How to tell how old a track is

[david]

[twist]

For the most part its all just a guess. Either the dogs will run it or they won't! An hour old track in this area right now would be considered a blistering cold track. So conditions play a major factor. Andy

[david]

[al baldwin]

I/ve been kidding, have the coldest nose dogs in the world. Pull the dogs off bobcat often, mark the exact spot. Have come back two weeks later, put the hounds on that old scent at the exact spot. Trailed jumped & treed that cat in less than 15 minutes. These dogs are pretty hot nosed. :

[mondomuttruner]

lol, well said Al.
Most every track gets the dogs put down on it. I give the track a second look after I know how the dogs are working it and use that info for future use. Unless it snowed in the last 12 hours, then I don't give them a second look.

[fallriverwalker1]

AL im still looking for those fancy glasses that can see the time stamped on those tracks / telling when there made, I might have some of those cold nosed dogs , and just don't know it

[mark]

Well, at least now we know which glasses you ended up with yesterday.

[fallriverwalker1]

MARK a tramp stamp is what I call tatoes on a girl // not a time code in a game track// but this is cali not Oregon you guys might see things difrent in all that rain

[mark]

Well the rain is defiantly putting a damper on the Snowshoe hunting up here. Its easy to age their tracks though, i just turn loose when i see em lol

[cfanno01]

This is an interesting topic and a very good read. this type of thing gets me thinking bout my own dogs and experiences/experiments. once i consistently starting jumping cats on a regular basis i stared experimenting in an effort to try to learn more about the dogs behavior and limits as cold trailers. reading about Deweys trailing a week old track and dog lake blues bringing up that they could be sight trailing is interesting....I personally believe that dogs learn to sight track as i have seen it in my own dogs but I also believe that they will not advance a track simply on sight (at least mine wont). I've done some experimenting with old tracks I know i wont jump just to learn about the dogs and improve their "cold trailing". I've done this several times with the same basic results and here's why I believe even in that week old track they are smelling the game to some degree....I drop dogs on a cat track I've seen for the past 3 days in melting snow conditions. it can still be seen but i cant tell what it is anymore its so melted. the dogs see the tracks in the snow and begin to sniff and after 15 or 20 feet begin to open and continue to slowly advance the track for a half mile until i pick them up at the next rd...still on the same cat track. I've replay the same scenario with deer tracks 3 days old. the dogs follow them for 15 or 20 feet sniffing but do not open and come right back to the truck. I'm not saying they follow every week old cat track but they do follow some and its not by sight alone because they have never moved a deer track in this fashion much more than 30 feet. Enough of my rambling... I just thought I would share this experiment of mine.

[barksalot]

cfanno01; That is good rational work. Moving from the unknown to a point of reasonable knowledge. Thank you.
Bayne

[dwalton]

cfanno01 that is a great example of learning whats going on out there. Look at what they have done with drug dogs finding drugs in vacuum sealed bags in gas tanks. In my opinion dogs can smell a lot more or better then we give them credit to be able to. That is where all the other traits come in, they have to want to cold trail and get confidence in themselves that they can move that track far enough to get the reward. Dewey

[U.R.E.]

Try this little experiment. Take a couple pounds of raw meat and leave it out to taint. Once it gets to smelling ripe put it in the freezer. Once it is frozen smell it. It will not permeate the air as much but you will darn sure be able to put your nose to it and smell it. Leave it in the freezer and check it over the next year or two if you like. It will remain about the same as far as smell goes. Now take it out and toss it on the ground about 10-20 feet from another piece of meat simulator is size that you didn't freeze. Check them daily by simply walking by them. The fresh unfrozen meat will stink to high heaven before the frozen piece will. What I have observed is that the fresh piece will stink more for a shorter period of time but the frozen piece will hang around longer. As Dewey said the conditions will soon eliminate all traces of scent. Before to long you won't even know there is tainted meat around. Had you left the meat in the freezer you could have returned over several years and enjoyed the wonderful smell.
I know this because I use to make trapping bait.
How does this translate into trailing and/or aging a track? Well I'm not sure. Maybe it just supports the idea that just because a dog can detect cat scent it doesn't mean much unless the cat is caught. Or maybe just because the dog detects week old frozen in cat scent it doesn't necessarily mean it is cold nosed. Who knows.....once a dog, a cat and all the other variables come into play it becomes as David said, "a mystery".
That brings me back to my "point of view". Who cares when the track was made? They will catch it if they can.

[david]

[david]