geography or breeding?

[cfanno01]

I will be looking for a pup in about a year as my dogs will all be around 5 to 6 yrs old at that time. these are my first hounds and have truly been a pleasure, however, I will be a lot more picky with the new pup as i've learned a few things since i started hunting them. I personally hunt both bobcat and coyote, and enjoy both, but am far more addicted to cats...coyote keep me and the dogs hunting when cat season is closed. My dogs are much better at coyote than cats at this point. Long story short, most guys near me hunt cats with bear or coyote dogs as the kill season is only a month long. Would I be better off finding a true cat bred pup from another area of the country, or getting ahold of a pup close to home with parents that run cats, but are more or less bred for other game? Thanks

[Twopipe]

The best advice I'd give is find out what the most successful cat hunters are using in your area. Fast bear dogs would be a good place to start looking.

[walkerblacktan]

If it was me id look for a pup local first. No point in paying all the $$ for a pup from across the country if you could find one somewhat close to home that will work great for you. Oh and also how do you keep your dogs from running yotes while your chasing cats and vise versa? Sounds like an interesting combo to run if you can make it work.

[cfanno01]

thanks for replying. the dogs I have now usually will run the track I initially drop them on (hunting mostly snow). Ocassionally they leave a cold cat track for a fresh yote unfortunately...but its still fun either way and it doesn't happen that often. the cats usually stay in the swamps whereas the yotes don't. Im going to run both with the pup also, im just hoping to get something that might favor cats more than the dogs i have now.

[southern fox]

u could possibly have a good strain of cat dogs and don't know it , I hunt cat and grey fox with mine , and have for many years , i use running hounds only no tree dog in mine , i have been breeding these hounds for a long time and most come deer proof, if u run more of one than the other they will naturally be better on the one u give the most time on , mine run cat better than fox, for us here not having many fox , 10 cat for every one fox , if u want cat hounds use them on cat , they will show u if u keep feeding them cat

[dwalton]

Geography and breeding are things to consider in choosing a pup but I feel something that is over look a lot of the times is your expectation as to what you want in a dog. Do you want it to cold trail, do you want a hard core tree dog, how do you want it to handle a track, a fast or slow trailer,do you care if it barks in the kennel, are you heavy on your correction, ect. Think about and you may have already these things. If you don't like the dog your pup turns out to be it will never meet your expectations. Good luck Dewey