BigGameHoundsmen.com

Fullcry has brought this up on numerous occasions and I believe it has merit. Here is what I have found:


I am rapidly becoming a believer in kenneling together. I do this with my GS's, males and females together. They eat out of one bowl and the only time there ever was a dissagreement was when the bitches started coming in heat, but even then it wasn't bad. I separated the females from the males until the heat was over and then put them back together. Still no problems and very efficient at feeding time. They have partners to play with and it eliminates some of their boredom. I think they see themselves more as equals, rather than independants constantly vieing for dominance. This allows the owner to more easily become the alpha in the pack.

I think why individual kenneling causes unwanted problems, is because it is not the natural order of a pack. It allows each dog to establish it's own territory and subsequently defend it. It allows very little personal interaction between them.

On the otherhand, introduction of new dogs to the group will be a touchy subject.

Liontracker I agree one hundred percent. I kennel my dogs together as well. UnfortionatlyI have to keep them on a strict diet in this south texas heat. Some of them are bigger dogs (75-80lbs) and some smaller (35-45lbs) I put indevidual bowls out with their fool and stand in the middle making sure they stay at their own bowl. I have no problems and soon they don't even try getting another dogs food. I don't have the same problem in the winter as they all get alot more to eat. Then I just feed them and leave them alone. No fights once they learn their pecking order, and I'm on TOP.

I put my personal dogs in big runs together, I seperate my Birddogs from the Hounds but normally I dont have any problems. With the hounds I feel they bond better and that helps them work better as a team. My birddogs love each other and do better together.

ALL THAT SAID, I have had a few issues over the years keeping dogs together like this. In some situations if you have a dog fight and your not home to stop it, you can get dogs that team up and go after one dog. Especially when the dogs arent getting run everyday because of the heat. I notice my Hounds get alittle cagey if they dont get out to road at least once a week. My problem this time of year is the Desert Heat, and Snakes. I can only road my dogs early in the morning or later in the evening, and this time of year we have snakes everywhere around the roads during those times in the desert where I live. I have a half acre run/yard for my dogs to run in but thats not always enough to take the edge off. I also seen with the hounds that if they are in a big yard/run and they are all together, once it cools the younger dogs like to start playing chase, and grab ass games, face barking ect.... and I dont like that crap either. The dogs know better if I'm out in the yard, but if I'm in the house, it becomes the out of sit out of mind game with some of them. So it can lead to issues if your not right on top of things all the time. So Ive ajusted and now keep them together during the day, but kennel them all up seperate at night, or if I go somewhere. I'm home all the time, and always out in the yard with the dogs, as I work out of my house, so I really have little issues, BUT to the average guy I could see issues popping up if your not around or paying attention all the time.

I also built one big house and they sleep together. I think this helps.

Kind of like being married... don't P.O. your partner too bad or you'll
be sleeping on the couch!LOL!

I also kennel all together.......I have an outside kennel and built an inside kennel connected to my office (loophole to local ordinance). Most are able to roam yard during the day and only 2 are actually kenneld outside and they are kenneled together.

Works great until females come into heat.........5 of 6 are in heat now. Then I go back to traditional kenneling.

i only have 2 hounds but they are kenneled together in a big run. separate feed dishes, same water pale. my female is three, male one. i through my male in the run the day i got him and my female seemed to almost mother him. we do every now an again have fights, but never in the kennel and all caused when my female does not want to play anymore and just has to whoop up on the pup to let him know she tired and not playin anymore

only issues I have had were introducing new adult males, doesn't work too well. Wasn't pretty. I keep runs for the older dogs that can't be introduced. I kick in the males pups at about 2 months of age so everything can get ironed out. Started scatering food, I like it better tahn bowls, part of the big pen is a covered concrete run, I throw the scoops of food in there and let it scatter like marbles. I think it does two things, when its time to eat you better eat, and you can tell right away if dogs are going right for one another being possesive. I have noticed that they are only concerned with eating, between each others legs, bumping into each other, etc etc. Shows me they are pretty tolerant and possesive behaior is not in the equation.

I kennel as a group as well. I have had mixed results. As certain dogs in my pack have aged the pecking order has changed as well. My old lead dog suddenly was put on the bottom of the pecking order when one of the younger dogs discovered that she was now bigger than her predasessor. When I got home my older dog was chewed up, bloodied, covered in dirt and missing a portion of her pad on one foot. She no longer stays in the kennel with the others. I continue to kennel the rest of the pack together excluding the catch dog, who is always seperated from the other dogs. I think in the future I wont have any more issues as all of the dogs kenneled together are of the same sex and relative age. Just my opinion but in the future for myself I will only keep dogs of the same age, size and sex in the same kennel. Otherwise I think I may have a soap opera going on in my kennels when im not around. Wether it be fights to females who may be comming into heat. Im not into day time drama while im at work.

I think its a great idea to have a turn out pen for all the dogs however they should be kenneld seperate at night. I have expermented a lot and finaly the set up I have now seems to work the best. Each dog has their own kennel and house. They know which one it is and at feeding time go into it when I tell them to. Trying to feed everyone together leads to problems as some dogs eat faster than other and try to steal the others food.
At daylight they are all turned out into a large 1 acre pen with a large pond. I have found that the dogs are MUCH happier this way. And quieter. I don't have the barking problems anymore. Everyone has a pecking order. They all play together including the old dogs. I dont have a fighting problem as anyone who fights finds a new home underground.
The pond is awsome for the dogs especially here in Red Bluff with our hot summers. I borrowed my neighbors bobcat and scraped out a pretty good pond. The old dogs swim in it to cool off. The young dogs play in it just like kids in a swimming pool. I love to go out and just watch.
Also having the pups with the older dogs, gets them much more interested in game. I can dump a @#$# over the fence and the pups do what they see the old dogs do. I will never go back to chains or kennels again as long as I have dogs.

Right now Im with everyone on this board, except my dogs have backyard at the moment and all seem to do good for the most part, except one of my younger pups thinks he is top dog, and he is definetly working his way up there. We usually try to feed him seperately to keep away from this as we cant watch them eat all the time and have to be at work early. Otherwise they get along great and it helps to have my pups learn stuff, like when a housecat walks by my main female freaks out (I usually hate barking around my house and dont tolerate it at all because of my neighbors) and shows the younger pups what they should be doing. Now all of my dogs go crazy when they see a housecat, obviously all they can do it bark but they learn from the older dogs quickly and learn what they can and cant do together. I will have something eventually when my house gets underway (hopefully soon, damn people move too slow) that they will have an acre to run around in and have their own seperate kennels at night and where I feed them as to not have any possessive traits. They have all been on a coon kill together and no one got possessive so that was good. I think having them together might make them a better pack in the long run, socializing all the time, when they get let loose to hunt they know its work time and got all the playing out of their systems.

I've read through this post several times and have but just one question....

It seems as though all of the dogs in the kennel together will form a "pack" mentality with the "master"(owner) being the alpha figure. This is good right? What happens when this pack is thrown together with another dog or group of dogs when hunting? Won't it screw up the whole dynamics of it? I can see a pissin contest coming when another male dog comes runnin up and sniffs the a$$ of the matriarch of your pack and the male that usually does that gets pissed and the whole pack decides that the other dog is not welcome.


Just wondering if I'm on the right track.

Usually I hunt alone, so it doesn't really apply most of the time, but ocassionally I like to throw in with someone. I wouldn't want any problems.

Scott

I hope more houndsmen read this thread and think about the possibility of trying this. I'm glad to see so many other guys have found the advantages to keeping their dogs together. It has been the best thing I've ever done with my dogs. That being said, I think there are definately some guidelines that guys should take into consideration.

First, I've never introduced a female into my mix of hounds since I started this 11 years ago. If you run both male and females, I think I would keep two seperate runs and keep the males and females seperate. Maybe if you only had one male it could work? Sounds like some guys are having some luck keeping both males and females together. I have no desire to do any breeding so running all males works great for me.
I have two acres fenced around the house. Within that area, I have about 1/2-3/4 acres fenced for the dogs. I originally cross fenced it thinking that I might have to seperate dogs but that has never happened so the gates are always open and they can run the entire length. I ran water right next to the fence that is heated in winter to keep the pipes from freezing and power for lights and one heated water bucket. The dogs all sleep together in one 8' long dog box. The floor, sides and top are all insulated with R-30. We have several weeks in winter here that get down to minus 20 so keeping them all together is also much warmer for them.
I have introduced two adult dogs to this setup without any problems. One male was cut the other intact but I had him cut within a couple of months. I didn't have any issues though. Pups are simple, the older dogs seem to really enjoy them and never show any aggression. My dogs ages right now are 9, 6, 4, and 1. Every day these dogs chase each other and rough house with each other. The younger dogs seem to keep the older dogs energized.
I have zero tolerance for a growly dog for any reason even at feeding time. All my dogs eat within 10 feet of each other. They all have their place and stand there until I put thier food down in seperate bowls. Well, OK some of them jump around like idiots. But you get the idea. They all know it is not acceptible to eat out of another dogs bowl and they follow that rule very well. They do clean up anything on the ground around that bowl while the other dog is still finishing though. Some dogs eat faster then others so I feed the slow eaters first and that way they all finish about the same time. I set down the bowls and go clean out and fill up the water bucket. I think clean water every day or every other day is important to healthy dogs. If your bucket is green and filthy, it's not healthy. This is another advantage, only one bucket to keep clean.
The biggest advantage I have found with this setup is that my dogs are much healthier. In 11 years, I've never had a dog to the vet. The reason dogs bark around the house is because they are bored stiff sitting in a 10' long kennel or on a chain. There is no stimulation for them day after day. The fact is most guys don't run thier dogs 2-3 days a week like they should. I'm one of them. In the summer, I don't get to hunt so I road my dogs 1-2 days a week. In winter, I run lions full time.
If you have problems with your dogs feet being soft and sore, this will take care of that forever. I've yet to have any sore feet after a run because your dogs are keeping thier feet conditioned every day. Sore feet doesn't come from poor genetics or because they have white pads. They're feet just aren't conditioned properly. Also, there is no shoveling crap and washing down kennels every day. The dogs naturaly go to a far corner of the run and go there. Also, no odors anywhere since they are on natural dirt.
I can't honestly think of any disadvantages other then not keeping females which isn't at all an issue with me.

Interesting topic. I have my pups together now but when I was a kid I had a team of sled dogs. All of the dogs were Siberian Huskies and while there were males and females, they were mostly around the same age. I did have them on chains for some time but found when I would run them, they would only want to play and kind of "catch up" with one another before the work could begin. I began putting them all into one kennel and I found they got along fine....(Huskies are normally possesive and territorial dogs). I also found when they were kenneld together, they worked much better together in the lines and while running. Now, that said, I also ran my dogs upwards of 25+ miles per day nearly every day so....they were less apt to cause crap because they were tired!

I've often thought of building a kennel where there were seperate night time kennels that were indoor/outdoor type kennels attached to a barn type building...(Like a stall barn for horses) with a gear room, food room, cleaning area, etc....And then having two large turnout pens where you could put males and females seperate....Not that I'm against having them together, I just know that my luck the wrong dog would breed the wrong dog the second I left for the day and I've have a bundle of the wrong pups....

It worked great with those dogs though....On a sidenote, I don't have the team anymore....I was about 12 years old and I went to a little league baseball game and when I can home all of my sled dogs were stone dead...poisoned....Never did find out who did it either...Maybe I wish they would have been a little meaner?! AS a 12 year old who worked his @ss off to get into the sport it was devestating and I never had any other sled dogs....Just hounders!

With my sled dogs, I never did really have a big problem introducing new dogs. I would however, have them work together for a good while before turning them into the same pen...Always seems that dogs who sweat together are better bedmates to one another...I'd be very interested to hear how you guys do introduce new dogs/puppies into the pack.

I'm all ears boys...how do you do your new kiddo intros into the pack? Success stories? Horror stories?

FullCryHounds wrote:I hope more houndsmen read this thread and think about the possibility of trying this. I'm glad to see so many other guys have found the advantages to keeping their dogs together. It has been the best thing I've ever done with my dogs. That being said, I think there are definately some guidelines that guys should take into consideration.

First, I've never introduced a female into my mix of hounds since I started this 11 years ago. If you run both male and females, I think I would keep two seperate runs and keep the males and females seperate. Maybe if you only had one male it could work? Sounds like some guys are having some luck keeping both males and females together. I have no desire to do any breeding so running all males works great for me.
I have two acres fenced around the house. Within that area, I have about 1/2-3/4 acres fenced for the dogs. I originally cross fenced it thinking that I might have to seperate dogs but that has never happened so the gates are always open and they can run the entire length. I ran water right next to the fence that is heated in winter to keep the pipes from freezing and power for lights and one heated water bucket. The dogs all sleep together in one 8' long dog box. The floor, sides and top are all insulated with R-30. We have several weeks in winter here that get down to minus 20 so keeping them all together is also much warmer for them.
I have introduced two adult dogs to this setup without any problems. One male was cut the other intact but I had him cut within a couple of months. I didn't have any issues though. Pups are simple, the older dogs seem to really enjoy them and never show any aggression. My dogs ages right now are 9, 6, 4, and 1. Every day these dogs chase each other and rough house with each other. The younger dogs seem to keep the older dogs energized.
I have zero tolerance for a growly dog for any reason even at feeding time. All my dogs eat within 10 feet of each other. They all have their place and stand there until I put thier food down in seperate bowls. Well, OK some of them jump around like idiots. But you get the idea. They all know it is not acceptible to eat out of another dogs bowl and they follow that rule very well. They do clean up anything on the ground around that bowl while the other dog is still finishing though. Some dogs eat faster then others so I feed the slow eaters first and that way they all finish about the same time. I set down the bowls and go clean out and fill up the water bucket. I think clean water every day or every other day is important to healthy dogs. If your bucket is green and filthy, it's not healthy. This is another advantage, only one bucket to keep clean.
The biggest advantage I have found with this setup is that my dogs are much healthier. In 11 years, I've never had a dog to the vet. The reason dogs bark around the house is because they are bored stiff sitting in a 10' long kennel or on a chain. There is no stimulation for them day after day. The fact is most guys don't run thier dogs 2-3 days a week like they should. I'm one of them. In the summer, I don't get to hunt so I road my dogs 1-2 days a week. In winter, I run lions full time.
If you have problems with your dogs feet being soft and sore, this will take care of that forever. I've yet to have any sore feet after a run because your dogs are keeping thier feet conditioned every day. Sore feet doesn't come from poor genetics or because they have white pads. They're feet just aren't conditioned properly. Also, there is no shoveling crap and washing down kennels every day. The dogs naturaly go to a far corner of the run and go there. Also, no odors anywhere since they are on natural dirt.
I can't honestly think of any disadvantages other then not keeping females which isn't at all an issue with me.

Any problems with the dogs trying to dig holes in the bare dirt under the kennel wall?

CBT, My hunting buddy just picked up a pup that was 8 weeks old about a month ago. I took him in to see the big dogs right away. I held him on my lap and let the dogs all smell him. Then put him down and let them all get aquinted. He comes over to the house at least once a week now and that pup runs right up to the gate and wants in with the big boys. Yesterday, I let him in and they started playing and running around right away like he does every time now. It is much easier with a young pup because the older dogs are not threatened at all. I've introduced two older dogs to my dogs and they both did just fine. No growling or hair raising. But I think you'd better have a good handle on your dogs and that they all know who is the leader. I honestly think that keeping dogs seperate can make a dog much more aggressive towards other dogs.