Walker Problems.... Anyone have some good advice

[nmplotthunter870]

I recently acquired a five month old female walker who comes from parents who are awesome lion hunters. This dog has zero interest in roll cage animals. I've put her on a cage with my four month old Plott and her brother; they will going ape s$%# and she will just walk off smelling the flowers. She will walk up to a cage coon, sniff it, but as soon as it growls and lunges, she takes off. My question is: Is there anything that I can do to give this dog some drive or is she just not going to be a hunter? I realize that I got her a little late, I always start my pups playing with a skin when they are super young.

[dirtywalkers]

some times dogs dont care till there are older my pup didnt care till almost 1 and now she will catch a coon by herself and she just turned 1 and didnt take intrest till 8 mnths some dogs just take longer than others

[Bearkiller]

Late? Give her some time. She's still young.

[BuckNAze]

My lead dog didnt look at a coon at 3 months old, tried him for a couple weeks then at 3 1/2 months old he saw a bear on the ground and went ape $hit. After that he helped catch a coon on the ground at 4 months give. Some need more time and sometimes you have to let them mature at their own pace.

[BOSS HOG]

maby shes just a late starter, 5 months is still pretty young, i wouldent give up yet. try tieing her back where she can watch and let the other dogs have all the fun

[nmplotthunter870]

I'll try that. Keep her tied up while everyone else rolls around. That way she can watch instead of finding other ways to occupy herself. Thats a good idea, never thought of that. When I said I got her late, I meant that I didn't have her as a tiny pup that I could play tug o war with a skin. Was also thinking maybe I need to give her more time to bond with me and the other dogs; she still acts pretty insecure.

[dwalton]

What do you plan to hunt with the pup caged coon? Just maybe if your not going to hunt cage coon she might make a good dog. Just maybe everybody puts a lot of meaning into what a pup does with a cage coon that means nothing about hunting the dog. Sounds like a good kind of pup to me. The one I would pick for what I do. Dewey

[nmplotthunter870]

No interest in caged cats either.

[plottpappaw]

i'd just let her be a puppy. when you were 2 did your parents expect you to mow the yard? walkers that i have dealt with when started young burn out around 2. also i had a dog one time that woild mess with a caged animal of any kind but he would sure trail a bear and fight one.

[coop74]

My 7 month old wont even bother with a caged critter.But you can watch him start trailing one.My female bear dog, never showed interest in cages or drags,winded a bear.Treed it, been running on her own since.

[Lil Joes BigGame hounds]

I can understand your frustration. But having a dog bark at a caged coon wont make that dog want to trail. Which is what you want to put your time and energy into. Im guessing you live near some coon country. So just take that young dog out for a few hours a night and see if you can bump into a coon. As she gets older she will start putting it all together. Some dogs take a while dont give up. If she came from proven dogs then you have half the battle won. Just keep showing her tracks and she will eventually start hunting.

Well off to take some of my own advice. Good luck! let us know how she improves.

[nait hadya]

I recently acquired a five month old female walker who comes from parents who are awesome lion hunters. This dog has zero interest in roll cage animals. I've put her on a cage with my four month old Plott and her brother; they will going ape s$%# and she will just walk off smelling the flowers. She will walk up to a cage coon, sniff it, but as soon as it growls and lunges, she takes off. My question is: Is there anything that I can do to give this dog some drive or is she just not going to be a hunter? I realize that I got her a little late, I always start my pups playing with a skin when they are super young.

she is probably wandering off looking for something to hunt. five months is way to early to quit on a hound,five years maybe...

[Cold Track]

It seems that about every three months someone comes on here with this same dillemma. I think a lot of people are so excited for their new pup to hurry and grow up so they can start to hunt them. It's hard to have patience, but that is what's needed to some extent. If it's a year and a half old then I'd worry. Someone already said it in similar fashion, but you can't expect your five year old to play basketball with the high school boys. First off, most of the time your doing this training in an area away from the pups home. It's not comfortable and probably even big eyed and scared to these strange surroundings. Secondly the pup's probably there with a bunch of other dogs screamin at the trainer and that might scare the hell out of them, let alone this strange animal that is lurgeing at them in a cage. And some pups just mature slower and that's not interesting to them even though there littemate might be coming apart. Myself, I try them and if they don't fire at 5 or 6 months, I'll try the cage deal next month. I like it better if they'll show interest in trailing something and use their nose. If you watch a pup and its manorisms you can kinda see what ones are ready. By nine months they better be hangin with the older dogs, at least not too far behind. I think as far as a caged trainer goes, I just do that so they can get an idea that this smell that might interest them belongs to that trainer in the cage that may also be exciting them. Then when you go do that turn loose those two things together might be stashed away in their brain. Hell a poodle might tear a cage apart, that don't mean they're going to trail a lion! These opinions and ideas expressed are mine and I am not responsible for you thinking I might know something! There's my sorry two cents on this .

[dwalton]

Cold Track: Good post, well said. Dewey

[larry]

If you don't have any attachment or much money in the dog, cut your losses and get something that acts the way you want. Why not have a dog that does everything you want???? If it doesn't have the drive and desire at a young age, doesn't have the instinct already there without you holding its hand, let somebody else wait for it to do what it should do automatically. Wanting to kill a caged coon definatley doesn't tell you everything you need to know about the dog, trail/tree for example, but it does tell you some things about the dog. I know of 3 5 month old littermates that got the cage door open on their own and proceeded to stretch a 35 lb boar coon, before the owner could get there it was over, granted, this is not a common everyday occurance, and doesn't mean they are gonna be ace's at everything, but it's sure not a bad start to build on.... do you want to start with promising behavior or discouraging behavior?

One more thing to consider, you keep workin that walker next to 2 plott littermates, that walker is just never gonna look as good!