Tracking questions

[Donaye37]

I got three questions. Question 1: how do you get your dog to stop tracking and get off the trail and come back to you when your,ready,to pack up and go home?

Question 2: lets say you see tge direction your game is going so you know where the trail should be and your dog is on the trail but is goung in the opposite direction on the trail, how do you get em going the other way beside just coaxing them?

Question 3: after you get your game and your hound is at the end of the trail after you harvest your game or when you decide to track a different animal, how do you get them to pick up another trail and not the same one, like how do you get them on another trail without getting back on the same trail you were on without going into a completely diffent area totally away from the other?

Hope these make good enough sense, thanks for the help.

[beagledog]

Question one
Something hounds men have been trying to figure out for years
Best I have found is a shock collar
Question two
Let your pup figure it out. She will get it
When you can hunt her you will be able to see this when you are in the field it will be like a light bulb will turn on and she will have it down cold
Question three
She will do it instinctively


The best advice I ever got about hunting with dogs came from my grandpa who hunted birds but I think it hold up for all dogs and it is this let your dog teach you how to hunt behind it don't teach your dog how you want it to hunt that is a sure way to ruin a good dog
Hope that help

[Donaye37]

Ok cuz sometimes when she is searching for the ravbit pelt sge will go towards where I started not where I ended, but I see that she will just have to get it. Wirh Q y what do you mean she will do it instictively?

[beagledog]

She will instinctively go after more game that's what they love to do

[Donaye37]

Oh I see. Sweet! Cant wait for her to get to that point where she really has that crave.

[bearpaw]

I would be cautious about training a dog to stop trailing when you want to go home. I like a dog that never wants to stop until he is too tired or until I catch him.

The more tuned in you get to getting to the game that your dogs pursue, the more determined and successful they will be. Of course I am coming from a hounders perspective and maybe beaglers look at it differently.

[Donaye37]

 so its better to just catch em and throw in the truck instead of stopping them from tracking so they always have that edge?

[bearpaw]

I don't like the idea of being able to call a dog off the track, it seems they would not have as much drive, I would rather catch the dog crossing the road or something like that. I don't have any proven explanation for that theory, it's just an unproven opinion. Someone else may have a different opinion.

[Donaye37]

Yeah ita logical, I like it. Sure hope ill be able to catch mine. haha

[Machias]

That is one of the reasons I stopped hunting hounds and switched to Leopard Curs, they can be called off the track or the tree, doesn't hurt their drive at all.  Hounds are bred to have one thing on their minds.  Drive that track all the way to the tree and stay there.  They have one mission in life, drive that track!! It's one of the things houndsmen LOVE about them.      Leopard Curs, no less drive, no less treeing ability, but they handle alot better and can listen when they are using their noses.  I have one right now that has a touch of hound in him and he is a knuckle head when it comes to the track.  Will not leave it.  I hunt with an older gentleman down in CA.  I have seen him dump four dogs on a bear track and they took off like they were shot out of a cannon.  He walked over and noticed cub tracks on the edge of the road.  He started hollering and called all four back and up on the box.  We treed a big ol boar about three hours later.  At that tree we had 8 dogs at the tree.  We took photos and loved up on the dogs and then he said ok lets go, they all left with him....not a single dog on a leash.  I have never been able to do those things with a hound.

[bearpaw]

There ya go, a complete different perspective about curs, I knew there had to be one. 

I can think of a couple times that may have been nice to call the dogs off.

[Machias]

The way the countryside, especially back east, is getting cut up into smaller and smaller chunks, those gravel throwing get deep coonhounds are slowly becoming a problem.  A closer hunting cur is the ticket for them little chunks.  Out west here the hounds probably still fill what most houndsmen desire.  Curs are certainly not for everyone.

[Arteman]

About question one, I've always felt if I let my dogs go and they were doing their job, and still moving a track, then it was my job to stick it out and never pull them off a track just because I was tired of it or wanted to move, however, I some circumstances like last year we cold trailed a lion down out of the forest in Okanogan right between a shop and a home, we retrieved them crossing a road.  I won't shock my dogs off good game.

[Arteman]

Question 2,  if you have a dog taking the wrong end pretty consistently that can't figure it out on its own then I'd get rid of the dog.  I had a female that on a very cold track would take the wrong end on dry ground occasionally, but if left alone she would always figure out the right end and move the track.  Of coarse in snow you wouldn't have this problem, ill always show them the right way.  I know some hunters like their dogs to figure it out on their own.

[Machias]

Lots of dogs will backtrack when you lay down a scent trail, that's one of the reasons I don't like doing it too much, it can create bad habits.  Most dogs will figure it out, give them a little time.  A few times you dump the dogs on a hot bear track they will initially take it the wrong way, but usually it doesn't take long for them to get it turned around.