What age to start puppies in the woods running with older dogs?

[HOGMAN]

Yes sir, If I eventually get a good place to train puppies I will be doing good, I am eventually going to build a hog pen that is about 25 acres, when I do, I will be able to do like your explaining.. But until then I will just take them-- practice rigging and turn hogs out with them.. My pups have done pretty good in the past.. I have tried a lot in the past, I have an introducing pen that is it.. (All sight) and I fool around up there training bulldogs and trying to sort between dogs that my dad gets-- people give him.. I got a 300+ in the boar hog that will separate the men from the boys to train catch dogs only.. But before I take a puppy to the woods normally I will make sure they know how to lead- very well- (I take a lot of kids with me -sometimes so handle is a must) Make sure they know how to load into the box, and ones I rig I make sure they will do fine up top.. I take mine on average 9-10 mock hunts around my house and they do get to smell squirrels and deer... I have never had any of my pups run a deer at six months, (that is why I want to breed my gyp to your dogs) @Cajun.. My gyp run her first deer at 9 months 3rd time to be out of the pen, now she is one eyed. But the guy I hunt with he doesn't take as much time with his as I took with her, and she has developed into a hound.. I feel as if watching the puppies learning what their role is in the pack is more enjoyable to me than catching hogs all the time.. Its a pleasure to be able to watch hounds raised and growing into dogs, Good dogs are not born they are made.. The same hounds I raise almost all came from the same group of guys.. We try to better each other and our selves and our hounds.. We figured out over time that people tend to learn more and the guy who got me into hog hunting has been doing it for more than 25 years. He may not have the best old dogs, but he has the best puppies I have ever seen and had the pleasure to hunt behind- That is the only thing I have a question about on his training, is when he starts his puppies.. The rest I follow right behind him in training a puppy..

[Goose]

My pups get to run loose so by the time they are 4-5 months old they are running squirrels, rabbits, etc. They are using their nose everyday & learning how to get thru the woods. By the time they are 5-6 months old they have graduated to deer & I have to chain them up. I start running them in my 25 acre pen & by the time they are 7 months old, you can sure tell which ones have the nose to trail. I keep a running hog in there and nothing big enough to hurt them. I will start carrying them to the woods when they are 9 or 10 months old but will not put them on anything that will hurt them. I am going to pick their battles.Once they are 11 or 12 months old, all bets are off & they are running with the big dogs & by then, they know what the score is. Makes no sense to me to put immature pups on game like a big boar or a bear & get the snot beat out of them. That being said I know a lot of people that start their pups early on bear & they do fine. Everybody uses whatever way that has been successful for them.

That's my exact philosophy on it as well Cajun and I've seen from first hand experience how by letting your pups run loose for several months puts them up front quicker, I let mine run loose until they are harassing cows so much that they won't leave them alone or they're wondering off running something for lengths of time, by the time I feel like they're ready for a no holds barred hunt, they already know what's it's like riding and spending hours in a box, how to work a hog good, can already run a track, know some basic obedience, and know how to go with the other dogs, there's way more to it than just leaving them in the pen until they're 10 months old and hauling them to the woods, @ Hogman I have to disagree with you, yes good dogs are not born they're made, but GREAT dogs are born not made, there's plenty of lines out there that produce naturals, the type of dogs that take to your game of choice like a duck does to water, no they aren't born running tracks, they have to have somebody show them what's expected out of them but then the rest is up to them to learn and figure out with a little help, if you find yourself steadily having to train on a dog then in my opinion you need to find some different prospects or blood to mess with, you'll put yourself way ahead by doing so.

[Goose]

I guess I do it all wrong. My pups start going along hunting at around 3 months old and follow me to easy trees. Most of my pups will run truck to tree before they are 6 months old.

Attached is Rocket age 3 months and 13 days starting a lion track while i was collaring up. He stuck his nose in every track all the way to the top of the bank. He had followed me into around 6 trees before that so he had been exposed to cat scent.

Fella get off your soap box, this kid asked a question because he is wanting to learn something and folks on here gave THEIR opinion on how THEY do things with THEIR dogs, not one person said the mighty dhotmessler houndsman was doing it wrong by doing things his way. That's awesome that you have pups that do things to YOUR liking, that's what it should be all about is personal satisfaction. Pretty sure the title of this topic wasn't come beat your chest and tell us just how young you can get your pups in on game.

[HOGMAN]

My pups get to run loose so by the time they are 4-5 months old they are running squirrels, rabbits, etc. They are using their nose everyday & learning how to get thru the woods. By the time they are 5-6 months old they have graduated to deer & I have to chain them up. I start running them in my 25 acre pen & by the time they are 7 months old, you can sure tell which ones have the nose to trail. I keep a running hog in there and nothing big enough to hurt them. I will start carrying them to the woods when they are 9 or 10 months old but will not put them on anything that will hurt them. I am going to pick their battles.Once they are 11 or 12 months old, all bets are off & they are running with the big dogs & by then, they know what the score is. Makes no sense to me to put immature pups on game like a big boar or a bear & get the snot beat out of them. That being said I know a lot of people that start their pups early on bear & they do fine. Everybody uses whatever way that has been successful for them.

That's my exact philosophy on it as well Cajun and I've seen from first hand experience how by letting your pups run loose for several months puts them up front quicker, I let mine run loose until they are harassing cows so much that they won't leave them alone or they're wondering off running something for lengths of time, by the time I feel like they're ready for a no holds barred hunt, they already know what's it's like riding and spending hours in a box, how to work a hog good, can already run a track, know some basic obedience, and know how to go with the other dogs, there's way more to it than just leaving them in the pen until they're 10 months old and hauling them to the woods, @ Hogman I have to disagree with you, yes good dogs are not born they're made, but GREAT dogs are born not made, there's plenty of lines out there that produce naturals, the type of dogs that take to your game of choice like a duck does to water, no they aren't born running tracks, they have to have somebody show them what's expected out of them but then the rest is up to them to learn and figure out with a little help, if you find yourself steadily having to train on a dog then in my opinion you need to find some different prospects or blood to mess with, you'll put yourself way ahead by doing so.

Goose I agree with you 100% I think it easier for some dogs, for sure, but they need to have their fair shot of time in the woods, and if the dog comes out natural well good, but he will have to have fare shot of woods time-- that's what I meant about saying dogs are made not born. Some people expect for a dog at 1 year old go and bay their own hogs, I personally haven't seen many like that.. I will keep putting these puppies on hogs and turning them out on a few hogs.. I am looking into lines that tend to be natural, but theirs good and bad in every breed.. I feel like the plot breed Is the breed for me, they are pretty consistent.. I will keep raising my own and breeding into what I feel would better my line, but I am going to keep training these puppies until I get somewhere I can do like @Cajun --thanks for yall's time on explaining and discussing different things about younger hounds, I definitely learned something about training hounds- definitely seems like theirs something I can learn every day!

[dhostetler]

I want to take a moment to apologize on here. I have a low opinion of people who beat there chest. So if I came across as that my apologies I was simply trying to point out that I start my dogs young and wanted to give some examples.

[HOGMAN]

I want to take a moment to apologize on here. I have a low opinion of people who beat there chest. So if I came across as that my apologies I was simply trying to point out that I start my dogs young and wanted to give some examples.

Same here, if I ever come across cocky please call me out on it and let me know. Takes a real man to be humble.. we all do things different and we can learn something new about hunting everyday! At least It seems that way!

[Goose]

I want to take a moment to apologize on here. I have a low opinion of people who beat there chest. So if I came across as that my apologies I was simply trying to point out that I start my dogs young and wanted to give some examples.

No harm no foul, Hogman, Cajun, and myself all hog hunt with our dogs, there's several reasons it's better to wait and take your pups when they're older, number one, our game is ALWAYS going to be on the ground and ready to fight for life, if you bring a young immature pup or a pup your just starting and he runs in there and gets plowed and cut to heck and back by a boar with good teeth, or shook like a rag doll by a big sow, you stand a high chance of ruining that pup for good, this is not always the case but is one of the number one things we as hog hunters factor in and it's best to wait until the pups are physically mature enough to handle the hog and mentally mature enough to handle the situation, and I appreciate as a gentleman about your reply.

[double j]

I only hunt Lions, only went bear hunting a couple of times. But I let the young dogs go all the time lion hunting if they can keep up with the older dogs. 4 or 5 month old dogs only had to look for them a couple of times over the years. Your older dogs have to be pretty straight dogs and not get sucked back in towards the pups when the pups get stuck in snow or ledged up. I think it helps in the trash breaking when the pups have to keep up with broke dogs they kinda will go past deer ,elk, sheep and finally and hopefully get to a lion without getting into to much trouble. But I pretty sure I wouldn't turn young pups in on a bear race and a hog until they were mature enough to handle it.

[pegleg]

As a side topic. I've raised pigs in two strand electric fences in the past with zero issues . I'm betting four strands of electric barbed wire and a six foot swath mowed along the inside would keep any wild hog in. You might want to give them a while to figure out where and what that fence is before training dogs on them. But if it works as well as I think it would sure cut the cost of a training pen. But you'd want to get the best charger you could get ahold of. If any one tries it I'd like to hear how it turns out.

[Goose]

Peg leg there used to be a pen in north ms that was about 10 strands of high tensile hot wire that was several hundred acres and it worked well for the man, he would guide hunts and allow people to come hunt up there, had a bounty on a big boar hog in there, now that I'm thinking about it I'm not sure how well it worked for him, it wasn't open very long.

[pegleg]

Well probably wasn't the fence that caused the failure although I suppose it could have been

[bchoundman]

I like to have my pups on 30-40 bears before a year. My lion dogs i like to start around 9-10 months get them a couple easy ones then get them on some tuffer colder ones.

[scrubrunner]

Hogman, when u get a place u can let your pups run loose don't let their momma out with them. The last 2 pups I had, their momma would dig out and the pups would follow her off hunting before they were weened good. 1 pup was missing for 2 days twice, the first time a neighbor that lives 1/2 mile through the woods found it at her house the 2nd time it came home.

[justahunter]

I start a pup when it's ready to start . they let me know when they are ready . usually start them on bear at 7 months or so . coon and lion as soon as they want to go. If they get whooped off then off they go . it's part of my culling process. I personally won't wait a year for them to turn on . after having so many pups that start early I won't wait that long I will give it away .

[Goose]

Hogman, when u get a place u can let your pups run loose don't let their momma out with them. The last 2 pups I had, their momma would dig out and the pups would follow her off hunting before they were weened good. 1 pup was missing for 2 days twice, the first time a neighbor that lives 1/2 mile through the woods found it at her house the 2nd time it came home.

That's very good advice, right now I have a litter of some clay bred pups out of a cur hound gyp that are about 10 weeks old, I'm having to keep the gyp up by my house and the pups on a piece of my property just right down the rd, whenever I let her off the chain she'll cut through the woods and go down where I always keep my dogs and twice I've had them pups follow her off, luckily they had enough sense to find their way back home, they are fine as long as she isn't around and just saunter around being pups but as soon as she runs to them, almost as if she is rallying them up she'll take off and go make a big loop in the woods, scares the heck out of me because it's becoming more populated where I live now.