Local Famous Dogs

[Ike]

By famous I guess a hound could have been held up as special by locals and/or have been in a video or written about in magazine articles or books. With that said, I can name off dozens of famous dogs that gotrdone time after time, when the chips were down and their performance made the difference whether a hunter tagged a tom lion or not.


Labrum's Dunny dog centered under this tom lion and Skeeter and Red to his right, the later two hounds were owned and hunted by Duane Freston.

Labrum did a video on VHS back in the mid-ninties called Hound Dog Heaven. He probably still has a few of those tapes kicking around, but the video was done to promote his guide service and sing the praises of the hounds that ran down tom lions for his hunters, and there were plenty that he put on film. Dogs like Chief, Sly, Dunny, Sqaw, Rowser, Junior, and the list went on and on. Labrum also had lots of friends help him out on clients and some of their dogs that were note worthy were, Bones, Red, Leo, and the Ike dog which was one of the Boren hounds.


Photo by Dennis Ingram
Photo of Labrum's Junior dog out of Chief, photo was on the cover of Full Cry, a double page spread in American Hunter Magazine and used in Outdoor Life.


I was in that group as well and many of you saw my LionHeart, Ryan, Ike, Rowen and Choco dogs in action. Dogs are made famous by people like us telling others of their deeds or worth--it's those hounds that make the game we chase special!

ike

[BuckNAze]

Ike, was that second dog a full B&T, or did it have a little some extra mixed in? Great picture for sure!

[Ike]

I've had lots of people think that Junior was a black and tan hound, but he was a plott cross that belonged to Shawn Labrum. Acutally, probably only a 1/4 plott. Lasbrum picked up a pup from a guy that came from CJ Prock, which was a plott dog, then he crossed it into a bitch he got from Hal Mecham I believe, and Junior came from that cross. My LionHeart dog came from a litter mate sister of Juniors, and her name was Sqaw, so I guess LionHeart was an 1/8 plott?


Sqaw, another Labrum hound that came from the Chief dog and was the damn to my LionHeart bitch.........

ike

[rzhounds]

The old dunny dog pictured above was also a Hal Mecham raised dog, actualy dunny was raised and also trained by Hal, if you notice the brand on the dogs left side was Hal's old brand, I heard the dog was one heck of a dog in his day. The way Mecham explains it, that dog was pretty old when Labrum got him. All the dogs mentioned above I heard was good suckers, I have heard from a lot of guys the old Ike dog of Boren's was the best dirt lion dog they ever seen, most of them say still to this day they aint seen a better cat dog, living now or past, and I believe it because I know for a fact no one around here has a dog that has seen as many lion's as the old Ike dog of Boren's, because there just isn't that many lion's to see around here the last ten years. I forgot to mention that old dog in my earlier post, because old red and white Ike is probably the best cat dog to ever live in the basin, and that is just my oppinion from what I have heard about him from a bunch of different people. I don't know how they get any better than that, well probably because they don't...

[Ike]

I hunted with both those dogs, and they were good lion hounds for sure. Red was a pretty good bear dog. However, I wouldn't say those were the best two hounds that ever came through the Basin...............Matter fact all of those hounds were good open ground lion catchers and if one excelled above the others I didn't pick up on it.

ike

[rzhounds]

I don't know much about the red dog, my post was about the Ike of Boren's because thats the one I've heard the most about. All I know about him is what I have heard, and thats that so who knows I guess. When I was younger I went hunting with the Ike dog one time and he trailed an old lion track a long ways, clear to where another hunter miles and miles away had already killed the tom, it was pretty neat to see that old dog trail that chity tom track that far, I was young so it made it that much cooler, I remember telling myself one day I hope I have a dog like that, good learning day for a young boy..

[Ike]

Good enough rz, and I didn't mean to shit on your memories that you grew up with. My comments were to point out that lots of people had some damn good hounds, and Labrum was certainly among those people. Labrum dug down and tried to get it done for his clients, had some tough dogs and lived through some tough hunts. I can remember him running everything he had ragged and borrowing Ike, Bones, Red, Leo or any dog that would finish his own track attempting to finish up for a client. That's what alot of guys never understand, and that's a guide goes out day after day and beats his dogs and equipment up until the job is done. If those guys hold out for mature toms, and the conditions are chitty, then a guy better start every killer tom he finds no matter how old that track is. And if a guy does that it isn't long until his dogs are all used up.

I just finished up hunting a young man on bear. His father and him had ran lion hounds for fourteen years, and done alot of horse back hunting along the way. They told me they had killed some really nice tom lions but hunters hammered that population until they walked away from the sport. The father told me that he'd caught bears before but wasn't a bear hunter. They were good people who loves to hear the hounds run and loves the sport, and I worked my butt off for them because that is what I do. The father told me after the kill that he'd never hunted with anybody that put out more effort, and I suppose he was taking about all day long day after day, rigging, getting out and finding the tracks and measuring for size, then driving on until a good bear was found and the job was done.

But what do I know cause some people claim I'm only an Internet hunter...........

ike

[Outlaw 3]

My Black and Tan Bandit has a pretty good name around here. He tackles the cat when I brought him home at 6 wks old. He was treeing his own coons when they were bigger than him and was completely broke off them by 6 months old. He struck his first bear track from the inside the dog box before he was 6 months old and before he had ever seen or been turned on a bear. He won the American Plott Association Tennessee Plott Round Up hog bay at 7 months old. He struck, trailed, ran and bayed for 8 hours, then treed a bear before he was raising his leg to piss. The other 5 dogs we turned loose with him quite the race after 6 hours. He also won the Virginia Bear Hunters Association Bear Bay the only time he ever entered it. He got chewed up almost everytime he was turned loose for the first season and luckily survived to get a little smarter and a little less chewed up. He was only the second black and tan I had ever hunted with and the only one around when I got him and now there are pups out of him in a bunch of yards around here and few in wisconsin. He had a natural desire to please handles like a dream. He is house broken naturally but he doesn't stay in the house. He is gentle as a mouse and lets my wife's cat sleep in his house and share his food. He is faster than most dogs he has ever been hunted with. Will tree all day and night even if he completely looses his voice. He can strike out of the box and trail and tree what many can't smell on the ground. He still has the grit and desire to get the job done after countless bears. He seams like he appreciates each one more than the last. I appreciate the opportunity to brag on him as you can tell. I have a small section on him with some more photos on my site outlawhounds.webs.com

I received him as a gift from a girlfriend in college when he was less than 6 weeks old. She paid $50 for him.

[patch]

mark's ike dog was anice dog .But my old Mister dog and Mark,&Bruce's dog Lacy did all the catching for alond time

[BEvans]

I have been racking my brain trying to decide which and who had the the most famous dog that I knew about. After reading some of the other replys, it sounds like there are some really good dogs and good handlers out there, but I still could not decide on which dog I thought was the most famous. I looked up the word famous in the Webster dictionary and it said famous meant "widley known". So from there I figured the most widely known hound in the Uintah Basin would have to come from the most widely known houndsman. I have hunted New Mexico, California, Arizona, and quite a few different mountain ranges in Utah and it seems like no matter where I go after talking to different people on the mountain and they find out where I am from someone will always ask if I know Hal Mecham. When I was hunting on the Lal Sal mountains this fall, there was an old man with the last name Garcia cutting up trees he had fallen in the road, after talking for a few minutes and looking at the dogs he asked if I knew Hal Mecham, he said that somewhere around twenty years ago he tagged along on a bear hunt in the Lal Sals with Hal and Jerry Boren. Hal is now 61 years old and has ran hounds for the better part of 40 years. I decided that Hal being the most famous houndsman I now about, would have had to owned the most famous dog I knew about. It seems like whenever I am talking to other houndsmen that have been around awhile and Hals name gets brought up, the old Gunner dogs name shortly follows. When I was younger Gunner was the most talked about hound around. He was mostly known for how aggresive he was on a bayed bear. One story I remember is a couple of guys said they seen Gunner being drug threw the oak brush upside down by a bear. That sounds pretty awesome. Hal said that he owned Gunner until he was 15 years old and had seen him when he was 17. During the 15 years spent with Hal he created quite a name for himself. Gunner was hunted as hard and seen as much game as a hound could possiably endure during those years. I know back in those days Hal was taking alot of hunters and traveling all over to try and fill is clients. I would have to vote that Hals Gunner dog is the most wildly know famous hound I have ever heard about.

[rzhounds]

Brad I would have to agree with you 100% for hounds and houndsmen around the basin you hit the nail on the head. Hal's not only a good good houndsmen but gives a realy good testimony of his faith in God and is not bashfull about it and to me that is the neetest thing about him, Hal Mecham in my oppinion is truley a living houndsmen legend, and has taught me tons and tons about hounds and hunting.

[Ike]

I've spent a lot more time visiting with Hal over coffee than I have hunting with him, and that will never change as I load my dog box full and have more interest in hunting my dogs than having a companion while afield. However, Shawn Labrum tells me there was a time when Hal Mecham was as tough a man on a lion track that ever lived. Hal and Labrum both told me about a time in the eighties when his pack of dogs would stay in an open bed pickup truck and not come out until he called them. I can only guess that's the days that Hal hunted his Gunner and Red dogs. But Mecham told me himself that those dogs were the real deal and I have no reason to doubt him.

I remember Mecham telling me a story about his days in Cedar City when he and another guy had killed a dozen or more lions. He told me that he had had a lion carcass dragged up where each dog could get their own chew and a local hounddogger followed him into camp. The two visted awhile and then the guy notices that each hound had it's own lion carcass to chew on and he turned to Hal and said, "damn, can't you save a little for seed?" Hal told us that the guy left before he could explain that another guy had ran down and taken half of those lions. Nevertheless, Hal and his hounds were known in those days as a crew that could getrdone, and getrdone they did!

ike

[rzhounds]

Very good reply Dennis, I have hunted with Mecham a lot and he is the real deal not a better lion and bear hunter around IN MY OPPINION and is truley a good friend.

[bigboarstopper]

There was a man by the name of Pete Scardina in Monterey County California. He must be in his late 70;s to early 80's now. He was one of the first men in california to run dogs on hogs. It was done the ole fashioned way on horseback in the national forest. He ran a very popular guide service in the 60's 70's 80's and early 90's. I cant say that I knew the man personally but his plott hound blood is still around and his dogs were making his living for him. I havent seen a plott hound in my county that wasnt out of his blood line. I cant say I really knew any of his dogs but the bloodline sure carries his good reputation.

[Ike]

Ol' Shawn Labrum had a plott cross years ago that he named Chief and was suppose to be a pretty good dog. Rumor has it that if that dog started snorting and blowing down a dirt lion track that all a person could see was a cloud of dust after he left...................

ike