BigGameHoundsmen.com

michael

You act as if a 6 month old dog wont do nothin. I start takin my pups for walks at 3 months of age. I dont really carry a rifle or nothin but I just like takin them for walks cause they like it. Last year I had 3 month old pups runnin rabbit pretty darn good then one day at about 4 1/2 months old two littermate sisters started a track and I about shit when a yote popped out of the timber and them two little shits ran it awhile before I could get them caught off of it. I was damn sure enough worried for them and my little girl was about to have a breakdown. Years back my old man and I were walkin a little 5 month English gyp and she started treeing squirrels. So dad said, "lets take that bitch for some walks at night and see what she does just for fun." You guessed it, she started running and treeing coon. About a month after she had started we took the rifle just for fun and tied her back and popped the coon out and made sure it was good and dead so she didnt get ate up and she dove right on it and that she was a tough one for sure. She could not have weighed much more than 30#'s yet. Dad hunted her about once a week or maybe once every 2 weeks for about the next 6 months basically just takin her for walks and hardly ever shot a coon out to her and she when on to make the most naturaly coon dog I have ever seen but she got killed really early in life. Anyhow, the point is that some of em just got it. That does not mean though that I would cull one cause they werent like her. I started my 7 month old July male on yotes last year with a couple grown dogs and within about 3 or 4 months he was running start to finish. Got chewed up a bit but he overcame it. He is damn near a finished dog this year for me.

By the way, just cause they win a competition hunt damn sure dont mean they are worth a pinch of shit.

I like dogs to be firing on something by 6 months, just show me they've got a little bit of fire. If I'm not seeing anything by a year or so I get a little nervous. When that second season comes and I'm not seeing enough progress, they don't stick around.

A lot if depends on how many young dogs I've got and how they are progessing also. Why put a lot of effort into a dud, when you've got another young dog showing a lot of promise. I will still give that other one chances, but I won't coddle them. I don't subscribe to the social services "everyone is a winner" type mentality, it's competition brings out the best and the others don't make the team.

with that said, I've had very few dogs that didnt' show me something by a couple years.

Nolte, I like that philosophy.

briarpatch

Ok Dan, I'm not saying that a 6mo old won't do anything, but expecting them to do something at 6 mo is ridiculous. If you read how the top trainers for years have been training their hounds, they don't do anything with them until around 8 mos or better. Every dog is different just like people. I can tell there are quite a few older guys whose minds still have matured past that of an 8 yr old. Quite a few of which can be found on hound hunting sites. I realize that comp hunting doesn't mean much, but the point I was getting at is there are great hounds that won't even look at a caged critter but will still tear it up in the trees. The two best hounds I have every seen started out at 6 mos and the owner said that he wished he would have waited because he could've wrecked them. Another of the best hounds that I have hunted with didn't really turn it on until 5 yrs old (that was a plott too by the way).

I agree with you on the caged critter thing but that sure as hell aint how I judge my dogs. I like dogs that can run a track and start tryin really early in life. Like dogs with a lot of hunt real early in life. Them pups that are bringin opossums into the yard by 4 and 5 months. Them are the ones I like. Tryin to catch rabbits and catchin mice and shit. The ones that when you take them for a walk they always seem to jump some game of some sort and run it whether it be a squirrel or rabbit or even a deer. I just hate pups that act like pups and try never to keep one like that and never would breed one that was an ass grabber at a young age cause I personally dont like it.

Dan, I agree with you. I don't like the way pups act, and I think we all want a hound that likes to ran around and chace critters at a younger age. The point I am getting at is it is absolutely asinine to cull a dog at 6 months. At six months a dog can be nothing more than a pain, but given another six months, they could turn out to be one of the greatest hunters you have ever had.

michael.magorian wrote:Dan, I agree with you. I don't like the way pups act, and I think we all want a hound that likes to ran around and chace critters at a younger age. The point I am getting at is it is absolutely asinine to cull a dog at 6 months. At six months a dog can be nothing more than a pain, but given another six months, they could turn out to be one of the greatest hunters you have ever had.

Now, I have to agree with you almost 100%.

Only reason I cull at that age or younger is for what I like to call neurotic behavior which it may not even be the right term for it but whatever the term I hate it and wont put up with it. I like calm dogs and certain lines just throw retards from time to time and I cant stand it.

You guys that want to argue about it being assinine to cull at 6 months, or state my dogs are no more than tools to me. I would really like to know why after all these years of breeding, that yours are not getting better, younger? i don't need a dog that will eventually, hopefully, maybe, get up enough courage to bark at a coon. I need bear fighters.
Dogs are the only canines in the entire world, that ever get a pass, because they're domesticated. I'll tell you this much, and if you don't understand it, well there's no hope that you ever will.

I DON'T DECIDE WHO STAYS AND WHO GOES AROUND MY PLACE, MY OLDER DOGS DO.

They set the bar, and draw the line, I enforce it. I am not keeping a dog until two years old, and turning them out with others that either need them to help out, or get the hell out of the way. the second I went into a bay and saw a dog not pulling their weight, I'm getting my collar back. it's not fair to the others to give out passes to culls, and I'm not waiting 2-3 years to see if a dog wants to start hunting. If I never had dogs that came undone at a young age, I wouldn't expect it, but my partners and I have them, breed for them, and keep only them.

You make these snap judgements from what you have seen or feed, not what is possible. This crap of giving dogs years to start proving themselves is an excuse, always has been, always will be. Sorry for your loss. If it were so assinine to cull at 6 months, or younger, anybody that did it, would be out of dogs. I don't give a rats, about compitition hunting, and I don't care how many trophies a dog has, you might cull mine for not being a super coon dog, but send yours on over and let me stick them on a shitty bear in the steep and deep, and see how they compare.

The next thing I'm sure I'm going to read, is you guys are actually breeding those dogs, right? Guess what you're going to get from it?

More of the same.

Guess what I get? more that will come undone at 6 months, or less and run, bay and fight along side the old dogs at a year or less.

And by the way, I'm very attatched to my "TOOLS" I really doubt many, if any, of you have been through what I have for your dogs.

If any of you young guys are reading this, don't let anybody out there convince you to keep a chinese tool, when you can go get a CRAFTSMAN, that works really damn good.

Deleted

Onalimb: Just curious what influences you to match your hounds for breeding
OH Wait there only PLOTTS
Now I know why you are so FRUSTRATED
Better- Younger Just never saw a 6 month Pup that was finished
Bring your finished Plotts up to BC we will run them on Grizz ,then tell me what you think

The statement about God putting me here to do something, was not ment to ruffle any feathers, or get anybody bent, and it was never meant seriously, it was meant in the manner that if I plan on doing something, I'll do it as best I can.



Bob Baldwin, I never said or saw a finished 6 month old either, and I'm not frustrated in the least, except for people that spew all the crap about giving dogs passes because of who or where they came from, and their own inability to recognize something at a young age. So anybody else that doesn't put up with the crap that they do from a dog, and won't agree to give endless chances, must be ruthless or cruel.
I have no long distance bay dogs to run on grizz, I'm not throwing them into a meat grinder and loosing any so somebody who has dogs that bay from 30 yards can claim a superior dog. Don't claim yours are pulling hair on the grizz in BC, because I know enough people that have been on them to know what lives and what dies.


You guys are funny to say the least, and all your posts make for one hell of an add for breeding or pups. I knew I never wanted any of what you had when I first posted on this thread.

So how come the best breeders/trainers don't even mess with hounds until they are well older than 6 months old? Instead of using a pirate nickname like onalimb, why don't you say what your name is and what line of hounds you breed and maybe we can hear from people who have hunted with or purchased hounds from you. You know beings you are the smartest breeder/houndsman that has ever hunted game.

True Blue, Deleted by myself

Read it all Micheal Magorian, My names been on my signature on every site I've ever been on.

Never said I was anything, except unwilling to put up with a cull, and who are these top trainers that won't mess with a pup until they are 6 months or more? Comp coon hunters like yourself I suppose.

Preston, I agree with alot of what you say if you want to catch and not spend a couple of years to rebuild a pack. I will make my decision on a dog during their first bear season after their a year old. The dog will have to stay in with the old dogs and be at the tree, treeing after a few hunts. The one's around six months, I will coon hunt them in the briar's with the old ones again. I expect them to get in and help the pack. I will decide by the end of coon season if they will be around for bear season. The ones that make it to bear season only will be there at the end of season if they are doing the things I stated above. I give them all of coon season to prove something to me and about half of bear season or their gone.