Lee Brothers

[bency]

I just picked up a red tick thats from this line of dogs(Lee Brothers), a buddy of mine has been breeding these dogs for 15 years and loves them. Just wanted to see what everybody knows about this strain of dogs?

thanks,
mike.

[Mike Leonard]

It is very hard for anybody to comment much without knowing the excact dogs these trace back to. The Lee Bros. owned and sold literally thousands of dogs spanning their hunting years. Just about any dog that went thru their hands was later labeled a Lee Bros. dog if it amounted to anything. In actuallity only Ernest Lee the eldest brother ever cared a whole lot about keeping records and propigating an actual strain of hounds accredited to the Lee name. He was infact one of the instrumental founders of the bluetick breed when it was established as a regisitered breed seperate from the English breed. He, Elbert Vaughn, Bluetick Bill Harshman, Warren Haslour, O. Grant,Smith, finley and a few others sort of set things up in the beginning. He was also instrumental in making the bluetick hound the official dog of Arizona. ( How many knew that?) but the other brothers,Vincent, Dale, Clell, Arthur and Barney cared little about registry or keeping hound records. Later in life Clell Lee because of him becoming quite a celebrity at hound functions began breeding up some english hounds and also had some of the blueticks that had Lee's Cougar and Lee's Battler in their pedigree as well as some Sugar Creek Breeding . so you see it is very hard to just label a hound Lee Bros. Breeding and know what particular strain or batch it came out of. Dale Lee the most famous and hardest hunting of all the Lees didn't give a hoot or a holler about what color a hound was, what he looked like or anything else he just better catch game or he wasn't going to live long around him. I had a few redticks out of Arizona from some ranchers that said they traced back to some dogs that the Lee's used from a guy over around rodeo, New Mexico. These were pretty good cold trailers, and i think they had some infusion of bloodhound in them as did many of the old strain hounds from the land of dry ground lion hunters.


I would be interested to know where your friend got his start with these dogs 15 years ago.

[bency]

yea theres definately alot more to it than i knew. But i will give my friend a call and see what i can find out.

thanks,
mike.

[bency]

So i talked to my buddy (Harley Paul), and he said that hes been breeding the dogs for 10 years not 15, my mistake. Harley got the dogs from guy named Holmer Bryant and Holmer had been breeding this strain of dogs for 30 years and just basically sold them, never really hunted them.
And he did tell me that the redtick i have is a pure breed from this line of dogs.
mike.

[Cowboyvon]

Hey Bency where are you at .. I know Harley pretty good. I thought him and Sid Savage were in partners on some of those Hounds?

I've roped with Harley some and have probably spent more time then I care to admit with him in the Pine Knot

Brett Vaughn

[bency]

Brett,

Im soon to be out of las cruces here in a few days, but you are right, Harley and Sid are partners on those hounds, but dont know exactly the whole story on that whole deal.

Mike.

[Mike Leonard]

Ok I know the dogs and I know Homer well also and he is a good lion hunter, cowboy poet, and not too bad a fiddler either. Ho Ho Homer ( you guys that know him will understand why I did that. LOL! His dogs in essnece Knothead and Hornet being the foundation dogs that came out of and old red dog that the Hendersons had over around Datil and Dusty New Mexico probably trace back closet to the Slash Ranch bred dogs of Dub Evan than to any of the Lee Bros. Breeding. The Lees used a lot of the Slash dogs ( Scout, Rat, Screamer) being some of the best known to cross on their dogs. They took Dub's Little Brownie dog and crossed him on some of their bitches as well. They felt these dogs were tops as cold trailers, and the best they ever saw and handling a doubling back lion.

Anyway I had some pups out of Hornet and a black bitch I got from Bud Hutchings in Utah, and these little rascals could flat trail at an early age.;

Pat Wantland at Glenwood probably knows more about the history of these dogs than most . His old Dempsey dog was also related to Homer's dogs and was about the fastest dry ground dog I ever saw. If them dogs are like some of the old ones you better get a good hold on them if you go to give them a whippin because they just might eat you up......LOL!

[tyre&rachellelee]

My husband is Ernest lee's grandson and we have been trying to find a hound from the lee bro's line and more info on my husbands heritage we have alot of artifacts from some of tje hunts please contact us 520-668-9952

[Grzyadms4x4]

"we have alot of artifacts from some of tje hunts"

Have any that you can share on the net?