Making a silent dog

Talk about Big Game Hunting with Dogs
hoyter
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Making a silent dog

Postby hoyter » Mon Feb 14, 2022 10:51 pm

I know that this has been talked about a lot but I have a couple of questions. I have a couple of walker females that are quiet on the track and do not make a sounds until jumped. They are hell on bobcats. I am at the point now where I put only them on bobcats and only hunt my louder dogs on lions.
My questions are:

does anyone know of a line of treeing walkers that consistently produce pups that are silent?

Has anyone had experience hunting a hound puppy that came from parents that are open on the track with silent hounds? Have these puppies “learned” to be silent from the dogs that they hunt with?

Both of these females came from litters where the rest of the dogs are not silent. I got lucky I guess. Does anyone have experience breeding two dogs that are silent on the track that threw pups that were also silent on the track?

Thanks
lawdawgharris
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby lawdawgharris » Tue Feb 15, 2022 11:53 am

This is a very interesting subject to me. I hope you get feed back on it. I have hunted with some silent hounds and I really liked them. I know of a Walker dog that was bred for bear but culled only because he is silent. I haven’t hunted with him but would love to. I’m told he is blazing fast on track. The guy that had him is said to have Walker/ pointer crosses as well and they can’t keep up with this full hound. They say he’s the real deal hog dog. How are your two females bred?


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lawdawgharris
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby lawdawgharris » Tue Feb 15, 2022 12:02 pm

As for can you breed for silent, I absolutely believe you can. It’s a matter of breeding silent to silent and selecting the pups that are silent. I know of some plotts that have been bred to be silent. There are going to be some that aren’t out of them naturally and there going to be different degrees of silent. Some don’t strike bark, some won’t bark until a track gets pretty hot, and some that won’t bark until they have the game stopped or treed. The longer you selectively breed for it the more consistently you get it.


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macedonia mule man
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby macedonia mule man » Tue Feb 15, 2022 4:23 pm

If you have a dog that barks on strike, jumps and runs barking, has an animal at end of chase while barking, why would need a silent dog???
Beebout-it
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby Beebout-it » Tue Feb 15, 2022 5:22 pm

My best dog runs completely silent and I use to only turn her loose on Bobcats, problem with that is although my catch rate is higher the other dogs get no work catching bobs. My stud is very open and most of her pups run pretty quite. I'm at the point I enjoy hearing the race as much as catching the cat so leaning towards the mouthier pups out of each littet.
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby Beebout-it » Tue Feb 15, 2022 5:24 pm

Also I do think that running pups with her they do learn to open less and less.
macedonia mule man
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby macedonia mule man » Tue Feb 15, 2022 7:30 pm

I believe mouth is a fixed trait, not something a dogs learns to do.
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby not color blind » Tue Feb 15, 2022 10:41 pm

IMO, if you're gonna run silent dogs, you might as well just set traps..
Cajun
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby Cajun » Tue Feb 15, 2022 10:56 pm

Over the years I have had a few Plotts that were silent. I could have made a fortune breeding silent Plotts however it is not what I like. If a dog can smell it and move it, I want him opening. Just my preference.
Back to your question I have had a couple of Plotts that were silent and they were out of open parents and I could never understand why these dogs were silent but I do believe somewhere back in the gene pool there might have been a silent dog and the genes lined up.
Like Marcadona Mule man said I do not think silent dogs will open running with open dogs and I know my Plotts have not shut up running with silent dogs It is whatever is in their genetic makeup. Now I do believe when you breed a open dog to a silent dog opening seems to be dominent but it could go either way.
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GVBEAR
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby GVBEAR » Wed Feb 16, 2022 12:37 am

I got a pup from a cross that the father was semi silent on track and mother I would say was average mouth on track not babbling but pretty vocal. Well the litter from my knowledge has all been more silent than even the father. I have only hunted with one of the littermates so going off what the breeder told me for the rest of the litter. But my pup and the littermate will strike, but once put on the track go silent until they tree the game or see the game. The breeder said with this line you can't always guarantee they will be more silent that average but this line of dogs if he makes the cross he has a better chance of them coming out more silent. They are not walkers though more of cross bred dog. I am still not sure if I like the dog more silent or not has shortened some races but really hard to turn dogs in to the chase or figure out if he lines it out before the rest without just staring at the GPS screen which isn't fun.
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby lawdawgharris » Wed Feb 16, 2022 1:23 am

I agree that the open trait is USUALLY going to be dominant when bred to silent. Probably going to take a couple of breedings before you get a whole litter of silent dogs even when breeding silent to silent. Lol I’ve never seen open dogs get quiet when ran with silent dogs but I have seen dogs out of silent stock that didn’t start out barking on track but did start doing it later on. Was it a learned thing or was it that that dog was gonna do it regardless, I don’t know. It seemed weird that they would would be the exception for the dogs they were out of and just so happened to be the one that was hunted with open dogs. A lot of the competition hounds have gotten to where they don’t give nearly as much mouth. That was definitely intentional for the sake of points or not helping other dogs get points off of their find so to speak. I don’t have anything against either style if it’s a good dog but I do prefer a silent dog for the way I hunt and the area I hunt. I have seen really good ones both ways. I know Cajun catches lots of hogs with his open dogs just like we do here with silent so it boils down to preference. There are benefits of both.


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macedonia mule man
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby macedonia mule man » Wed Feb 16, 2022 9:02 am

If you run a total silent pack,how does it look a a Garmin chart? How does the other dogs know that a loss has been picked up. How far will a race be strung out over a four mile run? I started running dogs when I was 12 yrs, I’ll turn 81 on the 27th of this month and have never hunted with a pack of total silent dogs. I know in squirrel dogs no mouth until treed is preferred but I don’t think that makes much difference. I hunted with a full B/T coon hound that was fully open on squirell track and the community killed a truck load with him. Everybody in the community hunted him.
lawdawgharris
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby lawdawgharris » Wed Feb 16, 2022 12:17 pm

So first off, happy 81st birthday mule man!
As for hunting a silent pack, this is how it works for me. If I have 3 dogs on the ground, they better everyone be independent about wanting to find a hog. If they can’t be depended upon to do the job start to finish then they won’t be at my place. I cast hunt which means they could all be out in several directions looking or they may all be in the same general area or even right together. When one starts baying then the others are going to honor it. If the hog breaks bay before they get there to assist, then because they moved towards that bay they are searching for that track of the hog and their buddy. I believe because dogs smell everything independently, they realize this is a hog and their buddy is ahead trying to stop it again. This brings them together either because the dogs joining caught up or the original dog has it bayed again. If they leave on a track together and come to the point where one thinks the track does one thing and the others think it does another, then they split. Somebody is right and somebody is wrong. Mr or Mrs wrong will recognize it shortly and return to where they split and pick back up and have to play catch up to the ones that did right. If it gets to a point that the track seemingly disappears, then tracking IQ and hog IQ come into play. Usually they will start making loops or circles to pick it back up. It may happen one at a time or they may all hit it together, but eventually it’s going to get lined out. I have had young dogs that were knocked out of races because of this scenario. My tactic has been to go to that spot on the garmin and move around in the same circle that the other dogs did in a slow fashion so that the youngster can think they figured it out and when they leave on it just sit and wait. I believe whole heartedly that they use the extra scent of the dogs ahead of them to track as well plus I think it gives them a little confidence in thinking they are doing right. Sometimes the others get bayed and the young dog honors them before they actually get to figure it out. Sometimes when we bay sounders, after the initial catch, if we have three dogs on the ground, we may have three different bays going at once. When you go to one and catch that hog then that dog either leaves to honor one of the others or if they can’t hear them they may go bay another one. Depending on the situation as to whether we catch them or chance them leaving and baying solo again. Most times they end up with one of the others either because they’ve heard them or when they went back to where the original group was bayed to start another hog, they either heard the other dogs from there or they smelled their track leaving on a different hog than the one they left on. Of course you can get those dogs that are too independent won’t honor other dogs. The only way they will be baying with another dog(s) is if the other dog(s) honors them. That isn’t a quality I care for.


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macedonia mule man
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby macedonia mule man » Wed Feb 16, 2022 12:28 pm

Say whhhat?????? Lol. Sounds reasonable.
lawdawgharris
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Re: Making a silent dog

Postby lawdawgharris » Wed Feb 16, 2022 1:23 pm

Mule man, not to change the subject, but are you still hunting your own dogs? I ask because I have a really good hunting buddy in Florida that is 85. He can’t get through the woods anymore. All he can do is sit on the buggy and listen to the bays. It just kills him because his body and his mind aren’t on the same page, tons of want to but no can do.


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