Porkie's

[HardHittin]

During breeding season of Porcupine's they used to have this god awful sounds.
Hows the porkies in your area.
Some things shouldn't breed A liar for one and A Porkie
They are about gone here Northern Calif and with a little help they won't get reinstateted.
Matt

[Kevin D]

I remember sitting in a tree stand bow hunting one time and hearing a strange call coming from a bush. Eventually, a porcupine came wandering out so they apparently make that noise in the fall too.

I've been thinking of leasing out my dogs to the fish and game for their annual porcupine survey. Yep, the DWR is sure to get an accurate population count from DNA samples on the quills they collect!

[BKMFR]

I know alot of guys don't like porkies. However, I would bet that porkies make up about 50% of our bobcat's diet. I really dislike it when people randomly kill them, I think they are really hurting the cats.

[TomJr]

Porkies are not so bad, after all dogs can only get hurt by one if they do the attacking... Just train them not to bother those nasty things.

[Hummer]

I remember sitting in a tree stand bow hunting one time and hearing a strange call coming from a bush.

Hey Kev, are you sure it was a tree stand and not a motel room down the road from Hawn's??


In my neck of the woods it seems like the fishers are cleaning house on the porkies more so than the bobcats. I think the cats have moved out looking for more porkies cause lately its way easier to find fisher tracks than a cat track around here.

I think every dog I have owned has got stung by a porkie at least once and a couple of the "smart" ones got it a couple times. Sometimes I swear the dog knows but it just has to get that one last sniff a little to close and WHAM!!!!

[Buddyw]

Porkies are not so bad, after all dogs can only get hurt by one if they do the attacking... Just train them not to bother those nasty things.

Don't stop typing there Tom.. My ears were just perkin up ready for you to explain more..

Kevin, If your dogs ever need a Rest for a day or two. Give me a call.

[TomJr]

Lol I dont have any magic way to train dogs off game I don't want them on. But I do spend alot of time with my dogs and they learn fast that way. Just expose them, in a safe way to the game and give a correction when they show interest, same as for anything else. Porkies are slow so you should be able to either show them one in a tree or in a trap if need be. I have always just used treed ones to teach mine.

I noticed you have a porkied dog in your icon... bet that was fun to pull all those out.

I do remember one of my first dogs being abit hard headed about porkies though. After the 6th time of trying to pull quills out of his nose and some was way deep in his gullet. I had to realy "correct" him to get him to stop looking at them. Anyhow after that he never messed with them again. (I don't have shock collars so was using a switch and yelling at him)

Now days I get on it right away and don't even let them get the taste before I put a stop to them even looking at a porky is a no no. Same with Deer and Chickens. I have my dogs running loose in 10 acres of Fenced orchard along with chickens and once I get them trained that chickens are off limits its all good. The chickens even act as live bait for foxes and bobcats once in a while

[SECOND NATURE]

first of all i would have to say to me the only good porky pine is a dead one i will not let one live as long as I'm alive before anyone who finds them beneficial decides to jump all over me for my opinion let me tell you why
Reason #1 when i was a teen training young dogs in a local farmers corn field when the young dogs treed i went to the tree and forty feet up at the top of a hemlock was a coon so me being the youngest my brother talked me into climbing it and shaking it out for the pups i did got within five feet of it so i could really shake threw my arm over a set of limbs where one of those"nastythings' was hiding got my back covered with quills from the middle of it clear to my right shoulder for those that do not know quills are barb and will pull them self's threw tissue every move you make with a muscle and they go in a lot easier than they come out ..!!

Reason #2 I had a nice young hound that was speck bred she was only 5 months old we was walking an oak ridge looking for a bear to run the pup was just there for exercise did not expect what happened to happen she was a ways out ahead of us just be bopping around like pups do she threw her head up blew up stuck and took off when we got up there the hole pack struck and we ran a small bear in a hole the pup got bit in the head by the bear luckily it was small it shook her up some but she was fine she was turning into one of my best going all the way every time you ran her till the first time she every screwed up she found a stinking useless quill pig. she tried to eat it she was covered inside and out i was guiding when this happened cost me my hole weeks pay at the vets and figured it was worth every penny two weeks later i went to feed her and was still pulling quills she died that night vet said a quill must have found a way into her blood stream.

reason#3 as long as i have been cat hunting i have run across deer kills turkey kills rabbit kills and have never seen a porky kill that i would consider to be a cat kill in my life i even shot one by one of my cat baits and they never touched it but still ate the other bait I'm a taxidermist and i have found quills in there skins not real often i always figured it was from them crawling into a porky den trying to escape my hounds never figured it was from eating one as i said this is just my opinion of what i deem a truly useless animal and know one will ever change my opinion and still vow to kill every one i see until the day they start giving birth to bob cats..I will normally just read what you guys write and try to keep my mouth shut but i just could not let anybody express there opinion on them with out expressing mine sorry! (Lacey RIP)

[SECOND NATURE]

"I really dislike it when people randomly kill them, I think they are really hurting the cats."

i really can't believe this is even posted on a big game web site i truly despise them so much i seldom will even talk to anyone about them i wrote more to day just venting i do not think of them at all until i am killing one of those dam things........ I like cat hunting more than anything and if i believed i was hurting the cats i might try to change but like i said above i have seen no evidence of it...

[cecil j.]

During breeding season of Porcupine's they used to have this god awful sounds.
Hows the porkies in your area.
Some things shouldn't breed A liar for one and A Porkie
They are about gone here Northern Calif and with a little help they won't get reinstateted.
Matt

AMEN on them axx handled chewen son of a bucks leaven everyweres !

[snowy river black and tan]

I do taxidermy work on the side also and I rarely mount a lion that does not have quills. (we have a lot of porkys) You still wont see me letting a porky go. There is plenty of deer to eat.

[cecil j.]

first of all i would have to say to me the only good porky pine is a dead one i will not let one live as long as I'm alive before anyone who finds them beneficial decides to jump all over me for my opinion let me tell you why
Reason #1 when i was a teen training young dogs in a local farmers corn field when the young dogs treed i went to the tree and forty feet up at the top of a hemlock was a coon so me being the youngest my brother talked me into climbing it and shaking it out for the pups i did got within five feet of it so i could really shake threw my arm over a set of limbs where one of those"nastythings' was hiding got my back covered with quills from the middle of it clear to my right shoulder for those that do not know quills are barb and will pull them self's threw tissue every move you make with a muscle and they go in a lot easier than they come out ..!!

Reason #2 I had a nice young hound that was speck bred she was only 5 months old we was walking an oak ridge looking for a bear to run the pup was just there for exercise did not expect what happened to happen she was a ways out ahead of us just be bopping around like pups do she threw her head up blew up stuck and took off when we got up there the hole pack struck and we ran a small bear in a hole the pup got bit in the head by the bear luckily it was small it shook her up some but she was fine she was turning into one of my best going all the way every time you ran her till the first time she every screwed up she found a stinking useless quill pig. she tried to eat it she was covered inside and out i was guiding when this happened cost me my hole weeks pay at the vets and figured it was worth every penny two weeks later i went to feed her and was still pulling quills she died that night vet said a quill must have found a way into her blood stream.

reason#3 as long as i have been cat hunting i have run across deer kills turkey kills rabbit kills and have never seen a porky kill that i would consider to be a cat kill in my life i even shot one by one of my cat baits and they never touched it but still ate the other bait I'm a taxidermist and i have found quills in there skins not real often i always figured it was from them crawling into a porky den trying to escape my hounds never figured it was from eating one as i said this is just my opinion of what i deem a truly useless animal and know one will ever change my opinion and still vow to kill every one i see until the day they start giving birth to bob cats..I will normally just read what you guys write and try to keep my mouth shut but i just could not let anybody express there opinion on them with out expressing mine sorry! (Lacey RIP)

second nature/ I had a walker dog whod kill ever friggen skunk he come accrost in the valley and not ever get no stink on him/ infact some times hed quite a tuleys slue coon & swim accrost the channell go upon the slue levy and kill a skunk an then i`d see him swim back accrost and go back on and tree up the coon. I quickly got enughf of that ole mess and leashed him nd walked back on the slue ditch levy and each dead skunk I come apon hed killed I grabbed it up by the back feet an wear it out over him and tell him bad dog/ skunk
Then up in the mtns. some times hed cold trail and cold trail then get the track warm and shutt-off barks and come back with several and more quill in his muzzle and on his cheaks! I`d find the dead porkey and hed chew-out their belly portion. Then I desided too brake him and I did there was just one more porkie and the dog had hust 1 quill varley in his nose and I corrected him a final time. he gave that old busness up.
I had a redboe he just turned 2 yrs old a month earler and I went on a wild coon hunt with a cast of about 6 people watchen my dogs and 1 other guys dog I askedtoo hunt with me. The 7 month ole english hound I owned was a direct offspring of Hard Time Speck x Kaeshnars Tinna and he had just won a cast UKC hunt and so everyone wanted too come along too see a puppy out of 2 hounds that between them held close too adozen ACHA,UKC,LITTLE WORLD hunt winnwes in this pups first 4 genortaions of papers. Cause he treed a coon solo his very first solo when went too the foothills and I pleasure hunted him. I gave Dough Wattson oc Cowdersport Pen. # 750.00 18 months befor they made this same 3 ed crossing of Speck x Tinna.
Well this pups name was Wattson`s Great Gizmoe and he had jumped a porkey 1 time befor and I had spent 40 minutes with pliers and a pair of small sizzors taken quils out of Gizzmoe. So we turned loose and This boys walker pup out of Shortys Ranger dog strikes and my old dog 25 months old don`t even go check him out,but my 7 month old does and we shined down into the tuleys on this foothills creek hunt and there is a porkey and I hissed my pup real good and he killed that porkey andthen hurd my redbone trailing and working on up the creek so he flew off and cought up too Ole Hank and put in and this kid was borrowing my tools from the truck his pup had em in his mouth all around his face and he went with his pup back too the truck/ the black hunter with us went too catch his 2 dogs up on the hill off a deer track and the 4 other fellows as cast judges and ontorouge and me followed my 2 worken dogs and wenttoo the tree up. They had 2 coon setting up a oak tree and the pup couldn`t close his mouth an was gaggen but blowen on the trr over 90 bks a minute. I leased them and said I got too go too the vets cause this pup must have half that porkey in his mout in quills and face/ how he can breat is behond me ?
We hot rodded and made marrysville and met the vet who came down by a ph.call from my wife back in sacramento and we carried my pup in and he gave him a shot and put him out and pulled 2 handfull out of his trouth,tungue and lips and gumms. Then he took a whole bunch off the dogs face and around his eyes and in his nose/ he kept Gizmoe for 2 days too makesure he was ok. He said I got him to his office within 30 minutes or less from death!
The other hunter with me said he guessed his dog would die then cause he didn`t have the money to have the vet save him. The vet said bring yourd dog in here from the truck and we did and the vet,the dogs owner and me all 3 started worken together on the walker dog and got em out and he carryed his pup home/ that was my pups 2 ed and very last porkey he quite that ole mess.
Ya know I go was back into the middle 70`s then again in the early 80`s too them 2 instances too see in the woods/ but what I never experienced and just hearing bout the story of porkeys maken some strange scream sounds I was just cheated not too get too relate too/////////////////////////////////////1 but with it starting on the Big Foot fourm by some body sayen they hurd a porkey doen that and mateing while doen it, and maybe that the screams someone mistook for a big fot/had me fell out of my chair and dyeing with lafter an tears. I just thought that was a hoot, if it happes darn I wished I`d of hurd it just too experience it/ I believe its possible cause nobody is goen too bethat honest too putin print something that cute and funny !!!?

[Paul Conway]

I missed the night the fellas had to pull quills for hours while three fellas held the plott down and one pulled. Seems no matter how many are managed there's still more! Paul Conway.

[Kevin D]

I remember one famous internet hounsman once boasting that he'd never had to pull porcupine quills out of his dogs..................and my first thought was it sounds like he needs to breed a little more grit into his dogs...

[BKMFR]

second nature. Yeah your right......I've never thought about it that way. I know I've had a great young hound killed on the road while hunting. I believe that it was by a ford. So, I've decided that everytime I see a ford, I am gonna use your logic, and really work it over good with a ball-bat. That should make the roads alot safer for hounds and really teach them fords a lesson to boot! Here all this time I thought you were supposed to teach the dog to stay away from the trash......not teach the trash to stay away from the dog! Thanks for the advice!