It was a hot and humid day for mid September in Minnesota. Along about dark the fog started filling in the low ground and the temp dropped into the low 70’s, normally the high for this time of year, when I started collaring up dogs and loading them in the box. I kept passing up old Traveler, 9 years old now, as I was getting those young dogs that are at the top of their game and loading them up. I couldn’t take it any more, I turned the old dog loose and he ran to the truck and jumped up and down, waiting for me to help him up. Of course, old Rose, 10 years old, goes everywhere I do so I couldn’t leave her behind.
I know I don’t have any business running those old dogs with the fast pack, but they lasted this long in my kennel because they had something special and I don’t have the heart to leave them behind.
Rabbits are scarce this year in my running grounds, it’s been damn tough to get one up and going lately and they better not loose it. Just the way I like it. I pulled up to the fire pit, emptied the dog box and sat on the tailgate to wait. Think I had 7 dogs in all, but only 3 that I would call jump dogs. Dusty and Faith are young and fast and they get out and go hunting for a hare when you cut them loose, but old Traveler has jumped more hare than the rest combined.
15 minutes of quiet broken only by that dang pup jackin’ around, she’s really trying my patients, when old Traveler throws out his rough old bawl mouth down towards the Leaf river. There’s one there but he’s not sure just yet where it went. Pretty quick Dusty gets in there and his big bawl mouth echoes down the river with Traveler’s, still picking and sorting tracks. Then Dusty lines it out going north and the race is on.
Now it gets interesting. The rest of the pack falls in, and I mean they were screaming. The kind of race that stands your hair on end if you have any hunting blood in your veins at all. North, up along the road, then back along the river and around them pines, then back up through the thick stuff by that old dead jack pine. Hope was always near the front with that high chop, barking every breath. Faith was right with her. She don’t have much voice anymore since she ran that stick through her throat but she was giving it everything she had. The rest were all mixed in with everything from low to high, bawl and chop, all trying to make more music than the rest. This is what gets me by during the week, when I have to go do what I do to keep the bill collectors happy.
They crossed the road way north, better than a quarter mile from were they started, and then headed south, down along the ridge on the east side of the road. Traveler came by way behind. He was out of it already but he wasn’t giving up. Rose was still up with the front runners, but not for much longer. The hare took them south and then back west, all the way to those blow downs back in where the Leaf meets the Crow Wing river, close to a half mile from where they crossed on the north end. Those blow downs always slow the dogs down and this time was no exception. Still, they worked through the tough stuff without a check that lasted more than a few seconds.
It got tougher when the hare made several loops, back and forth and around the same area until it was good and tracked up. Dusty worked his way through all this like he knew just what to do. I heard him coming hard up the back side of that little rise and I got down there just in time to hear him come screaming down off that hill and across the road going east. Hope and Faith flew past right behind him. The rest of the dogs were way behind with no chance of catching up at this point.
The hare made a big circle on the east side of the road and came right back to the same spot he crossed earlier, passing up the slower dogs on the way. Dusty, Hope and Faith hit the road, but this time they turned north up the road. This is a favorite trick of a well educated hare and it works more often than not. The hounds picked their way up the road, but they never did find where the hare left it. Far as I know, it kept going north right up to Canada!
This is Billiam, he's gotta be over 17 inches at the shoulder, maybe 18? He's real young but tries hard. Hasn't shown the kind of nose power I wanna see but he sure is nice to look at 
