Trailing Determination

[pegleg]

There's been a few good discussions on here lately.
I know with technology and different areas and styles of hunting many may not have a lot of experience with this. Plus some game it just isn't realistic.
But what's the most persistent trailing you've seen? Not really asking about dogs trailing in and getting treed. But dogs trailing and trailing? Not that it should be said but actually trailing and not stuck in a area either. I'm guessing this will ally mostly to big country bear hunters some and more to bare ground lion hunters but I'd appreciate anyone's input.

[Mike Leonard]

Persistant trailing is a trait that is most needed especially in bare ground lion hunting. I am sure all of us who hunt that way have seen those older dogs that would pound away at a track all day moving it as possible and still have to be dragged off the track at dark, and the same dog would pick it up next morning and go at it again for hours. I have had some dogs that you would think it was futile to continue but you just put up with it because they seemed to be so into what they are doing, and occasionaly they move it to the point they jump the lion and catch it. Now that is true hound perisitance.

But to me what I really want to see is puppies doing this at a young age before they have all that experience racked up. I was talking to a friend the other day on the phone and he was watching a pup that just turned 5 monthes trailing, opening and moving on tracks that were made the evening before. This pup had been at it solid for 5 hours when he called me and I am not sure how long he kept it up, but I know the type dogs this guy raises and I am sure he just wouldn't quit. This is a natural trail hound who most likley will develop early into a cold strike and trail hound, and without such a dog a bare ground lion hunter is hit an miss at best.

I have seen baby puppies out of this line trail all morning on mice tracks left in barn and buildings just to be on a trail. It was an easy thing to switch them over to larger game such as rabbits or even feral cats, and later on to wild game.

Some people shake their heads when I say I let them trail jack rabbits and such at a young age, but some of the best trail hounds I ever saw trained themselves pretty much on jack rabbits, and if they can trail them well they usually have a pretty good nose. Most of these are easy to bump off rabbits later when they get interested in things with sharp teeth and claws.

[Chris Todd]

Good topic Nathan. I think what alot of people can't comprehend is the value to a dry ground lion hunter the pounding grinding never say die hound can be to a hunter. I started a Tom one morning. I had a group of good lion hounds with me. One of them was Josie she was just 3 at the time. We trailed this Tom all day strait away from camp. Never moving fast but not ever making bad loses. Well right before dark I decided to give up and head for camp. I thought I had all the hounds with me. So I headed for camp. After riding a ways I heard a dog bark. It was Josie and she was still working the track. Well it was pitch black. So I left her figuring I would pick her up the next morning.
. Next morning early I got to where I had heard her last. Got out the old Johnson beeper. And I could just barely get a signal out of her collar. She had crossed the biggest roughest canyon in the country. So I urged my horse off the rim I was on and up the other side. When I hit the rim on the other side the hounds with me opened and and headed down the rim. I got out the beeper no signal. So I headed on toward my other hounds figuring she must have went on that way trailing this tom. I had gone a good 3-miles got up on a high point and could just barely get a signal out of her collar. This went on all morning and. Into the afternoon. The other hounds I had with me continued to trail but were always within hearing. I was to the point of giving up when I started to gain on her. I caught up to her in some bluffs where she was having some trouble right before dark. She had trailed for two days straight. The last 24-hours alone.
. As far as fast starting cold trailers. I have had the ones that were good trailers at 6-months and the ones who didn't really start cold trailing till they were 18-months. And overall as 2-year olds there was little to no difference. For me personally I don't like working pups to hard till they are around 1-year of age. I have seen in several dogs owned by myself and others burn out. And what I mean by that is they just get tired. When you are riding 20-25 miles a day in rough country with pups that are not mature it wears them out and you end up with a young hound that won't leave your side.

[pegleg]

Well track persistence sure pays off sometimes. But I'm sure its more a biggame or bare ground advantage where you have limited game or are after a specific animal.

[dwalton]

One of the best trail jobs I have ever seen on bobcat happened in the mid '80's. The last day of our bobcat season I struck a bobcat off the rig first thing in the morning[7:00 AM]. On the Umpqua and Smith River divide. About noon I caught up to them on the main Smith River road listening to them trail down the from the ridge and swim the Smith River across the black top and up over the ridge into Marsh creek drainage. Down the full length across the creek and back up the ridge toward where they came from. I headed back over the top of the ridge in time to hear the jump and tree. Looking at my watch it was 10:00 PM. They had been on that cat for 15 hours mostly trailing until the jump and short race. They covered 71/2 map miles in some of the roughest coast range that we have. A lot of the bobcat dogs in southwestern Oregon go back to one of those dogs and is still being bred today. For me bobcat hunting is cold trailing, getting on a cold track and moving it. I would rather listen to a pack of dogs moving a cold track any day then to a jump race. When a pack can move a cold trail, the jump does last to long on a bobcat. Just my opinion. Good hunting Dewey