Those older dogs look like they may have Plott in them, especially that older female with the big round flat ear.

  This is and has been a good thread, going back through the history of these dogs has been a pleasure to me.  Thank you guys and keep up the good work.

Good hunts with good people are always fun and rewarding in more ways than one.

   I guess everyone likes to catch a real good boar, me included. But the dog work is in finding them and getting them to stand bayed, and since good sows don't kill or maim dogs maybe we should shift our preference.  The hogs I like the least are the briar patch shoats.

  Some really good hogs, and as you said a steady diet of them comes at a cost. Sure hate to hear about the loss of dogs, they're not automatically replaceable, but I'm sure you guys will weather the storm. Hog dogs and bear dogs have a high risk occupation.

  In hindsight I think I lost a Plott female to chagas before I'd ever heard of it. About 3 yrs. ago in the Texas Hill country we bayed a good Boar hog, not a monster but a good hog in an almost impenetrable white brush thicket. My gyp got hit at the back of the ribs barely visible injury but was sored up a few days and went right on. Some time passed and she seemed to gradually lose all stamina, just couldn't hang anymore, was not old either. I laid it off to the injury received from that hog. I had her staked right under a pole light while there, supposedly the light attracts them, and the timeline somewhat fits.
 That pole light was on the edge of a juniper thicket that the Mouflon sheep regularly bedded in to avoid coyotes when they had lambs so there was the draw of the lights and a steady meal available
 The dog that was sick not long ago is sick again after seemingly a full recovery, I haven't seen any of the kissing bugs, here but on the "chagas map" Oklahoma is listed. I don't know if he could have had it all this time "since the Hill Country trip" and just now shown up with symptoms.    With there not being a good cure, and no vaccine I don't plan to have him tested.

  Sorry for the double post, didn't realize the first one went through.

  Sure hate to hear Ol'Sketch has a serious illness, on the upside even if she doesn't make it through it she's leaving quite a legacy. She has spawned you a good strain of dogs that should last you for decades. Not all dogs that make good ones, are able to reproduce. Seems to me she has excelled on the ground and in the brood pen.

 Sure hate to hear about Ol'Sketch being seriously ill, on the upside if she doesn't make it through she is leaving quite a legacy. Started you a good solid line of dogs that should last you decades.

  In the year or so I've known him he has gotten more critical and harder to please with dogs. That's a good thing, he's hungry for more knowledge and better potlickers. He is getting along real good with the pups from the Cajun program, has taken them 4-5 times now. He's starting to sort through what he hears or has heard according to what he sees and be able to pick out what he can use for his own opinion.

  He's wanting to get a mule and hunt more with me, he was looking to buy a good mule ready to use. He works on a ranch, rides and ropes, pretty good cowboy, due to the cost I have encouraged him to find a 2-4 year old mule that is unbroken and make him a mule. He thought my mule was great and I explained to him I hunted on her at night the fourth time she'd ever had a man or saddle on her back, rode her where I wanted to go, led dogs. and jumped a fence or two. It don't take long at all to have one useable, and from there on out they just get better. With his skills I could coach him through the first 3 or 4 days and then he could just stay after it for a month or so, in no time he'd have a good mule of his own without much money tied up.

  I used to have an extra mule for Lisa, Chelsea, or visitors but he aged out. He was actually given to me and was supposed to be a man killer, I told them I didn't want someone elses problem but finally they said just try him if you can't use him sell him in the loose horse sale and we'll split it. I gave in and went and picked him up, came home tied him close and solid to a tree and saddled him, I'd been told when you cinched him and stepped back he'd have a bucking fit. I had leaned up a 5 foot sorting stick just for the occasion, when I stepped away he jumped and kicked one time, I didn't even have time to grab the sorting stick.
  I led him out in the county road, grabbed the headstall, pulled his head around to me and stepped on expecting the very worst, he left in a running walk up the road. I didn't go far and came back and hooked a big tire and rim to the saddle horn right out in the road and took off, he didn't try to run away from the very noisy tire like many do, I pulled it off both sides of the saddle didn't bother him at all got back to the house. Chelsea was 8 yrs old had been riding her own horse (not a kid horse) for 5 years but she'd never saw a mule and was having a fit to ride him. I told her this mule is supposed to be bad you don't need to ride him yet, she kept on and finally I said alright but if he bucks you off you better not say a word, I pitched her up on him and off they went no problem at all.
  After this long winded tale that was totally irrelevant to the original post, I can say that mule was just misunderstood and smart enough to know who he could take advantage of. We used him here for many years everyone rode him, but if a stranger was going to ride him I'd saddle him before they got here so they wouldn't see him act up, and be afraid of him. Sometimes he'd have a pretty good fit, I could scold him and he wouldn't do it but it just went with him. He had some scars in the girth area, I figure whoever started him had ridden him really raw and that made him cinchy.

 He's just a good, kindhearted young fellow.

  A package arrived here from a young fellow that's a friend of mine, "Colt Humble" we've hunted together a little bit and talk on the phone often. Months ago he'd mentioned he needed to get him a good sticking knife, so I referred him to Cajun and told him Cajun hammered in the finger guards and they were pretty cool.. I had also told him it would be good if he could get some pups from him. They got together on the phone and he ordered him a knife and some pups, unbeknownst to me he ordered me a knife as well that arrived today sheath and all. A really good set up, about a 6 inch blade with the forged in finger guard. Thanks to Colt and Cajun I now have a really nice new sticking knife.

                                                                   

                                                                   

 Congratulations Slim, on the hunt and the journey you've made with your dogs.

 Condolences to you and yours.

 They're doing more and more, usually have to put them up in their 5th month.

 Dogs baying 2 hogs after hunting hard, new catchdog's first appearance looked good and no injuries, can't complain about that.

 That was a scruffy looking hog for sure. Do you vest all your dogs?

 We have 3 Plott pups loose around here that were 4 mths old a week or so ago and in the last week or two I have been hearing them bark down in the woods, I figured they were trying to run a rabbit. Yesterday I  heard them across the road in the brushy fencerow, they sounded treed, I got to looking and the little idiots were treeing on birds, they'd be looking up at one and barking then when the bird flew further down the fencerow they'd follow until it stopped or they saw another and tree some more. That went on forever. Never had any do that around here.
  Monday my wife brought home our girls long haired chocolate colored Aussie dog because she was going to be out of town for a few days, those pups had their hair stood up and were raising cain, they kept getting closer to him and he wouldn't go with Lisa for being leary of the pups, after she got him in the pen they bayed him  for 2 hrs with me running them off periodically with the BB gun. Don't know how that will translate to baying hogs or treeing bear but it has been comical.

  Thank you'all.

 There are no discernable differences in their behavior or working traits, I have bred the black ones but never black to black. Best I can tell that is a color gene only, probably recessive and occasionally links to present as dominant.
  At the moment I have 2 black pups not old enough to work, they are from 2 different litters, one is all home breeding the other is a three quarter home breeding from a female that was out of one of my males and another strain female. That total outside female had 3 or 4 black ones when bred to my yellow male. When I get them at home there is usually just 1 or 2. Long term I usually have from 1-3 on the yard.
 I don't mind them at all but don't breed for them since that's not how I found them but don't consider it when evaluating them. Some folks that see them prefer their color.