Remember when you hunt bare ground you are constantly watching the ground for tracks. Many times you may spot a track that the dogs went over for reason and you see it may be on really bad ground but you check it out and bring the strike dogs back to it and work with them and many times you may get it going. So you see you are a strike dog too.I like having a few dogs that stay close and stay fresh. When you ride your horse 10 miles you have to know the strike dogs going back and forth and up and down are making 30 miles, so they get a little worn. When the track is found and the gang joins in it is good to have a couple that have gone 10 miles or maybe a little more to put in to help those that have gone the 30 miles already.

I usually hunt 5-9 dogs at a time and usually two or three are out in strike postion. These dogs have to be very athletic and have a lot of bottom because you just don't ride up a canyon and find a lion as a rule those dogs have to get up out and around to pick up that track where the lion travels.

I know a lot of folks have laughed at my methods because I go back to my bird dogs roots but I use whistles. I keep 2 Roy Gonia whistles on a lanyard around my neck. One with a pea in it and the other a straight blast whistle. I can stop my dogs with a blast on the straight whistle bring them in with the trilling whistle, and this is a lot better than all that dang yelling I hear some guys do. My older strike dogs learn to take hand signals so if they are across a canyon and say I want them tyo go up higher and check or drop off into the cut I stop them on a whistle and then give them a hand signal with my hat. It takes time but they pick up on it and lots of yard work reinforces this.

It is really amazing to watch once you get a pack of free cast dogs working with you and you can really cover some country that way.


To me it is about as much fun as a guy can have with his clothes on. LOL!

[Eric Muff]

In this country guys are very reluctant to hunt with horses or mules for a couple of reasons.
First of all we are only permitted to hunt lions with dogs in Alberta Dec 1st to Feb 28th so it's usually cold and miserable conditions.The best places to hunt with horses are in the foothills of Western Alberta where there is alot of road access to boot so it likely makes better sense to truck hunt so as to avoid the frustration of being passed along the roadside by a pickup while you are enjoying the day with your mob.
In areas where there is limited road access horse hunting is possible and a pleasure although very few guys try it.I have talked with fellas about it and they are concerned about there ability to control a pack of hounds from the back of a horse and have even talked about resorting to the use of panniers as a safe way of transporting dogs into these areas!
Yeah I chuckled on the inside too and just saddled up!As long as these guys are stuck in that frame of mind there is NO competition and lots of room for me and my hounds.
I cast em just like you fellas do and then let the world slip away.It is important to stay in touch with what is happening around you and keeping your eye on the ground but for the most part we hunt in the snow so unless things are melted out the dogs don't often miss an opportunity.I'm not real big on killing cats and would be happiest just snapping the odd photo or two so I don't get too wound about what cats I run,basically I run the first one we strike and thats good enough for me.
Early Dec is usually best time period as this country gets it's fair share of snow and although it melts out often on the south slopes the wind blown drifts are soon deep and treacherous and can even be undetectable traps for horses in areas where narrow creeks get filled with drifted snow.North facing hillsides get hard to navigate as well and all that melting and freezing makes for icey areas that are nasty under a dusting of snow and are again often hard to detect until it's too late.
Not much you can do to make doggin much more fun or relaxing that add a good mountain horse to the mix!

[mike martell]

thanks guys. this is all good stuff. when a guy hunts from a vehicle it is totally different. you have the safety net of leaving that young dog contained. it is an easy habbit to get into. big mike i like the idea of just riding off and leaving a young dog on trash. i could never get a dog to clean itself up for nothing.i see your point of a dog not wanting to be left out of the action, over time i see were this could work. it all comes down to exposure. mike leonard.i recalled two of my trashy hounds back in the 70's. i tried the necking method. my theory was that in the thick western oregon brush the dogs would hang up, thus making it easier to stop them and thrash them on deer. i necked them at 18 inches apart. boy could they single file and fly attached together. with no trackers in those days i would find them on the road a day later ten miles from were i cut them loose. hanging out side by side. lol...i like the bird dog system as well. i guess when you hunt every day you need many hounds. i like about three to four total. this however limits you to the number of days you can hunt. but i like it simply because you have better control over fewer dogs.also i comment on not appreciating a lion dog very well. as any dog can tree a lion. this is true to a point. a true lion dog is as special as a gifted bobcat hound. it really gets hard for me to think along the same lines of a coon dog..... but you have all seen the type that is a class act and deserves the credit. in keeping fewer hounds i like to have more versatility. mike l. george did also speak of dale and ben and the invention of the shock collar. this is true. these guys invented the shock collar. george said he was vague on details. he seemed to think there was an engineer from some major company involved in this process, george told me the original transmitter was in a box, and was about 18 inches square to accomidate the internal components. the guy involved somehow was or ended up being connected with tri-tronics. who later brought it to what it is today. george said dale and ben got little or nothing for this invention.no patent. no royalties. by todays standards they would be wealthy men. i'm sure neither cared about nothing other than having this device to elevate them to the next level. and hunting. you are also right about "tons of dogs". thanks to all for the great input. this is how we preserve as much of our dying heritage as possible. mike

[mike martell]

eric, sorry i passed you up i was writing the previous post. you have some great areas around crowsnest pass country.i come through there a few years ago from hunting eastern montana. i headed up into lethbridge alberta than west to b.c. it was early summer. when i got half way over crowsnest pass a sow and cub jumped the road. i all but run the cub over as the little bugger was 10 feet behind ma.on the same trip i seen a young grizzly bear out of castlegar b.c. i see what you mean about your area. as well as your hunting technique. you probably have a wolf problem as well to deal with. anyhow good luck to all of you lion hunters whatever your methods. mike