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A friend and my partner at work has been trying to get me to come hunt a spot he and al rennick used to hunt 20 years ago. With all the horor stories he has told me about the mile deep canyons and hours of walking i kept putting him off.
So this morning i desided to try his spot out. After picking him up we started up the road. We came to a shit load of reprod, i said this looks awesome should we start here? He says no if they go that way its not good. After about 5 miles of asking when can i let these dogs out and him replying not yet, I was starting to wonder why i even came up here.
He finally says ok u can shit them out on this left hand road. I collar up the dogs , vegas, stormy, ringer, lacey, stitch and a friends dog named rita.
We start roading the dogs and dont go 300yrds before they start giving tail. Vegas lets out some , if i find where u left the road we are going to have a race barks. They run down the road a few hundred yards and turn around and fly back up the road. They find where the track left the road and over the hill they go. Vegas , Lacey and rita doing all the barking . After trailing for 500 yrds ringer and stitch sound off and the race has me thinking this wont take long to get jumped. After they hit the bottom of the canyon and start up the other side I tell clint he wont pull that hill , he will have to turn and com back down. After they are proving me wrong clint says dont let them cross that road its bad over there. We jump in the rig and fly around to cut them off.
We pull up to find the dogs on a 50 ft rim above the road. i left clint there with leases and drove around the top and called them out. The race was kinda at a lull at this point anyways. There was around 20 mexican tree planters jibbering and it just didnt fill like they were going to pick the track up again. STRIKE ONE
We drove down the road 3 miles or so and had a pretty hard strike off the truck. Letting all the dogs down they start working the track , fairly old but moving it. after 500 yrds they split up and Vegas has her own track. the rest trail to where i have moved the truck. Vegas has warmed her track up and the others have not so they start going to her. only ringer and lacey make it to her and the race is in full jump. the other 3 are cutting cross country but not gaining any ground. The 3 with the cat get it out of the reprod and in a creek with timber. I say hes done for they will tree him in less than 5 mins. as they are giving him the u better climb or get ate barks. Everything goes silent and i think im going to here a locate bark. nothing for about 3 mins so i saay lets drive down there i can see a road on the garmin. Expecting to pull up to a tree job i turn off the truck and hear them running again going back to where we had come from. an hour and a half later with muiltiple loses and different dogs taking there shot at the cat they come right above us where there is a 30 rim above the road. The dogs come off the rim and look up and down and over the road and come up with nothing . i dont think the cat came off the rim and told clint i will walk the m around and get it going again. he says lets find a different one we are not even to the good spot yet. reluntant i say ok . STRIKE 2

We drive for another hour or so when Vegas says stop . Ilet her and stormy down and they went 190yrds off the road and start opening . i turn in the rest and Vegas and stormy have chacked out. We drive down the road and i said they are right here , Vegas and stormy hit the road and in full run go down the road for 600 yrds before they shoot up the hill. they get up the hill and have a 2 min bobble. i said to clint i cant believe super dog hasnt caught up yet. Talking about lacey. about that time here she come like a thoughbred racing horse with stitch not far behind. Ringer is a min or so behind them and rita is barely in hearing range. from the start to here is .9 miles on the gps. the dogs make a big circle and come right back to the spot they had the bobble. This spot is only 50yrd above the road. and i start getting ? makes on the gps. I tell clint they must be in a hole. we walk up there and sure enough they are. tieing dogs up that are out i try to get stormy out of the top hole when i here ringer get ahold of the cat . i run around to the bottom hole where Vegas and ringer are . clint says here it comes and starts to run . lol . I look and the cat is climing over top of Vegas and runs within 2 feet of me. We get the dogs back after the cat and thery make a couple circle and come right back to us. In another hole and out again. I hear my terrier in the pickup start freeking out and told clint the cat must haveran by the pickup. sure enough the dogs head strait to the truck make a circle and tree . we looked for about 20 mins and couldnt find it. STRIKE 3.
Im going back in the morning for a another change to take three swings. man this is fun even if u lose.

jc

great story hope you have a lil better luck this time around!! let us know how the next race/races go..

Great Story! Really get a feel for the kind of Country you are running in.

Bet you had those Wets jabbering about that "Gato de monte" and the noisy Peros.

Turn that KILLER terrier loose when the Cat is in the hole. He will end it quickly!

Good Luck next time!

CJC

Sounds like a fun night JC. I want to hunt that type of country again, my young ones are doing really good now. I had a long race yesterday... been after that cat for a couple months. Kept on rock piling on me, finally made a screw up and ran the wrong way and the dogs cinched the deal.

My dad and I went back today. We went strait to the place I ran the second race yesterday. We didnt drive very far and vegas said stop. The dogs went exactlly to where the cat had ran through yesterday. They went over the hill and opened a few times and came back to try the otherside of the road. As ringer came by he had a mountain boomers head in his mouth. I told my dad we got him now he has a full belly.The dogs went across the road below us and off into a wilderness area that lewis and clark wouldnt go into. Old grouth fir trees with salmon berries, mix in some huckle berry brush with some viney maples along with sword ferns and u got yourself a jungle. Oh yeah rock bluffs .
They trailed for about 400 yrds and jumped the cat. All the dogs were giving it to him. My face said it all , awesome im running a cat , I wish they would turn and come closer. Deeper and deeper they went. At around 870 yrds they started making circles and loses.I looked at the gps we were at 1750 ft elevation and the dogs were at 650ft. but only 800yrds away. It was steep. Dogs were getting slung out and lacey was shining. She had him up and running pushing as hard as she could when he would turn and run right back through the others. Another dog would pick him up and this went on for quite some time.
The dogs were looking for him and coming up with nothing . Stormy started to locate bark and i put on my boots. Hateing the thought of what i was about to go through i heard Vegas say hes over here . The cat had ran his own track and was heading back out of the canyon.
As the dogs were comeing up the hill the smile on my face got bigger and bigger with every yrd they were getting closer.
They brought him across the road but he had a suprising 5 min lead on them. The dogs were all together except rita and hank. They were about 5 min behind. so i put them in the box.
They were running in the same place where i had ran him yesterday and the race sounded great. He hit the road at one point and ran it for a solid 700 yrds. They must have been putting alot of preasure on him now he is making short circles and running the same area. as they scream above us the switch goes off. dogs start locating and settle in treed . total race time 2 hours 3 mins. I walk up to the tree and there is so much brush i am walking on top of it and the dogs are under my feet. There are 5 oldgrouth trees and i looked for 30 mins with no success in finding him. i think he was there but cant say for sure. I cant wait to run him again . We loaded up the dogs and headed home.

jc

Jc,

I know that dreaded feeling when the dogs take off into no mans land. Always a good deal when they double back. Late winter its really easy to turn out in the bottom of a canyon here and the dogs go up and over the top into another drainage... with no sleds or anything it sucks. Congrats on your new honey hole, keep them dogs happy!

That Rita dog you speak of is that Sam dotsons dog ? I had a buddy that had a dog named Rita and sold her back to Sam awhile back. I didn't figure there are many dogs named Rita out there.

no she is a dog that came from timm pittman. tim sold her to a buddy of mine 2 years ago. she has been laidup because my buddies wife has been in the hospitol for over 2 weeks. he called me and wanted her hunted while he was dealing with the family issues. she is not honnoring my dogs. she is a pretty decent dog and does catch her own cats .

jc

Rita is registered Finley River Walker what holds her up also is she has no running dog in her,and Jc has a fast pack of dogs guys,don't let him smoke you they can fly through the country in crappy terrain.Vegas and the rest of them potlickers he feeds are anything but slooow they are not.

A good rain a couple hours before the tracks were started, and I say the score would be tipped in your favor. John.