EAST TEXAS HOG DOGGERS FORUM

whats the best time to go hunting like from midnight til it starts getting hot or late in the evnings

Summertime...definitely nite hunting. I use to start at 11-12 at night. But this year it's been 3-4 in the morning. Thats usually the lowest temp your going to get and it Still gives you plenty of time to hunt (5-6 hours) before it starts heating back up.

Use a trail cam to figure out when the hogs are moving best on a spot then go an hour or two after that until they change their patterns

Anytime I get a chance to go is the best time whether 25 degrees or 105 degrees I'm gonna drop a dog.

we use game cameras alot but it seems to never fail they always change there pattern when you  decide to go catch them espically if its a boar hog or you catch a totally different hog than you have own camera that happend to use monday night i carried puppies to catch a bunch of shoats and we bayed a pretty good boar hog he whooped our butt pretty bad then own the way back we bayed the shoats and caught two so i guess my puppies got a good lession

Whenever ever my wife says get boy go on out of here

Lately for us if its a cooler than usual morning, that small window has been 3-5am. I see no sense in pushing dogs... To me that's a senseless way to lose good dogs and for what reason? Also, if the weather is cool enough to hunt w the moon, that's the way to go!!

If I'm not at work it's a good time

Ol Yeller bayed hogs and cows during the day in the summer time with no problems...  ;D

Threads like this is where I like to hear from the old timers and others that sure enough use their dogs as tools day in and day out...

I doubt the men who work their dogs on stock as part of their living just quit during the summer or worked stock at night...

Ha!! Yea, I don't believe everything I see in movies. ;)

During summer on the main place I hunt I have had my best luck after midnight. With the majority of time the best hunting being after 3 am. By daylight if u haven't found em u more than likely aren't gonna. Unless u find them in a corn field. This isn't saying I may not run across a sounder at 12 noon 50 yards off the highway in the shop yard. It has happened. This year tho lots of folks I know have been doing well at daylight till about 9. Myself not so much.

It's been hit or miss in Setx for us... But I try to be in the woods by 5-6 am and hunt til 10 or so or 7pm til whenever.. Even on the trail cams I have set there's no consistency with the hogs now that its warmed up.... But on another note if I gotta weld pipe 60 &70 hrs a week during the hot summer.. Mister you better believe that I expect them dogs to earn their keep also wether snow is on the ground or you can fry eggs on a pine stump.

From midnight to 5 is when I been startng and hunt to 9 or 10

I know what you mean, I see alot of people on here that frown strongly on working dogs during the summer and while I see what they are saying I can't say that I agree with it completely, regardless of who says what I strongly believe that it all boils down to conditioning ......... My personal dogs are not conditioned to the hunting in the heat due to my work schedule so naturally I do not hunt them during the day in the summer time....thats just common sense BUT there are guys on here who use their dogs 24/7/365 with out issue. The man that my dogs came from works cattle and hog hunts year round, 4+ days a week every week and so do his dogs, I have asked him in the past about the heat affecting his dogs and his response is that he is out there working and his horse is out there working and if they can than his dogs can and will to........it all boils down to common sense in my opinion.....I wouldnt bring one of my dogs out there to work with him and his dogs during the middle of the summer because they simply aren't conditioned to it but to say that he is wrong or ignorant for using his is simply asinine.

I like your style BA -I V, its always time to work the dogs the true cowboys like Ben Jordan and the ranch hands down in South Texas will tell you the same dogs have to work when no matter what the temperature is or they don't need that dog!!!

I run oil wells all day and run across more hogs crossing in front of me around 10:00am till noon.

I think the best time to go hunting is after a rain.  I'll hunt anytime of day and year, don't matter (wont hunt the swamps and bayous with gators in the summer).  Summer hunts must be places where there is at least a small amount of water.  I hunt an all plott pack, these dogs have no quit and don't come back until I go and get them.  This is a dangerous situation in the summer months.  My dogs wont just go a couple hundred yds and come back. 

Hog hunter, I have been interested in getting a true Plott dog to put in my pack. Give me a call I would like to know more.972-878-3095

I sure hear a lot of what some of you folks are saying.... And JUST passed some Amish headed from beeville back to their place via horse and buggy. No matter how you look at it some folks rely on their dogs, horses etc.. to make it through day to day.

As much as i wished i could run dogs to make a living i don't. (Darn-it) ;) so i really couldnt even begin to fathom what all is involved w all of that but would love to learn.

Conditioning is a very good point, but also prob the style of hunting you do is a factor, for example, some of our friends run cut vests on all of their dogs bc they run a rough pack. Type of field or brush may also be something to consider, regarding how thick it is and how much of a breeze the dogs get or don't get. And water on the property DEFINATELY helps, minus them big lizards that come w most of the water around where we hunt.

I guess the things to consider are never ending!! But common sense for your dogs is what it all Boils down to! There's nothin I love more than a day hunt bc I absolutely LOVE to watch the dogs work but still durring this time of the year, it's too dern hot for our pack!!!! I would hate to lose a dog to over heating, so night time it is!!

I have a question? What are these stock dogs doing during the day? Are they herding, fighting, busting brush and chasing cows full speed for long periods of time. Or are they riding in the truck, trailing a horse, putting a stray back in herd time to time, or pushing cows thru the shoots for limited periods. The reason I ask is most folks I know with cow dogs don't work them all out 5 hours at a time but short periods with the majority of the day either riding in truck on wheeler or just kinda hanging out.

I do know if u leave hunting dogs to their own vices during summer they will run at night. Most times rolling in bout daylight till 7 or so. I'm not talking bout the dog that got out tha pen or off the chain. I'm talking the dogs that run loose from Jan till Oct, our walker dogs did this for years running deer. The cooler it got the more they ran during daylight.

I will run my dogs in the daytime during summer but the dogs hunt better when night when it's a Lil cooler. When I do run during daylight In the summer I watch dogs closer and try to be sure to get ways to get plenty of water.

I'd like to old yeller burn ones ass up for 10 or 20 miles in 100 degree heat.

We ain't rounding up Grandpa's woods hogs anymore...

Lol not sure i follow?

Ya a real cattle man is real careful about when dogs and horses are worked in the 105 Texas heat. I'm not talking about day workers making 150 a day I'm talking about the boss using dogs to take the place of paying hands. They treat them dogs like they need em. Without the dogs those men are paying boys to take their place. The true cattle men I know today use dogs from early morning till it gets ridiculous hot. They also swap dogs out a lot. They don't rely on 3 dogs to round up rough cows all day in 100 degree heat. IF THEY NEED THEM. now I'm talking the men that pay not the ones that get paid.

I would like to see old yeller burn ones ass up for 10 to 20 miles in 100 degree heat.  ( reference to earlier post )

I quit you win

 The cowboys today have all the bells and whistles like helicopters and four wheelers. Down in South Texas from Pleasanton down to the boarder my family and friends had 100,000 acers plus and yes ran dogs hard all day in 100 plus weather during the summer months with 3 to 4 dogs all day long, busting brush and working rough stock without much breaks most days never lost a dog due to heat but thats what they were used too. I can compare running dogs on cattle this way and running dogs on hogs because I have done both and yes their are times when it is a higher level of intensity but not to much more.

Im glad someone else knows what im talking about.....helicopters dont work in southeast texas for roundin up cattle and it is still very common for guys to work cattle from daylight to dark with their "old yellers" and thats a simple fact.

I think what he is saying that ole yeller wouldn't be worth a crap on todays hogs because hogs are different.

Your right it is very common still... We gonna work about 200 head of mommas startin around day light in the mornin and I can assure you that those dogs will be used from then till we load the last calf on the trailer.... It's all about conditioning and what you expect from your dogs..

Well said.

Ol Yeller could do it...  his color says it all...  :D