BigGameHoundsmen.com

Our Foxhound Roots


I don’t pretend to know the exact history of the animal we call man’s best friend. But I do know there are some wild canines that can cross breed with the domestic dog. So let’s say that man took wild canines and began to selectively breed them to make them more useful and better companions. It is known that if the most docile and friendly foxes at a fox farm are selected from litters and bred to each other, it is only a couple generations before their ears start to droop. So it is not a hard job for the imagination to do the same with the wolf or other wild canine.

Consider the Wolf in the far North. They follow herds. They stay on the fringes and watch for stragglers. They stalk and hold their head and tail low. They sprint with great speed. They will split up and work strategies together at times. They will work to get in front of their game because that is less work and more effective than chasing them at times. They work silently for the most part. They use eyes, ears and nose in finding and controlling their game. They are known to be extremely intelligent.

Now, consider the Border collie. They follow herds. They stay on the fringes and watch for stragglers. They stalk and hold their head and tail low. They sprint with great speed. They will split up and work strategies together at times. They will work to get in front of their “game” because it is less work and more effective than chasing them at times. They work silently for the most part. They use eyes ears and nose in finding and controlling their “game” (sheep, cattle). They are known to be extremely intelligent.

Now consider the European Fox hound. They use their nose almost exclusively to follow the scent trail of their game. They give voice almost constantly while they hunt. They always chase their game and never try to get in front of it. They will happily chase their game all day with no regard for the convenience or effectiveness of the method. They give no appearance of strategizing with another dog. They would never stalk their game. They rarely use their eyes or ears in finding their game. They are not highly rated in the canine world for extreme intelligence. Many strains of foxhound would loose interest in the fox if they actually caught up with it or if it went in a hole. This was by design. These dogs were bred for the chase and to be followed by nobility on horseback. It took hours of work to prepare for a hunt. They did not want the dogs to quickly catch the fox. For some, the preference was that they not catch the fox at all.

Now I ask, between the Border collie and the Fox hound, which is of the more highly refined breeding? Which probably took longer to develop? Which probably had an unlimited amount of money poured into the development? For all three questions, my best guess is that it was the fox hound. They were developed by and for kings and nobility. Hundreds of years of unlimited funds and full time staff went into working on this. Working on what? Now I am not an expert on this subject. I am depending on a book about it. But it absolutely blew me away when I realized something for the first time. The fox hound was developed to NOT catch foxes. Dogs that caught them or showed interest in baying them were eliminated from the breeding program. They spoiled a fun party is what they did. They only spoiled a big party once.

I met a sheep man named Ray Carver back near Dallas, Oregon about 1982. I would see Ray’s hounds on their boxes as I drove by his place, so one day I stopped in. They were beautifully put together tri colored hounds. They were his coyote dogs. Ray had stacks of Hunters’ Horn, and Red Ranger magazines. He showed me how that community of dog men policed each other for accuracy in breeding records. Every cross ever made had to be published in the magazine for all to see. If there was anything fishy about it, the whole community knew it. He told me that there are many strains of foxhound in America that have accurate records going back well over one hundred years.

I will never forget what else he told me because it struck me as very strange, since I am from the Ketchinstuf Clan. He had spent much of his life trying to find foxhounds that would actually bay a coyote and eventually kill it. He said it had been almost impossible to find, but that now he had dogs that would catch and kill a coyote. He was a sheep man. He wanted dogs that would catch and kill a sheep killing coyote.

Now after reading this book about fox hounds, it all makes sense. There were hundreds of years that went in to developing dogs whose lives depended on the fact that they not catch anything. Now, in relatively short time, a relatively few people with a relatively small amount of money have tried to undo all that history. These few have been trying to put together some fox hounds that want to catch something.

Consider this also: People are still breeding for coyote dogs that do not catch coyote. I have visited a couple coyote running pens and this is what I learned: dogs that catch a coyote are banned from the pen, and they are banned from competition. And those who enjoy competing in pens are going to exclude that dog from their breeding program. And beyond that, if a dog is intelligent enough to realize the coyote is circling and cuts to where the coyote will soon be, he is disqualified. So dogs that show an ability to catch are eliminated from the breeding program. And dogs that show ability to reason and solve problems are eliminated from the breeding program.

Now, consider this: there are seven breeds of UKC coonhound. Of those seven, five of them are, at their foundation, foxhound breeds. The remaining two breeds have strains that are heavily infused with the same foxhound based blood.

Next, consider this: most dogs being used to catch bobcat are either directly based in Americas’ foxhound/coyote hound breeds, or directly based in Americas’ coonhound breeds. In either case, they are founded in dogs that were originally bred to not catch anything. Now a small group of people have worked very hard to turn these dogs into catching, baying and killing dogs. But they are fighting a long and powerful genetic history.

Now, I ask you this: is it any wonder that bobcat races last for hours and often end in nothing being caught? These type dogs are used to catch raccoon, bear, lion, and bobcat. Of those species, which one gives the most fox like race? Bobcats do. But in some ways a bobcat race is more difficult for the dogs. The bobcats are harder to stay with because of less scent, because of their meandering, often confusing habits, and because of a tendency to hide on the ground or in elevated places. So these dogs have made it back to their roots of chasing something all day and not catching it.

I have no experience fox or coyote hunting. But I have hunted good coon hounds that had no intention of catching a raccoon on the ground. And they rarely, if ever, did. If something climbed a tree, they would bark at the base of the tree. But they never caught anything on the ground. About 98% of the raccoons I have hunted were not very fast. Some of them, I could run down in a foot race across an open field. I have done it. Yet, these dogs never caught one on the ground. Why? Well I am guessing it is because they did not want to. They were originally bred to not catch anything. Those hundreds of years of royal foxhound breeding at their core, still hold them irresistibly locked in this trailing/non-catching trait.

There are not a lot of dogs that have been bred exclusively for bobcat. But for those who are attempting to do this, I feel an understanding of the principle explained above is vital. This is especially true for those breeding dogs for areas where the bobcats do not readily climb trees.

David,

Once again you have invested lots of time and thought into putting the background of Today's Hounds into an understandable and readable format!

If a person were to read Nash Buckingham's Fox Hunting stories of the early Twentyeth Century or many of the stories from those old Red Ranger and Hunter's Horn magazines, you would read about the Gentlemen meeting about dark on a hill just above the coverts where Ole Yellowside (or any favorite running neighborhood Fox) lived. They built a fire and waited for all their compadres to arrive.

Then each Hunter released their Strike hounds and skillets were produced to fry up some supper....news and gossip was passed around while fish was a frying and the Hounds were searching. Then about the time Ole Lead, way off across the Valley just up against the big Wild Rose patch, threw back his head and announced to the world that Ole Yellowside had been there, and the Hunters had licked clean the Catfish bones, ate the last Hushpuppy, released the remainder of the Hounds to hark to Ole Lead, and opened the bottle of Kentucky's Finest, they then got comfortable to listen to several Hours of Hound Dog Music.

The last thing that they wanted to happen was for Ole Lead and the Pack to kill Ole Yellowside. This was the Culture for much of the Ole South!

It continues today with the Fox/Coyote Pens.

Now there have always been the Renegades like my Dad, Ben Hardaway, Stan Warren, Joe Rufus Lyne, Lewis Jordan and many others. These fellows were much more “Blood Thirsty” and rated their Hounds different from the “Fellowship” style of Hunters. These men wanted Hounds to run their Game to CATCH. (interesting that most all these fellows were or started out as Bobcat Hunters).

Mr. Ben Hardaway, in his book “Never Out Foxed” tells of taking some of his 1st generation Hardaway cross bred Hounds to a hunt with a gathering of “Night Hunters” who had a regular week night Fox Hunt. On the way home Mr. Ben asked his good friend and kennelman/dogboy if he had noticed the Cold Manner in which the other Hunters had treated Mr. Ben, ole Tut, and the Crossbred Hounds. Ole Tut replied “Yes Sir Mr. Ben, them fellers wasn’t very friendly…youse knows it might be cuase these Hounds of Ours don’t just run that Ole Fox to aggravate him, they’s run him toose Kills Him…that bees the last thing that theys wants to happen”!

Killing the Bobcat has never had the stigma that killing the Fox has had, maybe do the Ole Shorttails habit of looking for dinner around the Farms chicken coop more than the Fox. Also the Cat sure liked the Pork chops that Free Ranging Hogs who ran “outside” across the Southeast provided. Also Bobcat Hides, even in the South were a source of income in the Rural America of the past.

These are probably the reasons that the Bobcat Hounds have been selectively bred for over a Hundred years to “Run to Catch” where as the Fox Hounds were bred to “Follow a Fox” along and tell the Hunters where it had been!

Just my thoughts, thanks again David and we too look foreword to a GREAT BOOK from a Great Guy!

C. John Clay

David....glad to see you posting!

God Bless. Andy

David, thanks for shareing some of your most special and private thoughts. A book like you are writing is long overdue and will be a true one in a million. Best of luck in all you do.

Tim

Good read David, I have always hoped you would take the initiative to write a book. Safe driving and God Bless my friend.

Wow this is great stuff!!!

I may have missed this but where can I get you book? Is it avaliable by email or something?

curdawgs,

David's book is still a work in progress.

If you will go back through the "Bobcat Hunting" Section, about 16 pages, you will find MORE info from the BEST Bobcat Hunters of all times, that can be found anywhere else on the Planet. Some will be second Hand from the heir aspirant’s to the greats that have passed on to the “Happy Bobcat Hunting Grounds”.

For years, generations of really Very Good Bobcat hunters have been as secretive and as silent as their quarry. For some reason there have been several of the very best Bobcat Hunters/Houndsmen of all times feel comfortable enough over here to open up about what they feel has made them successful in their pursuit of the Bobcat.

The neat thing is that you will find information on all the regions of the Country. What works in the New England/Maine country is different from what works in MN/WI or ID/MT. Oregon itself is two entirely different kinds of Hunting with different requirements. Texas probably has three distinctively different kinds environments that require different styles of Bobcat Hunting which will require the use of different skill sets for the Hounds.

Any books that will come out will be hard pressed to capture all the information to be found Here!

JMO

C. John Clay

That is a true story. Here is what I posted a couple years ago when we got our very own section:

"Thankyou Buddy for giving us our very own bobcat hunting section. as far as I know, IT is the only one of it's kind anywhere in the world and at any time in the history of the universe."

I try not to think about it, but we lost a lot of years of bobcat wisdom when the board changed hands twice. There were folks posting then who also died before Buddy took over.

It was much tougher back then though, because we were lumped in with other animals. You had to dig through a lot of lion and bear info to find the bobcat stuff.

There is more bobcat wisdom available here also back in the older portions of the lion hunting board from when it was a "cat hunting section"

Thank you all for the encouragement to continue trying to put this thing together. It is still more of an "if" than it is a "when" at this point. I do not know how to put a book together. The trapping books I used to buy were run off on a mimeograph machine and stapled and folded in the guys basement. That is about the extent of my technical knowledge.

Thanks again to Buddy for being tuff enough to endure. You have already outlasted the others I think.

David, always a pleasure to read your posts! You've got a gift for putting thoughts into words and lyrics, and it's my hope that you continue regardless of the subject category!

A request if you will - this may be covered in your book draft but it's interesting to me both in hunting and training situations to try to diagnose what's going on inside a dog's mind and I know you've observed this type of situation. What are your thoughts on a dogs intelligence (innate or learned) when they possess this incredible talent and have shown it time and again, but all of the sudden decide they don't want to place themselves in that situation any longer? I'm sure you know the specific dog and situation that I'm referencing with this question.

I think at times we evaluate a dogs behavior with incorrect parameters, an example of that would be declaring a certain dog "afraid" when in reality they're just too smart to repeatedly put themselves in harms way. It's my opinion that this happens with a lot of bear dogs, and it seems they are culled for being "scared of a mean bear", when in fact they might just be the most intelligent of the pack. Kind of parallels your post above under Foxhound roots . . . .although I don't know much about bear dogs and am not a bear hunter.

Trying to get some insight into how dogs make decisions and evaluating their reasoning and problem solving intelligence.

Wow! what a great thread, This is why I keep coming on this site and try to keep my trap shut and just learn from the guys who know what they speak of, What a pleasure to read a non combative thread, David I will surely purchase a book when you are done writing, Thanks to all who threw in on this fine read, Ken

Hey Jed, it is awful good to see you on here. Surprised you would come down out of the mountains long enough to make a post.

You open a huge can of worms Jed. And I guess you knew that
It is something any discussion of bobcat dogs is going to have to get to eventually. It kind of goes back to my statement that most good bobcat dogs are always on the edge of not being able to do their job. But it comes at it from the other side. How much is too much?

We need speed, but the speed and running style of the grey hound would be too much in most situations. Even a dog with a good trailing nose would over run his nose at that speed on most bobcat tracks.

Most of us need tree, but some would rather have little or no tree than risk having one ounce too much.

We need intelligence and problem solving ability. But if the problem happens to be "It hurts real bad when I overtake a bobcat all by myself"; then all of a sudden, problem solving ability makes the dog useless for catching bobcats.

I will talk about the central gift of a dog. The thing that makes that dog stand out. But if that gift is great it will have to be supported by peripheral gifts or it will render the dog ineffective. A tremendous gift for problem solving will have to be guarded by a tremendous desire for extreme conflict with dangerous game, or a tremendous desire to please the master or maybe both.

Gifted people are the same. And we all have been given gifts. We all need our gifts to be guided by the Master. Otherwise, what makes us strong and great, makes us weak and destroys us.

Giftedness. . . . .

David, your response has me thinking about those special gifts and the additional guards or supportive talents in dogs. . . as well as people. . . you get first tree on this cast for that bit of shared knowledge.

Alas, what are the priorities for giftedness in a bobcat dog? Is problem solving Q1, supported by speed, then nose. . . . who knows but I'll bet you have a well supported opinion. And I'll guess that opinion and list of priorities is going to differ by the needs in each region, or is it possible that one specific gift is so necessary that it is the constant in all regions and the supporting talents differ?

Would the search be easier to formulate a pair or trio of dogs that have different gifts of complimenting talent. For example, the pair of cat dogs on Danny's latest yearbook. I know there's tons of pics with those two dogs posing for an end result that either would have struggled to make alone.

Sorry buddy, now there's two cans of worms open, and yes, I know. . . .

Boy, it just shows that I certainly am not any more qualified than a lot of people to be taking on a book project, and a lot less qualified than some. Yes, I do have opinions on virtually any question I have seen. But my answers are based on my experience which sure leaves out a lot of dogs and places I have never seen.

I think the trait every bobcat hunter agrees on is intelligence, or problem solving ability.
It can make up for so much in most other areas. Some dogs are super good at learning and remembering and predicting bobcat behavior the same way they can learn and remember and predict their masters behavior or his childrens behavior. They do not really have to have extremely long winded speed or have amazing stamina if they can have the cat caught in 30 minutes or less. I really feel they need an amazing sprint to close that gap once the cat starts his last sprint. But I myself have never seen that kind of sprint speed in an exceptional cold tracker. And now we are getting into stuff I have written a lot about.

There is a very well defined list of gifts or traits needed. They vary somewhat by the starting skills and the finishing skills needed in each location. But they all have to be present in your pack whether it is a one dog pack or a ten dog pack. I myself do not need extreme intelligence in every dog. But It must be present in one of them. It is so extremely hard to get the perfect balance of gifts in one dog. My best success has been to find them in two dogs that work well together.

I pulled this from one of the pages of the manuscript:

"Finding the Right Dog
Unfortunately, many dogs used for hunting other tree game will not be able to catch you very many bobcats. The specific skills needed for consistently catching bobcat are hard to find in one dog. I have never had it all in one dog. For me the times I have gone to catching a high percentage of cats, I had a couple of dogs that were really clicking together. There was one that was making the catching happen. But they each had weaknesses, and they each had strengths that made up for the other’s weakness.

You might be fortunate enough to find a line of dogs specifically bred up for bobcat hunting in your area. But you might still find it hard to get all the traits perfectly wrapped up in a single dog. Many bobcats have been treed by a single dog. I knew one successful bobcat hunter in the Cascade Mountains that only ever used one dog. It sure does happen. These dogs exist, and finding one is a good goal. It is a goal I myself never completely fulfilled. Yet I learned how to catch bobcats by combining imperfect dogs.

The combination that has worked for me is this: one dog that is exceptionally good at cold trailing paired with another dog that is exceptionally good at forcing a moving bobcat to stop. Depending on the cat, some stop by climbing trees, some stop by facing off for a fight, some stop by hiding on the ground. Now one of those dogs will need to be a good locator for the treed or hidden bobcat."

If I had the money to burn, I would live in one of the states with high bobcat density and liberal laws. I would have a big pack of bobcat bred hounds, and have buddies that had the same. The music can be so amazing.

But I don't have any of those things, and most especially money to burn. I think most people are closer to my situation than the situation of unlimited cats, dogs, large tracts of land to hunt, and money to spend on them. I want to make sure those folks know how a country boy can put together a two dog pack, have a ton of fun and catch some bobcats. I really do not think it is that hard to do once a person understands every necessary trait, and the dog families that are likely to have them.

One of my main goals in writing this is to make this sport more accessible to the common man who is not into the idea of throwing away his wife and kids. "I have a dream!"

Don't forget, determination...aka drive, fire, go, sand, desire etc. In my opinion, that is the single trait that can act as a central hub that will develope the other traits if the dog is given enough exposure. If a dog has a very high desire to catch a cat, even a dumb dog can learn and even a slow dog will push harder. A dog that keeps trying that is hunted hard will inevitably get better and better. If he doesn't run out of try, and continues to push, he will continue to improve.

I have a lot of opinions on that too. The dogs I started out with had as much drive and desire as anything I have ever seen since. And yes, after about two years of pushing them with everything I had, they started finally catching a cat now and then.

There has been some advantages to being dumb enough to move to where there are no bobcats. One of them is you only have a fraction of the time and opportunity to get a dog to catching bobcats. The dogs I started out with could never make it in this environment. That is why having one problem solver has become more important to me than drive. If I have one genius that only hunts hard when she feels like it, I will still catch two three, well probably more like five times the cats that I did when I had completely instinctive hunters that did not know the word quit.

I know this is contrary to everything I ever heard from any other hunter in the country, and it is even contrary to my own instincts. And I am writing about a few things like that. Things that could only be learned in extreme hardship and in a vacuum, isolated from any bobcat sub-culture. It is hard to write things that I know the general hounding public is going to reject. There are already things on this thread that I was not allowed to freely write seven years ago. But I still have this dream of dogs that are more naturally bobcat catchers. Dogs that do not need a couple hundred tracks under their belt before they make dogs. Something as natural as a retriever retrieving birds or a sheep dog herding sheep or a coon dog treeing coon. There are things I hope to include in the book, unless I chicken out, that will probably only be accepted by those who are completely new to the sport, because it is a complete break from what has become accepted as the only way. We have converted bear hunters with their bear dogs, we have converted coon hunters with their coon dogs, we have converted fox hunters with their fox dogs. We really do not have a breed of bobcat dogs. I know that is offensive and that is why I can not say any more. If I get the guts to include it, I will probably hide it in the back under "deep dark secrets. Do not tell your mom." But it is things I have seen with my own eyes that make me know things do not have to be this hard.

I agree though, there is nothing more disgusting than a dog that does not show desire when you think they should. On a couple extremely gifted dogs, I have had to look the other way. In my younger days, the dogs would never have stayed. The more human- like intelligence qualities a dog takes on, the more they are like humans, who do not play so hard when they feel sick or frozen half to death.

Wow, I probably said too much. I was going to keep this so generic and un offensive. Dang.