minnesota cat hunters question!

[archermn]

this will be my first year trying to run bobcat on my own. i have a solid 4yr old walker female coon dog. i am going to try and get her to run cats this winter. my question is are wolfs really a issue? i know there is always a chance but do you guys honestly worry about it every time you go out? being my first year and not knowing really any of the forests roads, i know there is a real good chance i will not be able to get to the dogs as fast as the guy thats been hunting the area for years. i am planning on starting around the mille lacs area and going north from there. any and all help would be appreciated. i do know a couple guys that would take me along but i would rather do it myself with my hound doing the work and not just tagging along. plus i want to kinda find my own spot instead of piggy backing of of them.

[david]

You show a lot of wisdom. It is so much harder to do it alone, but you pointed out some important advantages. It is not that hard to stay with your dog in MN. You will get good a t crawling through some brush, but most of the time it is not too bad. The only bad part is that if you have no one with you, you will have to walk all the way to your rig at the end of the day. I always did my best to stay with the dogs, often had wolves around me, and they never once touched one of my dogs. Other hunters in MN were not so fortunate. But I have never heard of a loss when the hunter was near his dogs.

There are many more wolves than bobcats in MN. I don't see any point in feeling worried about them all day. I dont give them much thought. It is a calculated risk. I am much more worried about roads and traffic. If you are the type to worry a lot about potential danger, I would suggest another hobby. Maybe watching football on TV. I think worrying about wolves whenever you see signs of there presence would sure take the fun out of bobcat hunting in MN.
I know there are states and areas where it would be impossible to stay near the dogs. But Minnesota is not one of them.

Have your boots laced and your survival pack on your back before you turn her loose, then get with it. Don't wait to see if she is going to stay by the road.

I sure like having a bell on my dog. I don't know if it is a wolf deterent, and I doubt it. But it sure keeps you moving toward your dog when she is not opening. If you are constantly stopping to figure out which way to go, it will be hard to keep up.

If you find wolf poop with dog bells in it, you might want to think about finding a different area.

[Twopipe]

What David wrote would be exactly the same advice I'd give ya.

[archermn]

Thanks for the replyes. With this early snow and long cold snap I'm not sure when,if or for how long the coon will be moving. So looks to me like the perfect year to put some time into cats and see if my female has the desire to run um. I feel like she has it in her. If I can find an area that I can get into and cover enough ground and get her on a track I'm confident we can see a cat or two this season. As far as the wolves go, I'm just going to hunt. Don't get me wronge the last thing I want to do is loose a dog but what good is a new f150 pick up if you are scared to drive it and get in a accident.

[david]

This weather is perfect. You need the hard water on the swamps to make it safe for you and for your dog. As long as it stays cold the snow will not crust. I think you have a few inches of soft snow. It is perfect right now. I hope it holds out for you till whenever your cat hunting starts. Conditions will dictate yor chances for success.

I will give you a heads up on coon. Your coon dog will be led by the cat right to the brush piles and dry beaver houses where the coon are denned up. She is a coon dog, and she will do her job by calling you to a coon or two or eight. They are nice coon so might as well keep your skinning knife sharp and collect those huge northern hides. You got your own personal guide (Mr. Bobcat) to all the winter coon hangouts. You are harvesting beautiful prime coon when other coon hunters and trappers have given up on coon for the year. It is a good way to look at it so you don't feel too frustrated all cat season when she switches back to her life long mission: coon.

[chiller]

david hit the nail on the head for this topic. me and twopipes fumber around in the woods a little bit during cat season and have a great time doing it. the only thing i could say different is going with a buddy with a dog that has been on some cats may help yours along BUT if you want to go bout it by yourself the reward will be alot greater when you see a big ol bob in a tree. like david said if you have a sure nough coon dog you will probably find some coon which is not a bad thing in the december months! i have tried to stay away from wolves the best i could over the last few years and the truth is they will always be around and all you can do is try to stay with the dogs the best you can. which ever way you go either by yourself or with a buddy, when you find a good track drop the box and see what happens. keep us posted on how ya fair this winter and good luck!

[archermn]

took the day and went and scouted around a bit. ended up stumbling on a pretty good area, good road system and found one old cat track. now all i need is a little snow. feeling better now that i found a area to hunt.

[chiller]

keep us posted and good luck

[archermn]

well I'm calling day one a success! went out early to where i seen that track the other day and sure enough it had crossed agin. drove the truck down the road about 50yrds and waited for daylight ( not sure if i have to in mn or not but i did). walked her down on the lead and cut in on the track. i put her nose in the track and pet her up good and walked on about 50 to 100 yards and she started to realize that i wanted her to run it. kept her on the lead tell she started to pull and want to go on her own, about 600 yards. unsnapped her and she took it about 100 yards on her own tell she made a loss. i walked in on her, made some circles and got her going agin. this time she took it real good and drove the track about 700 yards before she made another big loss. about the time i got to her she got it going agin for about 300 or so then stood on her head and ran the track back to me. i know she was working the track because i made a point to cross her track when i had a opportunity. the last snow was about 10 hrs so im thinking the track was a lot colder then i originally thought. i am vary happy with my dog, she has me feeling like a kid at xmas and i can't wait for morning to come. weather says two dustings of snow real early morning so we should get on a better track. I'm just pumped that i could get her to take the track and to see her work was awesome. now if i can just get her on a good track! we cut about 6 tracks later in the day but she would only take them about 50 to 100 yards then come back, witch i like if they were legitamently old tracks. I'm going to go at it a little different tomorrow. my plan is to only walk her in 50to 100 yards and if she don't take it move on. i think i wasted a lot of time today on a old track. does any one know if you can cut dogs loose before shooting in mn?

[1bigbear]

A track 10 hours after a snow isn't an old track. At the very most he's 10 hrs ahead of you. Might be only 2 though. Keep on it you might have jumped it in the next 10 min. Good luck.

[david]

Archer you said you think you wasted a lot of time. The time was not wasted if you value dog training. You gave a great description. You have a decision to make about the style hunting you want to do. If you only want to hunt hot tracks you are doing the right thing. But it is not too easy to always find hot tracks in MN.

Here is my advice as to what I would do in your situation: put on your survival pack and your running boots, be prepared to sweat a lot, and get with that dog. Stay on the bobcat track and not on the dog track. When she makes that lose, and she will, you already have the track. Leash her back up and walk her through the loss track for track. Keep putting her back on that track as long as she can smell it until you can't walk another step.

Like Big bear said, another hundred yards and you might have jumped that cat. And every next hundred yards could be the one where you jump him...all day long. Don't teach your dog to give up. Teach it to pound out that track as long as she can smell it. It might take a few days of walking with her, and running when you have a clearing, be there for her those few days and she will be there for you the rest of her life.

Teach her not to give up because that is not what Minnesota cat hunters or Minnesota cat dogs do. You and her are experienced coon hunters. She will have to learn this is a whole new ball game. She can't understand why she would Need to work so hard. You both are moving from a desk job at the base to Navy Seals on special op. You both will have to adopt a whole new attitude. Give it your all. It is good practice for the day when that is what it will take to stay alive.

Find that track she can work and just pretend that cat is the last morsel of meat on earth and if you don't catch it, you die. It is not her responsibility, it is yours. You don't have a cat dog to teach her what it takes. You are that cat dog. She will do it if she knows that is what you want. And she won't even care that you want it once her persistence rewards her with a hot jumped bobcat track. She won't forget how she produced that, and next time she will push harder. And you will come to trust each other like never before.

[archermn]

day 2! went with some guys today that had cat dogs. found a track early but tried to find a better one, with no luck we went back and cut two dogs. they cold tracked for awhile and we were able to drive around and cut my dog and one other. this was the second time i have tried to cut my dog in on a race. the first time dint go to well so i was a little hesitant trying to cut her in with the other dogs being out about 500 yards. i pulled her out of the box and made sure she could hear the other dogs and cut her and walked her about 20 yards and she got in and made the race for about idk maybe a 40 min. the dogs ended up coming out to a road and lost the track. we dint see the cat cross so we were unsure what happened. boxed the dogs and drove the road. ended up the cat came out but dint cross right away it walked the ditch then crossed. found the track and cut two good dogs to see if we could get it going agin. i was unable to cut her in on the race this time but the dogs did move it tell dark.got the dogs and headed home. there were multiple cats in the first area we cut in and I'm guessing with all the circling and what not it was tuff on the dogs. when they got across the road they moved it good it just dint want to go up. it was another successful day for my dog getting her to cut in and get in on the race and to stick with the other dogs. it was nice for the guys to let us cut our dogs in and get some experience. next snow I'm going out to try to run her and my hunting partners dog and see if we can get one moving ourselves. hopefully picture to fallow soon lol.

i am going to be more persistent on pushing her when she makes a loss. to be honest with never seeing a cat run i had no idea how they ran or for how long. i have a lot to learn and i know it just takes time and a lot of losses. will get her figured!

[archermn]

thanks for all the info guys vary appreciated. my first day out i probably would have kept going but we were already pretty far from the truck and going in a direction that lead to a vary big country. i just had to many unknowns to push on. just need more time, like i said will get her figured out lol

[archermn]

day 3 had fresh snow, got out early hoping to find a track and a back up before light but had no luck cutting a track all day.woods was dead 1 coyote and 1 fox all day. day 4, started early once agin. woods was more alive but still no cat tracks all day. couldn't play hookie any longer had to come home. still had a good time. wish i would have had another guy with to take some pictures of me and the hounds out there today, found some beutiful spots with snow covered over hanging trees.

[merlo_105]

archermn, Keep posting hope you and your dog the best I'll be looking forward to seeing some pics from you soon keep at it.