Austesus
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« Reply #40 on: September 27, 2021, 11:10:46 am » |
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Lol the cooler is actually a pretty neat idea. Luckily I’m slow at work right now so I’m going in first thing in the morning to do a little bit of paperwork and then at the house to watch the pups. They’re a lot of work that’s for sure.
And you have a good point Cajun, that was initially why I haven’t tried to track down anyone that has their own line of similar dogs. I know a lot of guys can be reserved about their blood and don’t want other people to get it. The men like yourself that have successfully bred families and lines for years have earned a lot of respect in my book, and I’m glad to have the forum to be able to get insight and advice from y’all. My passion truly is in the dogs. I really don’t care about killing hogs anymore, I always let someone else kill them. I just like to observe and analyze the dogs and I like to video the bay or the catch so that I can go back and assess what each dog is doing the entire time. I have also got in to the habit of keeping a journal and writing the details of every hunt I go on so that I can track progress and see patterns. I know how detrimental kennel blindness can be, so I figure that if I have a written log I can refer back to, it’s a lot harder for me to convince myself that a dog is doing better than it actually is.
And yes these dogs catch but work like true strike dogs. They still have a fairly cold nose because of Bo. They will typically take the hottest track they come across though, and they like to wind and run head up. They’re dead silent and it is extremely rare for one not to catch. On a true rank boar that’s got a lot of size to him you may see one backup, but I’ve watched the mom to these pups catch a 375ish lb boar and he flipped her up over the top of some corn stalks, she hit the ground and immediately tried him and got thrown again. Ended up shooting the hog as soon as he threw her the second time. They will typically hunt between 300-500yds out in circles, checking in periodically. If one doesn’t come back for a while they have probably slipped off on a track or winding. My experience has been that we normally catch hogs much closer with these dogs because they will slip off and catch the hog laid up in his bed and there’s no chase involved usually. I personally think that some guys get steered away from rough dogs because they tried dogs that counterfeit rough. Meaning they want to bite and grab on a hog but if the hog puts up a fight they’ll let go, or they’re agitating him darting in and out grabbing hair instead of just letting him bay. I would be completely fine if one of these bayed a hog if it was standing still, but the second they try to catch I expect them to stay hooked like a true catch dog. My mindset is that if they’re going to grab the hog, commit to it. They are typically all ear dogs but the mom to these pups will catch on the snout sometimes. The downside is obviously how hard it is to keep them alive. I prefer to run them with other truly rough dogs so they aren’t caught by themselves while other dogs are just biting and letting go. Not everyone’s cup of tea but there’s something about a rank dog that I love. Maybe it’s the warrior spirit. When they pop treed on the garmin it is a race to get to them as fast as possible, which has led to some of them dying when they ran a hog a few miles and caught it by themselves and either overheated from being caught too long or got killed. I personally never had my two get hurt bad. They have had minor cuts but nothing serious. My old male Dum Dum would catch the ear and turn so he was facing the same direction as the hog with their sides touching. I couldn’t figure out how he always escaped getting cut even when on some good teeth where other dogs got worked over pretty good, and then I had the chance to watch him hold a 225lb boar solo one day. Every time the hog turned to try and cut him he would just spin with him and never got touched. They are rough as Cobb but they are intelligent as well and tend to catch with a good style. I think the most similar type of dog would probably be some of the Florida curs that I have heard of. The mom to this litter has never barked nor bayed that I’m aware of. Dum Dum let out a few chops once at a sounder (before catching that 225lb boar) and I think it was because he had never seen a sounder before and was surprised. The second time was shortly before his death. He stopped a little 150lb boar that was rank with some sharp teeth, the boar gave him a little tiny cut on his shoulder and he backed up and let out a single bark. I honestly thought he had been wrecked when I heard the bark. Other dogs got to the hog and he was caught solid when I got there. They were in some real thick briars and I believe that he backed up and waited until he saw another dog to catch. I would actually like to see more of that in these dogs, so that hopefully they stay alive longer. With this litter leaning more towards Bo, I am hoping there will be a touch of bay in them. Bo wouldn’t hardly put teeth on a hog, but so far everything that has come from his cross with Black Betty has retained the catching trait. Her genes must’ve been very potent because 9/10 pups from every litter and even subsequent litters that some people had breeding the original pups to other dogs, they all come out almost like clones. They are very consistent, which is almost odd to me since both parents were different and no relation whatsoever
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