Cold Trailing

[mike martell]

Here you go Jim.
I'll save you that trip to town!

Every one has duct tape around the house!

[merlo_105]

You guys are lucky I have to tape my dogs nose open just to hope they smell something. How far on average would a 12 hour cold trail be I'm sure there is some educated guessers out there.

[mark]

well mark im on my way to town to bye me a new pair of glasses so I can see the time stamp on these tracks / so I know how old they are, shoot maybe I got one of them cold trailing dogs and don't know it jim

Well take your reading glasses so you dont end up buying a pair of Tramp Stamp glasses. Lmao

[Tanner Peyton]

Hey, finally there's a topic on here that I can comment on and feel as though my wisdom is worth a little more then its weight in salt. Cold nose dogs have always confused and intrigued me, in fact the connection between nasal receptors and how the brain process this sense in any animal is baffling. For fun you guys should look up the top ten animals with a the best sense of smell and compare that to the top ten animals with the most nasal receptors. I was dumb founded by the results. Anyhow, I for one have always felt that a cold nose dog is one that can do the most with the least. No doubt there are factors that effect the amount of time that a dog has before there is to little sent left to do anything with. Temperature, pressure, topography, sub straight, and air current are the big five in my opinion. But back to my main point, what on earth allows one dog to move a sent like it was nothing while other dogs sit franticly trying to figure out what the original dog is opening on? I guess what it all boils down to is the ratio of sent verses everything else in the air on that day, the number of receptors to detect that sent and the brains to realize what that sent is and where its going.

I have had the pleasure of owning a couple dozen good bird dogs, pointing and flushing, over the years. They also tend to have a very special talent in the ol factory sense. I always though it was neat to see all the similarities a crossed the board in dogs from a good pointing dog, and treeing dog, or a flushing dog and running dog. anyhow my ramble is done

You gentlemen have a good night

[dwalton]

The problem we have with our hounds is it takes several traits to get the job done. Brains, the ability to move a track, treeing, desire,toughness, staying power, good conformation and the list goes on. I seen a dog out of some of my dogs back in the '80's that had the coldest nose that I have ever seen, a good strike dog on lion. I would get him and use him when I had a lion hunter in on bare ground. He could strike a bobcat or lion off the rig and trail it for an hour or more before my dogs would open up on the track. He very seldom made a tree. The hotter the track got the slower he got. I have seen him when the track got good and my dogs took it over from him just barking in one spot and bitting bushes or move to the next bush and do the same. He just seemed to get scent over lode, next to worthless in catching game but he sure started a lot of tracks and work them up where my dogs could handle them. Sometimes cold nose means very little. Bloodhounds are said to have the coldest nose but you don't see them used on game much any more. At one time they were crossed with a lot of running dogs.Dewey

[barksalot]

"It takes several traits to get the job done. Brains, the ability to move a track, desire, toughness, staying power, good conformation and the list goes on."

Dewey, The above says volumes in a few words. The good dogs that many of us are fortunate enough to hunt, has a good balance of several of these traits with few true weaknesses. But the very, very rare freaks have most of these desirable traits with one or more trait at a superalitive leavel. The number of desired traits, with each one being geneticly complicated, is most likely the reason that it is so difficult to reproduce those great ones. Bayne

[Dan Edwards]

Yall need to just got dogs like I like. I don't know if they ever trail. They just go to where the critters live and jump them. I don't have many like that but they always jump coyotes for me. The others...........not so much.

[barksalot]

Dan, I have seen videos of your dogs. I will say this, they are poison for coyotes if they ever get within sight of one. It is amazing how quickly they can catch one. Bayne

[rockytrails]

"It takes several traits to get the job done. Brains, the ability to move a track, desire, toughness, staying power, good conformation and the list goes on."

Dewey, The above says volumes in a few words. The good dogs that many of us are fortunate enough to hunt, has a good balance of several of these traits with few true weaknesses. But the very, very rare freaks have most of these desirable traits with one or more trait at a superalitive leavel. The number of desired traits, with each one being geneticly complicated, is most likely the reason that it is so difficult to reproduce those great ones. Bayne

Along with Tanners 5 pretty well sums it up.

[merlo_105]

So where is everyone who trails 12 hour old tracks? Where are these Cold nosed dogs coming from?

[dwalton]

I think you miss the point dogs can trail a 12 hour old track in the right conditions. Some dogs cold trail better than others and depending on how you hunt and what works for you, you can be teaching your dogs to cold trail better or not to cold trail. In my opinion you will find dogs from the Southwest that are bred to cold trail and some breeders up here breed for cold trailing and track movement. Spent some time leaving your dogs at home and hunt with some of the strait bobcat dogs that hunt in the day time in the Northwest you will see a lot of different ability of hunters and dogs. You will see a lot of different opinions as to what works and they are all right for that person. Good luck Dewey

[merlo_105]

I got the point but I'm talking about the people who claim trailing 12 hour old tracks on the Norm. I understand scent conditions can make a track last longer, and i know I have trailed some in the snow that were reaching the 12 hour mark and got them caught. But like when Mark started this post he was talking about the people and dogs that do it on a normal day. I have seen my share of real deal Cat dogs.

[cfanno01]

I don't know anything about trailing bobcats in the nw or much about trailing them in dirt conditions but i see snow hunters where i'm from regularly trail 12+ hour old tracks. Sometimes you don't have a choice around here. If I know the track is from the night before its a good track to try in my opinion.

[david]

I don't know anything about trailing bobcats in the nw or much about trailing them in dirt conditions but i see snow hunters where i'm from regularly trail 12+ hour old tracks. Sometimes you don't have a choice around here. If I know the track is from the night before its a good track to try in my opinion.

These were my thoughts also, having hunted the Great Lakes.

Actually, I know of dogs from this region who routinely take 18 hour old tracks. And again, when you have snow, there are things that sometimes happen which allow you to age a track, and we learn to pay attention to those things.

But just from sundown to sun up can be about 15 hours or more. This is not all dogs, but I have known a couple dogs from this region, where if the track was not there the morning before, they were going to take it and almost always get it jumped. I say almost, but in my own private thoughts it was (always)...barring some extreme weather event. But I caught myself from saying "always", well, mostly to protect myself from Al, but also because it probably wasn't always.

I called them 18 hour dogs.

If I went back to that region I would work hard to find a dog like that. Because, as cfanno01 said, many days we only found one track, and felt blessed to find that one. (These are not "freak of nature" once in a lifetime dogs, they can be found any year you set out to find one)

They make exceptional snow lion dogs, and Knowing what you all have taught me, I would probably start my search for My 18 hour pup among the southwest lion hunters, if I could find a pup with a heavy coat. [I see some advertised right now by pegleg and it is killing me. It would feel so good to get one. But, after all, I am in North Dakota for the reasons of torture and not pleasure.]

I never had an 18 hour dog that could routinely catch its own bobcat on the ground, although I have heard of them that could. Neither could I catch most cats without them because "there is no chance of getting a cat caught unless you can get him jumped".

Maybe the reason we could count on taking tracks this age was because where I hunted, the temperature almost never got above freezing during cat season (even in the sun); and that might fit Deweys comment about stable weather.

[kordog]

i have only followed bobcat tracks in the snow here in maine .it is really neat to see what a bobcat does by following them in the snow. it also really opened my eyes to what it takes for a dog to cold trail here .especially them working an older track up just to the jump let alone the catch .good cold trailing hounds are amazing really with the bobcat circleing on its own track over and over in the(ultra thick jack firs) rabbit beats while hunting.then having all the other critters mixed in and the cat walking foot for foot in other animal tracks like deer or coyote etc.. to save energy walking in the snow.then you add all the other land ,and water(ice) obstacles that make for hard trailing ,and the distance a cat travels on an old track.then of course the cats sometimes end up in a hole which is a game ender.every cathunter should try snow hunting once in their life.