Can't Move old Track...

[liontracker]

This question came up in another thread. I was wondering what percentage of the old tracks you cut, the dogs can't move?

[pegleg]

I'm not sure of your definition of "cut" IF the dogs wag their ass but are silent they may catch 5% .if the old dogs whine but don't make another sound in a half hour then it goes to about 8%. and it goes up from there. visual tracks I don't get as often other then a kill or scat, scrape etc.but of tracks I see that the hounds haven't shown anything was around on, I have never caught a lion from rimming forward on a single track the hounds couldn't smell. That I could even halfheartedly think was the same cat. so I figure they are a better indicator of catching it then my eyes are. I still look at sign wistfully and come back through every couple days if I can. I had a circle I was riding that in my mind seemed perfect. a full days ride full of old lion kills and a great view the whole way . I rode through there 13 times in a month and never found a track or fresh kill. I went back in there a few weeks later and we treed two lions on the same circle which tells me it was different lions making up the circle . The percentage here is low. trails age fast and they don't leave a lot of identifiable tracks to catch your eye unless you spend time searching under overhangs where the dust picks them up and they don't get bothered much. kills are easier to find and age. when the dog sounds like your horse stepped on his tail I can catch mos t of them

[horshur]

Why would you bother with an old track?

[liontracker]

Kind of like a flyfishing purist. When I go in after a particular tom, I run that track no matter how old it is. Nothing like finding a big old sun-baked track that was made in the mud after a rain, and you know it is a week old. It's the toad and it takes you two days to catch him.

Cut - drive ,walk or ride across a visible track.

[Mr.pacojack]

Why would you bother with an old track?

Exactly But there is alot of talk and bragging about so and so's dog can trail a week old track in 110 degree heat of the summer and catch that cat in a month, and if they can't get it caught they lick the dirt and freshin it up.

[pegleg]

I run older tracks because we don't have a good road system. we don't have super heavy lion pops. and you could spend a whole year looking for a fresh track and not find it. I look at rig dogs the same way . why? I damn sure couldn't use one so I don't worry about it. I run the first runnable track I cross because if I pull the dogs we will most likely go home empty and I go out to run cats. Would I run a old track if there was a good track around the corner? no, I'd look for the hot track like most.

[liontracker]

Peg, absolutely on the testing...

However the pack of 4 I speak of are all veteran warrior lead dog material. Each a pretty balanced hound, working together to cast, work the cracks and crevices, and push that track faster than just track for track, hold the line style. Each of these 4 will also pick up there heads and run to catch at the slightest chance. Long story short, the faster you move a bad track the more likely you are to tree before dark.,

[horshur]

it would be shithouse luck to make up a week in a day.......

[pegleg]

who said a week brother? my hounds couldn't smell a week old lion track here if you scooped up two hundred yards of it and fed it to them through a humidifier.

[Lil Joes BigGame hounds]

Now i wouldnt want to run a week old track, but if you dont run old tracks your gonna be missing out on alot of dog work. I think you can spoil dogs by feeding them only the freshest tracks instead of havin them grind till it becomes that hot track everyone likes. I know some guys around here have spoilt there dogs. They would only run there game catchers and burn up the hottest tracks. Then when those dogs reached 12 years old and they had a bunch of old hot nosed dogs that couldnt do it and young dogs that never had a chance to do it.
So I have no problem running an old track even if I see those dogs are headed towards a loose they cant recover. I think its good for those dogs to cold trail and not catch sometimes. I wouldnt do this with a client but on my own why not? its better than not huntin. jmo

Joe Troyer

[BlacktailStalker]

I've watched dogs not be able to move a 6 hour or less old track from last nights wet snow that turned to rain...

[liontracker]

Me too on the wet snow and the rain. I was on a lion one time and we were getting close.It was in the thawing mud and a rain came in. I could actually trail the lion and see the water flowing into the track. The dogs had no idea it was there until the track would pass under a Ponderosa now and then. Sometimes there just aint nothin' left!

[liontracker]

I've found that I can stack shithouse luck in my favor, if that week old track is a tom looping around in a female in heats' territory. On a week old track of a tom moving up country, a guy would have better luck following the backtrack until where it is going and where it is coming from are the same!

[Brady Davis]

A buddy and I were out hunting last night and I was talking about old tracks and he asked why mess with them.
I agree with Tim...Kind of a purist mentality. For me, I've not owned many dogs that would really put forth a true effort on an old track, maybe they just didnt have what it took to work the track skill wise!? Have a buddy in Utah who cut a lion track last year that was about two days old, good conditions and walked his dog in about 5 miles to no avail....That would eat me up. There exists dogs that can work that track I believe. I personally think it would be much more rewarding to work an old track and warm it up only to tree it than it would be to dump a pile of catdogs out on a steaming hot track in the snow out of the bed of the pickup. Our world nowdays lives on instant gratification....We, for the most part, can't even fathom the idea of working more or harder than needs be.

You read stories of past big game houndsmen (Lilly, Stevens, Green, Lee, etc...) and those boys knew how to work an old track.

Lastly, I don't know where y'all live but if I only went with nice good tracks, I'd have many a day where we never got out of the pickup

[Brady Davis]

I've found that I can stack shithouse luck in my favor, if that week old track is a tom looping around in a female in heats' territory. On a week old track of a tom moving up country, a guy would have better luck following the backtrack untilo where it is going and where it is coming from are the same!

I wouild take shithouse luck all day long!!! I have seen areas here in Colorado where they cats don't move too far for a number of reason....I beleive you could make up huge amounts of time quickly. My hopes, however, will always be on the shithouse luck side