That's a good one right there…

The light running vest…
Sometimes a gritty dog that has learned to watch itself through experience can still get in a bind…caught between a bank and the hog or in thick brush or too many dogs piling on…one of those scenarios could get the dog killed or crippled for life…the light vest is good protection…it minimizes these issues and the dog learns to respect a toothy hog because the hits hurt and the pokes are small but forceful…
Some rough dogs will eventually get reckless even with experience…

My experience is that those type of pups will need a light running vest…sounds like he is on his way to become a really good hog dog…

The early starters...its a pleasure to have one cast alone at 3 to 4 months of age…they don't know what they are hunting just yet, it's a natural calling because they are born to do it…those are going to be the good ones…
I’ve read it on here a few times where coyotes have killed a few pups and I think that was going to be a good hunting dog one day…just last week I was talking with someone who came by for a pup and he had lost one to a coyote just recently.

I do like a hunting dog that rolls out alone and I like it best when they all pack up once a dog strikes…but if   they hit a hot track on the way to pack up i’m ok if they take their own track…I don't care for it but that's what good dogs do…

I like casting the dogs and once gone listen for the strike and them driving as close as possible...it’s more a combination of casting and roading…the idea is to develop the all around strike dog…

Cast dogs that will take a colder track has a lot to do with the type of dogs we hunt…it also has a lot to do with how we hunt them as to how cold a track they will take or how they will cast and hunt…when I hunted quite a bit with folks that hunted the way I hunted my dogs, my worked colder tracks…it’s all about bringing out the best from our dogs when we hunt them and that is my main focus when hunting with them…

I have a friend that I’ve given excellent quality pups back when I hunted quite a bit and we hunted together at times…so I knew some of those dogs should hunt as good as mine…they were good hunting dogs but because of his style of hunting his dogs lacked a few qualities they should have been good at…

He doesn’t really pay much attention to the wind when casting nor his dogs for that matter…he drops his dogs and rolls out on the wheeler or ATV…they don’t cast as far unless it’s a smoking hot track because they are more worried about keeping up…they don’t pay much attention to hog scent in the wind unless it’s fairly strong….and won’t take a hot track…but my dogs would and because the breeding was close to the same they should work about the same…the difference wasn’t the dogs but the two different hunting styles of the dog owners which was and is way different from one another…like the total opposite…

A cold nosed dog that casts, winds, drifts and finds quickly is hard to beat in my opinion….this dog is a well balanced dog that will take a decent track and put a hog at the other end of it…

I prefer cast dogs that can take a decent track and warm it up….if moving along the dogs are circling or crisscrossing and checking in at about 15 minutes without slowing down as they pass through…they are hunting the wind currents for hog or hog track scent….drift on track looking for the hotter tracks and then go…

If not moving along the dogs will cast pretty far looking for hog so it is best to keep moving when we can…

I don’t care for a cold nosed dog that is not a good cast and find dog…a cold nosed dog that casts, winds, drifts and finds quickly is hard to beat in my opinion….

I agree 100%. I want it all in a dog but one think I won’t do is beg one to do its job. I suck at training dogs so it better come natural or they don’t eat my feed.  Once you own a good one to set the standard, you won’t feed much else. 

10-4 on that….

Sorry to hear it…I’ve been hog dogging for almost 45 years and in the last 2 years or so have seen two illnesses I haven’t heard of before…its cost me 3 good dogs…

IMO if a dog has a ton of hunt, if it can smell a track its going to go. The terrain might wear a dog out thats not used to it or make it more likely to get injured etc but I bet it would still hunt.


I forgot his name but the ole boy that used to post tons of toothy hog pics was in real rough terrain, he always shot over the bay bc he said a lead in cd like most of us use wouldnt make it 3 hunts out there and I believe him, hilly, rocky, and every hog out there was toothy.

That would be Jesse Paul…in his part of the country he didn’t like to use any kind of vest on a dog on account the type of vegetation in his area is bad about hanging up the vests…that was before Garmin tracking but I suspect he still feels the same about the vests…no doubt about it he catches lots of toothy boars…

I also agree with what you said about a good dog…a good to great hunting dog can hold his own most anywhere if given the chance to acclimate…size can be an issue depending on the type of terrain…

There for a while I thought fish antibiotics were exempt from being made illegal for selling without a veterinary prescription…looks like they are being targeted and they could possibly be shut down…government is slowly taking control and our freedom is in jeopardy as we know it…

Excellent post Birdslayer86…

The problem I perceive happening in breeding better hunting dogs are several…

Some folks have different standards as to what a good to great hunting dog is and breed accordingly…and that is why there are so much inconsistencies when breeding hunting dogs…

Someone buys a pup with a few grand champions in the pedigree and pay lots of money for the pup…the pup doesn't make a dog worthy of breeding but gets bred anyway to recover some of their losses…

It's not easy finding a top-hunting bloodline that hunts as we like or with the consistency that we like…

And it is getting harder to find big enough places to hunt and train…this in itself is a challenge in proving dog performance for many hog doggers...

Good hunt T-dog…as usual your dogs performed well and sounds like that pup is on its way to making a good hog dog…

Excellent story telling and good hog…I could see the dogs working in my minds eye…

Sounds like excellent dog work…losing those dogs is a bummer, sorry for your losses…
I’ve lost 3 in the last year or so…one from a small puncture wound where a rare type bacterial entered, another from an even rarer bacterial infection and the catch dog from what I believe a twisted gut…the two strike dogs were boar stopping-catchers when working together…

IK think a lot of today's walker dogs are hotter-nosed on account of competition hunting...hotter nosed dogs get on hotter tracks and that is man-made evolution and not mother nature at work...

I've had a Kemmer Mt Cur gyp wind hogs where the walker acted like he didn't smell hog... the same with working out tracks...

But there are many good walkers out there...

Winding;
I believe many dogs can smell what other dogs smell and that some dogs do have a colder nose…but the winding response, I call it the winding trigger, comes from the brain and it is genetics at work…some dogs have a hair trigger and for others, the smell in the wind needs to be strong to get a response out of them and there are lots of variations between no trigger and a hair trigger…a colder nosed dog that is a good winder can pick up the scent on hogs a mile away…but I do understand their limitations after all they are dogs…we all know that if the scent in the wind is strong most hog dogs will blow up in the dog box…sometimes we must assist the dogs for them to succeed…
Below are a few examples of when the dogs need a little help…the better winding dog jumps off the deck, goes in the thick brush circles, and comes back and tries again…as the handler, I analyze the situation and can see the problem…the dog can wind the hogs but once in the thick brush he loses the scent and that is why he is starting over…a dog does have limitations when it comes to reasoning…so I look past the thick brush and about 3/8th of a mile or further and directly from where the scent is coming from, looks like it could be holding pigs…I turn into the wind and as soon as we get past the thicker brush the dogs pick up the scent and go…
Another top winder with a colder type of nose…we are about to call it a day and are headed back to the trucks…the dog puts his nose to the wind but does not react other than I interpret his interest as possible hog in the air…I look into the wind and can see a cane patch about a mile away…mostly salt grass between us and the cane…we turn into the wind and once we are about a quarter mile the dogs start moving to the cane and water…the dogs have limitations and sometimes we need to assist…some have said the dog was smelling hog close up and the hogs had moved to the cane…I am pretty sure that is not so. The dogs would have reacted differently if that were true…

Striking;
I wrote my thoughts on winding first because I do believe the better strike dog will have the better nose and they are more inclined to use it for locating game…the difference between the great ones in a league of their own, and the really good ones is brain power…the brain power gets them quicker to game location…most will never own or observe a once in a lifetime dog but there are quite a few great hunting dogs out there but even those are not as many as we think there are… 
The good ones will have a higher level of brain power which comes in handy on where and how to search…the nose will be a little colder for finding and locating older tracks, and they will use the wind to locate and start older tracks as well, they will also drift on the tracks to find the hotter end which gets them on the game…these dogs can make it look easy…
There are lots of other variables that were left out on account of this thread being a little long…I left that to others who want to add comments on genetics, heart, etc…etc…thanks                                   

I agree T-dog…

T-Dog...I'll do my part in helping you tame the crickets...

I bought Yeller’s dam, Dragon Lady as a pup along with several of her siblings. Smoke was the best of the male pups. He made an outstanding strike dog about as good as a hunting dog gets so I thought…
I bred Dragon Lady to a well-known brindle cur from around this area out of black mouth curs but it so happened he was a dark brindle…the reason for using this stud dog was simple enough. I wanted more size and a quieter mouth…the mt curs had lots of hunt and bottom, at 10 months they could run all day and most of the night and didn’t mind hitting the water…the first time I took them out they were exciting to watch swimming in the marsh checking out the salt grass patches for game…
Once Dragon Lady’s pups were born I started testing them and about at 6 or 7 weeks of age, I started running drags for them in the back yard…Yeller would lead the pack when running the track…at about 9 or 10 weeks I ran a “J” track and then doubled back and cut across to a five-gallon bucket, set the drag in the bucket, and turned the pups loose…as usual Yeller led the pack, he made the big “J” and doubled back and cut across to the bucket and stood up on his hind legs and was looking in the bucket at the drag…that about blew my mind…
Yeller was a laid-back kind of pup most of the time but would play hard at times with his siblings. I took him hunting when he was around 4 months of age, maybe a little younger…I cut the dogs loose and set Yeller down expecting him to follow us along…my brother and I walked about a hundred yards and I looked for Yeller before we got too far from the truck…he wasn’t with us so I told my brother to wait while I went back and got Yeller…about that time I heard a splashing from the slough up ahead, I shined the light and it was Yeller running back from making a lap…running with his head up and looking from side to side…well my adrenaline went to pumping is all I’m going to say about that…from that day forward that pup was unbelievable…at times when 10 months of age Yeller would out strike Smoke whom we thought was unbeatable…at a year old or so Yeller was in a league of his own…
Yeller and Smoke competed hard against each other…I gave Smoke to my brother on account that he needed a good strike dog, but it seemed I still owned Smoke because Greg and I hunted together quite a bit.
A quick example of a difference between Yeller and Smoke…we came across where a bunch of hogs were feeding on acorns and pecans…probably a large area as the hogs will spread out…Smoke hit the feeding area and opened a few times as he searched for the exit tracks…Yeller had the inclination to make a wide loop and was on the exit tracks in about a minute…he just knew how to find the hot end…
The things that impressed me the most about Yeller were between the ages of 8 weeks to 6 months…I thought a pup shouldn’t be able to do what he could do in that time frame of a puppy's life…
I’ve had at least 5 or 6 dogs as good and better than Smoke but none Like Yeller…Yeller was in a league of his own…Yeller was my once-in-a-lifetime dog…I thank God for allowing me to have him…he taught me what the greatness of a once-in-a-lifetime hunting dog can be…
Even after the years went by, I was having trouble describing or defining the difference between Yeller and the above-average dogs I mentioned…because these other dogs are pretty phenomenal at times and do a good job each time they are cut loose…
One day the answer occurred to me and it was very simple…it’s the brain…brainpower is what sets a once-in-a-lifetime dog apart from the rest…Yeller also had a colder nose from what I could see…and that colder nose helped him to respond when needed…in his older years, I saw how he used his nose to get first strike…we cut the dogs loose and he would make a big lap…if he came back you can bet no hogs in the area…covering lots of ground and dogs are hunting well…all of a sudden Yeller leaves out because he is smelling hog the other dogs aren’t smelling…by the time the other dogs are picking up on the scent Yeller is looking at the hogs and baying…brains, nose and the natural ability to find came easy to him…