EAST TEXAS HOG DOGGERS FORUM

Take it are leave it.  Its up to you .

A word of advise if you got yourself a crew of ruff ruff dogs that is stopping and catching you a pile of big bad hogs dont mess with the breedings by trying to make them looser leave the damn things alone !!!!!!!!  I dont care if you are getting dogs cut are not if you are stopping hogs and catching hogs with those dogs leave em alone dont tinker thinking O I need to loosen these dogs up I am tired of sewing dogs up are tired of spending money at the vet.  The hardest thing in the world to do with these hog dogs is to get a dog just the way you want it not to ruff not to loose , its a damn chore buddy and that is experinced breeder talking.  I done it !  I was one of the ones that said damn Iam tired of sewing dogs up but yet we were nailing big hogs big bad boars and everything inbetween but I thought well I will knock some of the catch out of these dogs but not the grit well I sure nuff susceeded knocked the catch right out of them now they are gritty as hell but not gritty enuff and wont catch till the catch dog gets there if it is over 200lbs.  Dont get me wrong we still catch big bad hogs but I sure as hell can tell the difference in the stopping the big bad runners .  We are stopping about half the big bad boys running hogs that we was stopping and catching all the time before I done a breeding and knocked the catch out of these dogs .  These dogs are close to three years old now and damn damn good dogs but the stopping power is just not there on the bad bad boys like it use to be and its my own damn fault .  So now I got to go back and rebreed another liter to get them back like they were because the dogs I bred were getting older and these were suppose to replace them but now just dont have the stopping power I want in a dog like their mothers are fathers had, everything else is there but that .   I can only say their breeding worked it done what it was suppose to do and what I had in mind but its just not me. I just thought I wanted it this way .  I played and I have now payed !  Dont get me wrong we get our share but I cannot stand missing the big boys like this, not all of them but a lot of them we are missing !

This is what you get for thinking you want to change !

Leave it alone !

Experience talking right there, great post.

I'll take all them looser dogs you wanna get rid of  ;D

Well I can tell all folks one dang thing if you think you can keep a dog from getting cut you are in the wrong wrong wrong business !  Its gonna  happen one way are another and its gonna happen ruff , loose, catchy are what ever . So it Might as well be , while getting that big bad Mofo  tied and laid down instead of chasing them all over the country with no hog at the end of it and you still end up with cut dogs !

I gotta hunt these dogs now untill I can get the next group on the ground and back like they were.  Dammit what is that another two three years just because I thought I wanted a damn change ahahhahahahahahahahaahahhahaahahah.

X2 wished I had done that years ago also. Now I hate the looser baying dogs I have. I want my old catch anything under 200 by themself dogs back

I hear ya brother...

You ever think it's the other way around? The hogs are running so bad because they learn to adapt from years of dogs biting and chewing on their a$$?

Might need to breed more "run" into the dogs to keep up with the hogs.

Nope. Caught twice as many hogs with those dogs, and the buddies of mine still running them catch more seems like LOL. Not many hogs got away from the old pack all that often as I can recall. Plus I don't like rangey dogs. No need for them down here. I don't want to "run" a hog I want the hog CAUGHT! LOL

could be enough grit to push the hog but not enough to stop it...well heck I just repeated what Texashogdogs said.

hunt the one dog with the least grit and if it bays up turn in a catch dog with a few gritty curs...see if that works...

You must live and hunt where hogs are plentiful?

I used to run those type dogs too... hogs were plentiful and easy to catch. Thats not the case around these parts anymore... and evidently it's becoming a problem all over the place.

O am sure they have leared to run and adapt to all the dogs running and chasing them sure man you know that has happened no doubt .  But I can tell you one thing when we were running the right kind of ruff assed shuttem down dogs we caught way way more hogs and way way bigger hogs on a regular deal  and I didnt even run a catch dog .  I never owned a catch dog up untill last year are so and that was only because Cory and all my buddys run them.  Na man Am going back to the old style of dogs caught way way way more hogs and bigger in a way way less amount of time and trouble .  Run aint got noting to do with it these dogs can Run like the wind and all day long its the get in dat butt and stay there thats gonna get them stopped and caught on a big bad boy .

I agree with not trying to change a good thing but also believe you need to to take into considerations that the hogs are adapting to us also

Size of property is defenitely the issue for us... even on a 5k acre place, about impossible to contain a boar hog that wants to run with loose dogs...  I'd rather not be able to find one than not be able to stop him when I do

This is just me and the kind of country we hunt Iam sure there is different types of dogs for different types of country .  Over here if you ain't got the right amount of grit stop and some catch in them they gonna run all day long .  I knocked the catch out of mine and look whats happened and apparently when you talk about knocking the catch out of dog you are also sacrificing a ton of stop power the two kinda running neck and neck .  Knock one out and you gonna knock some of the other also that is what has hurt me .

(http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h152/travis1975/-popcorn-smiley.png)

Yup ....Lmao !  Ya its Brewing aint it !

about next month I am breeding a kemmer to a 1/2 redbone 1/4 pit 1/4 american bulldog to help put the brakes on these big boars...

What happened to all your old dogs? Seems like it would take a long time to breed that out of them?

Man, the line of dogs I started with were damn near straight catch by themself no matter the hog...  caught alot of hogs and got beat up plenty.. so bred my best gyp to a dog with no catch... not convinced of the results thus far... dogs hunt their ass off, but are trying to bay hogs that should be caught... plain and simple.

Next breeding, going back to the rough  ;)

TX, how long ago was it when you had the rough super dogs?  I had the same kinda dogs 15 years ago and caught piles of pork but them same dogs wouldn't do as well on alot of the places we hunt now days.

Very interesting posts.  I guess it comes down to the "style" of dogs a man likes.  I agree hogs have changed.  I think this also depends on the area that you are hunting.  If I had a lot of hogs and I could find very fresh sign, I would have some rough dogs.  If you hunted where I hunt you would see that sign is not always fresh.  It takes a cold nose dog to trail nad find the hogs.  That is why I use plotts.

yeppers ;D i am on the fence... seen it go both ways. loose dogs with tons of bottom run them for ever and rough dogs run them for ever. if a rough dog cant get close enough to put a tooth in one i dont see a pig stoppin for them.

sometimes with the real rough you catch one big one and go home... ;D ;)

Yep empty handed... without hogs or dogs. ;)

X2 Noah and THD

Guess I was always lucky when I had thoses dogs. I was never put out of commission longer then a few days. I had less dogs injured and cut up as well when I ran 2 or 3 on the ground togeather, and could and would bet money the hogs never got further then 50-100 yrds from where the first sound was 98% of the time. All the dogs I ever lost was to stupid errors on my part or being shot. I learned the hard way NEVER take just one catchdog you know you can depend on when hunting with somebody elses catchdogs. I lost one of my best ones due to that reason. Like I said STUPID mistakes on my end lost me more dogs then hogs ever have.

yea Bryant...close to 15 years ago I lost 2 dogs so went about an hour past where you live to look at buying a dog...I took a ten month old pup and he caught 4 hogs in an hour or so. They were all 125 pound pregnant sows but they didn't run far...They been running like that over here since the 1980's...seems like we had more hog hunters around here back then than now...

The same pup couldn't catch one by himself in my area at that time...

I haven't hunted every where but I've hunted several different places in tx ar and la and haven't saw a place that hogs run any worse than in woodville and coldsprings and we catch good hogs with gritty but loose baying dogs.

Maybe y'all just caught all the dumb hogs and the smart running ones are line breeding? Lol

yep... we are giving mother nature a helping hand...that's for sure...

lol  line bred runners .... stick them all and let the easy catches go.

Where we hunt we have to produce numbers to keep the places. When you quit producing they get somebody who can. Give me a gritty/catchy dog that can find his own hogs anyday. I will send you all the loose baying non gritty dogs I come across anyday. My best dogs have been 1/2 or 1/4 bulldog. Fixing to start breeding back for that ASAP.

  I know of a hunter not far from you at all. He has some real loose dogs, with lots of bottom. That mexican piles up the pork.

  I know of a hunter not far from you at all. He has some real loose dogs, with lots of bottom. That mexican piles up the pork.
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I know folks like that in my areas as well. They hunt high fences LOL. Or hounds and put shooters on the known trails LOL.

I still got them them one gyp is 9 fixing to be in heat.   The other two are 8 going on 9. Also got a grand daughter of the 9 year old her daddy was also the straight stuff he is the CO dog, she is just like her grandmother the 9 year old ruff and bad but she ain't bigger than 35 lbs because of the hard hard line breeding saving her for a brood gyp cause there ain't much of that blood left .   There is one pictular dog you can almost breed him to a full fledge Pit and I would bet if you had a liter of 9 ,  
7 of them would not catch and the other two might not never seen anything like it .  Puts everything else you want but boy you breed him one time to a bad ruff catchy gyp and you got a liter that will hardly touch a hog bay them all day long but the ruff catch is gone gone its back up and bay .  I bred him to two of the three females and every dog in those liters are back off bay dogs some will catch the back end  spin one but other than that forget the ruff ruff catchy stuff.  I have not bred many of these dogs just what I needed and thought I wanted but I will go back to the old style.  

I lost two dogs in ten years not bad for as many bad bad hogs they have all turned in.

As far as the sewing goes aint nuff thread at a grandmaws house . 

The races almost never happened just every now and then was not many that got away. 

Two - Three years into back off breeding it seems like it happens a lot but still get hogs and some good ones but the really really bad boys its a all day ordeal and still a lot of the times go home whipped.

I know a mexican not for from me to that piles up some pork if it is the same guy I sold him one of the best find dogs he has owned for 150 bucks a year later he some him for around 2500 bucks .  Known him for years if it is the same guy.

We pile up pork to am talking about the big bad dudes that get away .

Yep empty handed... without hogs or dogs. ;)
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Jim im fooling with two different lines of dogs. Both are known to hunt hard and have plenty of bottom. But one line is rougher than I like but dead silent. The other is gritty to stop one but will bay most hogs and not catch, only problem I have with them is most of them are open on track. I wana cross the two but it'll take years to get it all together like I want them to work.

Did you start your line or buy into it? Just curious...

There is just something I admire about dogs that will truly strike, stick with, bay, and work a hog.

Different strokes for different folks……

Most of the oltimers I started out hunting with, wouldn’t hunt a dog that would put their mouth on a hog or tear one up.

I always thought that mentality came from a different perspective, where people used their dogs to work their animals, whether that be to round up, mark, or sell. Most couldn’t afford to have their livestock tore up.

Some of the ol guys in my area still talk about what it was like to free-range and ear mark hogs. That’s always an enjoyable, but often a one sided conversation where I rarely speak, but listen for all my ears are worth.

Either way times are changing, use what works for you and enjoy your hunts…

JMO…

I hear you brother... but them big, flop eared domestics aint runnin' the woods like they were back in the day!!!

Its all changing, the hogs run more, get chased more, and they are smarter.  I used to hunt 1 or 2 dogs that would catch smaller ones, shut down and bay bigger ones.  Now seems as soon as one bark, hogs run before they can even be stoped, and will run straight threw another group of hogs.  There are so many hogs now they can easily run to another group of hogs, and break the dogs up.  Just when you think you have the right mix of bottom, stop, and bay, something happens and I am back to figuering where I lacking at in dogs.  One dog can make or ruin a hunt, too much ruff, or not enough, and trying to match the dogs up for the perfect combo.  I have one dog hurt rite now, and without him the races have increased.  But when he is in the game, if you add one more ruff, thats too much and they catch hogs that they shouldnt, and stand a greater chanch of getting hurt.  When I have added ruff, it also made the looser ones ruffer, they feed on one another.   If I put all the ruff ones together, I would only be going to a pile of leftovers.   And yes im hoping the get the super dog that has it all, but untill then its about a pack complimenting one another, easier said than done!

i here ya pain tex . i'm headed in with a longer legged hound cross this year but they still seem gritty enough to shut one down [i hope ] . but i never gave up my hard hitters just in case . i'll allways have a few of them ruff as cobb cats around . i was supposed to have dun bin at it but mom got sick on me poor oll gal had to spend her 80th birth day in the hospital . she's home now and much better so we'll see what the new dogs got this weekend or next

Jimmy, not the same guy.


 Good post Richard.

reatj81,

Yeah man its tuff real tuff to get it right it can take years and years to perfect and then one wrong move and you are rubbing your head again.  I think for sure Iam gonna take that little black male and get him bred to Blu .  T.H. says the stop is there in them dogs and that has been the plan for me all along to cross mine with his .  When it comes to hog dogs T.H.'s words are as solid as a 100 year old Oak Tree he  knows his dogs inside and out and then some , so yeah think I might just do that.

 halfbreed
Thats what I have done I have put some of that stuff up and back for a rainny day man you never know when you gonna need some thing like that I always got the real stuff deal close close just in case .

Jimmy i def think we are on the correct page.  And yes these pups have it all.

How dare you call him a mexican...he is Italian. I just broke the news to his brother a few weeks ago and he hasn't spoke to me since.

QUOTE from MIKE  "You ever think it's the other way around? The hogs are running so bad because they learn to adapt from years of dogs biting and chewing on their a$$?"

Might need to breed more "run" into the dogs to keep up with the hogs.

The problem is biting and chewing, not catching and holding. If dogs are gonna catch, they need to commit and hang on. If they bite and chew without catching they only educate the hogs.

Another point about the catchy dogs. I sometimes hunt with a very well known and very knowledgeable hog dog hunter. He made an interesting commit about me wanting catchy dogs. He stated basically that I would get more injuries but would catch more hogs in the same time period than he could with his bottomless curs. I saw this first hand when we hunted both dogs. While he was busy following his dogs to a bay, we had two hogs already tied before he ever found his dogs and their bayed hog.

x1000... ;DIMO this has been the biggest challenge when it comes to hog dogging...we might have the right dogs for one type of terrain, move the same dogs to a different terrain and they are the wrong dogs for that area...sometimes a good (specialty type) me too dog added to the pack is what will get the job done...most of the time a me too dog can't find a hog on its own but will follow the strike dog to hell and back...

This is what my grandpa said about dogs back in the 30 and 40's he would use one or two dogs to bay up groups of hogs and ride his horse in and pick up the shoats with a rope cut em and mark em and the dog would never have to touch the hogs. The horse would watch for the sows and put a foot in her ribs if she got to close. This was around Woodville Livingston area. If a dog put teeth on hog he culled it.

Back in the late 70's and 80's there were alot of doggers that worked hogs (catch,cut) and only harvested what they needed.
When i was a kid I never had a tracking system just plain old school ears and eyes.
When dogs would bay we would walk in and catch what we wanted. I don't remember having all these hogs running like today.
Our dogs were gritty but mainly bayed tight.
The old timer that I started dogging with would  not go for a dog that was straight catch unless he was on a lead.

Now what I've noticed over the last 15 years is there is alot more new doggers hitting the woods with not the OLD TIMER beside them teaching them the better ways to handle dogs and the woods.

Todays world most doggers are harvesting every hog they catch,Over time (IMO)this has educated the hog population.
We have caught the majority of the old school stand,bay,fight,etc......hogs and the ones that have adapted to running to no end have survived.
I have the amount of dogs that I do because I have ruff,loose,straight catch, and Im always trying to add to the pot and everytime I get outrun I go hours on end the try and figure out a new  stratagy.
If we all had everything figured out it would not be any fun,This is what keeps our intrest up is how are we going to produce the perfect hog machine.
When someone figures it out please advise ;)

I had a couple of young doggers I met over the weekend at the local feed store and got to talking hog doggin and they were very arrogant young men.
They proceeded to tell me that they never have been out run by a hog and catch 5 to 6 hogs average every night they hunt rolleyes
I sure hope they don't think Im that stupid the believe that BS.

I just gave up, they were probably 18 to 20 yrs old and knew everything and have seen everything in the woods.
I learned when I was young that you learned alot more by keeping your eyes and ears open and the big mouth shut.

Just thought it was funny.

makes me sad to live in that generation, hope you fellas dont think that of me :angel:

Fixing that only comes from years of putting your foot in your mouth. Lol! After a while you just learn to shut up and listen. This is a great post, and my eyes are open and busy. ;D

Let me say I have also met and hunted with a few young men and ladies that show the upmost respect and really want to learn.
These are the type young hunters I will go over and above to make sure they are heading on the right path.

I gave away more dogs that these kids could not afford because I knew they would be treated and hunted with respect of the sport.

Not all the older hunters know everything but most have seen alot more and can maybe get the younger hunters going in the best way.
I still learn something everytime I unload my dogs.

I have been both routes and ended up keeping a pack of each for a while. The looser dogs always seem to outlast the rough dogs in the end though.

Joey

There is just about as many different ways and different dogs as there is different people.  This post was put here to try and help some people that might find it useful when they are thinking of going different ways when they already have good dogs and are catching tieing big hogs.  The pasture is not always greener on the other side and it only takes one slip to mess up what great stuff you already had maybe not mess it up but put a dent in what you already had that was a close to flawless and you imagined .  I bred dogs for a long long time not cur dogs but bulldogs and I can tell you it only takes one breeding to pull out the good things just as much as one breeding can put in good things and most the times if you are not careful even with hard studied and much thought about breedings things can throw you big time curves.

Breeding dogs over the years I have found out that its not so much the bloodlines to worry about but it is about finding the right and correct clicks between two dogs once you find those clicks you need to breed them to the wheels fall off because this is were it is at .  I doubt very serisouly if a man ever has but maybe one perfect dog in his life time I know I have had some great ones but only one stands out as the perfect dog and the catch to the story is I didnt even know how he was bred and no one else did either !  He was found at a road side park sitting on a picnic table the greatest damn hog dog I ever owned are seen and becaue I didnt know how he was bred I never even got a damn pup out of him because I didnt want to breed him into my lines of dogs even tho he would burn every damn great bred dogs ass up in my yard when it came to finding baying holding and shutting down any size of hog he found hogs with other dogs could not  !  I have kicked my self in the ass ever since to damn proud and stubborn to take a chance might be the biggest mistake I have ever made !  He died  on the run stuck in the neck  under the cut collar chasing a big 275 lb boar hog that it took me two years to catch after he got killed !  Needless to say he taught me a golden lessen breed to the dog not the paper and if you got something good dont mess with it  !

BarW, my Grandpa tells me the same about them Free ranging hogs in the lufkin area when 59 was a one lane road. a piggin string is what they used to pick up the pigs from the ground into saddle. He also has other good stories too!

Italian my butt.


     I Wouod rather loose a few hogs then have to doctor dogs all the time. Rough dogs get hurt.

I sure like watching dogs working hogs its a pretty site spinning hogs .  I imagine the hogs back in the ole days were not near as bad as they are today with everybody and their cousins chasing them.  Times changed shorter land bigger badder meaner running hogs because we are not trying to herd them are drive them but catch and tie them are shoot them and so the hogs change with times with that being said as the hogs change and adapt also being culled by everything from mother nature to all of us chasing and culling them the hogs get stronger faster meaner and everything else so  the dogs have to change to adapt to the hogs in order to stop them bay them and catch them.  Am not saying ruff gritty catchy dogs are better than any great loose baying dogs but I like them better and for my situtation shorter land to hunt pissed off farmers I have to have them plus Iam 50 years old and dont want to go on long races if I dont have to. If I had 10,000 acres to hunt it still would not change for me I still would not want loose baying dogs and long races and thats just me Iam sure others feel the oppsite and have different situations there is not a thing wrong with it at all.


Its just the times .

I've run loose dogs that have bayed 25 + hogs in a group. And that night they were Superdogs in my book and theres nights I chased these same dogs miles and miles and never get the hog to stop and bay long enough for me to get there with help.

Then I've run my rough dogs and caught hogs quick and home by 10pm and that night they were my superdogs.
I've also had these same rough dogs get cut down so bad I was questioning them ever to hunt again.

If a hog is going to bay he will and alot of times make average dogs look like superstars.
In my book a team of dogs that consistantly produces hogs is what Im running rather its loose,rough etc...............

You're hunting areas constitute alot of times what kind of dogs you can run and be successful.